The Twist of a Knife

‘Would you like to sit down?’ I gestured at the table. I wanted this to be businesslike and the sofas didn’t feel appropriate. Nor did I offer her coffee or tea. I still had no idea what had brought her here but I wanted her and her assistant out as soon as possible.

They sat at the table. ‘Nice place,’ Cara said.

‘Thank you.’ There was a long silence. I was standing by the grand piano – which I had inherited from my mother and which I played every day – and I realised that Cara was waiting for me to join them. I walked over and took my place at the end of the table, as far away from them as I could. ‘So …?’ I asked.

‘I wonder if you could tell us where you were last night?’

It was a line I would never have used in a television drama – it’s such an old chestnut – but that was really how she began.

‘I was in bed,’ I said.

‘Before that.’

‘I was at the theatre.’

Mills had already been scribbling my answers down in his notebook, but somehow he picked up the fact that he’d been given his cue. ‘It was the first night of your play,’ he said.

‘If you knew that, why did you ask me?’

He ignored me. ‘Mindgame at the Vaudeville,’ he went on. He twitched his moustache without seeming to move his upper lip. It was a neat trick. ‘It hasn’t had very good reviews,’ he went on. ‘The Guardian said it was pretentious.’

‘I don’t look at the reviews,’ I muttered.

‘The critic from the Daily Mail said it was the worst play he’d ever seen. The Times wasn’t sure. Variety said: “It’s so goofy it’s almost fun.”’ He looked at me sadly. ‘Almost,’ he repeated.

I felt the familiar sickness in my stomach. ‘It’s very nice of you to come and tell me what the newspapers think of my play,’ I said. ‘But wouldn’t you say that’s a slight waste of police time?’

‘And Harriet Throsby was the worst of all,’ Mills went on. ‘She really tore it apart. I imagine they’ll publish her review posthumously in the Sunday Times. Maybe they’ll frame it in a black border. That would be a nice touch, wouldn’t you say, ma’am?’

These last words had been addressed to Grunshaw. She nodded slowly.

‘Sort of a … final curtain,’ Mills added.

‘What are you saying?’ I cut in. ‘Is Harriet Throsby …?’ I couldn’t finish the sentence. Not because I was shocked. It just seemed so unlikely.

‘Did you meet her at the theatre?’ Cara asked, ignoring my question.

‘Yes, briefly.’

‘And did you read her review?’

‘Yes. We all did. It was on Sky’s phone.’

‘That would be Sky Palmer.’

‘She played Nurse Plimpton.’ I wondered why I’d used the past tense. Perhaps it was because I knew that my play was dead too.

‘There was a party backstage at the theatre, is that right? Can you remember what time you left?’

Suddenly I was angry. ‘Look, I’m not going to answer any of your questions until you tell me what’s happened. Has Harriet Throsby been murdered?’

Cara looked shocked. ‘Whatever gave you that idea, Anthony?’

‘You said she’d written her last review. You said it would be published posthumously.’

‘She could have had a heart attack. She could have fallen under a bus.’

‘Then what are you doing here?’

Cara conceded the point. She let Mills tell me. ‘Harriet Throsby was stabbed to death in her home sometime around ten o’clock this morning. Can you tell us where you were at that time?’

‘I was in bed.’

‘Still in bed?’ Mills sounded disbelieving.

‘I went to bed late. I got up late.’

‘Could your wife verify that?’

For a moment I was confused as various thoughts crossed my mind at the same time. ‘No,’ I admitted. ‘She’d gone to work.’

‘When did she go to work?’

‘I can’t tell you that. I was asleep.’

Mills wrote down my answer, presumably word for word. He underlined something not once but twice. He was making it clear that he doubted what I was saying.

Cara took over. ‘Do you own an ornamental dagger?’ she asked.

‘No,’ I said. She had caught me unawares and looked at me sadly, as if I had just given myself away. She was waiting for me to continue and I realised the mistake I had made. ‘Actually, I do have a sort of dagger,’ I said. ‘Ahmet gave it to me last night.’

‘You’re referring to Ahmet Yurdakul, the producer of Mindgame?’

‘Yes. It was a first-night present. He gave one to everyone.’ I stared. ‘Are you saying that Harriet was stabbed with one of the daggers?’

Again, I received no answer. That was Cara’s technique. She wanted me to know that she was in control. ‘Can you describe the dagger?’ she asked, sweetly.

‘All the daggers were the same. They were silver. About this long …’ I showed her with two fingers. ‘And there were some words on the blade. “Is this a dagger …?”’

‘I would have thought that was pretty obvious,’ Mills said.

‘It’s a quotation from Macbeth,’ I explained. ‘“Is this a dagger which I see before me?” Ahmet had produced the play in a castle somewhere in Yorkshire and he had some left over.’