‘Oh, sir! For goodness sake don’t!’ said James nervously.

‘Come, come, James! We must look after our guests, you know!’

The dancing brought the first part of the entertainment to a close. Gossiping and chattering, the crowd proceeded to the foyer. Cigars were lit and, considerably daring, one or two women accepted cigarettes from their escorts. Genial and expansive, Sir George let the crowd wash about him.

The second and main part of the programme was a melodrama with a cast of eight in three acts. It had been a long day and Joe began to nod, losing the thread from time to time of the unnecessarily complicated plot. The applause, however, was warm and people were beginning to stir in their seats and gather up their wraps when a girl came on to the stage and held up her hand. The audience at once fell silent and looked at her with pleasurable anticipation. She was wearing a long, simply cut white satin evening dress with a red rose at her breast. Her hair, caught in the stage lights, was the colour of a freshly minted King George the Fifth penny and hung, shining and loose on her shoulders.

Pretty girl, thought Joe automatically. He glanced at his programme to see who this might be but there was nothing listed after the melodrama. He was turning to Sir George for some explanation when she began to speak.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of the theatre management committee I have to make an announcement.’ Her voice was low and musical and carried well to all parts of the auditorium. This was a girl who was used to appearing on stage, Joe thought. Taking her time, she swept the gilded boxes with a confident gaze, gathering attention.

The audience settled into a rustling, whispering expectancy.

‘A tragic announcement, I’m afraid. We’ve had many distinguished performers in the Gaiety Theatre and all had been looking forward to hearing perhaps the most distinguished of all – Feodor Korsovsky, booked to perform here for four nights this week.’ There was a long pause. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I have to tell you that Monsieur Korsovsky was shot earlier today on his way to Simla. He was killed on the Kalka road.’

The gasp and the roar of astonishment that greeted her words drowned for a moment what she had further to say and once again she held up her hand for silence.

‘At the moment,’ she continued, ‘there is little more to say but, in his honour and in his memory, I am going to sing a Russian song.’

The murmur of expectancy and surprise broke out again. An Indian with a stringed instrument in his hand slipped quietly into the orchestra pit below her.

‘This song,’ she went on, ‘should properly be accompanied by a balalaika but Chandra Lai will do the best he can.’ She nodded to the Indian who plucked a chord on his instrument. They nodded to each other again in an unbroken silence and she began to sing.

Her voice was untrained and soft but sweet and true. Joe knew enough Russian to make out that this was a lament. A song of sadness at a parting. A song sung, as far as he could guess, in perfect Russian. And perhaps here in the foothills of the Himalayas this haunting farewell was not out of place. It was a song of the mountains, the distant Russian mountains, beyond which a girl’s lover had strayed never to return.

The song wound its way through three verses to the soft accompaniment of the strings. Joe was spellbound. Who, he wondered, could this be? Who was this girl, herself overcome by the pathos of her song and with tears, he noticed, running unheeded down her cheeks?

So, after all, someone had been waiting for Feodor. Someone in Simla was mourning him.

Chapter Five

«^»

As the last note died away the singer smiled sadly and instantly left the stage. It was clear that any applause would have been out of place and Joe noticed that, so moved was the audience, everyone stayed silently in their seats for a full minute, eyes downcast.

‘For God’s sake, George,’ said Joe urgently, ‘who was that? I want to meet that young woman.’

George rolled his eyes. ‘I don’t think even James could fix that for you. You’ll have to join the queue, I’m afraid. No use going backstage when Mrs Sharpe has just performed! I know, I’ve tried it myself. You can’t move for the bouquets and the strings of eager young mashers waiting to throw themselves at her feet.’

‘Mrs Sharpe?’

‘Wife of Reginald Sharpe. They’re both on the board of the Dramatic Society. And he’s another obstacle to intimacy with your little songbird – you’ll generally find him backstage like a lurking Cerberus!’

‘Look, George, my interest is purely professional,’ said Joe firmly. ‘I want to know how well that girl knew Feodor and why she was weeping at his memory.’

‘Oh, come on, Joe! Don’t let your romantic imagination run away with you – there wasn’t a dry eye in the house, including your own, including mine… but I see what you mean. James! Our guest has made his choice. Help us to hack our way through to Mrs Sharpe’s dressing room, would you?’

As steam gives way to sail, the crowds hung back and moved away before Sir George’s majestic approach. Joe followed him down corridors and around to a series of poky little rooms behind the theatre – the backstage of any provincial theatre in the world – where actors and singers were calling subdued goodbyes and closing doors. A tall spare man in evening dress approached them with a questioning smile.

‘Reggie!’ said Sir George heartily. ‘Good to see you! It went very well, I have to tell you. And here’s someone I’d like you to meet. Joe Sandilands who’s staying with me for the next few weeks. Joe is from Scotland Yard. Pretty useful chap to have around in our present mysterious circumstances! Would you mind introducing him to your wife? I think he has something he’d like to ask her.’

Reginald Sharpe eyed George with, in sequence, irritation, resentment and suspicion but these fell before an imperious and steady gaze down the length of George’s aristocratic nose and he summoned up a tight smile. ‘Of course, Sir George. How do you do, Sandilands? But look here – my wife is very tired and I’d be grateful if you could confine your, er, interview if that is what this is, to a few minutes only. I’m sure you understand.’

Joe was not quite sure what he was supposed to understand but he managed a sympathetic murmur of agreement. Reginald Sharpe knocked on a door and called out, ‘My dear, you have a visitor. From Scotland Yard, no less. Will you see him?’

There was a moment’s pause and then the door was flung open. She had not had time to change or to remove her make-up but she had dried her tears. A smiling and quizzical face greeted them. ‘Scotland Yard? Good Lord! Was I so criminally bad this evening? And which one of you has come to arrest me? Surely not you, Sir George? How good it is to see you again!’

Introductions were made, with rather bad grace, by Sharpe. ‘My dear, may I present Mr Sandilands who is a guest of the Governor? Mr Sandilands, my wife, Alice Conyers-Sharpe.’

With good humour and not a sign of the advertised fatigue, Alice Conyers-Sharpe took control of the situation. Sir George and James and her husband were all dismissed gracefully and Joe found himself alone with the young woman. Alone and, for once in his life, lost for words.

‘Mr Sandilands? Do sit down over there and tell me why you wanted to see me. Something tells me that you have not fought your way backstage to compliment me on my awful singing.’

‘Well, as a matter of fact, I have,’ said Joe. ‘I was moved by your love song. So was everyone in the audience. But I particularly, since I was with Feodor Korsovsky when he was killed.’

Alice nodded and he understood that the news of his involvement had obviously already reached her. She leaned forward, a look of deep concern chasing away the questioning smile. ‘What a terrifying and sickening experience you must have had! It makes me shudder to think that while you were being shot at, while Korsovsky was dying, I was here at the theatre dancing the cakewalk with the Tinker Belles!’ It occurred to Joe that she was the first person to acknowledge that he too, though unscathed, had been involved in a horrifying incident. He felt impelled to confide in her.