by R. T. Jordan
Polly leaned against the railing and looked down at the white waves flooded with light from the ship. She then looked to the sky. Polly closed her eyes and shook her head. “Laura, dear. I have a very funny story for you. You’re probably someplace hot and sticky right now and you could use a giggle. Remember the paintings you loved so much? The Warhol, Bachardy, and Hockney that I bought from you for next to nothing when you were broke? Guess what? I got what I paid for. Nothing. You sold me fakes, just like the ones I had reproduced for you. I knew almost from the beginning but figured they still looked good, and were cheap, so why make a fuss and have to pay a fortune in insurance premiums. And I’ve lied all these years telling people that they’re genuine. Hell, I’ve impressed hundreds of guests. Isn’t that too funny?”
Suddenly, the scent of fresh sea air shifted and Polly picked up the fragrance of men’s cologne. She sniffed the air, turned away from the ocean, and gasped as she found herself staring directly into Dorian’s fierce and blazing eyes.
“Interesting conversation you’re having with the dead,” Dorian said.
“At least she can’t talk back to me anymore.”
“Confession time?”
Polly nodded. “I suspect you didn’t like what you heard.”
“On the contrary. I wanted confirmation of what Laura told me with her last breath,” Dorian said. “My guess is that Laura counted on you keeping your trap shut all these years. If the Peeper got wind of the story, she would have looked like Bernie Madoff, and you one of his hapless victims. Of course, she’d have cried shock and embarrassment and explained that she didn’t know anything about art and had obviously been duped herself. You could afford to keep quiet about her deception. I can’t.”
Polly rubbed her arms against the evening chill and said, “You were swindled. She cheated you, the way she cheated me and probably others. So you killed her. When did you find out they were fakes?”
“Too late,” Dorian said. “I stupidly thought that since she was a pseudocelebrity that she’d be on the up and up. I had the canvases appraised after I paid her $175,000.”
Polly laughed. “Sweetums! Haven’t you ever heard the saying, ‘If it sounds too good to be true …’”
“The Andy Warhol Art Authentication Board denied the authenticity of the silk screen,” Dorian interrupted through gritted teeth. “They laughed at me. Then I demanded my money back from Laura. She laughed too and had the gall to say, ‘All sales are final.’ She had an insolent, imperious way about her.”
“I remember the look,” Polly said. “It was an attitude that made you want to strangle her.”
“I paid her every cent that I had, for Christ’s sake!” Dorian looked deep into Polly’s eyes. “The last thing she said to me was, ‘Get them from Polly Pepper.’”
“She sold me what she sold you—worthless junk. I just didn’t make a stink about it. I never believed her tale of Warhol’s lost can of soup. What a crock.” Polly smiled. “But I was able to help a fellow thespian who needed money, and I let her go on thinking that I was as much of a moron about art as she was about musical comedy. Funny, eh?”
“Never mind,” Dorian spat. “Laura ripped me off. I got chummy with you in order to get my hands on what was rightfully mine. I think you’re lying about their authenticity.”
Polly stared Dorian down. “How did you plan to get them out of my possession? Did you think I’d simply hand over my Hockney?”
“In a manner of speaking.” Dorian reached into the inside breast pocket of his sport coat and withdrew a tri-folded piece of paper. He held it under his nose like a cigar and pretended to inhale the aroma. “A change to your will.” He smiled.
Polly blanched. “Tim had you pegged as a nut from the beginning. In the future, I’ll pay more attention to his intuition.”
Dorian repeated, “In the future,” and offered a hollow laugh. Opening the folded document, he explained what he’d done. “I love the Internet. There’s a Web site for everything—www.Sicktodeath.com creates wills for only $9.95. I made a codicil to yours. You’ll sign it, and I’ll be very happy to receive your generous bequest of three of your most important pieces of modern art.”
“You wasted money,” Polly said.
“After you’re gone no one will question your gift because we’ve become such chums during this week. Our mutual love for modern art is now well established. At least by the passengers who saw us together at the art auction. It was especially lucky that my cell phone went off. It called further attention to us.”
