Movie Palace Cozy Mystery Boxed Set: Books 1-3

by Margaret Dumas

  “I just move ’em,” he shrugged.

  Again, fair enough.

  “Can I ask you to bring it downstairs for me?” It looked like a wardrobe box, the kind you hang clothes in for a move. A few months ago Ted had paid someone to pack up all my possessions from the house I’d shared with him in wedded ignorance, and he’d had everything delivered to me here. This box had probably just been forgotten. It belonged with the rest of the them, still unopened, down in the basement prop room.

  “Is there an elevator?” the guy asked.

  “No, but there’s twenty dollars,” I offered.

  “I’d be happy to.”

  Fair enough.

  “Open it! Open it!” Trixie urged as soon as I’d seen the delivery guy out and returned to her in the prop room.

  “I don’t even know what it is,” I told her.

  “That’s why you have to open it, you dope.”

  “I do know what it is,” I reversed myself. “It’s clothes from my old life, and I don’t want them. I don’t want any of them.”

  The prop room was downstairs, below the stage. The room was large, with high ceilings and brick walls, and was a gathering place for junk that had accumulated over the long history of the theater. Bits of sets and racks of costumes from the time when the Palace was on the vaudeville circuit, along with furniture and equipment that nobody had ever gotten around to throwing away. Since the delivery from Ted back in January it had also held twenty-two boxes containing the remnants of my former life. I hadn’t known where else to put that much stuff until I felt like I could deal with it. The new box fit right in.

  Trixie put her hands on her hips and shook her head in exasperation. “Why, Nora Paige, you’ve been putting this off and putting it off and I just can’t see why. They’re your things. Don’t you want to go through them? Your clothes. Gee, if I could wear something new I’d jump at the chance.” She looked down at the wide-legged trousers of the snappy usherette’s uniform that she’d been wearing since 1937. “Not that I don’t look cute in this,” she dimpled.

  “Cuter than anyone has a right to,” I assured her. Especially anyone her age. “But I can’t get wrapped up in all of this now. I don’t have the time. Tommy’s been arrested for murder, and—”

  “And that has nothing to do with you, does it?” Her hands remained on her hips, determination written on her face.

  Well, not really. Although it felt like it did.

  “So open it!” She clapped in excitement. “At least open this new one.”

  I wavered.

  “Why, I bet the clothes in here are just grand,” Trixie said, passing her hand through the corner of the box. It was taller than she was. “And you know if they stay boxed up down here they’re going to start to smell all basement-y.” She wrinkled her pert nose.

  That was a good point. However much my old wardrobe didn’t suit my new life, I didn’t like the thought of ruining good things just because I couldn’t face the memories they held. If I didn’t want them I should donate them. But first I had to steel myself to see exactly what Ted had sent before he’d sold my house.

  “Wouldn’t it be funny if this is where that stinker husband of yours hid all the money?” Trixie asked.

  “Hilarious,” I told her. “But let’s not get our hopes up.”

  I started picking at the tape on the large wardrobe box. I assumed the clothes I’d last seen six months ago—designer jackets and chic sleeveless dresses more suited to power lunches at the Ivy than slinging popcorn and sweeping the stage—would be hanging neatly inside.

  “Ooh, I can’t wait!” Trixie said. “I bet it’s something good.”

  One satisfying tug and the top of the box was open. I folded down the front to see what was inside.

  “Gowns,” I said. Maybe half a dozen, all carefully packed in tissue and hung on clear acrylic forms that gave them shape.

  Trixie squealed. “They’re beautiful! Take them out! Take them out right now so I can see them!”

  I pushed the tissue aside. One dress was red, with long sleeves and a deep V-neck, sequined to within an inch of its life. Another was sheer and white with elaborate crystal beading and an empire silhouette. The third was a pink satin strapless with a huge bow on the hip.

  “Oh, Nora, they’re wonderful. I can’t believe you ever wore anything this gorgeous.”

