The Empty Grave (Lockwood & Co. #5)(20)
We sat for a moment in silence.
‘La Belle Dame Sans Merci …’ Holly breathed. ‘“The Beautiful Lady Without Mercy” … They call the ghost that?’
‘They do.’
‘On account of its deadly feminine allure?’
‘No. Because it’s her name. We know who the apparition is, see? Didn’t I mention it? La Belle Dame Sans Merci. She was an actress, of a kind, at the turn of the last century. Great star in her day, and a wicked and beautiful woman, she was. Now it seems she’s left the grave and is walking again. Here, take a gander.’ From an inner pocket of his jacket he drew, much creased and greasy-looking, a large, yellowed, folded piece of paper. He passed it across the table in a covert motion. ‘For Gawd’s sake, don’t let Charley Budd see that,’ he said.
Lockwood took the piece of paper and opened it. I leaned in close. George and Holly left their seats and came round the coffee table to look over our shoulders.
It was a theatrical flyer, printed in black and gold. It showed an illustration of a blonde woman posing languorously amongst rolling clouds of golden smoke. She wore a glamorous outfit that was hard to describe, partly because there was so little of it. It had a faintly eastern feel. It was all plunging necklines, cunningly positioned slashes and tightly fitting curves. It looked both impractical and chilly. The woman’s long slim arms were festooned with bracelets; she had a tiara on her head and her fair hair billowed behind her, merging into the smoke. Her eyes were half closed and entirely hidden behind enormous black lashes. She had her head thrown back, and her lips parted in a way that was either enticing or half-witted, or both. Beside her, written in eerie letters in the smoke, were the following words:
At the bottom of the flyer, the name and address of the Palace Theatre were given, along with a date more than ninety years previously.
Mr Tufnell had taken the opportunity to help himself to another slice of cake. ‘La Belle Dame. Legendary beauty, as you can see.’
‘Yup,’ said George.
‘Looks a bit overripe to me,’ Holly said. ‘Don’t you think, Lucy?’
‘Definitely.’
The impresario grunted. ‘She was a cruel woman in life, they say. Her looks gave her power over all who saw her, and that’s the power her ghost has too.’
Lockwood was frowning at the handbill. ‘And she’s the one haunting you …? How can you be sure, Mr Tufnell? How do you know it’s her?’
‘Because La Belle Dame met her gruesome end onstage in that very theatre. She was an escapologist, see? People came from all over London to see her perform marvellous illusions in which she narrowly avoided death. Her most famous stunt was that very one you see there: The Sultan’s Revenge. She was shut in an upright casket like a coffin, which was hung about with chains. Men then impaled it with swords, with her screaming from inside. Of course, it was all fake. Really, she’d dropped through a trapdoor in the base of the box and escaped under the stage. She was ready to pop back up when the swords were withdrawn. Easy. Until the night it all went horribly wrong …’
Mr Tufnell paused and swallowed. He had spoken with passion and dramatic eloquence; also with his mouth full. The gentle rain of cake crumbs that had accompanied his account now stopped pattering on the coffee table. ‘Some say it was sabotage,’ he whispered, ‘the vengeful act of one of her scorned admirers. Others claim that the lad charged with flipping the lever had downed a skinful and simply forgot his cue. Either way, La Belle Dame did not drop through the floor. She was still in the box when the swords were driven in. The shrieks onstage that night were real.’
‘A nasty way to go,’ I said. ‘Nasty for the audience too.’
‘To begin with,’ Mr Tufnell said, ‘no one in the theatre understood what had happened: they thought the torrent of blood was part of the act. But it just went on and on …’ He took a sip of tea. ‘I hope I’m not distressing you.’
Lockwood was eyeing the damp crumbs on the table. ‘Only a little. Right, fine. That’s the story of how she died. Tell us about the ghost.’
Our client nodded. ‘We do an afternoon performance in the theatre. No evening event, naturally – everyone’s out before the sun goes down. It’s an old-school circus variety show: trapeze artists, jugglers, clowns and acrobats on the stage. Most are adults, but I’ve got kids who clean up after the show. A couple of them came to me reporting that they’d seen a woman walking in the back of the theatre while they were sweeping the stage. Late afternoon, it was. They’d thought she was a punter who’d strayed in somehow, but when they went to find her, she was gone. Few days later, another kid was passing the main dressing room, just before lock-up. Out of the corner of her eye she saw someone in a black dress standing there. When she stepped back, the room was empty.’
‘All a bit ominous,’ Lockwood said. ‘What did you do?’
‘Nothing. We weren’t in the building after dark, were we? This was in daylight. I thought we’d be safe enough … until what happened to Charley and poor Sid Morrison.’ Mr Tufnell sighed with feeling; he took off his hat and ran his hand through his nest of curls.
‘What happened to Charley, Mr Tufnell?’
‘It was late afternoon, three days ago,’ our client said. ‘The ghost-lamps were just coming on outside. Sarah Parkins, our stage manager, had forgotten her coat; she went back in to get it, and spotted Charley Budd walking down a corridor, all smiling and blank-eyed, like he was in a trance. She saw something with a woman’s shape beckoning to him from the end of the passage. Says it was all dark around the shape, though the lights were on everywhere else. He was going straight towards it.’ Mr Tufnell looked at us. ‘Well, Sarah didn’t waste any time. She just upped and rugby-tackled Charley, brought him crashing to the floor. As she did so, she says the darkness at the end of the passage kind of flared, then went out, and all the lamps came on again. And Charley was still alive – but in the condition you see here.’