A Chorus of Detectives (31 page)

They all took turns telling him what they'd done and what they'd found out and why they had settled on the assistant manager and the chorus master. O'Halloran was surprised to learn that Ziegler had once sung in the chorus of another opera company; that was something his own investigation had not turned up. But on reflection he decided it meant little; Quaglia was still his candidate.

“Eh, I think of something,” Scotti said. “If we try Thursday—
Tosca
, it is not big chorus opera.”

“That's right,” Gerry added, surprised she hadn't thought of it herself. “Only a limited chorus, and most of them go home after the first act.”

“
Most
of them?” O'Halloran asked.

“A few appear in Act Two,” Scotti explained. “And four or five men are needed to play prison guards in last act.”

“That's good! The fewer people around, the better. But there'll still be four or five choristers around at the end of the opera?”

“Six, precisely,” Gatti said.

O'Halloran leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, thinking. He'd long since come to the conclusion on his own that the only way to stop the killer was to catch him in the process of attacking a victim; normal investigatory techniques weren't going to reveal the name of the killer in this case. But O'Halloran hadn't been able to think of how to go about it without using a chorister as bait; he couldn't endanger a civilian's life, even though doing so might save other lives. But the Met people's plan had possibilities. Spread the story that one of the choristers was separated from his bodyguard and then substitute one of his own men for the ostensibly missing singer—it just might work.

Emmy got tired of waiting and said, “Well, Captain? Are you with us?”

O'Halloran wished she hadn't put it just that way. “
If
we can work out a feasible plan, yes.” He waited until the cheering had stopped and then went on, “I want the men who'll be taking the risks in on the planning. I want to make sure that every one of
you
knows exactly what you're doing. I want to see not only that the danger is minimal but also that the only ones exposed to it are police.”

“You want a lot, Captain,” Emmy complained. “But I for one don't mind letting someone else take all the risks.”

“We understand the kind of man we hunt, Captain,” Gatti said a little more tactfully. “I know you sometimes think we are crazy people—but we are not foolish.”

Crazy but not foolish.
A man could do worse
, O'Halloran thought. “All right. Wait here until I get my men—and then we'll get to work on the plan. We've got a big job cut out for us.”

“What is going on?” Beniamino Gigli demanded. “I know something is going on. I insist you tell me what is going on!”

“Why, whatever do you mean?” Geraldine Farrar said uneasily.

“You and Gatti-Casazza and Scotti, you whisper together and you exchange the
looks
that say you know something I do not know.”

“Oh dear. We'll have to put a stop to
that
.”

“And Emmy Destinn and Pasquale Amato—why are they here? They do not sing tonight.”

“They frequently listen from backstage.”

“But not tonight,” Gigli growled. “They too whisper and say I-know-something with the eyes. You tell me now what happens.”

Gerry went
tsk-tsk
. “It's supposed to be a secret. If I tell you, will you promise not to repeat it to anyone?”

“What is it?”

“Do you give me your word?”

“
Sì, sì
—I promise. Now tell me.”

“Well, we're planning a surprise party for Mr. Setti.”

He blinked. “Oh, is that all.” He turned on his heel and marched away.

Gerry let out a big breath. Gigli was singing the tenor role in
Tosca
, and he'd been in the opera house only fifteen minutes before he caught on to the fact that something was afoot. She'd have to warn the others.

She found Gatti-Casazza and Pasquale Amato on the stage level; their heads were together and they were whispering up a storm. “Oh,
there
you are!” Gerry trilled and sailed up to them with what she hoped was an open and honest demeanor. Quickly she related her little interchange with Gigli and warned them they were giving the game away. Then she laughed gaily. “Laugh!” she commanded between clenched teeth. Amato managed a convincing laugh, but the best Gatti could come up with was a
humph-humph
sound. Gerry glanced around, but no one seemed to be paying more attention than usual.

“Perhaps is best we do not talk at all,” Amato said. “Or at least no more than necessary.”

“Pasquale, will you tell the others?” Gerry asked. “I've got to start getting ready.”

