Murder in the Second Row (22 page)

‘It does look
as if somebody’s still fairly upset with you, doesn’t it? Pulling
down your power lines was a nasty stunt. I guess that placatory
letter from the vicar didn’t quite do the trick after all.’

‘No, and your
ninety percent certainty that it wouldn’t escalate looks like a
non-flyer as well, doesn’t it? Am I right in thinking that the
damage to the power lines was deliberate?’

‘Yes, it was.
Once the power guys untangled the mess they found a length of rope
with weights on the end. It seems someone threw the weighted rope
over the wires so that it wrapped around, then pulled hard enough
to rip them down.’

‘How come they
didn’t get electrocuted?’

‘Well, there
was a rubber bungee cord at the scene as well. One theory is that
he fastened the bungee cord to the end of the rope, looped it round
a tow-bar, and just drove off. The Faraday Cage effect of the car
would protect him from shocks.’

‘Bastard!’
exclaimed Jessica. ‘How bloody dare he?’ She paced about her living
room, almost steaming from the ears. She whirled and faced
Jack.

‘We have to
catch this lunatic, Jack. I’ve got a show to put on next week and I
won’t have this dickhead getting in our way. If he makes any kind
of move during a performance the news media will get onto it and
then we’re screwed. Anything that stops people from coming to the
show is going to threaten our very survival.’ She eyed him
fiercely. ‘So, my long arm of the law, what are you going to do
about it?’

He sat back on
her comfy sofa and crossed denim-clad legs. ‘I guess this isn’t the
point where I explain about budget restraints and lack of police
resources, is it?’

‘No it bloody
isn’t! That would just get you the “what do we pay our taxes for?”
speech. I’m expecting better things from you, Jack.’

‘Oh yes?’ His
lazy smile stopped her in her tracks. His dark brown eyes held a
glint that she found a little bit disconcerting. The promise of the
“better things” that she could expect was being telegraphed across
the room. A room that suddenly seemed very small, and rather
warm.

‘Stop
that!’

‘Stop
what?’

‘Stop sitting
there like the hero of some romantic novel. You’ll be running your
fingers through your unruly hair in a minute, I know your sort.
Chest hair will be curling softly from the V-neck of your shirt and
there’ll be a waft of citrus-scented aftershave.’

‘You read a lot
of these novels, do you?’ he said, grinning broadly. ‘So what
usually happens once the waft of aftershave reaches our heroine’s
delicate upturned nose? Does she swoon, or does that come
later?’

‘Look mate,
swooning went out with whalebone corsets. Today’s women are made of
tougher stuff. It takes more than finely-chiselled features and
eyes like chips of ice to make us weak at the knees. We don’t fall
for that arrogant macho stuff any more – oh!’

Jack had
reached for her hand and pulled her onto the sofa beside him. ‘You
don’t? I shall have to revise my whole seduction technique then.’
He chuckled at her expression. ‘Relax, Jessica, that was a joke.
Look, we’re friends, we feel an attraction for each other, but
there’s no rule that says we have to manufacture a capital-R
Romance just yet. Let’s just enjoy each other’s company.’

She gave him a
surprised look. ‘You make it sound so easy.’

‘It is easy. At
least, it should be. Most people try too hard.’

‘And here I was
thinking we were on the verge of discovering our hidden passion for
each other. Alone in my living room, meaningful looks, all that
stuff. I suppose it was a bit of a cliché, wasn’t it?’

There was a
pause.

Without another
word he slipped his hand under her hair, pulled her face towards
him and kissed her. The kiss lasted quite a while. Finally he
released her and they pulled apart, breathing a little faster.

‘OK, sometimes
they do get it right.’

‘Who?’ she
murmured.

‘Romance
writers. Sometimes the scene does call for a sudden passionate
embrace.’

She raised an
eyebrow and smiled slowly. ‘Go on then. What’s on the next
page?’

He showed
her.

Several pages
later they were almost at the next chapter when she laughingly
called a halt. ‘OK, mister, that’ll do. You came round for dinner,
remember, and to help me figure out how to keep the theatre safe.
Let’s at least have something to eat. I’m starving!’

