You're playing the corpse. You have hiccups.
Three ways to save the show from under a table.
Your cue. Stay down.
Choose how to save the show.
Five minutes to the bow
“The killer can be certain of one thing,” says the inspector. “This man will never make another sound.”
You hiccup.
Until tonight, the dead banker was considered the easiest part in your theatre. They found you under the table at the end of Act Two. All you have to do now is lie still for five minutes while the inspector exposes the maid.
The inspector is played by Paul, who helped you tie your tie before the show. He appears to regret it.
The audience is quiet. You feel another hiccup coming.
Behind your head is an old telephone. It isn't connected to anything, but there is a button underneath that rings its bell. To your right stands a fake fireplace with a clock. Beside it is a full-length portrait of the earl, painted on a secret door. The real earl is supposed to emerge through it at the end. The earl is played by the caretaker. You last saw him holding a sandwich.
Rita, the stage manager, is watching through a gap in the wings. Before the show, she said, “If you really need help, raise your hand. I'll stop.”
The inspector takes another step towards you.
“And only the clock can tell us—”
Now.
On the line
You press the button at the exact moment you hiccup.
The bell rings long and desperately. The inspector jumps, along with the front row.
Paul picks up the receiver. The telephone was supposed to ring five pages ago, bringing news of the earl's death. The earl is now alive, behind the portrait, and clearly listening.
“Hello?” says the inspector.
You hiccup again. He presses the receiver to his ear.
“You're breaking up.”
The cord runs from the receiver to the telephone beside your face. Paul looks at the cord. At you. At the maid, who has half a page of confession ready to go.
Then he covers the mouthpiece and whispers, almost inaudibly:
“Can you stand?”
He keeps his hand over the receiver, as though waiting for an answer from another town.
Ending: a living witness
“Stay on the line,” says the inspector.
He gives you the receiver, puts the telephone on the table, takes your elbow and helps you out.
The maid looks more horrified than she did at any rehearsal.
“But I—”
“You saw him dead,” Paul says quickly. “As we all did. That is precisely what he intended.”
You are standing centre stage, in chalk-white makeup, holding a telephone receiver. Laughter starts in the back row.
“The banker faked his own death,” the inspector announces. “Debts, forged documents—”
You hiccup.
“And very poor nerves.”
The portrait swings open. The caretaker emerges carrying the envelope intended for the actual ending. He has managed to hide his sandwich.
“The insurance policy!” Paul says, with relief.
The envelope contains the costume-hire invoice. You recognise the red stamp.
“I'd like that entered in evidence,” you say.
Paul produces the handcuffs. They were meant for the maid. She hands him the little key, looks you straight in the eye and says:
“Life. No parole.”
After the bow, she takes the receiver from you.
“Tomorrow, you iron all the aprons.”
The clock speaks
You knock on the side of the fireplace with your heel. It comes out louder than the hiccup.
The inspector turns towards the clock.
“Exactly. It stopped at a quarter past eight.”
Another hiccup. Another knock.
Paul is silent. The clock is painted on plywood. So are the hands.
“And now,” he says carefully, “it's going again.”
There is a brief rustle behind the portrait. The caretaker is unwrapping his sandwich. His entrance is two pages away, which, by his reckoning, gives him time.
The inspector bends towards the fireplace and taps it with one finger. Now the audience knows where to listen. Another hiccup from under the table will ruin everything.
At floor level, you can see the edge of the portrait door. A little magnet holds it shut. You could reach it with your heel.
Ending: the secret door
The door opens.
The earl is standing behind it. Envelope in one hand. Sandwich in the other. He has time to finish chewing, but not to pretend that this was the plan.
“Aha,” says the inspector.
The maid steps forward.
“But you're not supposed to come out until after my—”
She stops.
Paul turns slowly towards her.
“After your what?”
Someone near the front says a very quiet “Oh.”
The maid looks at the open portrait. At the earl. At the thoroughly living heel sticking out from under the dead man.
Then she lifts her chin.
“After my confession.”
She delivers the remaining half-page straight into the inspector's face. She doesn't retreat or look for a prompt. Even you stop monitoring your hiccups. She has never been this good.
As the handcuffs click shut, the caretaker notices your foot. He discreetly pushes it back under the table with his walking stick. A second later, half a sandwich descends into the darkness beside you.
The curtain closes.
You sit up. The maid demands her key back. Paul wipes his forehead with his tie.
“What's in it?” you whisper to the caretaker.
“An alibi.”
A hand under the table
You raise your hand.
Paul looks at it. At Rita. He says nothing.
Rita closes the curtain.
A few people start clapping, assuming that was an unexpectedly short ending. Then they stop.
You sit up on the floor. Someone coughs on the other side of the cloth. You hear a programme being folded.
“Sorry,” you say.
Rita puts a glass of water beside you.
“What for? You gave the signal.”
She waits until you have picked up the glass.
“Shall I tell them there's a technical problem?”
You look at the painted clock. The disconnected telephone. Paul, who has sat down beside you in the inspector's trousers.
The caretaker appears behind the portrait.
“Am I on?”
Paul puts his face in his hands. Behind them, he is laughing.
On the other side of the curtain, they are still waiting.
Ending: five more minutes
Rita steps in front of the curtain.
“Our dead man has hiccups. We'll be back in a moment.”
The audience laughs. It isn't the sound you were afraid of. It travels gradually along the rows, and someone right at the back claps once.
A minute later, you are ready to crawl under the table again. You put the glass behind a table leg, out of sight.
The curtain opens.
Paul is standing over you. Rita whispers the last line before the interruption. He hears it. But he says something else.
“I must ask the witness to remain calm.”
The audience laughs. You don't move.
Paul explains about the clock. The earl enters on cue, without his sandwich. The maid confesses, and this time nobody interrupts her. Not even you.
Before the bow, you reach for the glass. Paul notices and kneels.
On stage, the inspector hands the dead man a glass of water.
Then they both get up.