‘Thank you,’ Alleyn said, shutting his watch. ‘Fifty seconds. Will you all come on again, if you please?’

When they had assembled in their old positions, he said: ‘Did anyone notice Mr Poole as he waited by the door for his re-entry?’

‘The door’s recessed,’ Poole said. ‘I was more or less screened.’

‘Someone off-stage may have noticed, however.’ He looked from Darcey to Percival.

‘We went straight to our rooms,’ said Parry.

‘Together?’

‘I was first. Miss Tarne was in the entrance to the passage and I spoke to her for a moment. J.G. followed me, I think.’

‘Do you remember this, Miss Tarne?’

It had been at the time when Martyn had begun to come back to earth. It was like a recollection from a dream. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I remember. They both spoke to me.’

‘And went on down the passage?’

‘Yes.’

‘To be followed in a short time by yourself and Mr Bennington?’

‘Yes.’

‘And then Mr Doré joined you and you went to your rooms?’

‘Yes.’

‘So that after Mr Bennington had gone to his room, you, Mr Percival, were in your dressing-room which is next door to his, Mr Darcey was in his room which is on the far side of Mr Percival’s and Miss Tarne was in her room—or more correctly, perhaps, Miss Gainsford’s—with Mr Doré, who joined her there after looking in on Mr Bennington. Right?’

They murmured an uneasy assent.

‘How long were you all in these rooms?’

Jacko said: ‘I believe I have said I adjusted this infant’s make-up and returned with her to the stage.’

‘I think,’ said Martyn, ‘that the other two went out to the stage before we did. I remember hearing them go up the passage together. That was before the call for the final curtain. We went out after the call, didn’t we, Jacko?’

‘Certainly, my infant. And by that time you were a little more awake, isn’t it? The pink clouds had receded a certain distance?’

Martyn nodded, feeling foolish. Poole came behind her and rested his hands on her shoulders. ‘So there would appear at least to be an alibi for the Infant Phenomenon,’ he said. It was the most natural and inevitable thing in the world for her to lean back. His hands moved to her arms and he held her to him for an uncharted second while a spring of well-being broke over her astounded heart.

Alleyn looked from her face to Poole’s and she guessed that he wondered about their likeness to each other. Poole, answering her thoughts and Alleyn’s unspoken question, said: ‘We are remotely related, but I am not allowed to mention it. She’s ashamed of the connection.’

‘That’s unlucky,’ Alleyn said with a smile, ‘since it declares itself so unequivocally.’

Gay Gainsford said loudly to Darcey: ‘Do you suppose, darling, they’d let me get my cigarettes?’