“I don’t think so,” Carson told him, “else they would have had Christine ready when Nora’s cue came. But I haven’t had time to make any inquiries. I’ll see if Celia Moore knows anything. She shares Nora’s dressing-room. She was with Nora when I saw her last.” He turned away alertly and surveyed the backstage turmoil, then began working his way toward a group near the electrician’s booth.
Shayne followed him, holding Phyllis’s arm. “Be easy on Carson, angel. He has taken a stiff jolt tonight and you can’t blame him for being edgy.”
“That doesn’t justify his ugly insinuations against you. He talked as if you’d been hired as his wife’s bodyguard.”
Shayne laughed easily. “I’ve got a tough hide.”
He saw Carson drawing a middle-aged woman aside and recognized her as the woman they had encountered in Jasper Windrow’s store that afternoon. Her dark hair was parted in the middle and drawn back smoothly in a knot at the nape of her neck. Pressing through the crowd, Shayne heard her say:
“No, Frank. Nora didn’t say a word to me.” There was a look of deep concern in her eyes and her rich voice throbbed with pity. “Poor kid. I didn’t even know anything about her father until the end of the first act.”
“Did she seem terribly upset?” Shayne asked as he reached them.
Celia Moore turned brilliant hazel eyes on him, shaking her head. “Not that I noticed. But Nora is a trouper. God knows she must have been hit hard to let Christine horn in — the way they hated each other’s guts.” Her last words were spoken absently. Her eyes had narrowed upon Shayne’s angular face. “Sa-ay, you’re the lug who almost mixed in with my boy friend this afternoon. I thought Jasper was going to take a swing at you.” She chuckled in a delightful baritone.
Shayne nodded impatiently. “The name is Shayne. Now, about Nora — didn’t she give you any intimation that she might not go on?”
“Not a single damn’ intimation. She was putting on her make-up when I left her in the dressing-room.” Celia Moore pursed her lips and glanced speculatively at Frank Carson. “I don’t know a thing about it,” she ended briskly, and laid an apologetic and slightly damp palm on Shayne’s coat sleeve. She looked at him coyly and said, “You’ll have to excuse me now. There’s a gentleman out there somewhere who’s wondering what the hell’s become of me.”