Soap Opera Slaughters

by Marvin Kaye

  “Housekeeping is hardly her strong suit,” she said beneath her breath.

  The room was the same as I saw it the night before: tables groaning under piles of scripts, sheet music and dust; the same recording paraphernalia atop the FM/phono compact. The cassette in the compartment whirled the finale of the G&S operetta to its joyous conclusion.

  “Sounds like an old recording,” I remarked.

  “It is,” Hilary nodded. I’ve got it They transferred a 1930 performance from 78s to tape. It’s back to back with an even older Trial By Jury.”

  The last mock-Wagnerian motif sounded and in the silence that followed, the burbling of the air pump in the fish tank seemed surprisingly loud. Willie’s voice momentarily stood out in the hush, but he quickly adjusted his volume, and then more music played, a piano solo, something by Gottschalk.

  There was a curious frown on Hilary’s, but before I could comment the doorbell rang. Florence left the room and returned presently with Lara, who immediately crossed to me, apologizing for being late. But when she was a few feet away, she stopped talking and came to a halt.

  “Hello, Lainie,” Hilary said.

  The two cousins stared at one another like mirror images, then Lara gazed at me wide-eyed, lips half-parted in an unspoken question. A second of silence, and she turned away.

  Florence stopped the tape before the end and sat next to Willie on the couch. Their backs were to Hilary, who remained standing by the aquarium. Lara chose the same chair as the night before, the one opposite the sofa.

  Facing the group on my feet, I had Hilary straight ahead on the other side of the couch and Lara on my right Their stares were the legs of an obtuse angle with me at the apex, like a moth double-pinned to a specimen board.

  I made an effort to ignore them and concentrate on Florence McKinley. “I’m going to construct a scenario, and you’re the star. I’m taking a calculated risk doing this, and I don’t expect you to appreciate it, either.”

  I paused, waiting for her to comment, but she just glared at me with lips pressed into a thin, grim line, evidently following Willie’s advice not to speak.

  “Lara,” I began, “brought me here last night because you claimed someone was trying to blame Ed Niven’s death on you. I checked and found out you were extremely jealous of any woman Niven so much as smiled at—and according to at least one witness, he smiled at quite a few of them. You probably had Kit Yerby fired for that reason.”

  She opened her mouth, then remembered and closed it again.

  I went on. “It didn’t take much effort on my part to discover you really called me here as a tool to get at Joanne Carpenter. It’s true, of course, that she lives near WBS and has no alibi for Saturday, but then, neither do you. And in my opinion, Joanne never could have hurt him.”

  I phrased it deliberately to rile her, and it worked. Angrily, she began, “And you think that I have the capacity to—” But she stopped herself at a glance from Willie. A vein throbbed in her temple.

  I continued. “I can’t prove that you put the alcohol in Joanne’s ‘medicine,’ but you were quick to suggest that she did it herself to further implicate you. Unfortunately, the argument cuts either way. Lacking evidence, I have to call it a stalemate.”

  Florence sniffed disdainfully. “Your incompetence is not my fault.”

  Ignoring the taunt, I said, “Hitting Ames with his Emmy showed a total lack of caution. Joanne was in the hospital when it happened, sleeping off her attack. An even if she’d been at WBS, she wouldn’t have had any idea what was going on between Ames and Tommy Franklin.”

  “Wait a minute,” the actress fumed. “I told you that I have the contractual right to review every new ‘Bible’—”

  Willie sternly silenced her. No wonder; she’d just made a damaging admission. Though Lara already told me she’d mentioned Franklin’s proposed—and missing—‘Bible’ to her friend, the news from Florence’s own lips was a time-saver for Fat Lou, and how he loved time-savers.

  “You have the right to see an officially approved storyline,” I said, “but we’re not talking about that yet, are we? I assume Ames intended to tell Tommy to rewrite his little stinger to make the actual method of easing you off the show less obvious. Maybe a little vacation for Martha? Or a debilitating stroke? WBS thinks the ratings eventually will improve if Ames gets rid of you. He might even think it worth the expense to pay your salary and keep you off screen till you agree to a settlement Maybe—”

  “Gene,” Willie interrupted, “can we stick to the main point?”