  My mouth had gone dry, so it took a moment for me to answer her.

  “I didn’t.” I finally said. “These aren’t my gowns.”

  Ninety minutes later I’d opened every box Ted had sent back in January. I’d found books, clothes, shoes, and handbags, all of them mine. There was a box with the wineglasses we’d gotten in Venice, and the silver coffeepot we’d picked up at a Paris flea market. One held the contents of my desk, including my lucky fountain pen and scripts I’d been working on a decade ago. There were a hundred things that might have made me break down with emotion, but nothing else that didn’t belong to me.

  Why had he sent these? Why now? And what did they mean?

  I rolled a costume rack over and unceremoniously dumped everything it held onto the floor. Then I carefully, carefully, carefully took each of the gowns out of the wardrobe box and hung them on the rack.

  “Nora, you’re right.” Trixie shimmered with excitement. “These gowns are famous.”

  “These gowns are iconic,” I said. “Every damn one of them.”

  Both the sequined red and the strapless pink had been worn by Marilyn Monroe in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953, Marilyn and Jane Russell), and the white was what Audrey Hepburn had worn to the ball in My Fair Lady (1964, Hepburn and Rex Harrison). They were joined on the rack by an ethereal blue chiffon number in which Grace Kelly had wafted around the South of France in To Catch A Thief (1955, Kelly and Cary Grant), a short red flapper dress slit to the waist that Cyd Charisse had used to lethal effect in The Band Wagon (1953, Charisse and Fred Astaire), and a lavender-gray ballgown in which Judy Garland had left it all on the stage in A Star is Born (1954, Garland and James Mason).

  Trixie stood behind the rack, her head just visible over the neckline of Judy’s ballgown. “How do I look?”

  “I’m not sure it works with the hat.”

  She laughed and cocked her little round cap further to the side, curls bouncing as she did so. “Nora, this is amazing! Why didn’t you tell me you had all these dresses?”

  “Because I didn’t,” I said. “I’ve never seen them before. Except in the movies.”

  I stared at them, biting my lip and trying to figure out how six of the most stunning costumes in movie history had wound up in my prop room, while Trixie chattered on about how beautiful they were. “Gee, I wish I could wear them,” she said, sweeping her arm through them all. She turned to me. “Did they come with gloves and shoes and things?”

  I shrugged, still thinking. She gave up on me and went to the large wardrobe box, peeking inside. “No gloves,” she announced. “But, say, Nora, there’s an envelope down there.” She disappeared into the box. I peeked over the top and saw her crouching at the bottom, unable to pick up a thick white envelope.

  “Careful, I’m going to tip it over,” I said, although it wasn’t as if I could hurt her.

  As soon as the envelope was in my hands I recognized the stationary. There was a whole box of it with the things from my desk. I tore it open and stared in disbelief at the three words above Ted’s signature.

  “I need you.”

  I was still clutching the note from Ted. I’d clutched it all six blocks from the Palace to Monica’s shop. I’d clutched it as she’d taken one look at me and ushered me through the back lounge and into her private office. I’d clutched it as I told her about the gowns.

  “That’s all it says?” She’d settled me into a chair in the soothing saffron-colored meditation nook of her office and was now making me
a cup of herbal tea. For once I would have liked her to offer something stronger. “He just sent you six famous dresses and a three-word note?”

  I held the evidence out to her. “‘I need you.’ What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Monica opened a jar of honey. “It might mean he needs you.”

  “He’s insane,” I said. “First he hides all my money and then he sends me a fortune in costumes?”

  “Is it a fortune?” she asked.

  I blinked. “Probably. I mean, if they’re genuine, which they seem to be, and if I could sell them, auction them off or something, which I could assuming I had a receipt or paperwork that proved—” I stared at her. “He didn’t send receipts.”

  “So he doesn’t want you to sell them.” She handed me a steaming mug, a thoughtful look on her face. “Why dresses?”

