The Perfect Ghost

by Linda Barnes

  How lovely to have secrets. It feels so powerful.

  The sex, Teddy, the sex is wonderful, superb, beyond intense. How I live for the release, the afterglow. I love to come and come, and lose myself; how it quiets the nervous voices in my head. I pray it’s as good for Garrett as it is for me, but how can I know? How can I know for sure? He’s so worldly and experienced. His bath is a marble pleasure palace with a Jacuzzi big enough for an orgy and a steam shower stocked with scented massage oil. He does things to my body I’ve only read about in books, but I reciprocate enthusiastically. I am enthusiastic, but Teddy, oh Teddy, I am woefully inexperienced. There was only you, no one else, even after you stopped wanting to be with me. I never understood how you could be so cruel, but that’s dirty water under the bridge now.

  Once the cast and crew arrive, we’ll need to exercise more discretion. But right now, at the planning stage, there aren’t many people to fool.

  The PA, Darren Kalver, we don’t bother trying to fool him. Garrett treats him like a stick of furniture. As far as Kalver’s concerned, I’m staying at the house to “facilitate further interviews.” He’s knows it’s a lie, but it’s his job to make Garrett look good. He doesn’t want to lose his job, so he treats me the same way he always has.

  We don’t have to fool Brooklyn Pierce, because we don’t see him. I don’t see him at all. Garrett drops by the shack occasionally to monitor his progress. When he’s like this, Garrett says, it’s better to leave him in peace.

  Pierce’s drinking has been spiraling out of control for years. Remember how his agent kept claiming he was out of the country? Garrett says he’s been through a revolving door of self-help and rehab programs. When he can’t stick to a particular treatment plan anymore, when even Betty Ford boots him out, the beach shack is his last refuge. He holes up there alone, drinks and drinks, but eventually gets himself sober again. He claims he’s going there “to write,” but all he actually produces is a lot of half-page, half-baked “treatments,” usually titled in the Ben Justice formula: The Purple Bagatelle, The Scarlet Conundrum. Garrett said his personal favorite was The Periwinkle Paradox, but I assume he was joking. If all you got from Pierce was a drunkard’s scrambled ramblings, it makes sense that he’d want to retract them. And I suppose you might have destroyed the tape.

  When I warned Garrett about McKenna’s shack surveillance, he said he’d take measures to protect the privacy of the place. I didn’t say I’d been in touch with McKenna, just mentioned that you’d shown me the man’s Web site. I didn’t want Garrett to think I’d been gathering gossip behind his back, not with everything so honest and open between us.

  It’s like a dream, this sweet new life. Sometimes I find myself thinking—only briefly, only tangentially—about a future beyond work, beyond writing, a future that might, that could involve this breathtaking house, meeting Jenna, being a mother, perhaps, to her and possibly to another. Garrett’s not careful the way you were. Oh, don’t get me wrong, he’s never said anything about wanting another child, but he did want one once, and I know how much he loves Jenna. He’s never asked whether I’m on the pill. And we talk about everything.

  He talks, really. And I listen, rapt and attentive, more Desdemona than Ophelia now. Remember how Othello says “She loved me for the dangers I had pass’d, and I lov’d her that she did pity them”? He loves the way I listen.

  He knows Cape Cod like a native, knows how and where the coastline has eroded, knows the names of seabirds and shorebirds and beach grasses. He once helped rescue a stranded pod of dolphins. When he told me exactly how it felt to rub water on their rubbery skins and hear their skittery noises, I could see it as clearly as a scene in one of his films. How much, how much you can know about another human being and still you’ve only scratched the surface of the surface.

  We don’t discuss our ages, or the way we fell into bed that first time, or the argument that preceded it. Of course, he’s much older than I am. And he’s been a bachelor far longer than he ever was a married man. But I don’t spend my time dwelling on that. I’m too busy working. I’m helpful, very helpful in everything from assembling the director’s book for Hamlet to pitching in and hemming a frock for a courtier.

  Worker by day, muse by night, Teddy. An inspiration. Me.

  CHAPTER

  thirty-four

  RE: Accident Reconstruction, misc.

  SENT BY: rsnow@dennisportpd.org

  SENT ON: April 5

  SENT TO: Paul Jericho, Chief of Police

  Paul,

  Glad to be back at the desk. You get a copy of the tox screen? No easy out there. He wasn’t driving drunk or impaired. The hydroxyzine is just over-the-counter allergy stuff and his wife says he took it all the time.

