The Final Curtain

by Gilbert, Morris

  “Well, let’s break for dinner,” Jonathan ordered. “Let’s go through it tonight, then twice more tomorrow. I think if we try hard, we can be ready for opening night, next Monday.”

  “Yeah—if nobody gets killed.” Ringo Jordan scowled. He wheeled suddenly and moved across the stage, disappearing behind the wings.

  “Nothing’s going to happen,” Jonathan interjected quickly. “We’ll have a guard at all times.” He spoke forcefully, but Dani sensed that he was covering up his own apprehension. She knew because she had the same problem.

  The next day was Wednesday. Ben had stayed at the Pearl until nearly three. Earl and Julio drilled him over and over on the mechanics of staging the play, and by the time the cast had finished with the afternoon rehearsal, he felt that he could function. The next two days went by swiftly. On Friday, Jonathan had Nero insert the notice that the play would go on Monday evening.

  “It’s a sell-out,” Tom Calvin told Dani the next day. “And not just for Monday, but for two weeks.”

  “How many are coming to see somebody get killed?” Lyle asked sourly. He was in a bad mood, for Nero had been at him for two days, picking at every fault in his performance. The strain showed, and Lyle’s good looks were marred by the look of fatigue on his face.

  “Quite a few, I would imagine,” Tom answered. “Just the way people stop to stare at a highway accident.”

  The three of them were sitting around a small table, drinking tea, waiting for Nero to signal the beginning of rehearsal. Calvin said, “You’ve done so well, Danielle!”

  Lyle nodded, rousing from his bad mood long enough to give her a tired smile. “You sure have. Better than Amber ever was.”

  The mention of the dead woman brought a sudden check to the conversation, and finally it was Dani who spoke: “I see we have our bodyguard with us.” She referred to the uniformed policeman who stood talking with Ben Savage. He was middle-aged, with the beginnings of a paunch and a pair of disenchanted brown eyes. Dani added thoughtfully, “He’s not exactly what I had in mind—but then, no one man is going to be able to watch everyone.”

  “I don’t think the killer will try again,” Calvin opined. “It’s not just that a policeman’s standing around all the time. We’re all keeping our eyes open.”

  Lyle muttered, “Well, if he does go after someone else, I’ve got a candidate for him! If Nero opens his mouth to me one more time, I’m going to knock his brains out!”

  There was such a savage look on his face that both Calvin and Dani were taken aback. Jamison was so even tempered that they had not suspected he had a violent streak. He suddenly shut his mouth, gave them an odd look, then rose and walked away.

  “Well, what do you make of that?” Calvin asked in surprise.

  “I don’t think Lyle meant it,” Dani said thoughtfully. “But he shouldn’t say such things.”

  “It’s hard for me to believe that one of us is a killer—not you, of course,” Tom added quickly. “Murder is something that happens on the street—or at least I thought so until all this happened.” He gave his shoulders a quick shake and asked, “Will you go to church with me Sunday?”

  “Yes.” Dani nodded. “I like that minister. He’s not very showy, but he always gives me something to take home.”

  “All right—let’s do it!” Nero called loudly, and Dani moved away to her position.

  The performance was excellent that night—by far the best they’d done since Dani’s first rehearsal. It was one of those almost magic moments when the actors all found themselves doing more than reading lines. Dani had only known such a thing twice in her brief college stage career—a play that became almost life as it unfolded itself. She forgot herself, her problems, and for one brief time almost became the woman she portrayed. Others felt the same, and by the time the performance was over, they all experienced a sense of exhilaration.

  Afterward Jonathan looked around at the cast, saying, “Well, folks, that’s what it’s all about, isn’t it?”

  “If we do half that well Monday night, we’ll have a hit.” Lily smiled.

  “We will do even better!” Jonathan exclaimed. His eyes were afire, and he laughed. “I’m just about drunk! Ah, the theater! Who needs alcohol when we have the theater?”

  “Me!” Mickey Trask piped up. “Who’ll go with me for a quick one at Leo’s?”

  The crowd broke up, and Dani went at once to her dressing room. She had started to pull her dress off, when a muffled shout caught her attention. Dropping her skirt again and stepping to the door, she opened it and saw Mickey and Lyle coming out of their dressing rooms. “What’s wrong, Lyle?” she called out.