  Suddenly I was stabbed with a memory. “We were going to go to an auction,” I said, blinking. “Back before I found out about the affair. Ted and I were planning to go to New York for a movie memorabilia auction. But that was going to be in November and everything blew up in October, and I didn’t even think…I never even remembered it until just now.”

  “Drink your tea,” she advised. “And maybe breathe.”

  I couldn’t do either. “I had my eye on a Bette Davis broach,” I said. “Not on six whole gowns. What in the hell was he thinking?”

  She tilted her head. “At a guess, I’d say he was thinking he needs you.”

  “Of course he does,” I fumed. “He hasn’t done anything for himself in years. But he doesn’t get to leave me and take all the money and still expect me to drop everything just because he doesn’t know how to order a damn pizza!” I might have been yelling by that point.

  “He doesn’t know how to order a pizza?”

  I wafted my hands and slumped, exhausted. “That’s what assistants are for.” I thought about it. “He must need me for something big. Something specific. He wouldn’t have thrown Marilyn Monroe’s gowns at a problem he could solve with an assistant. He’s too cheap for that.”

  Monica nodded. “He’s also emotionally stunted and weirdly controlling, from the looks of things.”

  “In other words, an actor,” I said darkly.

  “Maybe the gowns are an apology,” Monica suggested. “Remember back in January when he sent out that tweet? He called you his best friend.”

  I remembered the tweet. He’d encouraged his millions of followers to come see a movie at the Palace. It had boosted our attendance when we’d needed a boost the most. I stared at Monica.

  “Maybe,” she suggested, “in some weird way, he thinks you are friends.”

  “Let’s add ‘delusional’ to the long list of things he is.”

  “Are you going to call him?” Monica asked. “At least find out what he needs your help with?”

  “Well, I might,” I said. “If he weren’t a scheming, lying, cheating liar.”

  “Sure.” She pushed the tea toward me, nodding. “You’re better off with a text.”

  Chapter 10

  There was a knock on Monica’s office door just as I pressed Send on a text that I wasn’t sure I should send. Ted had left a three word note for me: “I need you.” After much consideration, I sent him a four-word text.

  You can’t buy me.

  When I looked up, Monica was checking the video screen that showed the hallway outside her door. Her security at the shop was tight, which only made sense, considering the amount of cash and cannabis she kept on hand.

  “It’s Abby,” she said, glancing from the screen to me. “She’s just bringing a delivery. It won’t take long.”

  “I should get out of here. I’ve taken enough of your time.” I stood. “Thanks for the tea, and for putting up with me.”

  She got up and moved to the door. “Anytime. And don’t do anything with those gowns until I get to see them.”

  “I won’t,” I said as she opened the door.

  Abby, the vendor that I’d met the other day before the owners’ meeting, stood in the hallway wearing a pale blue sweater that complemented her cropped white hair. She held a carton stacked with small brown boxes. “Hi, lovie,” she greeted Monica. “I’ve got all the custom orders from the other day. Kristy told me I should bring them back here so nobody sells them by mistake.” She set the carton on Monica’s desk before she noticed me. “Oh, hi.”

  “Hi. It’s Nora. We met the other—”

  “Of course, Nora.” She moved in for a quick hug. “I remember. You were here with Tommy, and—” She released me and took a step back, biting her lip.

  “And S,” I finished for her. She’d been deep in conversation with S when the rest of us had gone into the lounge for the meeting. The day before he died.

  “I couldn’t believe it when I heard.” She looked from Monica to me. “Did you know him well?” she asked me.

  “Not at all. That was the only time I met him.”

  She nodded. “So awful.”

  I remembered that she’d seemed as struck with his rock star aura as everyone else in the shop that day. She’d gaped at him when he approached and had seemed more than a little discombobulated by his presence.

