Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 152, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 924 & 925, September/October 2018

Murder in Aladdin’s Cave by Amy Myers

Amy Myers is the author of a half-dozen different mystery series. The earliest of them all, and one of the most popular, is that starring Victorian chef Auguste Didier. This new case is Auguste’s latest — but he’s no longer the author’s only fictional chef/sleuth! 1920s chef Nell Drury features in her next book, Death at the Wychbourne Follies, the second in a new series.

Auguste Didier was in full agreement with Queen Victoria’s declaration: He was not amused. The correct way to greet the opening of the New Year lay in producing a superb turbot à la crème in the delightful surroundings of the theatre-restaurant kitchen. It was not correct for him to be picking his way gingerly down into the bowels of the Galaxy Theatre in search of a parasol used in a burlesque performed twenty years earlier, in the mid 1870s. His ordeal was due to a request from Princess Petal, who was the leading lady in tonight’s pantomime, the traditional treat for children and their parents at Christmastime. It was true that the Princess Petal — Hetty Clogg in everyday life — was extremely pretty, but nevertheless the aroma of herbs in his kitchen was far superior to that of Aladdin’s Cave, the theatre’s name for the huge storage room reeking of stale air and dust from long-ago productions.

Auguste shivered. There was light here, thanks to the need to operate the understage machinery, but not enough to make this a desirable mission, especially as the charlotte à la chantilly demanded his attention.

“Strewth!”

Auguste heard this unearthly scream just as he reached the last step. Running towards him was Jacob Hunt, who maintained the many wigs demanded by the Galaxy productions. Jacob looked as terrified as he sounded. A slightly built, nervous man at the best of times, this lack of control was nevertheless unusual.

“What’s wrong, Jacob?” Auguste asked in alarm. This evening’s performance of The Princess and the Bean was due to begin in just under an hour’s time, at seven-thirty, and with the cellarmen not yet at their stations by the machinery, he would have to deal alone with whatever catastrophe had taken place.

“Body,” Jacob blurted out. His usual grin was absent and his face was ashen.

Auguste relaxed. “You just saw one of those dummies from Lady Katie’s Conundrum,” he reassured him. The dummies used for Miss Fanshawe’s Fashion House in that production had been very lifelike.

Jacob shook his head violently. “Body,” he repeated. “Blood.” He pointed to the doorway to Aladdin’s Cave and held out his hands, on which Auguste could indeed see traces of blood. “I shoved tonight’s wigs in the props room upstairs,” Jacob rushed on, “then came down here. I was after an old Black Club — hair comes from Spain, and the guv’nor said Henry Irving once wore it. And now look what’s happened. I find a blooming corpse instead. I tried to get the dagger out but couldn’t face it.”

In the dim light, Auguste could see Jacob’s jacket also bore signs of what might well be blood and he advanced even more cautiously towards the open door, beyond which now lay the darkness of the unknown. Summoning up what remained of his courage, he stepped inside Aladdin’s Cave.

No magic oil lamp lay there, no genie appeared as it had for Aladdin. Instead, beside the nearest pile of mock tree trunks adorned with dusty stage hangings and an old candelabra, sprawled the body of a man. The gaping mouth, the sightless eyes, and the blood — and the dagger still partly thrust into the chest — made it clear the man must be dead, but Auguste forced himself forward to feel for a pulse. There was none and the hand fell limply back.

“It’s Baron Glumboots,” he whispered in horror. Glumboots was the most disliked man in the Galaxy Theatre Company. “What could he have been doing here?” There was no response from Jacob. He had fainted.

Baron Glumboots, in real life Mr. Oscar Fish, had lived up to his role of villain offstage as well as on. Famous for playing this role in melodramas at the Adelphi Theatre, the Galaxy had been eager to acquire his services for the scoundrel who aspired to the hand of Princess Petal. The Princess and the Bean was based roughly on Mr. Hans Christian Andersen’s story, but in the Galaxy version Princess Petal has fled in distress from the baron’s evil advances to seek help at the castle of Queen Beanbody and her son Prince Ralph.

