Little Did I Know

by Mitchell Maxwell

  Chief Warren was a round, affable fellow. He had a trimmed gray beard and was fifteen pounds too heavy. If his uniform were red, you might mistake him for a young Santa. Upon arrival, I was ushered into his conference room without delay. His staff was eager to please. There were sandwiches of either old meat or new cheese and soft drinks. The whole feel of the meeting was that of a social, so I breathed deeply and took a seat. I grabbed a Coke and downed it, and then a Sprite and did the same. Variety in your refreshment is always a good thing.

  The chief asked an Officer Richardson to sit in with us as he had information about the situation. “Situation” is indeed an all-purpose word. Richardson was a looker. Straight out of central casting. His thick, jet-black hair was perfectly in place. He had bronze skin, light-blue eyes, and a perfect smile that was both warm and legit. His uniform fit like a tailored suit, and his demeanor was friendly and open, almost suggesting that we should all have a beer. He was also a fan of our two shows, praised the excitement of the parade, and was appreciative of the attention the theater in Plymouth had received since our arrival.

  Warren, Richardson, and I sat with a court reporter who was unofficially taking notes.

  The air conditioning was antiquated and the room was hot. Not Africa hot, but more than uncomfortable. There was a slight breeze from the open ocean-view windows and some air movement from a slowly turning ceiling fan. The AC simply made a grinding noise. I was glad I wasn’t a cop.

  “Mr. August,” the chief began.

  “Please call me Sam,” I said.

  “Sam, we have a problem with one of the young women who work for you.” He checked his notes. “Ellie Foster,” he said matter-of-factly.

  Before I could respond, there was knock on the conference room door. The court reporter excused herself and opened it to reveal an unexpected attendee. Veronica Chapman stood there, as businesslike as one could imagine. She had on a blue suit and white blouse. Her hair was in her classic ponytail and she wore navy-blue flats that matched the color of her outfit. She looked asexual, if that was possible for Veronica.

  Introducing herself immediately she said, “I am here to take notes for Mr. August. Sorry I’m a bit late.” Not waiting for a response, she took a seat next to me at the table, threw a yellow pad in front of her, and was ready to go.

  “What’s the problem with Ms. Foster?” I asked. “Has she done anything wrong?”

  There was a long silence, and then Officer Richardson spoke. He removed his glasses, put them on the table, looked me in the eye, and spoke from the heart. “Sam, my name is Scott Richardson. I have worked here in Plymouth for the past four years, and I have an impeccable record.”

  Chief Warren chimed in, “That is a hundred percent true. Scott is one of our finest officers.” He was looking at me and I nodded. Veronica took copious notes.

  Scott continued. “I met Ellie when your group first arrived about two months ago. We met at the Full Sail just before Memorial Day, and I began to see her . . . ”

  “Has she done anything wrong?” I interrupted. Silence.

  “Has she done anything wrong?” I repeated.

  “No,” said the chief. “Please allow the officer to proceed.”

  “Sam,” Scott said, “I met Ellie a few times in the evening. Also for lunch and even an early breakfast. Then, whenever I could, I pressed my schedule to make time. I liked her. I still like her, very much in fact.”

  “Has she done anything wrong?” I asked again.

  “I think Ellie is in trouble, or if she is not yet she will be. I needed to bring that to your attention.” Officer Richardson stared at the scarred wooden conference table, waiting for some sign to continue. The sounds from the street played out like a discordant series of notes, everything in a minor key.

  I was grateful for Veronica. She didn’t have to act out this charade as my support team. She was prescient. She knew something was amiss and that I might need more than guile.

  “Scott,” I said, “I know Ellie. She’s a fantastic girl. I also know she has issues. If her indiscriminate behavior has widened outside the boundaries of safety, then I can’t allow that on my watch. Please, you’re someone who cares about her, so tell me, what’s going on? Off the record. No judgments. Ellie is my friend . . .”

  Scott was silent. He wanted to tell me what was troubling him, but I think he had expected this to be more confrontational.

