Bantam of the Opera

by Mary Daheim

  It was lost on Judith, but Renie, with her deeper knowledge of opera, leaped into the void. “In other words, he was avoiding the demanding parts. Rudolfo is comparatively easy, as opposed to Radames or Otello.”

  Inez nodded gravely. “So it seems. For those of us who knew of his enormous self-confidence—despite his neurotic behavior—there was a feeling of concern. Why was Mario pampering himself? Was he fearful about his voice? He was too young to worry yet about his talent diminishing. Yes, he has been very cautious, avoiding difficult schedules. If anything, he should have gone on for another ten years at least, perhaps not truly peaking until he reached fifty. That’s why he’d put off singing Otello this long. He was waiting until his voice had achieved the proper maturity.”

  Judith nodded. Her idea was taking shape. “Do you know if he remained in Italy after those cancellations?”

  Inez looked puzzled by the question. “I was in Venice to sing Minnie in Fanciulla del West. We were not at the same hotel, of course. Mario and Amina had taken a villa near Arsolo, outside of the city.” Her high forehead furrowed in an attempt at recollection. “Now that you mention the fact, I don’t recall hearing of his presence in Italy until after the Rome cancellation. That would have been a month, perhaps six weeks, later.”

  “Would he have gone home to…Bari, is it?” asked Judith.

  Again Inez shrugged. “It is possible.”

  Judith couldn’t think of anything more to ask Inez. But Renie had another question.

  “In all honesty, have you noticed any deterioration in Mario’s voice this past six months?”

  The soprano considered the inquiry with great care. It was, after all, tantamount to passing judgment on a Raphael Madonna or a Michelangelo sculpture. “No,” she said at last. “No deterioration. But more exertion. That is, he seemed to work harder at producing the notes. Before, it was all effortless, as natural as water from a mountain spring.”

  “Ah.” Judith uttered the exclamation softly. “What does that mean to you? As a singer.”

  “It could mean many things.” Inez turned the snifter in her long fingers. “It could mean a vocal problem, an incapacity of the lungs, a gain or loss of weight, even a mental condition. What do you call it? A block?”

  “Right.” Judith fervently wished she could get in touch with Woody. There was so much she had to tell him, so many things she wanted to ask him to do…She gave Inez Garcia-Green her most gracious smile. “You’ve been a lot of help. The police will be very grateful.”

  It didn’t seem to occur to Inez why her musings on Pacetti’s vocal status should have anything to do with his murder. It was enough that she had been consulted and appreciated. Renie added to the diva’s sense of well-being by complimenting her on her performance of the previous evening. They left Inez in the lobby, where a trio of opera buffs jumped for joy at the sight of her and humbly requested autographs.

  “You didn’t mention the vial or the rock,” said Renie as they headed for the parking garage elevators.

  “I’m waiting for the handwriting expert to figure out the rock,” Judith replied, stopping abruptly at a row of pay phones. “Those two separate but seemingly equal Strophanthin bottles stump me. I don’t even know what to ask anybody. And I didn’t want to jar Inez out of her garrulous mood.”

  “Who are you calling?” Renie asked as Judith deposited a quarter in the nearest pay phone slot.

  “Woody. If he’s in, we’re going to swing by headquarters. It’s only three blocks from here.” She heard another unfamiliar voice answer. Judith’s request to speak to Woody was again turned down, but this time an excited explanation was given. Judith hung up the phone and turned to Renie with a wry expression. “It’s a boy. Woody won’t be in until tomorrow.”

  “What!” Renie gaped at Judith. “The baby came early? Oh, rats! What do we do now?”

  Judith started for the elevators. “What do you think? Go buy a baby gift. We’re headed for the hospital.”

  Sondra Price was delighted with the blue-and-white checked romper suit from Judith and the green-and-yellow striped coverall from Renie. The cousins had purchased both garments in six-month sizes, causing Sondra and Woody to laugh at the idea that their tiny son would ever fit into such enormous outfits.

  “Three months, and he’ll be wearing them,” Judith declared. “After all, he weighs over eight pounds now. You’ll be surprised at how fast they grow.”

