I Am Half-Sick Of Shadows (6 page)

Another thing about vicars was that they knew everyone’s business.

“Will you come in?” I asked, not knowing what else to say.

As he stepped inside, the vicar must have seen me looking past him in astonishment at his tired old Morris Oxford, which sat in the forecourt looking remarkably spruce for its age, a layer of snow on the roof and bonnet giving it the appearance of an overly iced wedding cake.

“Winter tires
plus
snow chains,” he said in a confidential tone. “The secret of any truly successful ministry. The bishop tipped me off, but don’t tell anyone. He picked it up from the American soldiers.”

I grinned and slammed the door.

“Good lord!” he said, staring at the maze of cables and the forest of lighting fixtures. “I didn’t expect it to be anything like this.”

“You knew about it? The filming, I mean?”

“Oh, of course. Your father mentioned it quite some time ago … asked me to keep mum, though, and so, of course, I have. But now that the vast convoy has rolled through Bishop’s Lacey, and the caravanserai set up within the very grounds of Buckshaw, it can be a secret no longer, can it?

“I must admit to you, Flavia, that ever since I heard Phyllis Wyvern was to be here, in the flesh, so to speak, at Buckshaw, I’ve been making plans of my own. It’s not often that we’re gifted with so august … so luminous … a visitor and, well, after all, one must grind with whatever grist one is given—not that Phyllis Wyvern may be said to be grist in any sense of the word, dear me, no, but—”

“I met her this morning,” I volunteered.

“Did you indeed! Cynthia will be quite jealous to hear of it. Well, perhaps not jealous, but possibly just a tiny bit envious.”

“Is Mrs. Richardson one of Phyllis Wyvern’s fans?”

“No, I don’t believe so. Cynthia is, however, the cousin of Stella Ferrars, who, of course, wrote the novel
Cry of the Raven
, upon which the film is to be based. Third cousin, to be sure, but a cousin nonetheless.”

“Cynthia?” I could scarcely believe my ears.

“Yes, hard to believe, isn’t it? I can scarcely credit it myself. Stella was always the black sheep of the family, you know, until she married a laird, settled down in the heathered Highlands, and began cranking out an endless procession of potboilers, of which
The Cry of the Raven
is merely the latest. Cynthia had been hoping to pop by and give Miss Wyvern a few pointers on how the role of the heroine should be played.”

I almost went
“Phhfft!”
but I didn’t.

“And that’s why you’re here? To see Miss Wyvern?”

“Well, yes,” the vicar said, “but not on that particular topic. Christmas, as you’ve no doubt heard me say on more than one occasion, is always one of the greatest opportunities not only to receive but also to give, and I have been hoping that Miss Wyvern would see her way clear to re-create for us just a few scenes from her greatest triumphs—all in a good cause, of course. The Roofing Fund, for instance—dear me—”

“Would you like me to introduce you to her?” I asked.

I thought the dear man was going to break down completely. He bit his lip and pulled out a handkerchief to wipe his glasses. When he realized he had forgotten to bring them with him, he blew his nose instead.

“If you please,” he said.

“I hope we won’t be intruding,” he added as we made our way up the stairs. “I hate to be a beggar but sometimes there’s really no choice.”

He meant Cynthia.

“Our last little venture was something of a bust, wasn’t it? So there’s all that much more to make up this time.”

Now he was referring, of course, to Rupert Porson, the late puppeteer, whose performance in the parish hall just a few months ago had been brought to an abrupt end by tragedy and a woman scorned.

Bun Keats was sitting in a chair at the top of the stairs, her head in her hands.

“Oh dear,” she said as I introduced her to the vicar. “I’m terribly sorry, I’m afraid I have the most awful migraine.”

Her face was as white as the crusted snow.

“How dreadful for you,” the vicar said, putting a hand on her shoulder. “I can sympathize wholeheartedly. My wife suffers horribly from the same malady.”

Cynthia?
I thought.
Migraines?
That would certainly explain a lot.

“She sometimes finds,” he went on, “that a warm compress helps. I’m sure the good Mrs. Mullet would be happy to prepare one.”

“I’ll be all right …” Bun Keats began, but the vicar was already halfway down the stairs.

“Oh!” she said, with a little cry. “I should have stopped him. I don’t mean to be any trouble, but when I’m like this I can hardly think straight.”

