[Celebrity Murder Case 07] - The Marlene Dietrich Muder Case

by George Baxt

  Monte Trevor said to Marlene, “Lewis Tate. Dead. How tragic.”

  Marlene blew a perfect smoke ring and said, “For some people death isn’t the tragedy. It’s life that’s the tragedy.”

  Trevor asked, “Nietzsche?”

  “Dietrich.” She moved away in search of a telephone and found one in the adjoining study.

  Anna May Wong, wearing a traditional Chinese kimono, sat at a desk sipping tea, studying the eight charts that were spread out before her. She and the kimono were two of the few Oriental items in the apartment. Outside of family portraits and mementos scattered about on tables and shelves and sideboards, the apartment itself was predominantly art deco. Much of the furnishings the actress had acquired when traveling and working abroad. She had filmed in England, Germany, and France, where she was a great favorite. There she was an interesting exotic, whereas in her own country, although the only Chinese actress ever to attain recognition, she was relegated to playing mysterious women in thrillers or cold-blooded killers. She had worked steadily until the past year, and through thrift and excellent financial advice was comfortably well off. She longed to get back before the camera, but at the moment she had no prospects. So she welcomed the opportunity to decipher Mai Mai’s charts. She was working on Dorothy di Frasso’s horoscope when the phone rang. It was Marlene.

  “Why don’t you take a break and come to Ramon’s party?”

  “I’m sure I’m not missing a thing.”

  “You’re missing Tallulah Bankhead.”

  “I’m not missing a thing.”

  Marlene laughed. “Actually, she’s outrageous, but less than usual. In fact, she’s rather subdued, like the aftermath of a hurricane. How’s it coming?”

  “I’ve got Dorothy di Frasso’s in front of me.”

  “Anything revealing?”

  “Listen to this prediction Mai Mai made. ‘You will never be in want. The Lord will provide. And if he doesn’t, your ex-husband will.” Mai Mai specialized in giving care and comfort to abandoned wives, ex-lovers, and stray cats. Actually, though, there’s something I think a bit out of the ordinary. Here and there certain words are underlined, but for the life of me I can’t see why Mai Mai thought them significant. I checked the other horoscopes and they too have underlined words, but they tell me nothing.”

  Marlene was thinking. “Tell me some of the words.”

  “Believe me, Marlene, they are nothing special.”

  “Name a few.”

  “There’s ‘forever’ and here’s ‘worship’ and ‘states’ and ‘squad.’ ”

  “‘Squad’? You’re sure it isn’t ‘squid.’ Mai Mai adored cooking.”

  “I know that. No. It’s ‘squad.’ But I’ll double-check. Chinese is so complicated it might turn out to be ‘squash.’ Where can I find you tomorrow if I need you?”

  “I’m at Paramount most of the day. Raymond’s test. With Joe directing, it’s bound to be an all-day session. In fact, I’m positive it will be and he’ll work me until I’m ready to drop. He’s furious I didn’t dance attendance on him at my party.”

  “Wasn’t he aware there was a murder?”

  “Yes and he’ll never forgive Mai Mai for stealing the spotlight. Don’t stay up late.”

  “If I can’t reach you tomorrow, what about Wednesday?” Marlene told her about Lewis Tate’s suicide and the funeral. Anna May had worked with him in an adventure story, Bound East for Shanghai. “I’m coming to the funeral. I want to pay my respects. Hanging. He deserved better then that.”

  “Amen to that. Good night, darling.”

  Anna May arose and turned on the radio. She fiddled with the dial until she found a program of symphonic music. She entered her bedroom. In one of its three closets she found a cardboard box that contained photographs and stills representative of her career. She rummaged about and found what she was looking for. Lewis Tate holding her in his arms unaware of an Oriental villain lurking behind them. Written in ink at the bottom, she read, ‘Why doesn’t he mind his own damn business. I hope I go on ravishing your lovely self into eternity. I adore you. Lewis.’ He had indeed ravished her, but not into eternity. A lovely redheaded ingenue had diverted his attention and she became his seventh wife. Anna May tried to remember her name. Minnie? Miriam? Melissa? Not important anymore. It had been important once and she brought her broken heart to Mai Mai in search of one of her miraculous cures. And Mai Mai waved the redhead aside with the prediction she would die of a social disease in a Honolulu brothel. Lewis Tate. Dead by hanging. She carried the photo back to the desk and placed it in a bottom drawer, where from time to time she would look at it and remind herself she’d been very much loved, if only briefly.