  Sondra, a pretty woman just past thirty, with a master’s degree in speech therapy, beamed up at her husband. “He’s going to be a pilot. I can tell by the way he squints, like he’s looking into the sun through the windshield of a 747. He’s wrinkled, too, as if he’s been out in the sun too long. Have you seen him yet?” she asked the cousins.

  They had. Renie assured the new parents that the wrinkles would go away. Judith said he’d stop squinting soon and start seeing. Woody insisted their baby already did. At the age of eleven hours and fourteen minutes, Woodrow Wilson Price III was obviously a precocious child.

  Half an hour later in the hospital cafeteria, the cousins did their best to bring the new father down to earth. As professional as Woody usually was, it took a few minutes to get him off pablum and onto poison. Even then, he was somewhat skeptical about Judith’s pip theory.

  “You aren’t one-hundred-percent positive those pips weren’t in the refrigerator Saturday night, right? Isn’t it possible that your cleaning lady threw them out? Would she remember doing it? Did you check your garbage?”

  Judith couldn’t categorically refute the points Woody raised. As for the garbage, it had been collected Monday as usual.

  “It’s possible,” Woody allowed after Judith had made another pass at convincing him she might be right. “Anything’s possible. But somebody had Strophanthin their possession. Why not use it instead of a bunch of flower roots?”

  Briefly, Judith was stumped. Then the answer dawned on her. “Because of the tea. Our killer is careful. He or she probably read up on poisons. If the murderer got hold of the Strophantin to use it on Mario and then discovered he always drank what was in effect an antidote, there had to be a shifting of gears. And of poisons.”

  “So why leave the empty vials on stage?” asked Woody. “Why one bottle on the table and the other in the flower arrangement? Why put some of the stuff in the thermos and bury it in your backyard?”

  “To confuse the issue,” Judith answered promptly. “Those pips are often mistaken for a form of digitoxin. If you’re off looking for someone who was running around backstage before the performance leaving vials among the champagne glasses and the exotic blooms while also dumping toxic substances in thermos bottles, then you’re never going to zero in on the killer. It’s a smoke screen. The big obstacle is that nobody saw anything suspicious going on before…Oh!” Judith jumped, almost knocking over her Styrofoam coffee cup.

  “What?” Woody turned curious brown eyes on Judith.

  But Judith shook her head. “Never mind. I’m probably having a minor brain seizure. Let me think this through. What about your handwriting expert?”

  Momentarily, Woody looked blank. “Oh—the rock and the sheet of paper. Corazon’s tracking that for me. Give her a call.”

  “Okay. Can I ask her to check with Customs and Immigration to see if Mario and Amina entered this country in April or May?”

  Woody raised his eyebrows. “I suppose. Why?”

  Judith settled back in the orange modular plastic chair. “I think Mario came over here to consult with Dr. Sheila Feldman, world-renowned throat specialist. He was having vocal problems, it seems. Now I don’t know what that has to do with his murder, but it suggests several possibilities to me. Can you get a warrant to go through Dr. Feldman’s records?”

  Woody’s face broke into a big grin. He shook his head slowly. “Mrs. Flynn—Judith—you come up with the craziest ideas! A singer like Pacetti probably consults a throat specialist at least four times a year. I’ll go along with the Customs and Immigration
notion, but I’m not getting mixed up with doctors. They always stonewall, if only because they think we’re fronting for the IRS.”

  Somewhat deflated, Judith shot a quick look at Renie. “Okay, Woody,” Judith said, “just don’t blame me when Joe gets back from New Orleans and finds out this case is looser than a galloping goose.”

  A brief expression of alarm crossed Woody’s face. “Mrs. Flynn…Judith…I’m not trying to be a pain; I’m just following police procedure. And,” he added on a wounded note, “having a baby.”

  Stung, Judith grew remorseful. “I know. I’m sorry. I just want to get this thing solved. Not only have I lost a guest, but the contents of my refrigerator may be responsible.”

  “She’s right,” chimed in Renie. “What’s really surprising is that it hasn’t happened before. With her mother’s leftovers, that is.”