They separated. Amato found Emmy and Scotti and filled them in, and thereafter the five conspirators avoided one another with a determination that was, if anything, more obvious than their earlier huddling together.

A polite knock sounded on Gerry's dressing-room door. It was Alessandro Quaglia, up to his old trick of imposing last-minute instructions on the soloists. His bodyguard peeked over his shoulder. “Tonight we take your entrance a little faster—only
un poco
,” Quaglia said. “The last
Tosca
, the entrance is too slow. It drags.”

“There was nothing wrong with the entrance,” she said sharply. Why was he always meddling with tempi? She suspected it was simply the easiest way he could think of to bedevil the singers.

“But you wish dynamic entrance, do you not? Last time is …” He waggled a hand to show lack of enchantment.

“Maestro Quaglia, could I persuade you to go over to the men's side and pester them instead of me? I'm really not up to this tonight.”

Quaglia's face darkened; he left without a word.
Now that wasn't very gracious of me
, Gerry told herself. Quaglia might be O'Halloran's suspect, but he certainly wasn't
hers
. “Maestro!” she called after him. “Get him, please, will you?” she asked the bodyguard.

Quaglia came back. “Yes?”

“Very well, we'll do it your way, if you're convinced the entrance is draggy. Only not
too
fast—I want to be able to get the words out!”

He smiled at her. “Do not worry, Miss Farrar. We find tempo that pleases both of us.”

Quaglia then followed Gerry's suggestion and went over to the men's side; he informed Gigli of Tosca's speeded-up entrance, since the tenor was on stage at the time. “Also, I feel we rush the first-act aria, do you not agree?”

“No, I do not agree. I sing it as I sing in rehearsal.”

“Come now, Mr. Gigli, surely you have the breath to hold the notes a little longer?”

Gigli turned red. “I have breath enough to blow you out of dressing room!” he shouted. “Always you meddle—you speed Gerry up, you slow me down! Why you make these changes
now
?”

“Because first act is too much the same!” Quaglia shouted back. “We need to vary tempi!
She
agrees—why can you not be like her?”

Gigli laughed. “That is not what you say last week!”

Quaglia muttered something and left the tenor alone, both of them wondering exactly how fast or how slow the aria would be sung that evening. On the steps down to the stage level, the Maestro and his bodyguard ran into Edward Ziegler and
his
bodyguard. Ziegler took one look at Quaglia's face and asked what the matter was. “Eh, Gigli,” Quaglia said. “He is worse prima donna than Farrar!”

“Impossible,” Ziegler said, straight-faced.

“Tonight she is angel.
He
is devil.”

Ziegler didn't offer to have a word with the tenor, knowing better than to get mixed up in musical disputes. “Is Mr. Scotti up here?”

Quaglia didn't know. He and his shadow continued on down while Ziegler made for Scotti's dressing room. The baritone was warming up while he applied his make-up.

“Mr. Scotti? Forgive me for interrupting,” Ziegler said, “but there's been a change. The chorister you have some stage business with in the second act—it'll be a different man tonight, and he's never rehearsed the scene. He knows what to do, but you might have to do a little last-minute adjusting.”

Scotti found this only mildly interesting. “What happens to regular chorister? Is he ill?”

“He showed up drunk. I fired him.”

The baritone paused in the act of lining his left eye. “That seems drastic. Perhaps he sings better when he is drunk.”

“Not likely,” Ziegler said dryly.

Scotti turned from his mirror to face Ziegler directly. “Why do
you
fire this drunken chorister? Is that not Mr. Setti's job?”

“Not this time. Well, now that you know about it, I'll leave you to get on with your preparations.” He left. The bodyguard gave Scotti a stern look and followed his employer.

Scotti turned back to his mirror, where one made-up eye and one natural one stared out at him. He sat thinking a moment about what Ziegler had just told him.

The other eye could wait. He got up and hurried down the stairs to the stage level. One of the stagehands pointed him toward where Setti stood talking to two of the choristers, their three bodyguards only a few feet away. Scotti motioned him aside.

“Yes, Mr. Scotti? Is something wrong?” the chorus master asked.