  Margaret Dumont, who had won instant recognition in films as the tall, dignified, and majestic foil to the Marx Brothers, was inconsolable about something and Tallulah was trying to offer her sympathy and bourbon.

  “Anything I can do, Tallulah?” asked Marlene.

  “I don’t think so, dahling. Margaret’s come to Hollywood and found religion. One of those sects that seem to proliferate in this deadly climate. But now her group’s been set adrift with the sudden death of their spiritual teacher, and dahling, a religious sect without a leader is a non-prophet organization. There there, Maggie dahling, don’t take it so hard, have a sip of bourbon.”

  “Nothing to drink, Tallulah, I’ll be all right. If only Mai Mai Chu hadn’t been killed. Whenever I was under stress, she was always such a comfort.” She was suddenly and mercurially no longer feeling distressed. “Marlene, is the gossip true?”

  “Which gossip?”

  “That you and Anna May Wong know who killed Mai Mai but you’re not naming the killer until you have concrete evidence?” Marlene wondered if there was anyone in the room who hadn’t heard her. Hers was a voice that could penetrate lead. Herb Villon rode to Marlene’s assistance on an invisible white steed with an invincible lance in his hand prepared to joust an adversary.

  “Forgive me, Miss Dumont, but Marlene and Anna May are as much in the dark to the killer’s identity as I am.”

  “Indeed?” She drew herself up to her full height and produced a lorgnette, through which she studied Herb Villon and quite obviously liked what she saw. “And who are you?”

  “Herbert Villon, the detective in charge of the case.”

  “How thrilling,” she gurgled, “you’re my first detective and it’s such a pleasant experience. Do you know my friend Hazel Dickson?”

  Villon said affably, “We’ve been introduced.”

  “Then you must be her inside dope.”

  “Oh, God,” groaned Tallulah to Marlene, who now held a much-needed glass of champagne.

  Dumont charged onward like a locomotive out of control. “Hazel says she’s positive you think Marlene and Anna May know the killer’s identity and it’s all in some of Mai Mai’s horoscope charts. And didn’t the waiter who was stabbed in the back have something to do with it?”

  “I don’t really know,” said Villon. “He was dead when I found his body so there wasn’t much he could contribute to the case other than some added mystery.”

  “But Hazel told me you and Marlene questioned him in her kitchen. You must have learned something then.”

  “Yes, we did,” said Villon, treasuring the look of expectancy on the face of the actress who was about to be deeply disappointed. “We learned he didn’t know anything about the killing, or so he professed. At the time, I believed him when he said he didn’t know the glass of champagne he was bringing to Madam Chu contained the poison.”

  “You have to be very careful with waiters,” warned Miss Dumont. “Waiters can be terribly two-faced, on one hand recommending the shrimps remoulade and on the other pushing the moules marinieres, which I loathe.”

  Marlene said to Villon, “Herb, here comes Hazel. She’s escaped.”

  Villon excused himself and went to Hazel’s aid.

  “She looks a bit done in,” commented Miss Dumont, “as thoug
h she herselfs been poisoned.”

  “If she hasn’t,” said Marlene, “she may soon be.”

  “I feel terrible,” moaned Hazel as Villon led her to the veranda for some fresh air.

  “What can I get you?” asked Herb. “You’ve already got a big mouth.”

  “Don’t be mean. I feel awful. Why is everybody looking at me?”

  “Your old buddy Margaret Dumont just got through telling the whole room that you told her Marlene and Anna May know the killer’s identity.”

  “I did no such thing. You don’t believe me. I can see it in your face. A puritan father ready to smack Hester Prynne with the Scarlet A. Let go of my arm. I don’t want to go outside. I want a drink.”

  “I don’t think that’s a very good idea.”