Auguste had discovered on his arrival in England from his native France that the pantomime was a peculiarly English tradition in which, as far as Auguste could gather, the principal boy was always played by a girl, and the elderly female comic character was always played by a man. Why this should be so, he had no idea. The English, Auguste decided, had some very strange ways.

At least he could testify that Princess Petal was played by a woman — and he knew all too well that Baron Glumboots was a man. Now he lay dead, murdered, a terrible end no matter what his misdeeds in life, Auguste thought soberly. Leaving a revived Jacob in reluctant charge, he rushed to find the theatre manager and, failing to do so, he used the theatre telephone to contact Scotland Yard, not far away from the Galaxy in London’s Strand. Then he braced himself to return to Jacob and the grisly scene.

They were not alone for long. His telephone call had been overheard.

“What’s all this about a murder?” The property master, Harry Waters, thundered down the stairs.

The property room for current productions was on the ground floor but Waters, new to the job, saw every storage room as being his exclusive domain, particularly Aladdin’s Cave. He was a large, sturdily built man and inclined, Auguste considered, to overestimate the importance of his job. As usual, his coat was covered with paint spatters — many, Auguste noted, as red as the blood of the late Baron Glumboots.

Waters peered over his shoulder into Aladdin’s Cave, to which Auguste was guarding the entrance. “Let’s have a look.”

“No one enters,” Auguste said firmly, “until the police arrive.”

“Darn it, it’s my props room,” Waters yelled, looming over him.

Luckily, at that moment the comedian Arthur Brown arrived, fully dressed for his role of Queen Beanbody, complete with a chestnut-coloured wig and big boots showing under his skirt.

Arthur Brown and Harry Waters did not see eye to eye — and not just because Arthur was six inches shorter than the property master. Only one thing linked them: They both detested Glumboots. Harry because, it was rumoured, Glumboots frequently hinted he knew a lot about his past life, and Arthur made no secret of the fact that Glumboots had wrecked his career. Rumours circulated about a role Arthur might have won at the prestigious Albion Theatre had it not been for Glumboots’s intervention. Unfortunately for Arthur, he was sharing a dressing room with Glumboots for this Christmas season.

“What’s going on here, mate?” Arthur said. “Heard old Glumboots had met his deserts.”

He didn’t seem unduly worried, Auguste noticed.

“You beat it, Brown,” Harry Waters snarled. “What are you doing down here?”

“Looking for you, mate. You weren’t in the props room when I got here tonight. Where were you, having a set-to with Glumboots?”

Harry’s answer to Arthur was a vicious shove, after which he promptly tugged Auguste out of the way by his collar, only for Arthur to push Auguste right back into the doorway. Harry and Arthur then set upon each other and during the ensuing fight Auguste managed to close the door and stand firmly in front of it.

Then, fluttering down the steps and clad in her Princess Petal costume, came Hetty Clogg herself. Auguste was very fond of Hetty, although she needed very little acting ability to play the part of the dewy-eyed Princess, whose talents lay in charming, not thinking. Her white dress floated around her, stage jewellery glittered upon her golden wig and around her neck and wrists, and her large blue eyes fixed themselves on Auguste.

“My darling Glumboots,” she cried to him. “Someone said he was dead.” Despite the tragic expression, there was, Auguste couldn’t help noticing, a hopeful note in her voice.

“He’s not your darling Glumboots, Hetty, love,” Arthur crowed with glee. “He was threatening to reveal your little spree with that singer last year. Your precious Earl of Otford wouldn’t like that, would he? He wouldn’t want to marry you anymore.”

Auguste stiffened. It was well known that the earl was besotted with Hetty, but that the earl’s mother, the formidable countess, did not share his rapture about his proposed bride.

