Staged Death

Book 0: The DCI Banham Series

by Linda Regan

Genres: Police Procedurals; International Crime & Mystery

Synopsis

The first title in the DCI Banham series by acclaimed author and actress, Linda Regan.

A thrilling tale of murder and mayhem set in the world of theatre, Behind You! is the scintillating debut crime novel from acclaimed actress Linda Regan. DI Paul Banham and Sergeant Alison Grainger investigate a series of mysterious deaths at a London theatre during pantomime season: it may be Christmas, but one of the cast certainly isn't full of goodwill to all men . . .

Release date: November 20, 2015

Publisher: Headline

Print pages: 258

Sample

Prologue

‘Are you enjoying yourselves?’

‘YES!’ the audience shouted.

‘Oh no you’re not,’ the Ugly Sisters shouted back, goading the studio audience to join in.

‘OH YES WE ARE!’ came the animated response.

The smaller of the two over-dressed pantomime dames jumped up and down on the spot, squealing like a spoiled child. ‘Oh no you’re not!’

The response was even louder. ‘OH YES WE ARE!’

‘Blimey.’ Lottie Banham pointed to the television screen. ‘I’m sure that’s Roy Hudd, but who’s the thin one? I know his voice.’ She looked over to her brother, suddenly aware he wasn’t watching. ‘Paul? Sorry, are you hating this? There’s a rerun of three old comedies after.’

Her brother shook his head. ‘Not at all, I’m enjoying watching the kids enjoy it.’

The children giggled and shouted at the screen, as if they were in the live audience. Lottie and eight-year-old Bobby still wore paper hats from their Boxing Day lunch; little Madeleine modelled a glittering tiara which matched the pink fairy outfit, complete with fluorescent wings and sparkly pink ballet pumps that Paul had bought her for Christmas.

‘I can’t believe how big they’re getting,’ he added.

Bobby screwed his face up and Madeleine giggled. A smile spread across Paul’s face.

‘Actually,’ he said to his sister, ‘I was just about to go anyway. I’ve got some things to do, and I’m on call so I should check in with the station.’

Lottie gave her brother a knowing look. ‘Are you meeting Alison?’ she asked.

‘No, as I said, I’m on call.’

‘Shame,’ Lottie replied. ‘I approve of Alison, she’s good for you. And she really likes you.’

‘Alison is my sergeant, and that’s as far as it goes, OK?’

‘You fancy her,’ Madeleine chipped in, her uncle’s love life suddenly more interesting than the pantomime. ‘Bobby told me you did.’

‘I’d just like to see you happy again,’ Lottie said.

Banham stood up, lifted his niece from the sofa and held her high in the air. ‘I think I’ll put you on top of the Christmas tree. You look more like a fairy than the fairy that’s up there.’

Madeleine squealed and giggled, spitting chocolate over the front of Banham’s denim shirt. He pulled a handkerchief from his trouser pocket and wiped the chocolate from her chin. ‘You’re much prettier than Cinderella,’ he said, ‘even with chocolate all over your face. And one day I’ll bet you’ll marry a handsome prince and live happily ever after.’

She giggled again and he put her back on the sofa gently and carefully. ‘Watch the pantomime,’ he told her. ‘You can tell me about Prince Charming later.’

‘Oh, stay and watch it with us,’ Lottie pleaded, ‘and then I’ll make us all turkey sarnies and fill you a doggy bag to take home, ’cos if you haven’t got a date, I’ll bet you’ve no food in the house.’

Banham picked up the sparkling shoe and carefully put it back on Madeleine’s foot. He caught Bobby looking dolefully at him. ‘What?’ he asked him.

‘I like Alison,’ Bobby said. ‘She’s good at football.’

‘Ah, but she’s not better than me,’ Banham told him. He nodded at the television. ‘It’s Brian Murphy,’ he said to his sister.

‘Who?’

‘The other Ugly Sister. It’s Brian Murphy, from George and Mildred.’

Alison Grainger had just put the word TREE on the Scrabble board. She scribbled down her score and looked up to see her father putting his letters either side of the R.

She frowned and shook her head. ‘No, you can’t have MURDER, Dad. It’s not Christmassy.’

He looked indignantly at her from the other side of the onyx coffee table, but she didn’t give him time to argue.

‘We agreed only words with a Christmas theme,’ she said quietly. ‘Murder has nothing to do with Christmas.’

‘Yes it has,’ he said gruffly. ‘You’re a detective sergeant in the Murder Division, and you’re on call, and it’s Christmas.’

Alison looked at her mother, but there was no support to be had.

‘If there’s a murder it’ll ruin our Christmas,’ her father argued. ‘Because you’ll have to go and solve it, and your mother and I will be left here alone.’ He nodded his head. ‘So it has everything to do with our Christmas.’