“The vicar won’t mind,” I told her. “He’s a jolly good sort. Always thinking of others. Actually, he came round to see if Miss Wyvern could be persuaded to put on a show to raise funds for the church.”

Her face, if it were possible, went even whiter.

“Oh, no!” she said. “He mustn’t ask her that. She has a bee in her bonnet about charities—dead set against them. Something from her childhood, I think. You’d best tell him that before he brings it up. Otherwise, there’s sure to be a most god-awful scene!”

The vicar was coming back up the stairs, surprisingly, taking them two at a time.

“Sit back, dear lady, and close your eyes,” he said in a soothing voice I hadn’t heard before.

“Miss Keats says Miss Wyvern is indisposed,” I told him, as he applied the compress to her brow. “So perhaps we’d better not mention—”

“Of course. Of course,” the vicar said.

I would invent some harmless excuse later.

A voice behind me said, “Bun? What on earth …?”

I spun round.

Phyllis Wyvern, dressed in an orchid-colored lounging outfit and looking as fit as all the fiddles in the London Philharmonic, was wafting along the corridor towards us.

“She’s suffering a migraine, Miss Wyvern,” the vicar said. “I’ve just fetched a compress …”

“Bun? Oh, my poor Bun!”

Bun gave a little moan.

Phyllis Wyvern snatched the compress away from the vicar and reapplied it with her own hands to Bun’s temples.

“Oh, my poor, dearest Bun. Tell Philly where it hurts.”

Bun rolled her eyes.

“Marion!” Phyllis Wyvern called, snapping her fingers, and a tall, striking woman in horn-rimmed glasses, who must once have been a great beauty, appeared as if from nowhere.

“Take Bun to her room. Tell Dogger to summon a doctor at once.”

As Bun Keats was led away, Phyllis Wyvern stuck out her hand.

“I’m Phyllis Wyvern, Vicar,” she said, clasping his hand in both of hers and giving it a little caress. “Thank you for your prompt attention. This has been a trying day all round: first poor Patrick McNulty, and now my dearest Bun. It’s most distressing—we’re all such a large, happy family, you know.”

I had a quick flash of déjà vu: Somewhere I’d seen this moment before.

Of course I had! It could have been a scene from any one of Phyllis Wyvern’s films.

“I am in your debt, Vicar,” she was saying. “If you hadn’t happened along, she might have taken a bad tumble on the stairs.”

She was dramatizing the situation: That wasn’t the way it had happened at all.

“If ever there’s anything I can do to show my gratitude, you’ve only to ask.”

And then it all came tumbling out of the vicar’s mouth—at least most of it. Fortunately he didn’t mention Cynthia’s coaching lessons.

“So you see, Miss Wyvern,” he finished up, “the roof has been more or less at risk since George the Fourth, and time is now of the essence. The verger tells me he’s been finding water in the font, of late, that wasn’t placed there for ecclesiastical purposes, and—”

Phyllis Wyvern touched his arm.

“Not another word, Vicar. I’d be happy to roll up my sleeves and pitch in. I’ll tell you what; I’ve just had the most marvelous idea. My co-star, Desmond Duncan, will be arriving this evening. You may recall that Desmond and I had some small success both in the West End and on film with our
Romeo and Juliet
. If Desmond’s game—and I’m sure he will be …”

She said this with a naughty wink and a twinkle.

“… then surely we shall be able to cobble something together to keep St. Tancred’s roof from caving in.”

FIVE

I’D
BEEN
SPENDING
SO much time sitting halfway down the stairs that I was beginning to feel like Christopher Robin.

That’s where I was now, looking out across the crowded foyer, where several dozen of the film crew were gathered in little knots, talking. The only one I recognized was the woman called Marion, who had led Bun Keats away in the afternoon. Since Bun was nowhere in sight, I guessed she was still resting in her room.

“Ladies and gentlemen!” someone called out, clapping their hands for attention. “Ladies and gentlemen!”

The buzz of conversation stopped as abruptly as if it had been cut off with scissors.

A pale young man with sandy hair had made his way to the bottom of the staircase, climbed up a couple of steps, and turned to face the others.

“Mr. Lampman will address you now.”

A few discreet lights were brought up to compensate for Buckshaw’s antiquated electrical system.