  “Okay. You mean Niven’s death. Florence lied to me and Lara about finding his clothing in her dressing room Monday morning. It was a clumsy fabrication to begin with, and now I’ve learned the police recovered the missing garments over the weekend.”

  “Where?” Florence demanded.

  “I suspect you already know. All right, I said I’d outline a scenario. Here it is. Niven wanted to break it off with you. You got him to meet you on some pretext Saturday on the top floor of WBS. You entered by the side door. So did he. You met in the sleeping alcove behind Umberto’s hairstyling room. You argued. Something happened, I don’t know what exactly, either you hit him or he fell and struck his head. Anyway, I think that’s the way Niven really died. You panicked and undressed him, carried him to the edge of the roof and let him fall, probably figuring the original wound would be eradicated on impact. They found tar on his feet, so it’s my guess it got on your shoes, too, and you had to clean it off with the newspaper on the snack room table. There was a scrap of it left over.”

  “Gene,” the lawyer interrupted, “do you have any hard evidence?”

  “That’s for you to judge. Umberto complained because one of the cots was rumpled, and its pillow missing. Somebody also stole a rather large quantity of collodion.”

  “And what’s that?” he asked.

  “A liquid containing ether. It’s used in creating fake scars and things like that on TV. Highly flammable.”

  “What are you suggesting?”

  “Add it up, Willie. Head wounds mean a lot of blood. If the falling-off-the-roof story was going to stick, she couldn’t leave a bloody pillow behind. I think she doused it with the collodion. I checked, it only comes in two-ounce bottles, so she probably figured she’d need a lot of it.”

  “Wouldn’t she have burnt his clothes as long as she was at it? For that matter, why undress him at all?”

  “To shift the guilt to Joanne by planting the evidence in her dressing room. Which is seldom locked. And that’s where the clothing was found.”

  “See, I knew it!” Florence said, but not with much conviction. Her nerve was faltering.

  “Of course you knew it,” I said. “You described for me the exact list of garments the police have at this moment. What’s worse, you even mentioned his bloody shirt. Now tell me, if Niven really fell off the roof naked, how could he bleed on his shirt?”

  The actress was starting to look her age, and more. Her forehead and the corners of her eyes seemed more wrinkled. “Why?” she pleaded in a hoarse voice, “why are you doing this to me?”

  It annoyed me more than her earlier arrogance. “You don’t even know what I am doing. Tomorrow I have to tell the police what I think. I’m emptying the bag tonight so Willie can help you prepare some kind of defense. I’m not doing it for you, though. I don’t like people who try to use me. This is a favor to Lara, because you’re her friend.” I paused, skewered on the cousins’ unwavering stares, feeling thoroughly rotten.

  “Gene,” Willie asked, “is that the whole lot?”

  “No. Remember the call I made before Lara got here?”

  “Yes. ”

  “It was to Inspector Betterman. I told him to pick up an old man named Woody as a potential witness. Woody just got fired from WBS as a security guard. He—”

  “All right, all right!” Florence suddenly shrieked, clapping her hands to her ears. “No more! Not now! Please!”

  Willie co
uldn’t quiet her. Giving me a barbed glance, Lara waved him away and said, “Why don’t the three of you go out and wait in the entryway?”

  As we did as she asked, she tried to put her arms around her friend, but Florence pushed her away.

  “You brought that man here in the first place,” she accused Lara. “You did this to me! Don’t think you won’t suffer—”

  There was more of it, but I tried to ignore it.

  Several minutes later, Lara joined us. Her looked white and drawn.

  “She’s a little calmer now. Not much, though. I’m going to bring her some Valium, then I suggest we all go home.”

  Willie and I began to protest.

  “She’s not going to run away,” Lara said. “Look, just leave her alone for tonight, all right?”

  “Then what?” I asked.

  “Tomorrow she promises to confess everything.”