  “Look,” Scott said, “Ellie is a very needy girl. When I first met her, it was really fun. It was all new to me, I mean about what she did and where she came from and where she was going. The first night I met her, I took her home and she stayed till morning. She is sexy, and sweet, and eager to please. It was fantastic. And still is. Except that it is all getting a little creepy.”

  “Creepy?” I asked. “How?”

  Chief Warren looked constipated. The court reporter’s eyes were wide, as if she couldn’t wait to share this steamy story after work. Veronica was still, yet she held my hand with strength under the pockmarked table.

  “Because I can’t keep up with her,” he said sadly. “I have to work and I can’t see her every night or when she has an hour free from rehearsal. I either satisfy her sexually or she gets abusive. If she doesn’t take her clothes off for someone every night, she simply won’t go home until she finds a willing partner. I care about her. But this sort of behavior is not normal. Needing to fuck somebody every night! Last night, she didn’t even check in with me. Later on, I heard she left late with an untrustworthy fucker.” He was quite emotional as he concluded. “Ellie is a sweet girl. She’s lost, but she is a sweet, kind person. I think she’s compromising her safety.”

  This was very disturbing and way beyond my job description. “Chief Warren,” I asked, “is Ellie breaking any laws?’’

  “No, Sam,” he replied, “but she is going to break some hearts, starting with her own, and then all too soon trouble will follow. Something has to be done.”

  “Are you suggesting Ellie Foster is acting like a whore?” Veronica asked.

  The chief looked at her and then at Richardson. No one was pleased to be in the room.

  “Ms. Chapman, if Ellie Foster was a prostitute, we would not be having this meeting. Ms. Foster is a young woman in trouble. She has made it known by her actions that she is available sexually to anyone—literally anyone in this county—and I need all the help I can garner to keep her safe.”

  “The fact that Ms. Foster chooses to have sex with numerous people in the county does not brand her as a bad person, sir,” Veronica snapped. “If it did, we’d have a whole lot of bad people in Plymouth County.”

  “Young lady, there are a lot of bad people in this county, and that’s why we are having this get-together.”

  “Gentlemen,” I said, “may I ask you to meet me at my place tomorrow at six? I need time to think and to take action.” They agreed.

  I left ahead of Veronica; she followed me out of the parking lot as if we were two strangers. About a half-mile down the road, I pulled over and she joined me in the front seat of my car. We sat for a few quiet moments and then I put my arms around her and said, “I am so lucky to have met you, Veronica. I can’t imagine my future without you.”

  After a moment she replied, “Good. Because if you did it could get mighty awkward around here. I’m the lucky one, handsome, but you have rehearsal in ten minutes.” She climbed out of the car. “Don’t be late. It’s one of your pet peeves.” Then, with that coy look in her eyes, “Is that offer to eat me still up for consideration?”

  Before I could respond she got in her car and drove off.

  59

  As I parked at the compound, JB came running to greet me. “You have three more messages from a guy named Johnny Colon. He said he’s called four times today. He demands you call him, or he’ll stop by unannounced.” “Just call the bastard back and let him know I will r
ing him as soon as I can. If he’s not happy then tell him to come see the show soon and I’ll grab a quick drink with him afterward.”

  “All good,” JB said. “Your rehearsal is on stage in three minutes. It’s with Feston, Fitzgerald, Elliot, Christina, and Ellie. The rest of the company is on the red deck setting the opening for you to look at. Jojo is running that.”

  “It’s showtime,” I said. Then I opened the door to the theater and entered the building. Light swept through the house and disappeared as the door swung shut behind me. I took a seat on the second-row aisle and watched the rehearsal. All the tension from the morning was gone. Feston looked like the kid who auditioned, both confident and giving. Ellie, the girl I just learned was fucking all of New England, was running the rehearsal with grace, charm, and verve. Elliot worked on the delivery of the song during every minibreak. Fitzgerald was a pro, precise and focused. Christina, who was a sexpot off stage, was playing her character with an ease and simplicity that made you forget her looks and believe in what she was saying. She was playing the mother of the prissy Englishmen in Anything Goes, and she caught laughs as easily as one catches fireflies darting in the night.

