This Private Plot (27 page)

Effie was at the other end of that rope. He'd never wanted to see her more.

The channel deepened, rapidly. A wave of cleaner water overtook them, pushing ahead in the race for the tunnel's outlet, spreading across the width of the tunnel floor. His knees and hands were now splashing in cold water. And louder than their breathing, sounds from behind them, a halting bass rumble, the treble counterpoint of sudden, high-pressure streams of liquid.

He trained the flashlight back along the dark tunnel. Its beam hit a flailing curtain of water, racing toward them, the Avon leaping and careening inside its newfound escape route. He flung himself onto Davina, locking his arms around her waist.

The river wrapped them before he could warn her, tearing off his glasses and wrenching the flashlight from his grip. His knuckles grazed across the harsh concrete. Davina whimpered, but was silenced when the water filled her mouth.

Once chance. The bitter cold water was already deep enough to cover them. Oliver dived and began to swim, sightlessly, working his legs frantically, still clutching Davina. He was sure the flow was moving him, but it was also buffeting him against the concrete walls. He raised his head for another breath, but the water had reached the roof.

His chest muscles began to pump instinctively, craving new supplies of air. How much further? There was a searing pain behind his eyes now. He flailed on sightlessly, disoriented. In five seconds, he would have to breathe out.

His hand closed around something moving underneath him. The rope. The rope that Effie thought was still tied to him, that was now being hauled in faster than he could swim, that might be pulled beyond his reach at any second.

He held on, still moving his legs, trying to keep away from the abrasive tunnel walls. And then he gave in to his reflexes and filled his lungs with half a pint of the Avon.

Ten seconds later, Oliver and Davina tipped out of the tunnel's mouth into the dimly lit cellar. Effie and Toby dropped the rope and dragged them away from the cataract of river water. Oliver struggled to his feet, coughing and gulping the fetid air.

“Get up the ladder,” Effie commanded. “The water's rising fast.”

Oliver started to obey, but the cellar was a blur. He could only vaguely register the shape of Davina rising out of the dark pool near him, shivering and still hunched over. He reached out to steady her, his hand brushing the pantyhose. She still hadn't let go. Was this some atavistic urge to restore a degree of decency as soon as she was out of the tunnel?

He found the ladder by touch and pulled himself up, followed by Davina, and then Toby, also drenched but even now distracted by finding himself sandwiched between a half-naked woman swathed in wet silk and his brother's girlfriend in soaking underwear.

Oliver staggered in the vague direction of his jacket. So he was several yards away, groping for his spare glasses, when he saw the outline of Davina shake off Toby's arm and begin to whirl something in air, like a sling. It swung over Toby's head once, but gathering speed in its second orbit, caught him on the side of the head.

There was a sound like a temple block being struck, and Toby crashed into Oliver, who had stumbled blindly toward his little brother. Before Effie reached the top of the ladder, Davina pushed her hard, causing her to fall back into the cellar. There was a deep splash.

Davina scuttled off through the trees, in the opposite direction to the bridge. Oliver let her go, scrambling across the sandy flagstones of the ruined cottage until he could lean over the cellar opening, calling Effie's name. He grabbed Toby's dropped flashlight and shone it downwards. It lit up Effie's face as she surfaced from the underground pool.

“I'll get her for that,” she vowed, climbing the ladder again. Oliver turned back to Toby, who was sitting up, cautiously testing the side of his head.

“What did she hit me with?” he asked.

“Her pantyhose,” Oliver said, finally locating his spare glasses.

“How thick are they, four billion denier?”

How did Toby know so much about pantyhose?
“She must have hidden something hard in them, a rock or a piece of wood.”

“Which way did she go?” demanded Effie. She picked up her dress.

“The wrong way,” Oliver said, pointing along Davina's escape route.

“Okay, Toby, get up and block the bridge. She's trapped, unless she fancies another swim.”

“Or unless…” said Toby.

“If she tries to swim for it, she's going to be pulled over the weir,” said Oliver.

“Good. But be quiet, Ollie, we're missing something. Unless what, Toby?”

“Unless she was planning to take my dinghy. She seemed to be running toward it.”

They sprinted to the riverbank. In the twilight, they could clearly see the outline of Davina, rowing the small boat toward the opposite shore, struggling hard against the current.

Chapter Thirty-six

Saturday evening (continued)

“Where will she go?” Effie asked Toby.

“The church has the nearest landing spot.”

Effie picked up her purse, which she'd left beside Toby's locker, and thrust it at Oliver.

“Take my car and try to head her off. I'll follow her.”

She ran toward the bridge, pulling her dress on over her wet hair. Oliver and Toby grabbed the clothes they had discarded and followed, heading for Effie's scarlet Renault, which they'd left on the riverside path.

Oliver had found the keys and clambered into the driver's seat before something occurred to him.

“I can't drive,” he admitted, as he started the engine. “At least, I never passed my test.”

“Just get moving,” Toby yelled.