Hetty looked tom between outrage and fear. “If Glumboots is dead, I never killed him. I wasn’t down here, Arthur. I only went to the props room.”

“What for?” snarled Harry Waters.

“The wigs,” she said indignantly. “I took mine and Miss Wisley’s to our dressing room, and yours and darling Glumboots’s up to your dressing room, Arthur, because neither of you was around. I was just being helpful. Miss Wisley wasn’t in our dressing room either; she’d said she was meeting darling Glumboots in the greenroom. Anyway, I couldn’t have killed Glumboots because he’s so much bigger than me and I wasn’t there anyway.”

After this volley of protest, Auguste predicted that Hetty would now faint, and so she did — albeit gracefully upon a chair. “How could you be so cruel, Arthur?” she moaned a little as no one rushed to revive her.

“Easy, darling,” Arthur chuckled. “I’m the Countess of Otford in disguise.”

And then there was another arrival, Miss Jane Wisley herself. Had she met Glumboots as arranged? Auguste wondered. Auguste and Jane did not get on, much as he admired her fine legs that made her such an excellent principal boy. They were on show too as she marched towards them, ready for her role in her pale blue satin coat.

“Jacob,” Jane announced imperiously, “to my dressing room, if you please. My wig needs curling — now.”

“Someone’s been murdered here. That’s more important than your curls,” Princess Petal moaned.

“Murder?” Jane went very white. “Who’s been murdered?”

“Darling Glumboots,” Hetty retorted — with some relish, Auguste thought.

Jane gasped. A trifle theatrically, he considered, judging by the hand clasped to her admirable chest, which was dutifully heaving under the blue satin coat. But perhaps it was genuine, as she was known to have been on very intimate terms with the late Baron Glumboots.

“That dear man,” she cried. “Oh no, it cannot be! No wonder he didn’t come to the greenroom.”

“He’d already chucked you. That’s what you told me,” Hetty said simply. “You said you’d make him pay.”

“I never said such a thing. Never.” Jane flushed. “He was the dearest man in London.”

“Didier!” A roar from the end of the passageway as Robert Archibald, the Galaxy manager, descended to the cellars. “What the dickens are you all doing down here? What’s going on? Fine thing if we can’t put a pantomime on without Scotland Yard descending on us. Inspector Egbert Rose, he says his name is. Turned up an hour ago and it’s only forty minutes to curtain up. Rose is asking for you, Didier. Your fault, is it? You pinched the Lovelet necklace?”

“A necklace?” Auguste was bewildered. The inspector had been here an hour ago? But he’d only just telephoned to Scotland Yard, and what was all this about the Lovelet necklace? That theft had taken place during the night nearly a week ago at the nearby Hotel Cecil, after Lady Lovelet had worn it to the first performance of The Princess and the Bean on Boxing Day evening.

“He’s come here to arrest you, has he?” Robert Archibald barked. “Understandable, but why’s he poking his nose in everywhere?”

“It’s usual—”

“What is usual,” Archibald roared, “is that a theatre puts on plays. Five minutes ago that inspector fellow ordered us to cancel the performance. I’ll have to give the whole audience its money back. We’re ruined. Ruined.”

“But murder must—”

“Murder?” Robert Archibald asked blankly. “What murder?”

“Baron Glumboots,” Auguste said, equally taken aback. “Mr. Fish’s body is in Aladdin’s Cave.”

“Nonsense,” Robert Archibald said impatiently. “Must be a mistake. There’s no murder. It’s theft the Yard has come here for. Stolen from the hotel, yet he has the cheek to say this theatre’s involved because no one else knew she had the necklace with her in London. It’s you he’s asking for, Didier. No murder, unless you’ve just bumped this Rose fellow off.”

Auguste took a deep breath. “There has been a murder, Mr. Archibald, and not of Inspector Rose. Look!” He opened the door to Aladdin’s Cave and Archibald peered in suspiciously.