From somewhere in the shadows behind them, a tiny middle-aged man made his appearance and, like a boy on a country road, strolled slowly and casually across the foyer as if he had all the time in the world. He was dressed, from the top down, in a rather battered olive-green fedora hat, a black roll-neck sweater, and black slacks.

In a different costume, Val Lampman might have passed for a leprechaun.

He turned and faced the others. I noticed that he didn’t ascend even one of the stairs.

“It’s nice to see so many of the old familiar faces—and a few new ones as well,” he said. “Among the latter is Tom Christie, our assistant director—”

He stopped to put his hand on the shoulder of a curly-haired man who had now come over to join him.

“—who will be seeing that everyone is zipped up and that none of you walk into walls.”

A small but polite laugh went up.

“As most of you know by now, we’re embarking under a bit of a handicap. Pat McNulty has suffered an unfortunate injury, and although I’m assured that he’s going to be all right, we’re just going to have to get on without his benevolent mother hen tactics, at least for the time being.

“Ben Latshaw will be in charge of technical crew until further notice, and I know you’ll extend him every courtesy.”

Heads swiveled, but I couldn’t see who they were looking at.

“I’d hoped to have a read-through of the first scene with Miss Wyvern and Mr. Duncan, but as he’s not arrived yet, we’ll substitute scene forty-two with the maid and the postman. Where are the maid and the postman? Ah! Jeannette and Clifford—good show. See Miss Trodd, and we’ll meet upstairs as soon as we’re finished here.”

Jeannette and Clifford made their way across the foyer towards the horn-rimmed Marion, who waved a clipboard in the air to guide them through the throng.

Marion Trodd—so that was her name.

“Val, darling! Sorry I’m late.”

The voice rang out like a crystal trumpet, bouncing from the polished paneling of the foyer.

Everyone turned to watch Phyllis Wyvern begin her descent from the landing of the west staircase. And what a descent it was: She had changed into a Mexican dancer’s costume: white frilled blouse and a skirt like the canopy of a seaside roundabout.

The only thing missing was a banana in her hair.

There was a smattering of light applause and a single wolf whistle at which she pretended to blush, fanning her cheeks with her hand.

She must be freezing in those short sleeves
, I thought. Perhaps working under hot lights had made her immune to the English winter.

She paused once, to give a helpless little shrug and point her chin to the upper reaches of the house.

“Poor, dear Bun,” she said, in a suddenly solemn voice—a voice meant to carry. “I tried to get some soup into her, but she couldn’t keep it down. I’ve given her something to help her sleep.”

Arriving at the bottom of the stairs, she floated across the foyer, seized Val Lampman’s forearms, as if to keep him from touching her, and pecked at his cheek.

Even from where I sat, I could see that she missed him by a mile. She looked a little peeved, I thought, that he had stolen her thunder.

As they held each other at arm’s length, the front door opened and Desmond Duncan made his entry.

“Sorry, all,” he said in that voice of his that was known round the world. “Last matinee at the pantos. Command performance. Simply couldn’t bear to tear myself away from the poor dears.”

He was bundled up in some kind of heavy fur coat—buffalo or yak, I thought. On his head was a wide-brimmed floppy hat of the sort worn by artists on the Continent.

“Ted!” he said, patting one of the electricians on the back. “How’s the missus? Still collecting matchbooks? I’ve got one she might like to have—straight from the Savoy.

“Only two matches missing,” he added with a broad pantomime wink.

I had seen Desmond Duncan in a film whose name I have forgotten: the one about the little girl who hires a failed barrister to force her estranged parents to reconcile. I had also seen pictures of him in some of the fan magazines Daffy kept hidden at the bottom of her undies drawer.

He had a sharp, beaked nose, and a projecting chin, which gave him the profile of a thunderbolt: a profile that was probably instantly recognizable from Greenland to New Guinea.

A sudden gasp from above and behind me caused me to crane my neck and look up. I should have known! Daffy and Feely were peering through the balusters. They must be flat on their bellies on the floor.

Feely made shooing motions with her hands, indicating that I wasn’t to give away their presence by staring at them.

I bounded up the stairs and lay down on the floor between them. Daffy tried to pinch me, but I rolled away.

“Do that again and I’ll scream your name and your brassiere size,” I hissed, and she shot me a villainous look. Daffy had only recently begun to develop and was still shy about trumpeting the details.