Oliver went through the motions he was still learning. Clutch down. Shift into first. Release handbrake. Depress accelerator. Bring clutch up gently. Stall car with a lurch.

He tried again. This time the car moved forward gradually. Oliver got it into second gear and they cruised along the path at about fifteen miles an hour. He was gripping the steering wheel, praying that he could avoid piloting the vehicle into the river in the darkness. Then he remembered to turn on the headlamps.

“There's Effie!” cried Toby, as they drew level with Holy Trinity across the river. She had commandeered a kayak that had been left on the bank and was rapidly paddling after Davina, who had almost reached a mooring slip downstream of the church.

“We're not going to get there in time,” said Oliver grimly.

“Not at this speed,” said Toby. He stamped down on Oliver's bare right foot, at the same time turning the steering wheel sharply to the right. The Renault accelerated across the grass of the riverside park and began to bounce alarmingly on the uneven surface, screaming for a gear change.

“Don't brake!” shouted Toby, “I'll steer.” He swerved to avoid a dog-walker who had appeared in the headlights, sending up a spray of mud and shredded turf. The car fishtailed over the grass. Oliver slammed the gear stick into third and ignored the metallic shriek it provoked.

They veered left onto the narrow but mercifully empty road through the Recreation Ground and then skidded onto the main road. Oliver braked sharply to make the left turn onto the bridge, then ploughed ahead, ignoring traffic lights, yields, and other cars—Bridge Foot, through the Bridgeway merge without stopping, onto Bridge Street, unavoidably wondering why the birthplace of the most prolific word-coiner of all time couldn't come up with some less prosaic street names.

Another left, onto Waterside, the straightest route toward Holy Trinity. The façade of the theater came into sight, looking like a 1930s grammar school. How long since they'd left? An hour and a half, maybe. The play would still be in progress.

“There she is!” shouted Toby.

Ahead of them, in the middle of the lamp-lit road, the bedraggled figure of Davina was sprinting toward them, carrying her pantyhose under her arm like a rugby player. About fifty yards behind, Effie was gaining.

Oliver slammed on the brakes. The car slewed sideways across the road and mounted the curb. Davina saw them, stopped, then ducked out of sight around the back of the Swan Theatre. Toby was first out of the car and chased after her. Oliver grabbed his shoes and followed Toby across a small courtyard and through a black metal door, into a world of darkness and silence.

He halted, disoriented. Toby was also motionless a few paces ahead of them. No noise of footsteps, but Davina's bare feet wouldn't make much sound on the firm floor. The door behind them opened again, and Effie came in, gasping for breath. Then they heard a woman's voice, thin and electronic: “But long it could not be till that her garments, heavy with their drink, pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious lay to muddy death.”

They were backstage in the main theater. The unseen loudspeaker was transmitting the action on the stage, and, dear God, they still hadn't finished Act Four—an entire act still to go.

Oliver's eyes adjusted to the weak illumination from Exit signs and table lamps. Tall brick walls covered with pipes and wires, leaning ladders, abandoned scenery, unused lighting equipment, large trunks that probably held costumes. He glanced up. The ceiling was high, lost in the darkness.

They stepped forward cautiously. It was a warren of potential hiding places for Davina, with makeshift rooms and changing spaces constructed from flats covered in black velour. Effie let Toby creep a few paces ahead, and then reached for Oliver's hand.

“For a moment, I thought I'd lost you,” she whispered, “I shouldn't have let you go in after that murderous bitch.”

“You're not the boss of me.”

“We'll discuss that later.”

“See?”

“See what?”

He tightened his grip on her hand. “There'll always be something for us to talk about.”

A brief female scream came from the gloom ahead of them. They ran forward. A group of figures seemed to be scuffling. Toby launched himself on the nearest, pushing the person to the floor.

“What the hell's going on?” it cried, in a voice that was instantly recognizable, and not merely as not belonging to Davina. The man, who was dressed in a peasant smock, got a grip on Toby and dragged himself to his feet.

“You!”

There were several unseen demands for silence.

“Sorry, Uncle Tim,” Toby whispered. “I thought you were a woman in a dress.”

Mallard glared at his younger nephew, then pushed him away. He spotted Oliver and Effie.

“I don't want to know,” he snarled. “Who knocked into me, what this is all about, why you left, why you're back here…I don't want to know. I'm supposed to be going on. Gravedigger.” He stalked away and took his place in the wings, untying a bundle, ready for the start of Act Five.

They turned to other person to come out of the melee, the actress playing Gertrude.

“I just came off and went to my little changing area back here,” she reported. “A girl shot out, caught me by surprise.”

“Did you see where she went?” Effie asked.

Gertrude shook her head. They pressed forward and emerged into an open area in the wings, lit only by a couple of closed-circuit television screens broadcasting the action from the stage. A few rows of rush-bottomed chairs were lined up, some of them occupied by members of the cast in various stages of slumber or catatonic boredom. Effie rapidly checked another row of changing spaces. All empty.

“We need backup,” she said.

They spotted the sleeping form of Humfrey Fingerhood, sprawled across two chairs. Effie checked his jacket pockets, extracting a phone.

