The Cinderella Killer by Simon Brett Page B

another country?’
    â€˜Yeah. She’s got some kind of trust fund. Money’s not a problem for her.’
    â€˜But is she a problem for you?’
    Kenny shrugged. ‘People like Gloria van der Groot are occupational hazards for someone in my position.’
    â€˜She’s a stalker?’
    â€˜You could call it that. But she’s not really too much hassle. She doesn’t ask anything of me – not like some of the weirdos I get mail from. She just … likes to be near me, I guess. She’s never done anything that makes me feel I should call the cops. I’ve never had to get Lefty in to start handing round the injunctions. Gloria is just obsessed with
The Dwight House
– or with my character in
The Dwight House
. It’s not me she’s after, just some fictional guy on the television.’
    They had reached the door of the pub. Suddenly Kenny drew back. ‘I won’t be joining you tonight. Got a few things need sorting out.’
    â€˜Fine,’ said Charles, but he was already speaking to his friend’s retreating back.
    He didn’t know whether it was seeing Gloria van der Groot … or his earlier encounter with Jasmine del Rio … or an anxiety that Charles knew nothing about … but something had rattled Kenny Polizzi.

FIVE
    BARON HARDUP: My wife and I were perfectly happy for twenty-five years. Then we met each other.
    Â 
    â€˜B ut it makes nonsense of the story,’ said Danny Fitz. ‘Not to mention the tradition.’
    â€˜Look, Kenny is the biggest name in this show,’ said Bix Rogers. ‘Nobody’s going to argue with that, are they?’
    â€˜I’m not arguing with that,’ said the Ugly Sister. ‘He’s a name that’s known throughout the world, but that’s not the point.’
    â€˜Then what is the point?’
    â€˜The point is that Baron Hardup – whoever’s playing the part – is still a minor role in the story of
Cinderella
. And there is a traditional pecking order in the Walkdown.’
    The Walkdown was what they were rehearsing that morning. This is the climax of every pantomime, when all the cast, in new costumes (or not in new costumes, according the exigencies of the production’s budget), parade from the back of the stage to the front to receive – and milk – the audience’s applause.
    Because this moment in the show involved the entire cast, Bix was actually giving some direction to the speaking company members as well as the singers and dancers, a novelty so far in the rehearsal process. And, needless to say, he wanted the show’s finale to be a really big production number. This was bad news for Charles. Though he could just about hold a tune and get away with singing onstage (particularly singing with other people – he’d got very good over the years at synchronizing his lips and letting no sound emerge), dancing was another matter.
    He could move all right, learn the steps that he was meant to be doing … so long as there was no music playing. Once the accompanist or band started, he was put off his stroke completely. It had been ever thus. From Oxford University revue onwards, Charles Paris had been the despair of a lengthening line of musical directors and choreographers. And since at auditions for the Empire Theatre Eastbourne’s
Cinderella
he had blithely assured the director that he could sing and dance, he wasn’t looking forward to the moment when Bix found out the truth.
    Lying at auditions, incidentally – or to put it more graciously, finessing the truth – is so common among actors that very few of them feel any guilt about it. After all, what matters is getting the part and if a few inexactitudes are involved in that process … well, surely it’s in a good cause. Age is one of the subjects where a little laxity with the truth is almost
de rigueur
. Charles had an actor friend from university