by Mary Miley
“Working there at the house until after the last person had left, she would have been present to see or hear something,” said Douglas. “Perhaps she came away knowing something about who was there at the very end. Perhaps she witnessed something that would have allowed her to identify the killer.”
And had been eliminated before that could happen? It seemed logical.
I crept on bare feet into the largest bedroom, the one that overlooked the fountain. This was a man’s room, decorated with the same Prussian angularity as the downstairs with a bare minimum of personal touches: a photograph of an older couple I took to be Heilmann’s parents, a picture postcard of a cathedral stuck in a mirror frame, and a book in German and half a chocolate bar on the nightstand. Shoes were lined up in soldierly precision on the closet floor; even his clothes hung at attention. There was not a speck of dust or an item out of place in the entire room.
I could not see the cop on the porch below, but I could smell him. The air was still and I heard a match strike and a loud exhale, and the smoke from his cigarette wafted up. He was maybe ten feet below me on the other side of the open window and I heard every cough, every creak of the chair, as clearly as if we were sitting side by side on a porch swing.
“What Zukor doesn’t know,” Douglas had informed me, “is that wretched little Lottie has been sleeping with that arrogant Kraut. Lottie’s husband, Allan, doesn’t know, either, naturally. Hell, I didn’t know until she blurted it out today. In any case, her monogrammed negligee and some other personal things are still in Heilmann’s house, waiting for the detectives to discover them and bring the scandal right to our front doorstep.”
And he wanted me to try to get them out of the house before the detectives arrived to search the place.
How could I refuse? Douglas Fairbanks had been nothing but kind to me, and Mary Pickford was my idol. They needed help. I had said yes. And now I was inside the director’s house, searching through bedrooms.
If Lottie hadn’t been so crazy for having her initials etched, painted, embroidered, or stamped on everything she owned, it might not have mattered that her personal belongings were spread about Bruno Heilmann’s bedroom. I came across her pink lace negligee, monogrammed LPF, hanging on the bathroom door next to the largest bedroom. I eased open the bureau drawers and found some silk underwear with dainty LPs stitched on the edges. On the dressing table were her sterling silver brush and comb set with large Ps engraved on the backs. A quick check of the bathroom revealed some jars of makeup, all thankfully unmarked, and a sterling-handled toothbrush, engraved. I snatched the toothbrush and left the rest.
A quick tour of the other bedrooms, just in case Lottie had left something identifiable in them, turned up nothing of hers, but I did make one unexpected discovery. The guest bedroom in the front of the house had been set up last night as a dope bar. Several beautifully carved Chinese opium pipes lay on the table. The large drawers of a clothes bureau were full of folded paper packets containing heroin and cocaine and many boxes of what I was certain were more drugs. I’d seen it all before but never so much in one place. It was more than one person could possibly carry. No wonder so many guests were going upstairs last night. Obviously the policemen had reported the body and left the search of the house for the detectives—if they had found this stash, they would surely have confiscated it for themselves.
As I was stuffing Lottie’s clothing beneath my washerwoman’s blouse in preparation for my departure, I heard the sound of chair legs scraping on tile. The guard was getting up.
Unhurried footsteps traveled across the porch, the doorknob turned, the front door creaked open and closed tight, and he entered the hall downstairs. I could hear him so clearly it was as if I were standing beside him. If he’d walked around the outside of the house, he’d have seen nothing, since I’d made certain my skirt and shoes were well hidden under a bush. But I hadn’t counted on him coming inside. Had I made a noise?
Instinctively I looked for a place to hide. I couldn’t imagine he was going to search the place, maybe just take a peek in each room to see how the rich director lived, but I couldn’t duck into a closet on the off chance he’d open it to nose around. Under the bed would be safer, and I judged I could fit.
The silence told me he was walking over the living room carpet. The creak of the swinging door said he was going into the kitchen, not toward the stairs, and I let out my breath. Maybe he wanted to raid the icebox or get himself a drink. I heard some faint rattles and clinks, then running water, then the swinging door again. An interminable silence followed when all I could hear was my blood pounding in my ears as if my heart had moved up to the middle of my head. Don’t come upstairs, I willed with all my might.