“Okay, Toby,” she said. “Go back and make sure she doesn't find a way out through the Swan Theatre.”

Toby saluted, turned, and instantly crashed into a stack of brooms.

Effie placed a call. From the hushed auditorium, they heard the faint sound of Doctor Who's Tardis. On the monitor, Oliver watched Mallard, now onstage, dry for a moment and scowl into the audience.

“Ben,” Effie said urgently. “No, I know Davina didn't come back. But she's somewhere in the theater. Get Geoff and Susie and cover all the exits from the auditorium. Well, throw a bucket of water over them. Don't let Davina get away. Because she killed Dennis Breedlove, that's why.”

She snapped off the phone. She knew that Simon Culpepper was sitting disconsolately in the front row, beside the heavily disguised Reg Thigpen, but she refused to give him the satisfaction of asking for help. Instead, she used her Scotland Yard credentials to call for a police presence at the theater. Oliver continued to watch Mallard on the screen, noticing his reaction when several more members of his party left their seats and walked out of the theater as he was speaking.

“Should we stop the performance?” he asked.

“She could slip away in the confusion. It's better to wait until we get the plod surrounding the building.”

They made another search of the backstage area, checking each changing area again, looking under tables, behind stacked scenery, up at the catwalks over the stage, even inside the huge metal costume trunks, but always keeping the return route to the loading dock in their field of vision. All the time, the play limped toward its conclusion—the gravediggers, Ophelia's burial, Mallard's lightning quick-change into his elaborate Osric costume, the insincere reconciliation between Hamlet and Laertes. But Davina eluded them.

The last scene began, with its duels and deaths. Oliver and Effie watched from the wings, silently accepting the likely truth that Davina had escaped. The grand drape hadn't been lowered between Acts Four and Five, but she could easily have slipped across the stage during the blackout and escaped the building through the unguarded exits on the river side of the theater.

A single flake of fake snow, left over from the opening scene, fluttered languidly down into the intensely white stage lighting, landing on Hamlet's head while he was in the
en garde
position. Even a sliver of soap wanted its one moment in the limelight, Oliver reflected.

Then he stiffened. He looked up, above the stage, shielding his eyes from the blinding spots. He nudged Effie.

“Somebody's up on that gantry,” he said, pointing up. “That high one, up in the fly tower.”

They scanned the walls. Effie caught sight of the spiral staircase, immensely tall, half-hidden in the shadows. She patted Oliver on the cheek.

“You stay here,” she said. “This is my turn.”

She began to climb the staircase, watching with every coil the changing perspective of the dazzling stage and its cage of curtains and lighting rigs, shrinking beneath her.

Effie stepped onto the dizzying catwalk. Her first confrontation with Davina had been as a nervous, underdressed guest facing a catty socialite hostess. What a difference it makes to your self-confidence when you're a cop facing a criminal.

Even if the criminal has armed herself.

Davina had nowhere to hide, certainly not behind the unused bags of soap flakes abandoned by the stagehands as soon as their snowmaking duty was over. She no longer had her pantyhose flail, so she'd picked up some sort of grappling hook and was now waving it at the approaching policewoman.

“Davina Bennet,” Effie began.

Davina lifted the weapon above her head with both hands and brought it down with all her strength onto the point in space where Effie's head had been half a second earlier, before she'd skipped lightly backwards. The catwalk shuddered and swayed.

“I arrest you for the murder of Dennis Breedlove.”

Davina swung wildly at Effie. The hook smashed onto the handrail, raising sparks.

“And for assaulting a police officer.”

Davina slashed again through the air in front of Effie's stomach.

“And for assault occasioning actual bodily harm to my boyfriend's little brother.”

Davina heaved the hook upwards for another swing at Effie's skull. Effie scooped up a handful of soap flakes and threw it into Davina's eyes. She howled, and the spiked end of the hook buried itself into a sprinkler pipe just above the gantry. Water gushed over her, soaking the remains of her tattered dress and tipping her onto a pile of loosely coiled ropes, legs flailing. The hook stayed embedded in the mangled pipe.

“And for indecent exposure, come to think of it.”

Davina scrabbled backwards and kicked a bag of soap flakes at Effie, who batted it aside with ease. It struck the edge of the gantry, splitting and snowing onto the stage far below. Effie gracefully sidestepped the stream of water from the broken pipe and continued to advance on the murderer.

“You do not have to say anything…”

Davina jumped up. She pulled a length of rope tight between her hands and lunged at Effie's neck. Effie tripped her.

“…but it may harm your defense if you do not mention when questioned something which you may later rely on in court.”

Effie picked up some of the rope and made a loop. Davina tried to drag herself to her feet again, but skidded on the wet, soapy surface. She clutched onto the handrail and aimed a wild kick into Effie's face. Effie caught her ankle, making her hop on the slick catwalk.

“Anything you do say may be given in evidence.”

She discounted the scream that Davina made as she tipped over the edge of the handrail and plunged toward the stage eighty feet below.