  “Did you talk to him long after we went into the meeting?” I asked her, silently wondering And did he happen to mention anyone wanting to kill him? Tommy, perhaps?

  “I did,” she said. “He was interested in everything in the shop, not just my line. I showed him around and answered what I could of his questions. Whatever I didn’t know about, Kristy did.”

  “Kristy’s good,” Monica said.

  “Very knowledgeable,” Abby agreed. “I think she made quite an impression on him.”

  “He definitely made an impression on her,” Monica said. “She couldn’t talk about anything else the rest of the day.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Abby said. “He certainly bought enough to impress her.”

  I’d been thinking I should go have a word with this Kristy, but Abby’s comment got my attention. “Really?” I asked. “He bought a lot? More than normal?”

  “I can’t say what’s normal,” Abby replied. “But he bought quite a bit. Three, no four things from me.” She frowned in concentration. “Plus a few samples. And he placed a custom order. But he didn’t just buy from my line. He filled a basket before he left.”

  “We’ll have a record of what he bought,” Monica said. “Receipts are itemized and tracked by purchaser. Do you think it’s important?” She looked at me.

  “I have no idea,” I said honestly.

  “I joked that he must be throwing a party,” Abby said. “And he told me the next day was going to be the biggest party of his life.” She looked at us. The next day he’d died onstage.

  She turned and shuffled through the stack of boxes she’d put on Monica’s desk. “I brought his custom tincture. I didn’t know what else to do with it. He’d given me his history and I was so pleased to be able to develop this blend for him, before I heard what happened.”

  She found the box she was looking for. It had S Bank’s name on the label, and last Tuesday’s date, followed by a handwritten list of ingredients, none of which were legible.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t really know much about how you work. What do you mean about him giving you his history? His medical history?”

  She nodded. “Things like illnesses and allergies, any prescriptions he was taking, as well as his experiences with cannabinoids. He was excited to see what I could blend for him.” She looked down at the box in her hands, her expression unreadable.

  “Did he take any prescription drugs?” I asked, wondering if they could have been tampered with. A doctor would never have told me, but I assumed there was no such thing as pot-purveyor-client confidentiality.

  I was right. “Just the occasional antibiotic,” she ans
wered. “Nothing on a regular basis.”

  “Right.” That let the tampering theory out. But not all drugs were prescription. “I got the impression S was pretty experienced with, um, cannabinoids,” I said. “When I saw him on the webcast that day he looked like he’d already taken something.”

  “I thought so, too,” Monica said. “When I watched it online, after.”

  I turned to Abby. “Do you know of anything that could intensify the effect of pot?”

  She nodded. “Sure, but not enough to kill him. Is that what you’re asking?”

  “I guess it is. The thing is, I’ve been wondering about where Tommy would have gotten poison—not that I even know what poison killed S or how hard it would be to get.” I grimaced. “On the news this morning they said they probably wouldn’t have the results from the autopsy until Friday or so.”

  “Do you think Tommy did it?” Abby asked.

  “I don’t know. But the police must have some reason for thinking so.”

  “We all have some reason for thinking so,” Monica reminded me.

  “True.” Especially if, with S out of the way, Tommy would get more of the profits from the game.

  “For what it’s worth, I don’t think it’s that hard to get your hands on poison,” Abby said. “Of course, my farm is all organic, but there are still plenty that pour on the toxic weed killer.”

  “Something tells me Tommy May doesn’t take care of killing his own weeds,” I said. Would he take care of killing his own business partner?

  “Forget about Tommy for a minute. You absolutely have to try on those gowns.” Robbie’s voice, over the phone, was definite.

  I was back in the basement after everyone else had gone home for the night. I’d managed to stay busy throughout the day, mainly putting things together for Friday’s midnight movie party, but once the handful of customers cleared out at the end of the nine-fifteen I had the joint to myself. Even Trixie had disappeared. That happened sometimes. She never remembered where she went when she was away, but so far she’d always come back.