“I think so,” agreed Alleyn. “Between the event and the time you and I went aloft, someone managed to climb one of the ladders and put things straight. It seems to me, Wade, that the most likely moment for this would be when they all left the stage. Off-stage it was quite dark. It would be a perfectly easy matter for one of them to slip aside behind the scenery, snoop round to the ladder at the back, and climb up. Whoever it was probably took off his or her shoes. Now, if this person went up during the time of the general exodus, he was probably hiding up there when I made my first visit. He’d want to get the job done as soon as possible and before the police arrived. It sounds more risky than it actually was. If he had been spotted he’d have said he was damn’ well going to have a look at the gear and have made a song about it’s having been interfered with. We know Gascoigne could not have done this.”

“Nor Broadhead either, if Brandon Vernon agrees that they went together to the dressing-room,” said Wade.

“Right. Now let’s look at the other half of the picture, shall we? The first visit, when the murderer cut the weight off the rope and moved the pulley. Again Broadhead says he and Vernon went together to the dressing-room, after the final curtain. That is, after Bert came down and reported the tackle all correct. If Vernon gives the same account, that lets both of them out. If Bert and his mates say Gascoigne was with them while they got ready for the party, that lets him out.”

“Looks as if it’s a crack less wide open, sir, when you get at it like that. Now, when I talked to Mason, he said he was in the box-office during the last act. When the people began to come away, he went to his own office — this room we’re in now — to have a word with the deceased. He says deceased left him here, saying he was going round to the stage. Mason says he then made a note of the night’s takings and did one or two jobs here. He went out once, ran along to tell the old chap who stage-door-keeps to show all the guests straight to the stage but to be sure and check up their names in order to keep off any hangers-on who hadn’t been invited. I’ve spoken to old Singleton, the doorkeeper, and he remembers Mason running along the alley to give him this message. He says Mason came back here. So does Mason. The old chap stood by the stage-door looking after him. And to make it a bit tighter, the old bloke says he strolled along to the office a bit later to ask about something, and Mason was there at his desk. Dr. Te Pokiha says he looked in before going to the party — he’d met Mason before — and stayed there yarning for a while, leaving Mason in the office. Now, Mr. Alleyn, the only way Mason could have got behind the scenes without Singleton seeing him is by going through this door into the box-office, out at the front entrance where someone might have seen him, and round the block to the back of the theatre. The door at the back is locked on the inside. Even if he had the key he couldn’t have done it in the time. He couldn’t have got back before Singleton walked across, which he says was about five or six minutes later. That’s that. Mason said he stayed on here — looking up his papers and so on — for a while — not long — and then joined the party. Singleton remembers Mason coming back and swears he didn’t go behind the scenes until the last of the guests were in.”

“I was among the last of the guests,” said Alleyn, “and I overtook Mr. Mason at the stage-door.”

“Did you, sir? Did you, now! Well, I suppose you might say that’s a pretty fair alibi for Mr. Mason. Would he have time to go up aloft after he went in with you, now?”

“Plenty of time,” said Alleyn sadly, “but he didn’t do it. I remember perfectly well that he was on the stage all the time. He stood near me and I talked to him and to Hambledon.”

“That’s what Hambledon said,” agreed Wade gloomily. “It’s a blooming nark, dinkum it is. Still, there’s better alibis than that have gone west before now, and I’m not going to forget this will. Mason’s a whole lot better off by this murder.”

“Was he badly off before?” asked Alleyn lightly.

“That’s what I reckon we’ll have to find out, sir. Do you think the Yard—?”

“Oh, yes. They’ll do it for you if it can be done. We call it making tactful inquiries. Aren’t I glad I’m not there.”

“You’re here, though,” said Wade, “and I suppose they know it.”

“I don’t like the way you said that, Inspector,” said Alleyn with a wry smile. “And I know jolly well what you’re thinking.”

Wade grinned sheepishly.

“Well, sir,” he said, “it looks as if it’s an English case more than a New Zillund one, now, doesn’t it?”

“Wait and see,” said Alleyn. “What about your tiki? And talking about the tiki, did you ask Mr. Mason where he went with Dr. Te Pokiha after the event?”

“He was very much shaken and Te Pokiha took him off somewhere to give him a drink.”

“The doctor brought him here. There’s a bottle of whisky and a couple of glasses in that cupboard there. I put ’em away to get Mason’s prints. They seem to have taken it neat.”

“So Dr. Te Pokiha felt a bit groggy, too,” said Alleyn. “He seemed so very sedate and professional at the time. What happened when they’d had their neat whiskies?”

“The doctor rang us up and left Mason here with his grog, when we arrived. Mason says he was still here when we went past. I remember noticing that door was open on the alleyway and the lights in here were up. I fancy I caught sight of him. Anyway, the doorkeeper says he mooched along the yard after we’d come in, saw Mason in the office and talked to him. He says he went along as soon as he’d let us in and stayed until Mason went to the wardrobe-room. They walked along together.”

“That’s right, too, sir,” said the silent Cass unexpectedly. “I was just inside the stage-door when he came through. I sent him along. He was looking horribly crook.”

“Ill?” asked Alleyn cautiously.

“Too right, sir.”

“Crook or not,” said Wade, “I’m not taking anything for gospel where Mr. George Mason’s concerned, by cripey I’m not. Now the D — Miss Dacres hasn’t got even half an alibi for the first stunt — fixing the gear before the murder. She says she went to her dressing-room and was alone there till she came to the party.”

“What about her dresser?”

“Says she sent her off to doll herself up for the party. Now Miss Dacres could have slipped round to the ladder at the back, fixed the gear, and then gone to her room. When did she come in to the party, sir?”

“She came in last,” said Alleyn, and up through his mind welled the memory of Carolyn hooting melodiously as she came down the passage, of Ackroyd opening the door on to the stage, of Carolyn making her entrance, of himself going to meet her.

“Last!” exclaimed Wade. “Last of the lot, and alone.”

“No. Not alone. Hailey Hambledon, Mr. Mason and Mr. Meyer went and fetched her.”

“That makes no odds,” said Wade.

“What about Mr. Hambledon?” asked Alleyn.

“He says he left the stage with the others after the final curtain and went to his dressing-room. His dresser was there but he didn’t want him and sent him away.”

“Yes. He was wearing a dinner-jacket. He’d only need to take his make-up off.”

“He could have gone up the first time, sir. As soon as the dresser had gone he could have slipped back to the stage and round to the ladder at the rear. It would have been after Mr. Meyer and Bert okayed the gear.”

“How does he stand for the second visit? He stayed behind with us — and the body — and left the stage while Gascoigne, Bert and I were still there. Said he was going to Miss Dacres’s room. He was there when I arrived later on. He went out, at my suggestion, to get some brandy. I don’t think he was away long enough to go up to the grid and get the brandy as well. Might have had time, I suppose, but it would have been damn’ quick work.”