  “I don’t give a damn what you think. And Dumont isn’t my old buddy. I don’t have any old buddies. I don’t have any young buddies either, come to think of it. If Dietrich doesn’t wipe that smile off her face I’m going to wipe it off for her.” Adela Rogers St. John said to Marlene, “Our Hazel now resembles a basilisk.”

  “A what?”

  “A basilisk, a fabulous creature with death-dealing eyes and horrible breath.”

  “Why Adela, dahling,” interjected Tallulah, “I didn’t know you knew Jeanette MacDonald.”

  Monte Trevor’s impending departure had put Ramon Novarro in mind of one of the late Sarah Bernhardt’s interminable farewell tours. Trevor was insisting, “But Ramon, you must seriously consider doing films on your native soil. You could become the emperor of Mexican film production. And wouldn’t Dolores Del Rio complement you regally as the empress? I will be traveling to Mexico soon to visit some friends in high places and I wish I had your permission to tell them you’re interested in returning there.”

  Marlene and Adela, standing nearby with Raymond Souvir and Dong See, exchanged glances.

  Ramon was telling Monte Trevor, “Despite the rumors circulating that I’m about to be professionally beheaded by MGM, I have an ironclad contract that has another three years to go, so unless they pay me off with hundreds of thousands of dollars, I will not be available in the near future. And Metro does not part with huge sums of cash, even in an emergency. It was so nice of you to come to my party. Goodbye.” Novarro left Trevor in the isolation of his extended farewell, and somewhat embarrassed, Trevor waved at Marlene and the others and beat a hasty retreat.

  Tallulah was saying to Raymond Souvir, “If you like, dahling, I can coach you in your lines tonight. I’ve got no immediate plans and I’d just adore coaching you, dahling.”

  Souvir’s eyes beseeched Dong See’s help but the violinist’s mind was elsewhere. Dong See saw the Countess di Frasso materialize at the other end of the room, after what seemed like a prolonged absence. With her was Brunhilde Messer.

  Marlene said, “I didn’t see her come in.”

  “See who?” asked Adela.

  “The tall woman with di Frasso.” She explained Brunhilde Messer.

  “She looks like a national monument,” said Adela.

  “She intends to be. I didn’t know she knew Ramon.”

  “In this town you don’t have to know the host to crash a party,” said Adela. “When I was first beginning as a reporter, I’d go to some shindig at Harold Lloyd’s and just say I was joining Charlie Chaplin. Since I was only sixteen at the time and you know Chaplin’s reputation for leching after girls fresh in their teens, it looked obvious that Charlie was somewhere in the house panting for my presence. Dong See’s beaten you to Brunhilde.”

  “I don’t want to get to her.”

  “She has Herb Villon fascinated. He’s over there at the bar with Hazel Dickson, who’s staring daggers at us. What could be eating her?”

  “Me. She’s jealous. She thinks I’m of special interest to her boyfriend.”

  “Well, aren’t you?”

  “Not the way she thinks. Poor Raymond Souvir. He looks as though he wishes the floor would open and swallow him. Aha! Brunhilde is waving him over. I don’t believe she hasn’t seen me.”

  “She has,” said Adela, “about the time you first saw her. She was looking at us then. Very slyly, mind you, but I caught it.”

  “Let’s join Herb and Hazel,” suggested Marlene.

  “Is it safe?”

  “Adela, there’s a special God who looks after me. I will always be safe.”

  “Such self-confidence in the face of Margaret Dumont practically declaring you and Anna May the most likely targets for murder by the killer. After all, declaring that you might know his identity.”

  “Why not her identity?”

  “Of course. Di Frasso and the Russian lady.”

  “Natalia Ivanov.”

  “That’s it. Ivanov.”

  “And Brunhilde Messer.”

  “She told you she got in late yesterday, too late to know about your party.”

  “That’s what she said, but it doesn’t have to be so.”

  “Marlene, if she had been at your house last night, you would have seen her.”

  “Not necessarily. I didn’t join my guests until almost eleven o’clock.”

  “Of course. Outfoxing Connie Bennett.”