Polly nodded. She thought Dorian’s plan was actually a pretty good one. “Ah, but if I leave the planet via a dunk in the ocean, you’ll have to wait ages—decades maybe—to get your mitts on my canvases ‘cause without a body it’ll be a while before I’m declared officially dead.”
Dorian nodded. “Everyone feels they have more time left on Earth than they actually do. Every breath could be our last. Accidents happen with the blink of an eye. Poof! Gone and soon forgotten.”
“I’m not accident prone,” Polly said. “After those vampires at Sterling Studios, nothing can harm me. And there’s no sense in signing some stupid will that you downloaded from the Net, ‘cause even if the artworks in question are real, I wouldn’t give a boring man like you the satisfaction.”
Dorian sniggered and shook his head. “All actors are liars.”
“We play roles,” Polly corrected.
“Right now you’re playing the role of an innocent who was taken advantage of by Laura Crawford, just as I was,” Dorian said. Suddenly he was in Polly’s face. “Bullshit!”
Polly tried to step back but was stopped by the railing along the side of the ship.
“You do have my art! Maybe they’re the pieces on your wall, the ones you insist are forgeries. Or maybe they’re tucked away in a vault.”
Polly could hear the roar of the ship’s engines and the sound of the vessel slicing its way through the Pacific Ocean. And she could see murder in Dorian’s terrifying eyes. “Why would I lie about being moronic enough to buy phony art? Do you think I want my fans to know how retarded I am about culture? I swear, the only things of any value in my home are my Emmy Awards, the People’s Choice Awards, of course the lovely Peabody—oh, and I have a soft spot for the Grammy I won all those years ago. Of course I want an Oscar and a Tony, too. My friend Chita has all those prizes, and a freakin’ Kennedy Center honor. If she wasn’t so damned nice, I’d …”
“Stop droning!” Dorian hissed. “I’ve hated every time you do that!” He made such tight fists that the document he held was crushed. “You don’t get to be a star by being half-witted,” he said. Dorian withdrew a ballpoint pen from his coat pocket and thrust it at Polly, along with the addition to her will. “Just sign and date the damn thing and it’ll be over.”
“You’re going to throw me into the drink whether I sign this silly paper or not because, first of all, I can identify you as Laura Crawford’s killer. Second, you need me dead to collect your entirely undeserved inheritance,” Polly said.
Dorian took a deep breath. “You’re right that if you go missing from this ship, it’ll take years for the courts to rule that you’re legally dead. That’s too long to wait for my reward.”
“You’re damn right, and in the meantime, my Timmy will loan the works to a museum. It’ll be near impossible to get them back once I’m officially not being resurrected.”
“I have it all figured out,” Dorian said with an arrogance reserved for those with an answer to any question. “And thanks for just now admitting that you do have the paintings.”
“I meant, if I had them. For crying out loud, I’m under a little bit of pressure here.” Polly squared her shoulders and demanded to be allowed to leave the scene. “I’m not signing anything, so you’re wasting your time.”
“You have my art! I paid for it!” Dorian demanded. “How many other buyers did you and Laura scam? It was a really clever shakedown, selling so-called masterworks to suckers. Y
ou haven’t made big bucks in television or movies in a long time. It takes a lot of moo-lah to keep that Pepper Plantation place running, not to mention all the champagne you swill. Now that I think about it, I’d say you and Laura had a good game going. Suckers are born every minute.”
There were tears streaming down Dorian’s face. “Laura took advantage of me. I hate when people do that! I’m too nice. I’m a stupid pushover! It’s happened all my life.”
“I don’t think you’re too nice,” Polly scoffed.
Dorian continued in a mimicking voice. “‘Dorian won’t mind if you walk all over him. Dorian likes being a doormat. Dorian’s too sweet to complain about getting his teeth kicked in. Dorian plays well with others.’”
“Laura was the final straw. Is that it?” Polly asked.
“She acted as if I were a nuisance for politely informing her that she unknowingly owned forgeries and had sold me knockoffs.” Dorian sniffled. “I tried to be a decent guy to give her the benefit of the doubt. She claimed she didn’t know that the paintings were fakes. But she said she didn’t owe me anything. That was all BS! She took advantage of me. Now, God damn it, you’re doing the same thing!”