With a show of
reluctance he allowed her to untangle herself, and followed her to
the kitchen where she prepared a salad and sliced some cold
chicken. He made himself useful by warming a couple of crusty rolls
under the grill and opening a bottle of chilled white wine.

They ate at her
small wooden dining table by the light of two candles from her
civil emergency pack. It was rather special. In fact, Jessica had
decided that the evening was too special to bring down to earth by
talking about the theatre’s problems, but Jack surprised her by
raising the subject himself.

‘So, Miss
Theatre Manager, how are we going to look after your precious
historic building for the next two weeks? Any ideas?’

She got up from
her chair, walked round the table and kissed him. He looked at her
enquiringly.

‘That was for
the “we” part of the question, Jack. It’s nice to know you’re on my
side, thank you. I did have a thought, actually. I could invite
some of the guys from the football club to come and keep an eye on
the place. They’re big and fit and not scared to get tough with
anybody who gives them a problem.’

‘And how would
you deploy these deadly weapons?’

She shook her
head and shrugged. ‘That’s the thing, I just don’t know. I can
hardly ask them to stand outside all night on guard duty, can I? It
wouldn’t be fair when they have to work the next day.’

‘Well, what
about making up beds for them inside? At least they’d be on the
spot to deal with any trouble, assuming it was noisy enough to wake
them up.’

‘Yeah, that
could work. And I can use them as doormen during the show when the
audience is coming and going, to stop any obvious loonies from
getting in. Thanks Jack, you’re a gem.’

‘All part of
the service, ma’am.’

She looked into
his chocolate-brown eyes and smiled. ‘What’s the rest of the
service, then?’

He showed her
that, too.

Jessica
practically skipped onto the stage on Sunday morning, earning
immediate suspicion from the rest of the staging team who were
preparing to hang the lights for the show.

‘You’re looking
far too happy for a Sunday morning. What did you get up to last
night? Come on, tell Uncle Howard all about it.’

Jessica tried
for an enigmatic smile but it came out as smugly satisfied instead,
fuelling their interest immediately.

‘I’ll bet you
were helping the police with their enquiries, weren’t you?’

‘How long is
the long arm of the law, exactly?’

‘Did he use his
baton?’

‘I can neither
confirm nor deny those accusations,’ said Jessica, blushing despite
herself. ‘Just shut up, will you? Haven’t we got lights to hang
here?’

‘Oh yes, and
they need to be well-hung, too – but you’ll know all about that, eh
Jessica?’

‘Guys!’ she
pleaded. ‘Enough already. I refuse to put up with this for the rest
of the day. If you want my help then keep quiet about my private
life, OK?’

She knew they
wouldn’t be able to resist the occasional comment but at least it
wouldn’t be a constant barrage of innuendo.

Gazza’s
lighting plan lay on the floor and he had already brought out all
the lights he needed from the theatre’s own supply beneath the
stage. The hired ones were in boxes along the corridor, where
Howard and Shane were unpacking them and bringing them up to the
apron at the front of the stage. Jessica picked up a large silver
parcan and hung it on the lighting bar, which had been lowered from
the fly floor to about chest height. She tightened the clamp and
fastened the safety wire, then stood lost in thought until Gazza
flicked a rubber wire tie at her.

‘Oy, wake up.
One of these comes next. Come on, we don’t want to be here all
night as well as all day.’

Guiltily she
pushed all the dreamily enjoyable thoughts of Jack out of her mind
and got back to work.

By lunchtime
they had completed all three lighting bars and Gazza was up a
ladder rigging the perches at the sides of the stage. The
conversation had moved round to the vandalism of the power
supply.

‘I don’t
suppose we could pin it on the developers, could we?’ suggested
Howard. ‘It might turn public opinion in our favour if they were
accused of playing dirty tricks like that.’

‘That would be
fine if they’d actually done it,’ said Jessica, ‘but unfortunately
I don’t think they did. It does look more like the work of a
deranged crank than a business organisation. The footage from the
security camera showed one figure, not a gang, but there wasn’t
enough detail to identify the person. Just someone tall and thin in
a hoodie.’

‘They could
have hired said deranged crank to do their dirty work for
them.’

‘Nah, too easy
for the crank to blow the whistle on them. No, I think Bayldon
Oliver will carry on attacking us through the media as usual, and
the nutter will keep trying in person.’