  “Don’t know,” he answered. “It sounded like Jonathan.”

  Dani left the dressing room, and as she sped along the rear of the backdrops, she saw Ben moving toward Ainsley’s dressing room from the other side. They reached the door at the same time, and he let her go in first.

  Ainsley was standing in the middle of the room, staring at the mirror, with eyes wide open in stark fear.

  Dani followed his gaze and saw a note taped to the mirror. Moving closer, she read it. It was the same as the last note, made of letters cut from magazines and glued on a single sheet of paper.

  DEATH, A NECESSARY END, WILL COME WHEN IT WILL COME. IF THE PLAY GOES ON, A LIFE GOES OUT. MEMBERS OF THE CAST, WILL YOU DIE FOR A MONSTER LIKE JONATHAN AINSLEY? ONE OF YOU CERTAINLY WILL HAVE A “FINAL CURTAIN” IF THE PLAY GOES ON!

  The bulky policeman suddenly appeared, commanding, “Don’t touch that note! Not till the fingerprint men see it!”

  Ainsley’s face was pallid, and his lips pulled tightly together. He shook his head, but said nothing. He seemed about to faint, and Trask whispered, “Not again! Not again!”

  “I’ll call the station,” Dani offered. As she went down the hall to call Goldman, she felt some of the weakness that had stricken Ainsley. She knew that he would insist on staging the play, and for the first time she realized that she herself might be the murderer’s next victim. Her nerves, under normal circumstances, were firm, but as she walked quickly through the murky backstage light, she felt her shoulders tighten, and she quickened her pace until she reached the well-lit area.

  8

  A Norman Rockwell World

  * * *

  Nobody left the theater, and Carmen spoke for them all when she said, “Now—we go through the whole bit with the cops again!”

  She was not wrong, for when Goldman arrived, half an hour later, he directed the print men to get what they could, then commandeered Ainsley’s office. “Ainsley, you and Nero wait in another office while I see the others.”

  Dani waited in the lobby while he spoke to Lily. Mickey was flitting around nervously, asking questions no one could answer, so she was glad when Lily appeared, bearing the message, “He wants you next, Mickey.” Trask went in and was out in less than five minutes. He left hurriedly, saying, “Hey, Ringo, Goldman says for you to come in.”

  One by one the cast entered the office, none of them staying very long. Finally the Lockridges came through the door, Goldman having taken them together. As they passed by her, Sir Adrian said, “You can go in now, Danielle.”

  “What did he ask you?” Dani questioned.

  “Oh, nothing really. Where were you during the performance? Did you see anyone go into Ainsley’s dressing room? Do you suspect anyone?” He shook his leonine head, and a sudden gust of anger touched his eyes as he guided Victoria toward the exit door. “It’s all quite hopeless, as I told him. Good night, my dear.”

  “Good night,” Dani said and made her way to the office, where she found Goldman standing by the window, looking outside. He turned as she entered, nodded, and greeted her, “I’m wasting my time. Anybody could have put that note on the mirror.” He lit up a cigarette, staring at her through the rising trail of smoke. “I don’t suppose you want to confess?” he asked with a slight smile.

  “Well, as a matter of fact, Lieutenant, I do.”
<
br />   His eyebrows lifted, and she found it difficult to tell him. “You’re going to be very upset.”

  She paused, and he prodded her sharply, “How about if I decide if I’m going to be upset. Just let it out.”

  “All right.” She looked him straight in the eye and said firmly, “I’m a private investigator. Ainsley wanted someone to find out who was sending the threats, so he hired me to join the company. He—or we—thought it might be better if I stayed undercover.”

  Goldman pulled the cigarette from his lips, stared at it thoughtfully, then lifted his eyes to meet hers. “Nice the way you let the police in on it,” he said evenly. “We just love it when private eyes sneak into town to help us solve crimes.”

  He was very angry, she saw, making what defense she could, “At first there were only letters. You wouldn’t have been able to do much about it, would you? I know how overworked policemen are.”