  The stress and tension of the other elements of the day vanished. I liked watching good work and the innate joy it created. The energy was so positive that I started wondering if I had overreacted this morning. They ran the number again, and it was better than the previous go-round. Although not a major piece of the show, it was a showcase for the comic talents of Feston and Christina, and comedy needs to be crisp. Secunda wandered in and sat next to me. Ellie looked out to the house and asked, “Should we run it again?”

  “Just a moment, Ellie,” I replied.

  Secunda put his arm around my shoulder and whispered in my ear. “Don’t you say a fucking word, nothing nice. You shut up. They deserved your tirade this morning and that’s why they are working this way. Stop trying to be Capra and think Machiavelli. Say it with me.”

  Slowly we said together, “It is better to be feared than loved because you can always make someone fear you.”

  Then I added for our amusement, “Love is another matter all together. . . . Ellie, just run it again and set it. It’s—” Secunda grabbed my arm.

  “Just run it again. Then take five and meet back on the stage. I’ll have JB bring the rest of the company around and we’ll go over a few things. Hit it.”

  They did the number and it was really good. They were really good. “Two steps forward and two steps forward,” Secunda said. “Keep your testicles. You’ll need them later this summer, I promise. I’m proud of you, Sammy boy.”

  I sat alone in the empty theater, thinking of what I was going to say. As I heard the company wander into the building, my mind was still blank. Someone throw me a cue, I thought, preferably one that will piss me off.

  Everyone took seats within the first three rows. I noticed that Marc Seconds no longer sat aside from the group, but was now attached to Carol Duteau’s hip. In addition to the cast, the rows filled with most of the orchestra, Diana, Debbie, Ronny, James, and Bobby who was back from Boston. Sort of like standing room only.

  I sat on the front of the stage and Jojo stood a few steps behind me with clipboard in hand. I ran my gaze over the faces in the first rows of the theater. “There is a difference between playing hurt and having an injury,” I said. “When you play hurt you have to work harder to sustain your usual level of performance. That is difficult to do, but it is part of maturation. Playing hurt is something we all must learn to do. Injured is a different thing altogether. The burden of injury means that you are damaged and have to get healthy so you can excel.”

  I offered no warmth or mirth in my delivery, just the facts and my very specific message. “I believe—and what I believe is what matters tonight—that this morning’s fractious behavior was the result of playing hurt. We are not injured, just hurt, and therefore we have to work harder to sustain our usual level of performance.”

  An audience of stoics began to loosen ever so slightly.

  “Tonight you will run the show as rehearsed and set. You will play it with joy and energy and relentless pacing. You will play it like the first time and remember that you all want this job. No one has put a gun to your head. If you do that, and I know you will, the show will be markedly better than last night’s and even better tomorrow. You will regain whatever confidence was dinged, and you will make us all proud. We have a busy day tomorrow, so notes on tonight’s show will be given by Jojo, Elliot, and Ellie on note cards. If you have questions on anything, we will be available at nine forty-five in the morning.

  “I found today’s events very difficult. There is no guarantee that we won’t have more of the same down the road, but I can assure you they will exacerbate tensions and create less productivity each time they occur. Let’s do our best to make sure we don’t have to deal with this sort of BS anymore.”

  Everyone was listening. Marc Seconds was managing to look at Carol Duteau’s tits and take notes at the same time.

  “The three best things about today are?” I didn’t wait for an answer. “One: you get to do a show tonight. Two: I get to watch it. Oh, and three: we’re sold out.”

  Everyone began to applaud and it intensified the way football players escalate their antics in a pregame huddle.

  “Break. Now let’s play ball!”