Alison shook her head. ‘No, that wouldn’t wash in court.’

‘We’re not in court, Alison,’ he said, raising his voice. ‘Tell her, Beryl. This is my house, and it’s Christmas, and we’re having a friendly game of Scrabble.’

‘Let him have it,’ her mother said anxiously. ‘It’s only a game, Alison.’

‘That’s double points too,’ her father said, stabbing his large finger at the scoresheet.

‘No, it’s cheating,’ Alison said firmly. ‘What’s the point of playing Christmas Scrabble if we can cheat?’

There was a silence.

‘OK, fine by me,’ Alison said at last, throwing her hands in the air and standing up. ‘Absolutely fine. It’s your go, Mum. I’m going to make some coffee. Do you want some?’

‘I’ll make it,’ her mother said, starting to get up.

‘No,’ Alison told her. ‘It’s your go; put a Christmas word down.’

‘I can’t, I’ve got mainly vowels,’ Beryl Grainger said apologetically. ‘I’ll miss this turn and make the coffee. You go again, Alison.’

‘I can’t go either,’ Alison said. ‘I haven’t got any vowels.’ She threw the pen down. ‘Oh, let’s call it a day. You win, Dad.’

There was another silence.

‘What is it? What’s getting to you?’ Gerald asked his daughter.

Alison took a deep breath and put her hands to her eyes. ‘Nothing. Sorry, Dad. I’ve been busy lately. I’m tired, that’s all, and it’s making me a bit snappy. Sorry. Carry on, I’ll change my letters and miss my go.’

Gerald carefully studied his new letters for a few moments, then put six of them down on the board under the last R in MURDER. They spelled ROMANCE.

‘Romance happens at Christmas,’ he said innocently.

Banham closed his front door behind him and threw his keys on to the table by the door. He walked into the kitchen and put Lottie’s doggy bags on an empty shelf, then opened the fridge and took out a can of lager. As he straightened up the photo on the wall made him catch his breath: a young blonde woman, proudly holding a new baby. He stared at it, then turned away and walked into the lounge, but too late; the memory was back. He looked around the bare room, imagining the Christmas they would have had if Diane and Elizabeth were still here. Elizabeth would have been eleven – just a few years older than his beautiful niece Madeleine. Diane would have cooked the family dinner, and together they would have watched Elizabeth tearing her presents open. The memory invaded him: his adored eleven-month-old daughter, her tiny head bloody and unrecognisable on her bunny blanket. Diane, only inches away, covered in congealing blood from multiple stab wounds as she reached out to save her baby. Ten years, one week, and around one hour ago – but their killer had never been brought to justice. And he hadn’t been there for his wife and child when they needed him most.

He knew Lottie was right; his life had to move on, and Alison was right for him. But when he had tried to get close to her, the memories and guilt came back and he couldn’t go through with it.

He popped the lager and took a long gulp. He should have rung her, but he hadn’t known what to say after shying off at the last minute with the feeble excuse that business and pleasure didn’t mix. She was furious, but he just couldn’t admit the truth.

He would keep his appointment with the counsellor this time; it was his new year’s resolution. If the counselling worked, maybe they could try again. The Phil Collins CD that Alison had bought him for Christmas lay on the coffee table. He slipped it into his stereo and pressed ‘play’. ‘A Groovy Kind of Love’ filled the air. He flopped into an armchair and closed his eyes.

Then the phone rang.

Chapter One

The alleyway to the back of the theatre building was cordoned off with the usual blue and white tape. Two police cars, their flashing lights signalling the emergency, were parked one either side of the road. The female officer standing guard gave Banham a shy smile and lifted the tape to allow him through.

He walked up the alleyway and opened the stage door. Half a dozen girls, none older than twelve, stood in the passageway. All were dressed identically: black leotards, black tights, black shoes. Some were crying, others looked dazed and bewildered. Banham’s eyes were drawn to a very pretty blonde girl who looked about eleven years old.

Another blonde, this one attractive and middle-aged, appeared behind the group. ‘Can I help you?’

He flashed his warrant card and asked the woman where the stage area was.

‘I’ll take you.’

She led him down the short corridor and turned left. A sign in the shape of a large hand with a pointing finger read STAGE LEFT. NO UNAUTHORISED ADMISSION DURING PERFORMANCE.

‘It’s through the swing doors,’ she said. ‘We’ve been told to wait in the Green Room, but I’ll take you through if you like.’

‘I’ll find my way, thanks.’

‘You don’t think it was anything other than an accident, do you?’

‘That’s what we’re here to find out,’ he said abruptly.

‘How long will we have to wait? Only, there are children in the show, and their parents …’

‘I’ll get someone to let you know as soon as I can,’ he told her. ‘I’m sorry, you are?’