  “Good to know you’re thinking of my welfare,” Goldman answered flatly. “And when someone did get killed, you didn’t think it was worth the trouble to let me know about yourself?” He turned and crushed the cigarette into a glass tray, then gave her an angry look. “I wonder how much influence I have? Like, do I have enough to get your license revoked?”

  Dani placated him, “I can’t blame you for being angry, Jake. I was wrong.”

  Her words caught at Goldman, and he stared at her for a long time. Finally he shook his head, but the anger had changed to irritation. “All right. I guess you can keep your two-bit license.”

  “Thanks, Jake,” she said, then added rapidly, “one of my operatives is on the job with me. Ben Savage. He came in to take Miller’s place with the sets. Ainsley thought it would be good to have some muscle on the stage, and Savage is good at that.”

  “Any more little goodies for me?”

  Dani smiled in relief, for he was past the angry stage. “No, that’s all. And really, Jake, you’ll get it all from now on—everything we turn up.” Then she frowned and shook her head. “Which isn’t going to be a lot, unless we do better than we have.”

  “What about the note? Any way you can pin down who put it there?”

  “Not a prayer! It’s pandemonium behind those sets during a performance. The actors and the stagehands falling over one another.”

  “But the note wasn’t there when Ainsley first got there, was it?”

  “No, of course not. It was put there sometime during the last act. Jonathan doesn’t go to his dressing room at all during that time. He’s on stage almost the entire act, and usually he just stands in the wings and waits for his entrance. This was only a rehearsal, of course, but he wouldn’t have had any reason to go to his dressing room.”

  “Somebody went there,” Goldman growled. “People didn’t go there much, did they? Into Ainsley’s dressing room?”

  “Oh, no. And if I had seen someone going in—other than Jonathan, I mean—I would have noticed it.”

  “Well, I asked everyone about it, and each says nobody went into that room.”

  “One of them is lying,” Dani commented.

  “Sure, but which one?” Goldman shook his head impatiently. “I’ve got a feeling about this thing. Whoever killed the woman—and tried to kill Lyle Jamison—isn’t going to retire. These serial killers who write notes are playing games. ‘Catch me if you can.’ Got to be a big ego involved here,” he said thoughtfully. “He’s betting he’s better than anyone else—that he can kill and get away with it.”

  “I guess you’ve got enough ego in this play to stock the world, Jake,” Dani pointed out. “All show people have it.”

  “Yeah?” he grinned suddenly. “You, too, Danielle?”

  “I suppose so—or I wouldn’t be in this blasted play!”

  He sobered, and his lean face was highlighted into smooth planes as he asked, “Any ideas at all?”

  “No, Jake. There are only two people in the cast whom I know are innocent: me and Ben Savage.”

  “What about Ainsley and Jamison? It was a close thing with that chandelier—and they couldn’t have cut that rope.”

  He saw a flicker of doubt run over her features and waited until she framed an answer. It came slowly, reluctantly, as though she hated to put it into words. “I’m used to thinking objectively about crime, Jake. Always it’s about somebody else. But now the thought keeps coming to me, But I’m one of the cast now. I may be the next to be killed! So it makes me a little over cautious, but I’m not letting anyone get behind my back until we have this killer behind bars.”

  Goldman nodded. “You’ve got a good idea there. I’d hang on to it, if I were you. Now, two things. Will you have dinner with me tomorrow night?”

  “No. I go to church in the morning, and we rehearse in the afternoon, maybe until late.”

  “You’ve got to eat.” He shook his head, saying innocently, “I think you’re anti-Semitic, Danielle.”

  “No! I’m not!”

  He smiled lazily. “Only way to prove that is to have dinner with me.”

  Dani tried to think of an answer, but could not. Though she knew he did not mean what he’d said, she laughed and gave in. “All right, Jake. But I’ve never been out with a rich cop. I’ll try to spend all your money.”

  “Fine with me. Now, tell Savage I want to see him. If he’s tough enough and smart enough, maybe I can use him. Always in the market for good volunteers.”

  Dani left, calling to Savage, who was talking to Julio and Earl, “The lieutenant wants to see you, Ben.” She moved away, wondering how the two would get along—she made a quick guess they would not.