‘Do we have a
plan for dealing with that, Jessica?’

‘Yes. We do. I
thought I’d get the guys from the football club to give us a hand.
We’ve got a couple of beds in the furniture bay, haven’t we? I’ll
set up one in the foyer and one in the Green Room and the guys can
sleep comfortably but spring into action if needed.’

‘So you’re not
going to set up a sweet little love nest in your office and have
your policeman friend over for a slumber party then?’ Gazza
chuckled from up his ladder.

‘Gazza,’ said
Jessica sweetly, aiming a rubber tie upwards. ‘You do realise how
vulnerable you are in those shorts, don’t you? I can see quite a
long way up them, you know.’

He squawked and
snapped his legs closer together, causing the ladder to sway
dramatically.

‘Get away from
me woman. You need my skills for this job. Knocking me down with a
shot to the goolies is not an option.’

‘Jessica, leave
our Head of Lighting alone,’ ordered Howard. ‘I’m damned if I’m
going to take all these lights down after the show without him. He
doesn’t escape pack-out that easily.’

At last, all
the parcans, floods and Fresnels were hung, each with the correct
coloured gel in the filter holder to give the appropriate colour on
stage. The bundles of wires were tied off and plugged into the
patch panel, ready for programming into the lighting desk. Gazza’s
work was really beginning now and Jessica didn’t envy his job for
the following day either, when levels and cues would be set.

For the next
night’s demanding lighting session, she made sure there was a table
set up in the middle of the auditorium with two of the best chairs
she could find. She put a jug of water and some glasses ready, and
a bowl of sweets. Directors were known to get tetchy during these
difficult technical evenings, even Adam, and staving off hunger was
one way she could help.

Adam had called
for a few volunteers from the cast, but the rest of the bodies
needed were usually supplied by stage crew. Jessica offered herself
also as a stand-in. It wasn’t hard, just a matter of standing where
she was told or moving from one spot to another, but it felt like a
performance, and was about as close as she would ever get to
stardom on the stage.

Adam called for
the opening scene. The stage crew had already put the table and
chairs in place on the hotel set and had taken up the places where
the actors would be standing or sitting. Gazza, sitting next to
Adam in the auditorium, brought up the lights and they decided on
the brightness that was required. The cue for that level of light
was programmed into the lighting desk so that it would appear at
the touch of a button when needed.

The process was
followed for every scene. Jessica stood patiently as requested,
trying not to squint into the dazzling lights when the rest of the
room was so black. Adam’s disembodied voice came out of the
darkness.

‘Jessica, can
you come down stage left next to Stewart please? Mark that spot,
Stewart.’

Stewart pulled
off two strips of masking tape and made a small cross on the stage
at her feet.

‘How are you
doing, Stewie?’ she whispered.

‘Fine, thanks.
Hey, Jessica, when do we get our tickets for opening night? I want
to make sure my Mum and Dad come to the show.’

‘Stewart, go up
to the hotel desk please and stand behind it.’ Adam’s voice was
terse.

Jessica waved
him away. ‘I’ll talk to you afterwards.’

The evening
wore on. Adam munched bananas for the stress-relieving properties
of the potassium. Gazza just got on with the job, no doubt
promising himself a couple of beers at the end of the night.
Finally, a little after midnight, levels and cues were at last
complete. Jessica caught up with Stewart and assured him that
tickets for cast and crew would be handed out the next night. Too
tired to celebrate, everyone went quietly home to bed, knowing that
the next night held the terrors of The Technical.

All through the
day on Tuesday Jessica had a feeling of impending doom. She
organised the football guys and set up their accommodation, all the
while keeping an ear open for any strange noises about the place.
Eventually, she accepted that it was just nerves, and a perfectly
normal feeling to have before a Technical rehearsal.

She checked the
Green Room notice-board to make sure everyone had looked at the
draft programme and had ticked that their names were spelled
correctly. There were a couple of extra names scrawled in as props
helpers so she jotted them down and went up to her office to add
them on the computer. As an afterthought she wondered if she should
put in a note about Tamara – perhaps an “In memory of…”, but
decided against it. The only people who would be touched by such a
gesture were the girl’s parents, and they certainly didn’t seem
keen on any further public mention of their wayward daughter.