A moment later Princess Petal relinquished her seat just in time for Robert Archibald to collapse onto it.

“What was Oscar Fish doing down here?” Inspector Egbert Rose of Scotland Yard grunted later that evening.

The performance had been cancelled, amid protests from Robert Archibald, and the earlier onlookers had been shepherded into the greenroom, normally where the cast relaxed, but today for them to undergo interrogation by Rose’s Sergeant Stitch. Thankfully, the body had now been removed, and only Auguste remained with the inspector in Aladdin’s Cave. The pleasures of the charlotte à la chantilly were not to be. He had hoped to creep away with the police surgeon, but Inspector Rose had said blandly: “Not you, Mr. Didier.”

“I do not know why he was here,” Auguste said helplessly in reply to Inspector Rose’s question. “He was not yet in costume, so he might have needed something or been searching for the property master. The props room is on the ground floor but I was told the property master wasn’t there at one point.” Auguste could not help wondering why he himself was here. Although he had helped the inspector in a previous case, that did not mean he had any desire to do so again. He was a chef, not a detective in the Criminal Investigation Department. He repressed the uncomfortable thought that he himself might be under suspicion, having arrived so promptly upon the body’s discovery.

“Coincidence,” Inspector Rose remarked, gazing round the piles of forgotten and unloved properties of all kinds, from comic masks to firkins of Dutch metal. “First someone tips the wink to me that the theft of the Lovelet necklace and others are connected with this theatre, and I’m no sooner here than there’s a dead body.”

“But no one from here would break into a room at the Cecil Hotel.” Auguste was amazed at this theory. “They are far too tired and too busy after performances to burgle hotels.”

“This isn’t the first jewellery theft. There have been others. It looks as if the villain shinned up the drainpipe and managed to reach the balcony of the dressing room next to where her ladyship was sleeping. Think of it, Mr. Didier. The Cecil’s gardens are handy for the river and so’s this theatre. The necklace could have been out of the country that night. Our Mr. Fish tumbled to what was happening and paid the price.”

“That’s possible,” Auguste agreed, “but Mr. Fish was not popular with his fellow actors nor with the stage staff and so there might be other reasons to account for his death.”

“How unpopular would that be?”

“Very unpopular. Princess Petal—”

The inspector blinked. “Who?”

“My apologies. Offstage she is Miss Hetty Clogg, who, it is said, was being blackmailed by Mr. Fish; he was threatening to reveal an unfortunate episode in her life to the Earl of Otford, whom she hopes to marry. Miss Jane Wisley too had good reason to dislike Mr. Fish, who, it seems, no longer wished to continue his relationship with her and no doubt expressed it very cruelly.”

“Unlikely either of those ladies would be jewel thieves or murderers, although Miss Wisley — if she’s the young lady in the boots — seems very sure of herself. What about the men?”

“Arthur Brown, the comedian, has apparently suffered setbacks to his career at Fish’s hands, and Harry Waters, the property master, is said to have had a more interesting background than the management was told.”

“He does indeed. He did stir for assault and theft a few years back. Would he plunge a dagger into Fish, though? And talking of daggers, any idea where that came from?”

“No, but I’ve seen several lying around here.” Auguste glanced round Aladdin’s Cave. “I would think they are very blunt, though.”

“The police surgeon said the blow had been delivered with force.”

Auguste decided not to dwell on the image that produced in his mind. “It suggests a crime committed on impulse,” he said hastily.

“Which,” Rose observed, “brings me back to my first question: What was Fish doing here? The chap who found the body had no idea, but he doesn’t work at the Galaxy, so what was he doing here?”

“Jacob collects the wigs from the previous day’s performance in the morning to be tidied and recurled in the shop at Covent Garden and leaves them in the props room near the stage-door entrance ready for the evening. Sometimes he searches for castoffs in Aladdin’s Cave.”