‘I’m Maggie, Maggie McCormack. My daughter’s in the show, she’s one of the principals.’

Banham nodded. ‘Did you …?’

‘She plays the cat,’ Maggie carried on. ‘My husband’s the stage manager and I do the wardrobe …’

Her voice died away as he fixed his eyes firmly on her. ‘Did you see what happened?’

‘No, I was watching the show from the audience,’ she said, lowering her gaze and brushing her eye with a finger. ‘I knew something was very wrong when they brought the curtain in. So I rushed back. Everyone was crowded around at the edge of the stage. Barbara Denis told me she wasn’t breathing and Vincent had gone to ring for an ambulance.’

Banham nodded. ‘Thank you. Could you look after the children?’

He pushed open the swing door and found himself at the left-hand side of the stage, as the sign had indicated.

The house lights were turned on full and light flooded the stage area and auditorium. But where he was standing, large and cumbersome pieces of scenery blocked both the light and his access to the stage. He found himself face to face with a tall, oddly shaped and brightly painted piece of plywood which he couldn’t manoeuvre around.

Alison – Sergeant Alison Grainger – was on the other side of the stage with her back to him, talking to one of the forensic team. She was wearing an ankle-length, grey military-style coat, with a maroon wool scarf. A matching maroon cap with a hanging bobble covered her head, allowing her long hair, mousy with a tinge of red and frizzy from the December night air, to tumble freely down her back. He thought she looked beautiful. He recognised the forensics officer she was talking to: Penny Starr, his young detective constable’s current date, her Afro hair peeping out from under the hood of her blue head-to-toe plastic overall. She held a magnifying glass in one latex-gloved hand and a pair of tweezers in the other.

Max Pettifer, the senior SOCO officer, was there too, deep in conversation with Heather Draper, the police pathologist. They blocked Banham’s view of the dead woman; he could see long, dark hair fanned out on the floor, but no face. Banham was glad – he hated looking at young female victims.

Banham put a foot on the piece of scenery to climb over it, but his foot slipped on the painted surface and he caught his leg on something sharp. ‘Fuck,’ he cursed loudly, feeling about for the offending object. It was a loose, sharp nail.

Alison looked up. ‘Don’t try to climb over that ship, guv, it’s not safe,’ she shouted. ‘Best to walk round the back.’ She pointed to the area at the rear of the stage where a black cloth hung from ceiling to floor. ‘There’s a thin passageway behind that black curtain, it’ll bring you round this side. But be careful, there’s scenery everywhere and very little light back there.’

‘Right,’ he said, looking around for the ship and realising that she meant the large piece of scenery. He picked his way around it and manoeuvred himself carefully around several smaller pieces before he found the passageway. Easy to have a fatal accident here, he thought. Perhaps the killer knew that – if there was a killer, of course. The health and safety officers would have a field day, especially with children working here.

He noticed a spiral staircase to his right, leading downward. So there was a basement too.

The passageway at the back of the stage was extremely narrow, and a solitary low-wattage lamp lay on the ground to help steer his way. If the actors had to squeeze down here every time they needed to cross the stage, he was glad he wasn’t one. At the far end he bumped against a wobbling wooden trestle table, edged carefully around it and found himself next to another spiral staircase. So, two staircases leading to a basement area under the stage. The actors probably used that to get across.

The trestle table was another accident waiting to happen. Two identical long swords lay side by side on it, both blades blunt and rusting with age. Beside them was a large, furry black cat’s head, with erect ears and large, green plastic eyes. The poster at the stage door read The Wonderful Colourful, Star-Studded Pantomime – DICK WHITTINGTON and his VERSATILE CAT. This cat didn’t look versatile; it didn’t even look appealing.

Someone poked him in the arm and he nearly jumped out of his skin.

‘Thought you’d got lost,’ Alison Grainger said.

Banham turned to face her. A few feet away at the side of the stage lay the dead girl, her head against a piece of scenery, next to a block of concrete about five inches square. He stared at the corpse.

‘Guv, you may not want …’

Sometimes he thought Alison could read his mind. ‘May not want what?’ he snapped before he could stop himself.

She took a breath before answering. ‘I was just going to say, there isn’t a lot to be gained from looking at the body. Either she banged her head against the concrete block as she fell, or someone lifted it and hit her with it. We can’t do much until the forensics report comes back. It may not even be a murder case.’

He looked over her shoulder again and studied the angle of the corpse. Alison spoke again.

‘That new forensics officer, Penny Starr, was with DC Crowther when he got the call. She’s offered to take the concrete block and do a light-source test …’

‘Who’s running this investigation?’ he asked her. ‘You or me?’

‘Sorry?’

‘You heard me.’

‘You are, guv. I was just … here, that’s all.’

There was a few seconds silence. He knew she had his best interests at heart, but he was the senior officer.