The sharp sound of liquid streaming into liquid brought a thin smile to my face in spite of the danger, and I thanked my lucky stars there was a water closet on the ground floor. The toilet flushed and the front door opened and closed again. I didn’t breathe easily until I heard him settle into his chair and scratch another match on the sole of his shoe.
I took one last glance out the front window and did a double take. Coming through the gate, walking briskly toward the fountain in my direction, were two men in dark suits and fedoras. Two detectives. Cheesit, the cops!
Crossing back to the rear of the house, I peered out to make sure no one was on the service road. The semicircular layout of the houses meant that the adjacent ones were not visible from the patio, so there was no worry that a neighbor would glance out a window and see me crouched there on the sill, gripping the edge with my toes. With all my strength, I sprang up toward the branch that had brought me here, rode the bounce until it settled, then worked my way hand over hand to the nearest sturdy limb and climbed down. Retrieving my skirt and shoes, I made my way along the service road past the other houses, limping in a tired manner toward the main street.
8
Myrna pounded on the bathroom door. “Jessie! Jessie!” I was standing in front of the mirror in my underclothes, slathering cold cream on my face to remove the brown makeup. The shapeless peasant costume was bunched around my ankles. Lottie’s belongings were on my bed. “Jessie! A very, very awful thing! Bruno Heilmann’s dead! The police are here! They want to ask us questions about the party guests! Come quick!”
I felt guilty that I’d left Myrna in the dark about the murders but reasoned that it was probably better for an ingénue like her to face the police without knowing any more than she did. There’s no substitute for honest surprise. And frankly, there hadn’t been time to tell her. I had stepped out of the police car to Douglas’s telephone call and gone from there to my costume trunk and makeup kit for the disguise. After returning from Heilmann’s and sneaking back into my house, I needed only a few more minutes to resurrect wide-eyed, earnest Jessie Beckett who would be more than happy to answer any questions the policemen cared to ask. I whipped off the bandana and rinsed the black dye out of the lock of auburn hair I had let escape.
“I’ll be right there!”
There wasn’t time to report back to Douglas Fairbanks. I would have to wait until the police had gone.
I put on a blue dropwaist dress with a pleated skirt and a pair of smart shoes, composed my face, and joined Myrna who was standing in the center hall with two cops—did they always work in pairs?—wringing her hands and looking up at the ceiling as if the names of the party guests were written on the plaster.
“… um, Raoul Walsh … and Gary Cooper. Let’s see … Catherine Hays was there. Laura Frances, Robert Alexander, Lottie Pickford—oh, but of course Mr. Fairbanks has already given you that name. Have I already said Sara Rutherford? Oh, Jessie, thank heavens you’re here to help me remember!” The policemen turned to me as I came down the stairs. “Officer Giles and Officer … I’m sorry, oh, Blackford, yes, they are working up a list of every single person who was there last night, and I can’t remember very many. One of the guests killed Bruno Heilmann and they’re trying to figure out who was the last to
leave.”
“I’ll do my best,” I said, squeezing Myrna’s hand for reassurance.
“Where did you run off to after Mr. Fairbanks called?” she asked me.
I was hoping she wouldn’t pose that question in front of the policemen, but Myrna was the sort who had nothing to hide and so was incapable of thinking anyone else did, either.
“He wanted me to meet him to go over the party list. He’s eager to help in any way he can to solve this monstrous crime,” I said piously. Then it was my turn to tell the police who had attended the party, and I was able to add several that Myrna had overlooked. Douglas Fairbanks had given them my name and Myrna’s, and as soon as they received the go-ahead from on high, they would follow up with each person on the list, asking them to recall who else was there. Eventually they would re-create the entire guest list.
“And what time did you girls leave?” asked Officer Blackford, who seemed to be doing all the talking.
Myrna spoke up. “That’s easy. It was twelve-fifteen because we had to catch the last Red Car at twelve-thirty.”
“Who was there when you left?”