“Mr. Ziegler, he tells me of chorister who shows up drunk.”

“Eh, sad business. He is no longer with us.”

“But why does Mr. Ziegler fire him and not you?”

Setti shrugged. “We have trouble with this man before. I tell Mr. Ziegler, give him one more chance. If he comes in drunk again, you can fire him. Why you ask? He is friend of yours?”

Scotti grinned sheepishly. “I do not even know his name.”

“Mr. Scotti, do you know you are wearing only one eye?”

“My eye!” Scotti slapped his hand over the wrong one and hurried away.

Setti was wondering what that was all about when he caught sight of Emmy Destinn peeking around a stage curtain. “Do you hear?” he asked her.

“I do not eavesdrop,” she replied indignantly.

“Of course not,” he said, “but I wonder why Mr. Scotti takes such interest in our departed chorister.”

“He said he didn't even know his name.”

“Yet he wants to know why he is fired.”

That's not what he asked you
, Emmy thought. “I suppose we're all concerned about anything that involves choristers these days,” she said. “I shouldn't worry about it if I were you, Mr. Setti.” She drifted away casually.

As soon as Setti turned back to the choristers, Emmy made a beeline for Gatti-Casazza. When she'd gotten his attention by poking a finger between his shoulder blades, he muttered, “We are not to talk together, do you not remember?”

“Do you know anything about the chorister who was just replaced?” she asked, ignoring his objection.

Quickly he grabbed her elbow and steered her five feet away, although no one was within hearing distance. “He is not really dismissed, but Setti and Ziegler do not know that. The chorister, he only pretends to be drunk.”

“But why?”

“Because I ask him. It is Captain O'Halloran's idea. The chorister who replaces the ‘drunk' one, he looks very much like Captain O'Halloran's man—the one who is ‘bait'? The captain says substitution will be easier, with this other chorister.”

“Ah! I see.” Then she scowled. “Why did O'Halloran tell you and not the rest of us?”

Gatti made a what-can-I-say gesture. “Perhaps he thinks the fewer who know, the better? I do not know. Eh, it is almost time for curtain.” He looked around; Gigli was in place. “Where is Gerry?”

“Here she is.”

Gerry was just then coming down the stairs. She shot a dark look toward Gatti and Emmy when she saw them huddling together; they got the message and edged away from each other. Satisfied, Gerry moved to her place by the upstage entrance, passing Quaglia and his bodyguard on the way.

They were having an argument. “I've got to be in the orchestra pit,” the bodyguard stated flatly. “How can I protect you from back here?”

“No, no—
impossibile
. You stay backstage.”

“I don't like it, the way you'll be exposed out there—your back to the audience and all. Any one of 'em could take a shot at you!”

“It is not
audience
I worry about,
imbecille
!
”

Gerry tuned them out; she tuned out everything except the opera that was about to start. The men did most of the work in the first act, which was fairly evenly divided between them. The tenor's idealism would gradually yield to the baritone's villainy, with the soprano acting as the bridge between them. But Act II—ah, Act II was
hers
.

The opera started. Before long Gigli launched into his aria, about half a beat ahead of the orchestra. But they got together after only a few more phrases and finished in fine style. Gigli sang a short scene with one of the supporting soloists and then her cue came.
Faster
, Gerry reminded herself and made her entrance—only to find that Quaglia was conducting at exactly the same tempo they'd rehearsed.
Blast the man
.

She'd been on stage only a few minutes when she looked into the orchestra pit and saw the back of somebody's head, not what one usually saw when looking down from the stage. A man was sitting in a chair pushed right up against the front of the stage, facing out toward the audience. He was not wearing evening attire nor was he holding a musical instrument. Gerry stared at the man's bald spot and realized Quaglia's bodyguard had gotten his own way.

She finished her duet with Gigli and left the stage. Scotti was standing there, waiting to make his entrance. She blew him a kiss and hurried over to where her maid was holding make-up and mirror; Gerry had to go back on again shortly. The choristers were gathering in place, with Setti fussing over them. Everything was normal.