by Angela Henry
“Why were you invited?” I asked Rollins when we were situated in our seats.
“Harriet Randall is a member of Holy Cross. She asked me if I’d come for moral support.”
Harriet at Holy Cross? Or any church for that matter? But then again, a person who bit a police officer and bashed people with a patent-leather purse would definitely be a candidate for spiritual healing. Was she a murderer, too? Could Donald Cabot be right in his suspicion that Harriet killed Vivianne?
“Why wasn’t the service at Holy Cross?” I asked.
“Because Vivianne was an atheist. She didn’t want a church service. She also wanted to be cremated and have her ashes spread out under the big Hollywood sign in Los Angeles. But I don’t think Harriet could bear not having a grave to visit. I’m going to let her know I’m here. You should probably keep your distance. I don’t know if Harriet will recognize you as Allegra’s sister. Just try and stay out of trouble, you hear me?”
I gave him a mock salute and watched him head off to greet Harriet. Harriet showed the first signs of grief that I’d seen in her when Rollins put his arm around her in comfort. She buried her face against his shoulder and sobbed for a few minutes. Either Vivianne’s death had finally hit her, or she was trying to cop a feel.
Once Harriet pulled herself together, the service started and a procession of friends and loved ones made their way up front to say a few words or share a story about Vivianne. As I’d suspected, many of the people in attendance had some kind of ties to the entertainment business. One of Vivianne’s former makeup artists, a freeze-dried-looking old broad named Suzette Keynes, with eyebrows that arched into the hairline of her white-blond wig, and wearing a leopard-print suit and pillbox hat that looked like museum pieces, told a long-winded story about how hard it had been to find the right makeup for Vivianne since cosmetics companies didn’t cater to black woman at the time. What should have been a tribute to Vivianne ended up being an infomercial for a new line of makeup she’d created for older women called Special Effects. Harriet had to clear her throat several times and practically shake her fist at the woman to get her to shut up and sit down.
Vivianne’s leading man in the movie Sassy Mama, a still-handsome and quite dapper seventy-year-old ex-actor named Felix Gerard, told the story of how he and Vivianne had had to put up some of their own money to finish the film when the production company that had produced it went bankrupt. He then went on to talk about the lack of good roles for black actors, which I thought was going to lead to praise for Vivianne’s acting career and how she broke barriers in Hollywood. Instead, Mr. Gerard bitterly mused about how he’d almost beaten out Sidney Poitier for the role of Virgil Tibbs. Apparently, it was something he still had his undies in a knot over, and he ultimately had to be led back to his seat by his embarrassed wife.
After each person finished speaking, Cliff kept trying to get up to say a few words, but Stephanie would pull him back down into his seat and give him a warning look like he was a little kid about to spill his milk. Finally, it was Harriet’s turn. She’d stopped crying by the time she stepped in front of the podium and stared mournfully at the rose-covered casket before speaking.
“The movie world may have known her as Vivianne DeArmond, but I knew her long before Hollywood did. I knew her when she was just Annie Burns, a skinny little girl who grew up on a farm on the outskirts of town. I knew her back when she had her first role as a shrub in our second-grade play, when she was a cheerleader in junior high, when she went on her first date, and got her first job as a clerk at Foster’s Five & Dime. Even when the bright lights of Hollywood, that shone with all the brilliance of fool’s gold, lured her away from her home—” she cut her eyes in Cliff’s direction “— she never forgot about me. And even after the career she loved so much chewed her up and spat her out, she still put aside her own pain to help me in my darkest hour. Yes, the entertainment world may have lost a bright light. But to me, Vivianne was simply my best friend and I’ll miss her more than anyone will ever know.”
I looked over at Cliff who was red-faced and furious-looking. Stephanie was rubbing his arm as if she was trying to calm him down. Kurt was asleep. What a loser. If he can’t even be bothered to stay awake for his mother’s memorial service then what else was he capable of? I quickly checked my cell phone to see if I had a message from Donald Cabot. No such luck.
An uncomfortable silence descended upon the room as Harriet returned to her seat. No one else took the podium and people were shifting around nervously. Ticia came forward from her place at the door and thanked everyone for attending, and announced that refreshments had been set up in the back of the room. A couple of people left but most stayed to socialize. Cliff was holding court in one corner and loud laughter soon filled the room. Harriet was deep in conversation with Rollins. Stephanie was talking to Suzette Keynes, who was pressing makeup samples into her hands. Kurt was the only one who wasn’t mingling. He was in the back of the room at the refreshment table stuffing himself with cookies. He seemed as good a place to start as any and I took a plate and sidled up next to him.
“I’m so sorry about your mother,” I said, as I filled my plate with cookies and cocktail mints. He turned to stare at me and I caught a flicker of recognition that quickly disappeared.
“My mother? Oh, you mean Vivianne,” he said, dismissively looking over at the casket. “Sorry, it’s just that we were never close. I saw her maybe once a year. Now she’s gone and everyone thinks that changes our relationship.”