“Gosh, everybody, just about. We left pretty early.”
“The Fairbanks left before we did,” I added, “but Myrna is right. There were maybe two hundred people there at midnight and the party was going full swing. If you don’t mind me asking, were you the officers who were called to Heilmann’s home this morning?”
Both Blackford and Giles nodded. So these were the men who had checked the body and called the detectives but had not gone upstairs. They’d be sorry if they’d known what they missed. Blackford continued. “This isn’t for public consumption yet. Captain said we could question you since Mr. Fairbanks had already told you, but they want to keep this death quiet for a while. They think it will help flush out the killer if fewer people know.” He lifted his shoulders as if to ask, Who knows where they got that dumb idea?
The number of people who knew about the murder was growing larger by the hour. Officers Giles and Blackford knew. So did the police doctor who had come to examine the body—was he the same one who had been at Esther’s? The guard out front knew. So did the valet who found the body. The two detectives who were probably still at Heilmann’s house knew. And Zukor, of course, and Douglas Fairbanks, and Mary and Lottie Pickford. And now Myrna. And me. A secret with that many people in on it wasn’t much of a secret.
When they finished their questions, Blackford said, “We need to call headquarters and the nearest call box is a couple blocks away. You got a telephone?” Myrna pointed him to the back of the hall and both men went to report in. We slipped into the kitchen.
“Isn’t it awful?” said Myrna softly, now that we were alone. “A famous man like Bruno Heilmann murdered! Who could have done such a thing? I guess they’ll figure it out pretty quick. As soon as they find out who left last, they’ll know who did it.”
“Not necessarily. Someone could have waited outside in the bushes until the last person had left and gone back inside to shoot him. Or one of the servants or cooks could have done it. Whoever it was knew how to shoot straight. He was killed with one bullet in the back of the head.”
“I told you so.”
I looked at her blankly.
“The bird hitting the window.”
“Oh, Myrna, that’s just coincidence.”
“It’s not. It happened before.” I sat motionless as she struggled to decide whether or not to tell me about it. Finally she took a deep, fortifying breath and plunged into her story. “It was in 1918 when the Spanish flu came. I was thirteen. Mother and David caught it first. You couldn’t get nurses. I mean, there weren’t enough. One would show up and then disappear into the night. Father and I nursed them. When they were half recovered, it struck me. Father made up the couch for me in the dining room. He used to come and wrap me in frozen sheets every night, trying to get my temperature down. He sat there—I can remember him sitting right over me—and he went through the agony with me, afraid I was going to die.”
She paused and shivered, although it wasn’t cold. Without meeting my eye, she swallowed hard and continued. “Finally I passed the crisis, and Mother and David recovered. Then one night, I heard terrible noises from upstairs. He was hemorrhaging. He had the flu probably a long time before it showed itself, not knowing it because he’d been so busy taking care of everybody else. And particularly of me. Well, I became hysterical, and to get me out of the way, they sent me to one of my mother’s friends. While I was wandering around the house, a bird hit a window. A minute later, the telephone rang and I knew what it meant. I took off up the stairs, running as far away as I could. They called me but I wouldn’t answer. When I finally went downstairs, my mother’s friend was crying. I knew my father was dead.”
“I’m so sorry, Myrna,” I said, giving her a hug.
She thanked me with a weak smile. “So you see, it’s not an old wives’ tale. It’s true.”
I thought of poor Esther. “Yes, maybe it is.”
A noise from the hall drew my attention. The two policemen were standing in the doorway, both of them looking at me. I didn’t know how long they’d been there.
“You’ll be coming to the station with us, Miss Beckett.”
I stood up. No need to ask why. It had always been just a matter of time before someone at the police station connected me to the other murder, Esther’s murder.
I was the only person who had been at the scene of both crimes. It didn’t look good.
9
“Sit there.”
The police sergeant pointed at a wooden bench that looked as comfortable as a Baptist pew, and I sat with my hands clasped in my lap so no one would see my ink-stained fingertips, waiting to be questioned again about the two Hollywood murders.