  Judith gave Renie the evil eye. “Et tu, Brute,” she muttered.

  “Et pips,” Renie replied, turning to Woody. “Wait and see, Dad. I’m with Judith. I think Mario et them and if I’ve got my cousin figured, I also think she may know who dished them up. Right?” Her gaze returned to Judith.

  Judith didn’t respond.

  SIXTEEN

  CORAZON PEREZ HAD left a message, so Judith called her back. The policewoman answered on the first ring. The handwriting expert had had some problems with the analysis.

  “The surface of the rock gave him fits,” Corazon reported. “He had better luck with the paper. But bear in mind that the drawings were impossible to work with. He had no basis for comparison. At least the musical score gave him a couple of letters.”

  “And?” Judith leaned away from Renie, who was practically on her neck trying to hear the conversation.

  “He couldn’t come to a conclusion.” Corazon sounded apologetic. “He won’t discount Inez Double G—as they call her in the homicide division—but he really can’t be sure. I’m sorry.”

  Sensing that Corazon was eager to move on, Judith quickly asked her to describe the original bottle of Strophanthin. Sounding puzzled, Corazon sketched a brief word picture.

  “That’s it,” said Judith, more for Renie’s benefit than for Corazon’s. “When you see Woody Price,” she said into the receiver, “remind him I’ve got its mate. Empty. It may not be as cute as a baby bottle, but it could turn out to be evidence.” Judith put down the phone. “Let’s see if that doesn’t get Woody back in the groove.”

  “What about the rock?” Renie asked.

  Judith grimaced at her cousin. “Nada, as Inez would say in her native Spain. Now I wish I’d asked her about that rock when I had the chance at the Cascadia this afternoon.”

  Renie strolled to the refrigerator. “It’s almost six. Aren’t you doing hors d’oeuvres?”

  “My guests are out,” Judith replied, fingering a note that had been left on the bulletin board. “They’re all being hosted by Maestro Dunkowitz this evening. I suspect they’re under the impression they may get to leave tomorrow. Woody didn’t say so, though.”

  “Woody’s in Babyland,” Renie replied, scrutinizing a jar of extra small oysters. “What do you say we fry these up for dinner? I don’t have anybody hanging around my house tonight either.”

  “Fine,” Judith agreed, heading for the back stairs. “But first we grill Edna Fiske. After Corazon Perez, Edna’s my next priority.”

  But upstairs, there was no sign of Edna. The front bedroom she had taken over from Mario Pacetti was empty of personal belongings. Judith swore under her breath and hurried back down to the kitchen.

  “She’s flown the coop.” Flipping through the phone book, she found a listing for E. D. Fiske at an address only three blocks from Madge Navarre’s condo. To Judith’s relief, Edna answered on the third ring.

  “I just got home,” said the nurse. “Mrs. Pacetti was somewhat ambivalent about my leave-taking, but patients shouldn’t be babied. She clearly no longer requires professional nursing care. I prefer to offer my services to those who genuinely need me. Thank you, by the way, for your hospitality.”

  “It was a relief for me to have you here,” Judith responded. “Medical assistance isn’t a standard option at a B&B. It must have been a great comfort for Mrs. Pacetti to have a nurse who had also treated her husband.”

  There was a slight pause at the other end. “I can’t say I treated him. Not in that sense. I merely assisted Dr. Feldman. Not that she could do anything, under the circumstances.”

  Judith eyed Renie who was wearing an anxious expression. “I suppose not. Surgery was…uh…out of the question?”

  “Definitely,” Edna asserted. “It leaves such scar tissue. Of course that was Mr. Pacetti’s decision and he was free to change his mind.”

  Judith rubbed at her forehead, trying to figure out in which direction she could go without sinking into the quicksand of ignorance. “Is it certain the scar tissue would have affected his voice adversely?”

  “Almost always. For an ordinary person, it doesn’t matter that much. But for a singer—well, you can imagine. Benign polyps wouldn’t frighten most of us in the least. We could get along quite nicely with a bit of a rasp in the voice. But not someone who sings professionally. The condition was quite recent. In fact, I understand he’d had an insurance physical last December and they hadn’t shown up then. He might have continued his career for a year or two. If he’d lived.” Edna’s own voice struck a professionally bleak note.