  ABEL HARRISON HAD DROPPED off Lara at Florence’s, so the four of us walked silently back to my car. The weather was beginning to turn muggy.

  The cousins got into the back seat and Willie rode up front with me. Neither Hilary nor Lara spoke, but Willie insisted I explain the significance of Woody in my scenario.

  “He was another calculated risk on my part,” I said. “I wanted to make sure, though, that Lou picked him up before I mentioned him to Florence, just in case I was right and she tried something desperate. Judging from the way she reacted, I’d say my hunch about him is accurate.”

  “But how does he fit in?” the attorney asked.

  “They fired him the other day for saying something stupid concerning WBS security on the newscast about Niven. But when I saw him at the studio today, he seemed awfully jaunty. Not to mention very expensively dressed. Brand-new threads.”

  “So?”

  “I also spotted him waiting on a park bench last night on the pedestrian walk behind Florence’s apartment, looking up at her windows. Maybe he was waiting for her to blink the lights as a signal that Lara and I were gone?”

  “Hmm.” Willie mulled it over. “Was he on duty when Niven fell?”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re suggesting blackmail. You think this Woody saw her at WBS Saturday?”

  That’s for Fat Lou to find out,” I said, steering into the bridge lane.

  After dropping Willie off on Twenty-third Street, I headed west to Eleventh and started uptown, wondering whether either woman in the back seat intended to speak to me again.

  Lara did. “I’d like to be driven directly home.”

  When I pulled up in front of her building, Lara’s doorman recognized her and hurried over to let her out of the car. She told Hilary good night, but I only got a brusque nod. I watched her disappear into her lobby.

  “Were you planning to stay with her this evening?” Hilary asked with uncharacteristic gentleness.

  I shrugged. “My things are up there.”

  A long silence before Hilary spoke again. “Gene...you never took all your clothes...

  It took me a second to comprehend.

  “Hilary, are you saying I can spend the night at your place?”

  “It’s just that you look too worn out to drive back to Philly. I mean, it’s only one night, and your room’s empty.”

  I accepted with some misgivings.

  I parked in the garage on Eighty-seventh Street where Hilary keeps her VW. She let me in and offered me tea or brandy before bedtime. It wasn’t very late, but she said she had an early business appointment.

  I’m pretty tired, Hilary. Would you mind if I had tea in my old room?”

  “Not at all. I’ll bring it to you.”

  It was strange entering my old quarters. The fact that Harry Whelan occupied them for six months didn’t matter. The place still felt like mine. I checked the closet and found a few shirts and one suit that belonged to me. They were too heavy for the season, but it’d be better than wearing the same things I’d had on for two days. I looked in the bureau and found underwear and socks. I couldn’t remember leaving any, but they were my size, so I was grateful. A quick shower, and I got in bed.

  A rap on the door. I bade Hilary enter.

  She brought me a cup of gunpowder tea, another favorite of mine. Putting it on the nightstand by the headboard, she sat on the edge of the bed, staring into her hands resting lifelessly in her lap. I thanked her for the tea, but didn’t take it yet I wanted to hear what she evidently had on her mind.

  It took her a while to say it “I don’t blame you, Gene, for liking Lainie.”

  “Does it make any difference whether I do or not? When Harry left, you certainly didn’t break any records to bring me back.”

  She gave me a hard look, and for a second, I thought I was due for one of her verbal rapier thrusts. But she wrestled with it and locked it away.

  Turning from me gave me a chance to gaze at Hilary for a while. I don’t remember when she looked lovelier. Her blond hair, loose and flowing—the way I’d always preferred it-framed the perfect oval of her . Her eyes might have shamed a sapphire, and she wore a pale blue robe over matching pajamas, an ensemble I’d given her last year. It reminded me her birthday was coming soon.

  She turned back and I lowered my eyes. “Gene,” she asked quietly, “what went wrong with us?”

  “Us, I suppose.”

  “Was it Washington?”

  “No. That was only symptomatic. Anyway, Harry told me nothing happened there.”

  “He lied.”