Hollywood is not really its own town—it was at one time but nowadays it’s part of Los Angeles, so the cops were Los Angeles cops and the police station was one of that city’s network, Division Six on North Cahuenga next to the fire station. In my experience—and I have some experience—small-town cops are stupid and mean; city cops are every bit as mean but not nearly as stupid. So I sat still as a rock and tried not to look scared.
I knew what they were doing—letting me stew a while to lower my resistance—but knowing didn’t make the clock tick any faster. I tried to distract myself by watching the noisy symphony that played in front of me. Clerks banged file drawers, secretaries clattered away in triplicate on Remingtons, telephone bells jangled, sergeants barked orders, detectives argued, and the swinging gate that divided the public from the police added an unsteady percussion to the whole. Division Six was a crowded place, even on a Sunday. Crime doesn’t take a day off. One officer adjusted the western blinds to let in more of the bright daylight; another, standing on a desk to change a lightbulb, kicked over a full coffee cup and cursed it. A drunk was processed at the counter and hauled through the door marked JAIL; two sullen prostitutes were fingerprinted, just as I had been earlier, and taken in the same direction. It made me think of a vaudeville stage with a dozen acts rehearsing at the same time and no stage manager to impose order. Meanwhile, I waited in the wings for my cue, my stomach churning as it always did when I was unsure of my lines.
I had plenty of time to think.
Everyone in vaudeville steered clear of the police, and I was no exception. Itinerant performers were often accused of crimes they hadn’t committed, and just as often the evidence consisted of one sentence: “You ain’t from around here.” It was totally unfair, except when it wasn’t. In my younger years, after my mother died and left me orphaned on the circuit with a kiddie act, I became a pretty good thief, thanks to the sleight-of-hand skills I’d learned as a magician’s assistant. My targets were mostly large department stores and grocers, and I seldom got caught. On those rare occasions, I’d act younger than my years and get off with a scolding or a few slaps. Except when I ended up in jail for the night. That experience, plus getting a steady job with
a reputable act, made stealing less appealing, and I mostly gave it up. I knew the police here had nothing on me from those years—those cities were too far away and it had been some time ago. And I was pretty sure they didn’t know about the role I’d played as a shill for a shady Indian mystic. But last fall, I’d been roped into a scheme to impersonate a dead heiress—a bit of acting that got tangled up in murder and came out a lot worse than I’d expected—and while the family dropped all charges against me, it had been a front-page story in several states. I’d changed my name before moving to Hollywood, but I couldn’t be certain that someone, somewhere, wouldn’t put the pieces together and decide that a girl who’d been involved in murders in Oregon might well be involved in murders in California.
I had already told the police everything I knew about Esther’s and Heilmann’s murders. Of course, they didn’t know about the items I’d taken from the two crime scenes, but those had nothing to do with finding the killer. And yes, I thought there was one killer.
I had never figured Esther’s death as random. It was too much of a coincidence, and coincidence always makes me suspicious. For one thing, there was no apparent motive—no robbery, no rape, no vandalism, nothing taken or disturbed. The break-ins that had occurred in her block, as reported by the neighbors, bore no resemblance to the break-in at Esther’s. In those, no one had been home or harmed, and robbery had been the motive. No, the person who killed Esther was out to kill Esther. The question was, why?
Bruno Heilmann’s murder had answered that, for me anyway. Someone shot him. Esther must have seen the killer, not actually doing the deed—if that had been the case, she’d have rushed outside and called for help or telephoned the cops or been murdered herself on the spot. Supposing the caterers had remained in the kitchen while she gathered up the dishes—a likely conclusion since they had stayed in the kitchen throughout the party—then she’d have been in place to see the killer, perhaps to speak to him while she picked up the last of the dirty glasses or wiped the water rings off the lacquered tabletops. She would have noticed who was last to leave the party and would have identified him the moment she heard about the murder. The killer couldn’t let that happen, so he shot Bruno Heilmann then somehow tracked Esther to her apartment. What begged for an explanation was how he’d found her, and why he’d used a gun the first time and a statue the second.