“Eh?” Rose looked puzzled.

“It’s the theatre’s name for this storage room,” Auguste explained. “It’s a glory hole full of items from past productions, and cast and staff can come here if they wish. It’s still odd that Baron Glumboots should have been here tonight and not yet changed for the performance.”

Rose checked his notes. “The police surgeon thought he’d been dead about an hour when he saw the body at seven-fifteen. Jacob Hunt says he came with those wigs about a quarter to six, went for a drink in the Coal Hole pub, then returned to have a look in Aladdin’s Cave and found the body about six-thirty.”

“And then I arrived.”

“Glumboots died about six-fifteen; your Hetty Clogg said that neither he nor Arthur Brown was in their dressing room when she delivered their wigs as well as her own and Jane Wisley’s — who also wasn’t there when Miss Clogg arrived. And that means your precious Princess Petal has no alibi either.”

Could the inspector really be thinking that Hetty could have committed this murder? Auguste pulled himself together. “What time did Hetty come for the wigs?”

“She told my sergeant about ten to six. When Jacob Hunt had arrived five minutes earlier to leave the wigs, Harry Waters, the props man, wasn’t in the props room and he still wasn’t there when your Princess Petal arrived, nor when Oscar Fish came marching in the stage door about six o’clock. He complained to the stage-door keeper that he couldn’t find Harry Waters or the wig and he was seen to go up to his dressing room. No more is known. Harry Waters said at first that they were all wrong and he was there at the time, but then changed his mind and said he too was in the Coal Hole pub.”

“Where Jacob Hunt would have seen him.”

“He claims not, because it’s a crowded place at that time of the evening. Now this Aladdin’s Cave, Mr. Didier, I’d like a look around. Never know, we might turn up a magic lamp. Feel like a genie, do you? Something brought that man down here and you might get a clue if you look around as well.”

“My magic is only in my kitchen,” Auguste replied cautiously.

Nevertheless, he thought, there was a kind of magic here, as they picked their way along the narrow passageway between the piles of unsorted properties. What riches might lie here, what memories that today’s horror might taint? He could see old tables laden with helmets and masks and plates of artificial food — he shuddered, then remembered that many of them would be thrown around the stage by Clown, which made the sight more bearable. There were mirrors and pictures stacked against the walls, boxes of foil decorations and stage jewellery, an old moustache carelessly tossed onto one pile, a fake ruby pendant that might have hung round Ellen Terry’s neck when she played Olivia, the dummy of a baby, and so much more, but no clue that Auguste could see.

“What better place to hide jewels like the Lovelet necklace?” Rose observed more practically. “Where to begin, though? Mr. Didier, no ideas from you? You’ve hardly won your spurs as a genie, have you?”

Magic lamps and genies indeed, Auguste thought gloomily as he made his way back to the theatre restaurant. It was gone ten o’clock now, and without a performance to provide customers he would have expected it to be empty. On the contrary, it was full with a crowd of people at the door waiting to be seated. Alas, it seemed it was not his cuisine that had brought them to the restaurant but, judging by the excited way his staff were being questioned, the rumours of murder. Did they think Jack the Ripper had chosen the Galaxy for his latest murder? he thought crossly.

The witnesses and, Auguste presumed, the suspects were still in the greenroom close to the stage, where, he was told, a hasty supper had been provided for them. Inspector Rose was now with them. Auguste’s spirits sank even lower. Inspector Rose seemed to think that he was a magician. It was true he could work magic with a bowlful of delicate truffles, champagne, and stock, but the ingredients of the bowl the inspector had handed him were beyond even Auguste’s powers: a jewellery theft and the death of an actor, murdered either for blackmailing those weaker than himself or for cruelly slighting a woman or because he had confronted the thief. These ingredients refused to turn themselves into a respectable dish, and he had no magic lamp to make them work. In short, he was no genie.