  I turned aside for my teacup, needing some activity to mask my feelings. It upset me that it still mattered.

  “I was angry at you, angry at your becoming so important to me, Gene. I wanted Harry to exorcise you. Only he couldn’t.”

  I said nothing. I took a sip of tea and did not speak.

  The silence grew longer and longer. Hilary finally broke it “Damn it Gene, talk to me!”

  “What do you expect me to say?”

  “Anything!”

  I put down the teacup. “Hilary, what you’ve told me is none of my business.”

  She stiffened. Her lips drew into an angry line, but still she didn’t lash back. Instead, she rose from the bed and started out stopping at the door.

  “I’m sorry I disturbed you,” Hilary said softly, and left. Without her, the room grew cold.

  Next morning when I woke, I found a note on my nightstand.

  Gene, I’m sorry about last night. We were both tired and upset. Lainie called late, but you were sound asleep. She’s not working today and hopes you’ll come over early. If you need me, I‘ll be back around five. If you’re short of cash, there’s about $150 in the office safe. You know the combination.

  As a matter of fact, I was short and didn’t have my checkbook with me. I borrowed one hundred dollars, left an IOU, and promised myself I’d pay her back as soon as I got home.

  I got dressed and went outside. Rain brought no overnight relief. Though West End Avenue was pockmarked with puddles, the sun blazed mercilessly and, by the time I got to Lara’s penthouse, the heavy clothes I’d donned were moist with perspiration.

  Lara opened her door and rushed into my arms.

  “Gene, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, forgive me!”

  She clung to me and I felt the sweet warmth of her flesh. Sensibly clad in lightweight halter and pastel-colored shorts, she wore a subtle flush of rouge on her cheeks and just enough eye shadow to draw me into their depths. Though she looked like she’d been crying, she was more glamorous now than ever she’d been on “Riverday.”

  I put my arms around her and we kissed.

  In the dim softness of her bedroom I cradled her in my arms and stared at the amber glow of the digital clock.

  10:15 A.M. I wanted to ask about Abel, but it was the wrong time for it, and anyway, I was starting to get antsy about calling Lou Betterman. I told Lara, and she nodded sadly.

  “All right,” she said. “But let me phone Flo first.”

  “Isn’t she at work?”

  �
��No. Mack told us they’d be shooting around the Jennett family today. It’s all sideplots till Joanne returns tomorrow.”

  I lay back against the pillows while Lara went into the other room to call Florence. She was only gone a short time when she reentered the bedroom, clearly distressed.

  “Lara, what’s wrong?”

  “It’s Florence, she sounds strange.”

  “Strange how?”

  “Drugged.”

  “Probably the Valium. What did she say?”

  “That she was going to clean up the mess she made. Then she hung up on me.”

  My backbone went icy. Leaping out of bed, I ran to the living room. “What’s her number?”

  “It’s by the phone.”

  There was a memo book; I flipped to the “M” page, found Florence’s name and dialed. It rang three times before I heard it being picked up.

  “Who is this? Lara?” Florence’s voice was indeed thick and curiously flat.

  I identified myself. A sharp intake of breath on the other end, followed by a longish pause which I waited out.

  “Leave me alone,” her voice finally murmured. “You can’t hurt me anymore.” A loud noise, as if the phone fell to the floor. I yelled her name, there was a kind of scrabbling on the other end, then a click and the line went dead.

  “Come on,” I told Lara, slamming down the receiver and dashing for the bedroom and my clothes. “We’ve got to get over there fast!”

  In any other city, I would’ve gotten ten tickets for the way I drove, but in New York, it hardly mattered. I pulled up across the street from Florence’s home, stopping next to a No Parking sign, the only empty space.

  Upstairs, Lara began to unlock the apartment, but I stopped her. “Wait! Leave the key in the door and get back!”

  “Gene, she’s my friend!”

  “Damn it,” I shouted, “go down the hall and wait.”

  She reluctantly obeyed. I turned the key the rest of the way, then, holding a handkerchief over my nose and mouth, very gently turned the knob and pushed in the door.