  Judith stifled a sigh of relief. It had been a guess, but a good one, considering Sheila Feldman’s specialty and her referral of Edna Fiske to Mrs. Pacetti. After exchanging a few pleasantries, Judith hung up.

  “Eureka!” she cried. “Now we’re getting somewhere!”

  “Are we on the same wavelength?” Renie inquired. “Pacetti with vocal cord trouble, right? Voice going before its time?”

  “You got it.” Free from Edna Fiske’s scrutiny, Judith made for the liquor cabinet. “Customs and Immigration will show that the Pacettis entered this country in April, probably, with the rhododendrons in bud. I don’t know where they stayed, but my guess is that somehow they got into the family housing at the Children’s Medical Center across the street from Dr. Feldman’s offices. Rules can be bent for somebody of Pacetti’s stature.”

  Renie had got out a pair of glasses and was putting ice into them. “So you’re figuring that Pacetti’s vocal problems may have something to do with his murder?”

  Pouring bourbon for Renie and scotch for herself, Judith nodded. “It’s possible. The trouble is, I can’t figure out what. If money is a motive, which it often is, who benefits from his early demise? Amina, for one.”

  “Schutzendorf, maybe,” suggested Renie. “Madge told me last night that his recording company would carry insurance on him. You know, like sports teams carry for their players.”

  The cousins had gone into the living room where they sat on the matching sofas. Judith considered building a fire, but decided it was too warm. “Edna mentioned an insurance physical, last December. But the polyps didn’t show up.”

  “Let’s check out motives,” Renie said. “Amina—unfaithful wife who collects insurance, estate, freedom. Not bad, huh?”

  “Somehow I don’t see Amina as seriously unfaithful. I mean, it sounds to me as if she took up with Plunkett just to get back at Mario for having the affair with Inez. Then he became a habit, like wearing mismatched socks. Unless…” Judith’s forehead furrowed as she recalled Inez’s reaction to the suggestion that Winston Plunkett was Amina’s lover. “What if Melissa was wrong?”

  “Melissa?” Renie looked askance. “Her reliability percentage is almost as high as Madge Navarre’s.”

  “But Melissa is working with gossip, not hard facts, like Madge.” Judith frowned at the bright little pumpkin lights that adorned the mantel. “What if Amina was having an affair—but not with Plunkett? Faithful old Winnie might make a good cover for something more serious. Let’s face it, we’ve always had trouble swallowing the Passionate Plunke
tt story. I can’t help but figure that the only thing he does with his fly is tie one for fishing.”

  Renie made a strange, bewildered face. “So Amina might have somebody else waiting in the wings. Hmmmm.”

  “Could be. But then we need another motive for Plunkett,” Judith reminded her cousin.

  “Did he know Mario was losing his voice?” Renie mused.

  Judith inclined her head. “Possibly. Plunkett may have accompanied them in the spring to see Dr. Feldman. And now that I think about it, he didn’t criticize Tippy for taking off after Pacetti got killed. In fact, he acted as if she’d made the right choice. I wonder…”

  Renie sipped at her drink. “But why would Plunkett kill him? He could always quit—like Tippy did—and get another job.”

  The jumbled blur of the past few days swirled around in Judith’s brain. Words, so many words, in accents foreign and domestic…She couldn’t remember all of them…And yet, there were snatches that came to mind.

  “The night Pacetti died, Plunkett said something out in the kitchen…It was about his life’s work, and then he…” With a sharp shake of her head, Judith gave the coffee table a kick. “Damn, I’ve lost it! Why do I keep feeling that if only I’d paid closer attention, I could put this thing together in logical order and figure it all out?”

  Renie gave Judith a sympathetic look. “We know who was in the kitchen last Saturday—everybody. Among the guests, that is. The Pacettis, Plunkett, Tippy, and Schutzendorf. But Schutzendorf was also the only one of this crew who wasn’t backstage before the performance Saturday night. Still, if he knew that Pacetti’s career was going down the drain, he might have done him in out of sheer pique.”