“It’s sad you didn’t get a chance to work out your differences before she died,” I said, popping a mint in my mouth. He looked at me closely again and I had to try hard not to squirm.
“Who’d you say you were?” he asked, looking me up and down.
“Sorry, I’m Nola Morgan. I was your mother’s beautician,” I said, holding out my hand and glancing over at Harriet, who was still talking to Rollins. He gave my hand a hard quick shake.
“I thought maybe you were a reporter. One snuck in here earlier today and tried to get a picture of Vivianne in her casket. That’s why it’s closed, now. I thought old Harriet was gonna stroke out,” he said giggling. I caught a whiff of marijuana, which would explain his munchies, at any rate, and his khaki-colored suit and blue shirt looked wrinkled, as though he’d slept in them. More loud laughter erupted from Cliff’s corner and Kurt rolled his eyes. “That’s my pops for you. Never misses out on an opportunity to tell a funny story about his glory days.”
“I read someplace that he used to be Vivianne’s agent.”
“Yeah, about a million years ago. He was trying to get her to audition for a role in some big remake of The Wiz as Glenda the Good Witch. But Vivi was being difficult, as usual. She never missed an opportunity to make his life hell.”
“Is the blond lady your stepmother?” I asked, around bites of oatmeal raisin cookie.
“My mom. Not my stepmother. She raised me, not Vivianne.” He cast narrow eyes at the casket still occupying the front of the room.
“Is she in show business?”
“Used to be. Ex-Vegas showgirl. But she quit once she married Dad and became a full-time mother to me. She put me before her career. Not like some women I could name,” he said and walked away.
Kurt certainly was angry with Vivianne, and he and Noelle needed money. If he’d channeled his anger into killing her, was it because he knew how valuable her memorabilia would become after her death or because she was never a mother to him? Either way, I had to be able to back up this info when I gave it to Harmon and Mercer. I sure wished Donald Cabot would call me. I was finishing up my cookie when I heard a voice behind me.
“Hello,” said Stephanie Preston as I turned around. She was dressed in a steel-gray power suit with big shoulder pads that looked as if she’d stolen it from Krystle Carrington’s closet. Her blond hair was pulled into a bun at the nape of her neck and her overly tanned skin looked less harsh in the soft lighting of the funeral home. Her makeup was s
till overdone however, with thick foundation, heavy purple eyeshadow and black eyeliner. Her lips were frosty and pink and I noticed some of it was smeared on her front teeth.
“I’m Stephanie Preston.” She held out her hand and I shook it. “Nola Morgan, nice to meet you.”
“So, you a friend of Vivianne’s?” she asked, looking over her shoulder at the casket.
“Not really. More like an acquaintance. I did Vivianne’s hair occasionally.”
“Aw, I bet that was an experience,” she said and laughed spitefully.
“Well, yes. Not to speak ill of the dead,” I said, quietly looking around the room, “But you know what she was like. She could be quite demanding.” I was hoping to keep the conversation going. I had the feeling Stephanie was looking for someone to vent to. And I wasn’t wrong. She snorted and laughed again.
“I know about Miss Vivianne DeArmond all right. She’s my husband’s ex-wife, or I guess I should say was I’ve never met a more vain, self-important and self- involved woman in all my life,” she shook her head. “But I guess you couldn’t really blame her for being the way she was, what with everyone telling her how beautiful she was all the time. But the one who really kills me is that best friend of hers,” she said, nodding toward Harriet, who was now talking to Ticia.
“What about her?” I asked, feeling my curiosity perking up.
“Harriet Randall has absolutely no reason to act so high and mighty. You know, what with her husband having robbed that bank here about twenty years ago. Are you from here? I’d have thought you’d have known.”
“Twenty years ago I was only nine. My biggest concern was mastering long division,” I said smiling.
“Oh, of course, you’d have been too young to remember,” she said, lightly smacking her forehead. “His name was Elgin Randall. He was a petty thief and robbed the bank Harriet used to work at. A guard was shot during the robbery. They never caught Harriet’s husband. He’s still on the run. They even thought she might have been in on the plot but could never prove it. Instead, they just fired her. That was not long after Vivianne had quit acting and moved back here to live in her family’s old farmhouse. She gave Harriet a job as her assistant, but it was the least she could do, considering,” Stephanie said smirking.
“Considering what?” I asked. Stephanie motioned for me to lean in closer. I did.
“Elgin Randall was Vivianne’s first love. They were engaged to be married when they were young but Vivianne wanted to be an actress and she left him practically at the altar and ran off to Hollywood. She met and married Cliff, but she never loved him. He launched her career and she felt grateful to him. Elgin was so heartbroken he ended up marrying Vivianne’s best friend, Harriet, instead. I guess they were happy enough until Vivianne came back here to live. She and Elgin never stopped loving each other and started having an affair.”
“How do you know?” I asked incredulously.
“Cliff told me a lot of it. But Kurt used to spend a couple of weeks with Vivianne in the summer when he was a kid, and he told me he saw her kissing Harriet’s husband and even walked in on them in bed once. I always wondered if Harriet knew.” We both turned to stare at Harriet as she rearranged the roses on top of Vivianne’s casket.