Back in the kitchen, he stared at the restaurant menu for the morrow but could not feel his usual excitement. A tarte aux pommes with the apples baked with Calvados as in Normandy and placed in a pastry case would be delicious. All the attention was on the apples, of course, and yet the pastry too played its part, despite being largely hidden. If he could turn the tart upside down, however, he would see only the pastry, although it would remain an apple tart and taste exactly the same with the same ingredients.

Perhaps he should do the same with the ingredients of this case? he thought fancifully. If Glumboots was the apple and his blackmailing, cruelty, and the jewels the pastry, what would happen if he turned it all upside down?

And at last he began to see. En avant! Forward! His excitement grew. Turning the apple tart upside down was the key. Could it be that Baron Glumboots had not confronted the thief — he was the thief? Yes, Glumboots was the apple and the jewels were the pastry. The dish was complete. He, Auguste Didier, was a genie after all, and the apple tart the magic lamp.

“No entry” Sergeant Stitch (who disliked Auguste) said with glee, barring his entry into the greenroom. “The inspector’s interviewing suspects. It’s confidential.”

“But—”

“No entry!”

Auguste glared at him. “Then I demand to be a suspect, Sergeant Stitch. I confess I was on the scene suspiciously soon after the murder of Mr. Oscar Fish. I disliked him for blackmailing Hetty Clogg. I knew where the daggers were in Aladdin’s Cave. I might have killed Baron Glumboots. Let me through,” he bellowed.

Sergeant Stitch took his revenge. Auguste was duly escorted inside with a loud announcement that Mr. Didier had confessed to the crime of murder. Auguste thought he saw the corners of the inspector’s mouth twitch, but Rose replied gravely, “Thank you, Stitch. I’ll deal with him.”

“The Lovelet necklace, Inspector,” Auguste began when Stitch had released his grip and the inspector had drawn Auguste to one side. “We speculated that Oscar Fish knew who was involved in the jewel thefts,” he continued. “But suppose it was he who organised them? He moved in high circles, knew where and what should be stolen. He could have arranged for someone else to carry out the job and bring the jewels to him for disposal elsewhere. This evening he could have been expecting the Lovelet necklace, but his accomplice betrayed him.”

Rose eyed him keenly. “Props?”

Auguste nodded.

It was a dejected group after the plates of sandwiches had been cleared. Auguste thought it a depressing sight. Hetty and Jane were still in costume and the white dress and the blue satin coat looked shabby and cheap without the stage lights on them. The wrinkled face of Arthur Brown, who was still clad in his shawl, skirt, and boots, staring out under his chestnut wig failed to look comic. Jacob was clearly deciding never to search for wigs again, Props was glaring with fury, and Robert Archibald sat grimly with them, arms folded defensively against this unexpected blow to his theatre.

“You, Miss Clogg, came down to the property room at ten to six and took several wigs back to the dressing rooms,” Inspector Rose began. “No one was there to receive them. Miss Wisley was here in the greenroom waiting in vain for Oscar Fish. Mr. Brown only arrived at the theatre at six-fifteen, in time to change for the performance, by which time Miss Clogg says she was in the dressing room. But where were you, Mr. Waters?”

He shifted nervously. “In the pub, as I told you.”

“Mr. Hunt didn’t see you.”

“Never saw him either, but I was there,” he glared.

“But one of you was with Oscar Fish in Aladdin’s Cave. Was it you, Mr. Waters, discussing your past life in Wandsworth Prison? Or you, Miss Clogg, pleading with him as he threatened you? Or you, Miss Wisley, angry at his rejection of you? Or you, Mr. Brown, eager to avenge old wounds?”

Harry Waters leapt up from his chair, turning it over in the process of making for the door. Princess Petal and Jane Wisley screamed and Arthur Brown let out a string of expletives as Sergeant Stitch came rushing in blowing his whistle. A hefty shove from Harry Waters cleared his way to the door, but Stitch was made of stern stuff and a leg quickly extended sent Waters stumbling into the sergeant’s less than loving arms.