In that moment, Dorian reached into his pocket and pulled out a DVD disc. He held it up close to Polly’s eyes. “Recognize the title?”
“I’m farsighted.”
“Season Five. One of your best.”
“Something tells me that you don’t want me to autograph it for you,” Polly quipped. “I think I’d rather go overboard after all. I don’t like blood. Especially my own. And that disc looks all jagged and sharp.”
“If you don’t sign this amendment right now, you’ll get the same thing that Laura Crawford had coming to her.”
“I’m damned if I do, and damned if I don’t,” Polly said. “But like you, I don’t appreciate being pushed around. So get out of my way or I swear I’ll fight you until one of us is dead. Be the nice man that people see on the outside and let me go.”
Dorian began to hyperventilate as he clutched the paper in one hand, and felt a sticky dampness on the other. He took his eyes off Polly for a split second to look at the hand that held the DVD disc; he was bleeding. He had gripped the sharpened edges of the disc too tightly. Dorian gasped and dropped the disc.
In that nanosecond, Polly took advantage of the moment and tried to bulldoze her way past Dorian. He grabbed Polly’s dress and nearly ripped it off as he dragged her back and threw her to the floor of the deck.
“‘Cry me a river,’ as the song goes,” Dorian hissed, and picked up the already bloodied DVD. He kicked the pen toward Polly and reached out to hand her the amendment to her will.
Polly looked up at Dorian and said, “The probate court will find it very odd that there’s blood all over a will. When some smart detective does an analysis they’ll discover it’s your blood. Although I’ll be long gone, and apparently there won’t be any eyewitnesses to what you’re about to do, all the pieces of the puzzle will fit together and you’ll end up spending two life sentences in a cell with Big Bowser. Or worse—Phil Spector who, believe me, is much scarier without his wigs on!”
Polly took the folded and wrinkled paper from Dorian and picked up the pen that lay beside her leg. She scrawled “Screw you!” where a line for her signature was drawn, and scribbled a date late in the future. She handed the paper back to Dorian.
He didn’t bother to review the paper but simply placed it in the inside pocket of his sport coat.
Polly looked at the DVD that Dorian was once again holding. “Did you decide to kill Laura Crawford with Season Six for any particular reason?” she asked.
Dorian cocked his head and said, “The commentary section. Laura came across as a sweet Mary Tyler Moore. But I knew better. She was a dragon. It seemed the most appropriate disc to use.”
“Why Season Five for me?” Polly asked.
“I hadn’t sharpened the others.” He held up his bloodied hand. He then retrieved the pen and threw it overboard. “As little evidence as possible,” he said. “God, you were a handful this week. No wonder men can’t stay married to you.”
Then suddenly he lunged for Polly. In quick succession, he grabbed her by the hair with one hand and yanked her head back. “This’ll only take a few moments,” he said as he held the DVD close to Polly’s neck.
Polly’s self-defense survival instincts suddenly kicked in and she began to fight for her life. “It’s men like you that I can’t stay married to,” she said as the two struggled. As Polly flayed and kicked and screamed, she knocked the DVD disc out of Dorian’s hand. It was instantly picked up by a strong gust of wind and carried into the air. Dorian automatically dropped Polly and reached up to grab the disc as if it were a basketball about to be called out of bounds.
However, as if he made a slight jump for the shiny disc, his sport coat filled with wind and as he reached for the DVD, he was thrown off balance. Suddenly, with a loud cry of fear and confusion his eyes met with Polly’s for an instant before he disappeared over the side of the ship.
Polly was in wide-eyed shock as she saw Dorian look back at her in disbelief about what had just happened to him. In a fraction of an instant, he was absorbed into the water. He was gone.
Polly stood staring into the ocean. She couldn’t move. Her eyes kept searching for Dorian. “Didn’t you just say, ‘Everyone feels they have more time left on Earth than they actually do.’ And ‘Accidents happen with the blink of an eye.’ You were right.”