That sure put a new wrinkle in things. Could Harriet have somehow found out her so-called best friend had been sleeping with her husband all those years ago? Was that the meaning of the letter opener in Vivianne’s back? Vivianne had stabbed Harriet in the back figuratively and Harriet had returned the favor literally. I didn’t have much time to think it over because Cliff had come over to join us.
“This is my husband, Cliff Preston. Cliff this is—”
“Nola Morgan,” I finished for her. Cliff gave my hand a hearty shake. He was dressed in a black suit with a gold tie. Up close I could see his eyes were the same gray as his son’s.
“She used to do Vivianne’s hair.” Stephanie stood a few inches taller than her husband and looked down at him affectionately.
“Really?” he asked, not looking convinced. “I’ve always known Vivianne to do her own hair. She had a pathological distrust of hairdressers after one messed up her hair so badly it fell out in patches. She had to wear a wig for months.” He spoke easily, but his eyes told me he smelled a rat. Uh-oh! What could I say? I looked over at Suzette Keynes, who was chatting up Rollins and got an idea.
“You caught me, Mr. Preston,” I said, laughing nervously. “The first time I did Vivianne’s hair was last night for the memorial service. I do hair and makeup for most of the funeral homes in this area. I usually try to be on hand during the services for touch-ups and things in case they need me.”
“You could have told me,” said Stephanie, squeezing my arm. Cliff seemed satisfied, as well, and gave me a friendly smile.
“A lot of people get creeped out when I tell them what I do for a living. I’ve kind of gotten used to stretching the truth.” They had no idea just how much.
“No big deal, young lady. I work in Hollywood, the land of illusion where nothing and no one is what they seem.” We all laughed.
“I bet the movie business has really changed since Vivianne’s day, huh?” I asked Cliff.
“Right you are, young lady, right you are. Movies these days are nothing but dreck in my opinion. All the great directors are gone. Now, everything is so overloaded with special effects people don’t even need to be good actors anymore.” He shook his head in disgust.
“Well, what about opportunities for black actors? Surely that’s improved, right?” I asked quickly to derail his diatribe.
“Yes, more doors are open to black actors these days, but there’s still a long, long way to go, both in front of the camera and behind,” he said. “I’m proud to say that I recognized Vivianne for the talent she was when other agencies would only have let her through the door to clean their offices.
But, still, I had to fight tooth and nail for every single part Vivianne got. That’s one of the reasons she did so many independent films. The big movie studios were reluctant to cast a black woman as the lead in a major motion picture. Independent filmmakers were able to take more risks, and even then it didn’t always work to Vivianne’s advantage.”
“How so?” I asked.
“Take Vivianne’s big-break out role in Asphalt City. She played a prostitute. That role was her greatest triumph and her greatest tragedy. After that she was typecast and mainly got offered parts as prostitutes or whores, ‘fallen women,’ as Vivianne always put it. No one wanted to see her as anything but the femme fatale. It was a hard pill for her to swallow. She was a great actress and wanted to be able to show her range, but she rarely got the opportunity,” Cliff said vehemently. Stephanie sighed irritably and turned to the refreshment table piling a plate high with stuff I knew she didn’t want. Cliff cut his eyes at her but otherwise ignored her.
Even dead, Vivianne was obviously a sore spot for the Prestons. Stephanie didn’t seem to mind talking about Vivianne as long as it was negative, but she apparently couldn’t stand hearing anything remotely positive about her, especially coming from her husband. How much had Stephanie hated Vivianne? But that was going to have to be a question I’d ponder at a later date, because Harriet Randall had finally noticed me and come charging over to where I was chatting with the Prestons.
“And who might you be?” she asked without a trace of friendliness in her voice. She was wearing a brown dress with an orange-and-black scarf draped around her neck and held in place at her throat with a large, gold, star-shaped brooch. The same black hairpiece that Mama had ripped off her head at the police station was back in its place on her head. She was a short woman, but her pointy-toed, two-inch black pumps put her almost at eye- level with me. She was so close I could see the faint trace of a mustache on her upper lip and two coarse hairs sticking out of her chin. She also reeked of Chanel No. 5. I looked around like I didn’t know if she was talking to me. I started to say something but Stephanie spoke up instead.
“Excuse me, but I don’t need a lesson in manners from the likes of you,” Harriet said, still not bothering to look up at Stephanie, who appeared furious.
“Now, what did you say your name was?” Harriet said taking a step closer to me. I remained silent. Where was Rollins?
“Harriet, calm down. You’re causing a scene. I thought this evening was supposed to be about Vivianne,” said Cliff.
Harriet did at least turn to acknowledge Cliff, and, as she did, the scarf at her neck slipped and I noticed three faint scratch marks on the left side of her neck. I could tell she’d tried to cover them not just with the scarf but with makeup, as well. But I could still see them and wondered what had caused them, a struggle with Vivianne, perhaps? I already knew Harriet was violent. Did Vivianne fight back and put those scratches on her neck?