Auguste leapt up, appalled at what was happening. The apple tarte was indeed upside down but the pastry was wrong. Props was a convenient abbreviation, but confusing. It meant both the property master and the property room. Come back, genie, he silently pleaded as Harry Waters tore himself from Sergeant Stitch’s grasp and was away before two uniformed police, summoned by the whistle, could stop him. By the time Auguste reached the door, Props was heading for the stage with everyone in the room rushing after him.

Come back, genie, Auguste commanded again, thinking feverishly. Glumboots had arrived at the theatre at just before six o’clock, but Props wasn’t there, the genie whispered to him encouragingly. The stage-door keeper had told Glumboots the wig was upstairs where he then went. Did he find it there? There was no way to be sure, but something was clearly wrong because he must have come down to Aladdin’s Cave almost immediately without changing, perhaps in the hope of finding Props down there — and perhaps the Lovelet necklace. But there he met his death. The genie seemed to be grinning — and no wonder, because now Auguste understood.

“Inspector,” he yelled dashing after the group now disappearing onto the darkened stage.

Rose stopped as Auguste reached the stage. “What?”

“We have it wrong,” Auguste panted. “Think of properties, not Props.”

At that moment, there was a scream from Hetty Clogg followed by gasps as a dark figure could be seen climbing up the ladder into the flies amid a mass of ropes and pulleys.

“Come on down!” roared the inspector.

A pause and Jacob Hunt climbed slowly down towards him.

“Very nice piece of sole,” Inspector Rose said approvingly to Auguste, after a late supper in the restaurant. “That forcemeat wrapped the fish up nicely. Like this case, thanks to you. What brought you to our friend Hunt?”

“It was simple,” Auguste replied modestly. “The wig made a splendid place to hide a jewel, because no one would examine it closely, except the person for whom it was intended. They are very intricately made with springs, gauze, and hair, and burying the jewels in Glumboots’s wig was an excellent way to transport them after Hunt had stolen them. Hunt’s firm works for a lot of theatres under contract and you will probably find that Oscar Fish plays in several of them. But tonight the plan went wrong somehow.”

“I can tell you how,” Inspector Rose replied. “Hunt’s told us the lot now. When Fish found his wig in the dressing room, the necklace wasn’t there. That’s why he rushed to see if Hunt was still in the theatre. He was. He had come back from the pub earlier than he had claimed, and Fish accused him of trying to cheat him. When Hunt protested and said the necklace had been there, Fish threatened to tell the Yard that he was the thief. Hunt lost control — who would believe him over the word of the great Oscar Fish?” Rose paused. “Time for me to call on the genie again, Mr. Didier. Ready?”

“Perhaps,” Auguste said cautiously.

“Where did the Lovelet necklace go?”

Auguste stared at him aghast. He had forgotten that small detail. “I don’t know.”

“Come on. Genies always know.”

Auguste cast a desperate eye around the restaurant for inspiration. His eye fell on Princess Petal, still clad in her floating white costume dress as she dined with the Earl of Otford. Auguste gazed at this peaceful spectacle and studied her more closely.

Could it be...? Could it possibly be...?

He cleared his throat. “Shall we ask Princess Petal, Inspector?” he suggested diffidently.

Inspector Rose followed his discreetly pointing finger and they went over to her table together.

Hetty turned to them in delight. “The earl and I are betrothed,” she told them happily.

Auguste left it to the inspector to speak. “And this lovely sparkling necklace round your neck is an engagement present?” he asked politely.

Hetty giggled. “Oh no. This is just stage jewellery. I found it lying on the floor after I’d delivered those wigs to darling Glumboots’s dressing room. It’s so much prettier than the ones we usually wear. Don’t you think so, Auguste?”

“I do, Hetty,” he replied. “Very much prettier, but alas...”