Suddenly an elderly couple stepped into the shadows with Polly. “Lose something, dear?” the woman asked. “We heard a scream. I hope you didn’t drop anything important overboard.”
Just as suddenly Tim and Placenta appeared from out of nowhere, heaving breathlessly from a mad dash to find Polly. Tim yelled, “A.L. Angela Lansbury! Oscar nomination. The Picture of Dorian Gray! Your ghost gave you the clue that the killer was Dorian!”
“No kidding,” Polly said, in monotone, as she tried to come to terms with what had just occurred.
Tim and Placenta both reached out to steady Polly, and in that moment, the captain and several members of the ship’s security detail rushed to Polly’s side.
“It was an accident. He tried to kill me!” Polly said.
“Where is that son of a bitch?” Placenta barked, ready to throttle Dorian Dawson.
“Too late,” Polly said. “He’s taking a swim.”
Polly looked at Captain Sheridan and suddenly she was fuming. “You should be brought up on security violation charges, for not keeping your passengers safe from killers! I was almost …”
Captain Sheridan raised his hands to put an end to Polly’s tirade. “It’s all recorded on our security monitoring system,” he said. “That’s why we’re here. We watched the entire incident.”
“So you were waiting for a commercial break to come to my rescue?” Polly charged.
Polly just as suddenly smiled. “I was right after all.”
Captain Sheridan made a face. “You haven’t been right once this week. Tonight you said that Cori was the obvious killer.”
“I clearly remember telling you and everyone in the theater that Dorian Dawson was the one you wanted, not sweet, darling Cori Berman.”
Tim rolled his eyes at Placenta. “I’ll back up Polly’s story.”
Polly looked at the ground and pointed to the DVD. “You’ll find Dorian Dawson’s blood all over that thing. Mark it as Exhibit A.” She drew a deep breath and looked around at her family, the crew, and a horde of passengers who had suddenly appeared as lookie-loos. “I think I deserve a reward,” she said, meeting the captain’s eyes. “The only thing that will do, aside from money, is a bottle of Krug, Clos du Mesnil. Pick up the tab, won’t you, Sweetums?” Polly said as she patted the captain’s cheek and walked hand in hand with Tim and Placenta toward the Polar Bar.
CHAPTER 27
Morning arrived too quickly. Wheeling their luggage to Polly’s suite to await debarkation ins
tructions, Placenta noticed an envelope with the Kool Krooz logo in the upper left-hand corner lying on the floor in front of the cabin door. “Lord, not another threatening letter,” she begged, as she retrieved it and rapped her knuckles on Polly’s door.
“Entrez vous, por favor.”
Tim took the envelope from Placenta. “Wanna wager that Dorian wasn’t Laura’s killer after all?” he said as he withdrew a sheet of paper. “Oh, God. It’s worse!” he cried.
Placenta took the paper from Tim. “A bill? Three thousand smakerroos?” Placenta studied the itemized list. “It’s that damn champagne! Those bottles of Krug, Clos du Mesnil were $625.00 dollars each! Dorian didn’t succeed in killing Polly, but this’ll definitely shorten her lifeline!”
When Tim and Placenta entered the suite, they found a radiant Polly Pepper looking every inch the glamorous legend that she was and exuding the haughty aura of one who had won a grand prize—and too bad for all the losers.
“I only wish Randy had been here to share in the thrills,” Polly sighed as she handed Placenta a few articles of clothing, expecting her to pack them in the suitcase.
“Trade ya,” Placenta said, exchanging the envelope for Polly’s silk bathrobe.
“My paycheck?” Polly squealed.
“Someone’s,” Placenta clucked.
The moment that Polly opened the envelope and scanned the invoice, her sweet smile turned sour and her jaw dropped. “This must be the work of Dorian Dawson!”
“It was your idea to buy pricey champagne to impress him,” Placenta jeered.
“Polly Pepper doesn’t impress anyone,” the legend pouted. She quickly realized that the words hadn’t come out right. “I mean I don’t have to go out of my way to make an impression. If we switch that story around we can easily convince anyone that Dorian needed to impress moi, then stiffed me with the bill. That’ll be my tale. J.J. can use it to have this charge expunged,” she said.