  When Savage walked into the office, Goldman at once voiced his opinion: “Your boss just told me about your little set-up here. Let me give it to you like I gave it to her—you two let me know anything you find out, or I’ll have you back in New Orleans eating fish bait so quick your head will swim!”

  “You scare her as bad as you’re scaring me, Goldman?”

  The lean policeman studied Savage, finally deciding, “You must have been a cop at one time or another. There’s always a little arrogance in cops.”

  “It’s the way with us cops, isn’t it?” Ben questioned in a bored tone. “You want to scare me some more with your fierce manner, or can I go get something to eat?”

  Goldman studied him, then said, “Go eat. But first, I don’t suppose you have any nominees for the psycho who’s all set to knock the cast off?”

  “This is going to be a tough one, Lieutenant,” Ben noted soberly. “You could put a man to watch every member of the cast all the time—but that’s a little impractical. As for clues, you’ve got the notes, the cut rope, and the gun that killed Amber LeRoi. Not much, is it?”

  “No.” Goldman shook his head, admitting almost angrily, “I hate this kind of thing! Nothing to hang your hat on. Let me know if anything drops.”

  “Sure, Lieutenant.” Savage left the office and found Carmen Rio talking with Earl and Julio. “You guys ready to eat?” he asked.

  “You mean we ain’t gonna get rousted by the law?” Earl demanded in mock amazement. “The revolution has come true, Julio!” He grinned. “This ofay gets pulled in by the fuzz, and us brothers don’t even get a look in!”

  “Ofay?” Ben asked, taking no offense. “I haven’t heard that for a few years.”

  “I ain’t kept up with my white-folk cussin’ like I should,” Earl confessed.

  “Yeah,” Ben grinned facetiously, appreciating the man’s act. “Now, let’s get those steaks I promised you.”

  “You fellas going to eat?” Carmen broke in.

  “I bet them a steak I’d be as good as they are on the sets,” Ben explained. “I lost.” He gave her a look. “Like to come along? You can keep these birds from picking on a poor redneck lad from the hills.”

  Carmen smiled, saying, “I’m starved! Let’s go to Benji’s.”

  “Benji’s!” Julio answered at once. “That place is too rich for my blood.”

  “I’ll cash i
n my war pension,” Ben offered. “Lead the way, Carmen.”

  “Thought you was Mickey’s main squeeze now, Carmen?” Julio grinned.

  “He doesn’t own me!”

  They took a cab across town to a steak house that spent a great deal of money on decor. They were met at the door by a snooty young woman who allowed them to follow her into a room no larger than the Colosseum, but not much smaller either. She said something that sounded like “The waierill bewith youso,” then stalked away.

  “Why’s she talk funny?” Julio asked with his brow wrinkled.

  “I think she’s got an adenoids condition.” Earl nodded wisely.

  “No, she’s been to some expensive school,” Ben corrected him. “All those high-toned college girls talk like that.”

  The waiter came all prepared to give a sales pitch, but Ben said, “Bring us four good steaks.” His abrupt manner insulted the waiter, who ignored him, asking, “And your wine?”

  Carmen ordered a margarita, and Earl and Julio called for the same. Savage gave the sour-faced waiter an innocent look. “I’ll have a root beer—not too strong.”

  The waiter gave him one look, then turned and left, his back straight. “You hurt his feelings, Ben!” Carmen laughed. Then when the drinks came, she asked curiously, “You’re not drinking anything?”

  “No. I’m a drunk.”

  They all stared at him, and Carmen asked cautiously, “You mean you have a drinking problem?”

  “Why, no, Carmen, I mean I’m a drunk.” He took a sip of his root beer and noticed they were all staring at him. “What’s the matter, you never saw a drunk before?”

  “Oh, yeah.” Earl nodded quickly. “I seen about a million—but I never heard anyone come right out and admit it.”

  “I guess you’re trying to say you’re an alcoholic, ain’t you, Ben?” Julio said. He seemed eager to put the matter in the right perspective. “I’m one myself. It’s just a sickness, you know, Ben.”

  “No, Julio,” Ben looked around the room with interest, then back to the other three. “I’m not an alcoholic. I’m a drunk.”