Free Coffin's Ghost by Gwendoline Butler Page A

called her. Supposed to have gone back home, but did she?’
    ‘Has she told the police?’
    Peter was vague, he didn’t know, might have mentioned it.
    ‘Why does Miss Arden think it’s this girl Etta?’
    ‘She hasn’t heard from her and she believes she would have done. Or ought to have done. But someone else was saying that she’d seen Etta around the town, and with a rough crowd.’
    Stella gave the firm advice that either Miss Arden or his wife ought to tell all this to the police if they were really worried.
    She walked away, thinking that gossip must be all over the town. A juicy case.
    Some houses attracted violence, she thought. Wasn’t there a local story that Jack the Ripper had lived there? It wasn’t a place she had liked during the short time it had been the Chief Commander’s living quarters.
    She had kept out of it as much as she could do, leaving him alone there. Looking back, he must have been lonely.
    She tidied up her office in the theatre, taking some work back with her to the tower so that she could let in Arthur and Dave, and then stay while they did their two-hour stint. Stella felt she did not yet know them well enough to hand over the keys and tell them how the security worked.
    They were just arriving as she got to the door so they all went in together. Stella worked in the sitting room while they cleaned upstairs, then, when they were ready to dust and polish the sitting room, she moved up to her bedroom.
    She could hear them talking as they worked, it seemed to be Dave doing most of the talking. As she came down to the kitchen to get a drink of water, she met him polishing the taps.
    He looked at her with a smile. He seemed to wear a light layer of dust over his face and his hair, greying him down like a statue that had been kept in the attic.
    A good-looking man underneath it all, with those interesting grooves on his face.
    ‘You don’t remember me, Miss Pinero.’
    She did remember him, memories can go and then come back.
    ‘I was with you when you were just setting up the theatre . . . I was only a general kind of dogsbody, not surprising you don’t remember me. I hoped I might get a foothold on the acting side. I played young middle age then, but it didn’t work out.’
    ‘I’m sorry.’
    ‘I get by. Do a bit of TV as it comes along. Play older types now,
The Bill
and
Carrie
and the odd documentary. If they want a real street figure or an old market man, they call on me.’
    ‘Or a dustman,’ Stella thought. ‘What about your colleague?’
    ‘Arthur? Oh, he has his ups and downs like all of us. Went up for a part, good one too, in a radio soap . . . he does a beautiful kid’s voice, you should hear his baby crying . . . lost it, though, because he wouldn’t do a baby screaming . . . said he daren’t, it might ruin his voice.’
    Stella wasn’t sure if she believed Dave. Behind the dust, it was possible there was a laugh.
    Arthur appeared at the door. ‘Finished the kitchen, Dave?’ He didn’t wait for an answer but started to check his cleaning equipment – part Stella’s, part they brought with them. ‘Let’s be off then. Morning, Miss Pinero.’
    It was his beautiful voice that had persuaded Stella to hire the cleaning team, although their prices were high.
    ‘Look after your voice,’ she called as they prepared to depart. He gave her a surprised look. ‘I’m working on it, Miss Pinero, trying to deepen the tones, get more richness.’ He smiled. ‘Covent Garden, here I come.’
    Soon she heard them leaving, dustman and hopeful opera singer, climbing into the van, with Dave still talking and Arthur listening. He was wearing a hat now, a dark felt with a big brim.
    ‘Did you tell her about the new murder?’
    Dave shook his head. ‘No.’
    ‘Why not?’
    ‘She doesn’t collect murders. Nor do we. Besides, you don’t know the woman was dead.’
    ‘I bet she was,’ said Arthur. ‘She dropped like a stone.Dead gone, sure of it. You couldn’t see.