  “By the time I came downstairs, there was such a crush of party guests, it was impossible to know who was there unless they sought me out. When Mai Mai Chu got on the bandstand, the crush was even worse because those who were in the other rooms and on the other floors or outside in the garden came hurrying in to see Mai Mai do her bit. After Mai Mai’s murder, I must admit most everyone was well behaved, but there were many who just went right on partying whether or not they realized they’d witnessed a murder.”

  “That’s my Hollywood,” said Adela. “The natives are always restless and self-occupied.”

  “Then I was with Herb and Anna and that adorable Mallory boy in the study for quite some time, and although for most of that period my guests were forbidden to leave, Herb soon relaxed the security and I’m sure several left almost immediately. In fact, I saw very few of them.”

  “Didn’t you get to sing?”

  “No, I left that to the suspects.”

  They had reached Herb and Hazel. Adela asked solicitously, “Feeling better, Hazel?”

  “I’m just dandy. Who’s the big broad with di Frasso. She’s staring at us right now.”

  Marlene kept her eyes on Herb and Hazel and explained Brunhilde Messer for Hazel’s edification. Hazel rejoindered with, “That ought to be worth a couple of items. So Hitler wants you to be his Queen of the May. I’m going to use that.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t,” said Marlene. “I do not wish to be connected with Hitler even in a joke.”

  “It’s too good a story for me to pass up.”

  Adela said quietly and pointedly. “I’m passing it up. And when I speak to Louella, I’m sure she’ll pass it up. And don’t try leaking it to Skolsky or Jimmy Fidler or the international press or it’ll be the last item you peddle to any of them.”

  “I’m not afraid of you.” Hazel’s voice was weak, the timbre unusually thin.

  “There’s no need for you to be. I’m just trying to let you know that there’s a time in every business to practice ethics and understanding. To deliberately try to hurt Marlene’s career …

  “That’s baloney! I think it’s a big laugh!”

  “Then go have a chuckle somewhere and keep it out of print. You know this town as well as I do. An item like that can be turned against Marlene, especially if Hitler becomes all powerful and a person to be feared.”

  Villon said softly but forcefully. “Hazel’s going to forget she heard what Marlene told her in what Marlene and the rest of us assumed was the strictest confidence, or I’m going to paste her one in the face.”

  “Oh dahlings, who’s the lucky recipient of that paste in the face.” She looked closely at Hazel as the bartender replenished her bourbon. “You, darling? You look as though you’ve already been pasted. Oops! Forgive me! I thought
you were someone else. I’m not wearing my glasses.” She turned on Villon. “You brute, dahling. You wouldn’t strike a defenseless woman, would you? Not with a surname like Villon. Surely you’ve heard of Francois Villon, the poet. Dennis King played him in The Vagabond King. The way he swishbuckled around, it should have been The Vagabond Queen. Now I know who that is with di Frasso. Brunhilde Messer. I heard her sing in London at Covent Garden. She woke me from a deep sleep with her “Yo Ho Te Hos.” The opera’s a perfect place for an insomniac.” She paused, took stock of her somberdooking companions, and then said knowledgeably, “I’m sure one of you is grateful for my rude interruption. Marlene, are you well? You seem very strange.”

  “I’m tired. I’ve had little rest since the party. I’ll have one for the road and then be on my way.”

  On the other side of the room, Brunhilde Messer was telling her group, “There is much to be done, despite the police investigation. They’ll find out nothing. I’m sure I can rely on you all to befuddle them.”

  Di Frasso asked, “Supposing it’s true; supposing Marlene and Anna May are on the right track.”

  “I don’t believe it,” said Brunhilde.

  “Anna May has the astrological charts, our astrological charts. Monte Trevor insists they will be incriminating.”

  “Perhaps, perhaps not.” She chose that moment to wave at Marlene, who acknowledged her with a flutter of her right hand. “Something’s troubling Marlene. I can tell. I’ve seen that look before, many times.”

  Dong See interrupted. “I’m tired. I’m going home.”

  “I’ll give you a lift.” Dorothy di Frasso had a lot on her mind, and Dong See was the person she wanted to discuss it with.

  Souvir said to the violinist, “I thought I was driving you home.”

  Dong See said affably, “You stay and enjoy yourself. Lots of pretty little starlets are starting to arrive. It looks as though Mr. Novarro’s party is going to progress well into the late hours.”