‘As long as we’ve got that straight.’ He nodded his head in the direction of the corpse. ‘Is that the exact spot where she landed when she supposedly fell and hit her head?’

‘No, one of the actors, Vincent Mann, moved her. She was wearing a black balaclava and he pulled it off in the hope that it might help her breathe, so she’s been moved. But only slightly, according to him.’

Banham walked towards the body and crouched beside it.

‘Evening, guv,’ said Penny Starr, holding a magnifying glass over the concrete block. ‘It’s tricky, this one; the girl apparently hit her head on this, but I can’t get anything from the concrete here. I’ll have to take it away and do a light-source treatment.’

‘Yes, Sergeant Grainger mentioned that. How long?’

‘Three days. Sorry, can’t go any faster – the reagents need to develop.’

Banham looked up at Alison. ‘We’ll need DNA from all the actors, to eliminate them.’

As he straightened up he heard a woman’s laugh. Heather Draper was standing a few feet away with Max Pettifer. The smile left Max’s face when he noticed Banham staring at him. ‘She died from a blow to the temporal artery,’ he said. ‘It was very quick and she was dead before the paramedics got here.’

‘She died instantly, I suspect,’ Heather Draper agreed. ‘But that’s off the record – as usual I’ve said nothing until the post-mortem’s done and you’ve had my report.’ She lifted the girl’s head so Banham could get a good look at the blow.

‘She must have hit the stage weight with a lot of force if she fell,’ he said.

Heather pointed to the girl’s cheek. ‘Someone has been knocking her about too. Those bruises aren’t fresh, a few days old at least.’

Banham rubbed his hand across his face. ‘When can I have your report?’

‘Hopefully tomorrow. I know the mortuary’s free. I’ll get it to you as soon as I can.’

He knew she would do her best; they always worked well together. Not so Max Pettifer, overweight and too fond of the sound of his own public-school voice.

‘I know it’s urgent, old son,’ he said. ‘I’ll do my best, but I didn’t invent Christmas, nothing I can do if the laboratories are shut.’

Penny Starr looked up from where she was examining the area around the corpse. ‘I’m happy to give up my Christmas leave,’ she said. ‘Colin is on the case anyway, so it’s not as if we’d see much of each other. I’ll give a couple of the technicians a ring – they’ll be glad of the overtime.’

‘Thank you, Penny.’

They might make some progress after all.

Alison Grainger was still beside him. ‘How far have we got?’ he asked her.

‘Her name is Lucinda Benson,’ Alison said. ‘She was the principal girl in the pantomime. Uniform called us; they were told she fell against that stage weight, in the middle of a routine that took place in pitch black and included most of the cast.’

‘In pitch black? No wonder she fell! This place is a death trap. And what was that stage weight thing doing there?’

‘It’s supposed to hold the scenery up.’

‘But it’s not; the scenery is falling down. How easy would it be to lift that concrete block in the middle of a routine that took place in the dark?’

‘You’d have to be quick, and strong, and know where to aim,’ Alison told him. ‘In the dark, that might be difficult. But all the people on stage with her know the backstage area extremely well, and they’re used to the lighting.’

‘Have we got a list of the actors who were on stage yet?’ he asked.

She pulled a sheet of paper from her pocket. ‘I got this from the producer. They’re all waiting in the Green Room upstairs. DC Crowther got here first; they told him everyone was on stage when it happened, except the pantomime dame who was changing his costume. Crowther said he couldn’t understand their technical jargon.’ A sheepish expression flicked briefly across her face. ‘I’ve … been in a few pantomimes myself … when I was a child, of course, not recently. So I told him to ask me if there was anything he didn’t understand.’

Banham suppressed a smile. ‘Good thinking, Sergeant.’ A sudden thought struck him. ‘You haven’t told anyone else, have you? That you’ve worked in pantomime?’

‘No, guv.’

‘Good. Keep it to yourself. We may need that card up our sleeve. Where’s Crowther, by the way?’

‘I sent him out front with DC Walsh to take statements from the pianist, sound engineer and usherettes – not that any of them saw much. I said we’d all meet up in the Green Room when you arrived. I hope that’s OK?’ She looked at him apprehensively.

‘Do we know who was standing where on stage at the time of the death?’

She shook her head. ‘All the children, and the actors except the dame, were walking on and off the stage carrying different-coloured ultraviolet fish.’

Banham blinked in bewilderment. Alison continued, ‘I’m sure the choreographer will know who was where in the scene.’

‘Good.’

Alison began to walk off stage; he caught her up as she reached the wings. ‘Um … why were the fish ultraviolet?’ he asked.

‘It’s called the underwater ballet scene. There’s a storm at sea, and all the cast fall overboard and land in the ocean. They’re dressed from head to toe in black, and the stage is in. . .