  60

  The show was terrific. I took very few notes from my seat in the balcony, which I gave to Jojo, who distributed them to the company as they got out of costume and readied for the remainder of their night. Sitting on the deck nursing a beer I watched some of the audience members, a spectrum of types ranging from dashing to dowdy, waiting at the stage door and asking for autographs or photos. I saw friends of the company offering congratulations, and I heard ambient bits and pieces of conversation about how great this was or how much they enjoyed coming and so forth.

  The night sky was a solid, dark blue with glittering stars that looked like handfuls of neon rice had been thrown into the sky at some wedding. I continued to watch the postcurtain travails unfold. By the time I had finished my brew and sought another, I realized for the first time that no one from my company had asked me to join them for a drink, a late pizza, or a drive into town. I sat a few minutes longer before I concluded that it was not an anomaly, but a statement. Okay, I assured myself, they will return when flush with winning.

  Then Veronica walked up and sat next to me. She was quiet but looked on the verge of a giggle. “Hey, big boy,” she said. “I’m calling that chit you offered earlier today and it’s getting late, so unless you’re a man who lacks integrity, I suggest we get started.”

  “Do we need any condiments?”

  “Noooo . . .” she said with an outsized shake of the head. Then she took my hand, and I followed her into the bedroom on the first floor of the old red farmhouse.

  61

  Thursday promised to be eventful. I had slept intermittently after  a.m. and had been staring at the ceiling for nearly an hour. I had appointments with a motley bunch today, and was haunted by the specter of unannounced visitors I had yet to meet. I had no intention of seeing anyone unless I knew their agenda, and at the very least I intended to be clear headed and alert. I felt like Will Kane hours before High Noon.

  I disengaged from my luscious girlfriend and crawled out of bed carefully, threw on some shorts, a sleeveless T-shirt, and running shoes. I whispered in Veronica’s ear that I’d be back in thirty minutes. “If anyone calls or shows up while I’m gone, they can wait,” I told her. “And if they become hostile or difficult, tell them to eat shit and die.”

  “I will,” she said, “but only if you kiss me first.” So I did. Then I left through the back door and ran toward the ocean.

  During my run I had a lovely encounter with Janet Kessler and ASK. They walked back to the compound holding each other closely with a blanke
t wrapped around their shoulders. It was clear they had spent the night together. They made no effort to avoid me. In fact, they seemed happy and proud that I had discovered them together. ASK was one of my best college friends and had just realized a long-pursued dream. Whatever good fortune awaited him, he had perhaps found his life’s springboard. The ocean has a certain aura at dawn. Quiet and soothing, it makes everything seem possible. It also helps you put your problems in perspective when you compare them to the size and scope of the unending horizon. Some were arriving at shore with the expectation of magic and some lingering after a miracle night.

  I worked my body hard, my mind and heart filled with optimism and a positive attitude for the day that awaited me. Attitude is one of the rare aspects of your life you are able to control, and I was choosing to be upbeat. I sprinted the last three hundred yards down the shoreline and then jogged back to the compound ready to get back into the game.

  The driveway was crowded with cars. The redwood table at the center of the compound was surrounded by people who looked like they were waiting for a free buffet. I slowed my jog to a fast walk so I could take in the scene. It was well before seven, but the place was teeming with people and drama.

  Gary and Susan Golden, Officer Richardson and Chief Warren were seated at the front of the table. Secunda, despite the muggy July morning sat among our guests wearing his trademark Hickey Freeman blue-linen pinstripe suit and smoking his usual Cohiba stogie. Dr. Rosenstein looked a bit wan, as usual, as if he needed a good night’s sleep. On the other side were seated a municipal official and the Patriot Ledger’s reporter Marc Seconds. The official wore a prominent shoulder patch that identified him as a Plymouth building inspector. JB, Officer Tommy, Veronica, ASK, Janet, and Sidney rounded out the rest of the table.

  “Good morning, all,” I said with forced cheer. “You’re all early, but we’ll figure that out together. Sorry about the weather. Give me a few minutes to clean up and I’ll be right out to greet you properly.” I walked quickly back to my room to change, feeling the eyes of some of our guests shooting bullets into my back.