  Spoke to Blake’s associate, girl called Em Moore, who’s finishing up that book they were working on. She wanted to know if we found a tape cassette at the scene or in the car. Little thing. Think I’ll go around and check the wreck again. She was surprised Blake wasn’t wearing his seat belt. Said he usually did.

  Heard from Larry Hines over at ARU. Based on the skid marks in the diagram, he focused in on the brakes, took a chunk of brake hose in for analysis, but he’s not sure there’s enough of it left to tell whether it’s damage from the fire or something else. Also, he mentioned a possible security problem at the lockup. Seems the seal was broken before he got there, tape sliced right through. I’ll ask D’Arcy what’s going on when I check on that cassette.

  Sorry you had to deal with that McKenna guy. Rest assured, I had to listen to him, too. Kept talking and talking. Shirley reads all that gossip stuff and she says he’s had a bee in his bonnet about Garrett Malcolm for years. I’ll get over to the Malcolm place this week, find out what I can, but I think the road conditions justify a bigger sign and better lights and that’s about it.

  Good news is the brother of that woman lives in the house on Willow Crest, one who went on the damned cruise, he’s due back today, so I’ll be talking to him.

  Russell Snow, Detective Grade One

  Dennis Port Police Department

  One Arrow Point Way

  Dennis Port, MA 02639

  CHAPTER

  thirty-five

  The Bloomie’s bag possessed the same quality of fascination, exuded the same magnetic pull as Pandora’s mythical box. If I left it sitting on top of the dresser, it caught my eye whenever I glanced up from the screen. When I shut it in a drawer, the drawer handle seemed to glow with an eerie inner light. I should have shredded the infernal thing and tossed the remnants into the trash, but I didn’t, and after so many weeks, its attraction had increased until it seemed to shoot out diabolical rays.

  Stop it, I lectured myself. Concentrate on forming sentences. Opening Pandora’s box never helps.

  Of course, I had already opened it once. Moreover, I’d found satisfaction therein. I’d successfully deciphered your shorthand jottings: JFLY meant James Foley, Malcolm’s cousin. 2nd BST BD meant second-best bed, as in the item granted to wife Anne in William Shakespeare’s final will and testament. I’d concluded that we’d traveled parallel tracks, Teddy, that each of us had been told about the Elizabethan oddity of old Ralph Malcolm’s will.

  I’d pondered the large figures and the meaning of HMB, but they continued to elude me. Caroline had displayed your check for a hundred and eighty thousand, but that was far less than the written numbers. None of our interview subjects had the initials HMB. The theater’s board, the outfit Malcolm seemed forever to be dodging, was the Cranberry Hill Board, the CHB, not the HMB. Had the letters been HMB, in that order? Perhaps I needed to take another peek.

  Aside from the notebook with its scribbled hints, what else resided in the depths of Caroline’s bag? I recalled two business cards, one from a legal firm, the other from a Realtor. I tried to focus on the writing, but my mind was like a fly buzzing around the corners of the room, unable to light. My pace slowed to a painful crawl. The more I tried to concentrate the less I was able t
o, and as concentration waned, the pull of Pandora’s Bloomingdale bag became a constant, irritating hum.

  What foolishness. I opened the drawer in a rush, upended the bag on the bed, isolated the business cards. RUSSELL AMES AND HUBER, NEW YORK, and PICARIAN REALTY, EASTHAM, MA. I thumbed the heavy stock of the Realtor’s card, ran a finger across the raised letters. Mr. Picarian hadn’t printed his business cards on his inkjet home printer. The phone number had a 508 area code. I could lift the receiver, press a few buttons, and inquire whether a Mr. Blake had recently spoken to someone concerning local property values.

  The telephone on the bedside table was a handset, one of many distributed throughout the various structures on the property, each linked to a central console located in the PA’s office. I could use the land line, but not without the possibility of Darren Kalver interrupting or listening in. And I hated to use my cell. Cell numbers were routinely captured by other cell phones. Who knew where Picarian Realty’s office phone actually rang?

  I tried to reinvolve myself in Chapter Eighteen, but found myself staring at the rumpled bed instead, picturing Garrett’s strong shoulders and slim hips, grinning foolishly at memories of the previous night’s sexual adventures, wondering what he was working on this morning, and where. He had a flurry of activities to monitor, both at the Amphitheater and the Old Barn, not to mention several casting issues to settle.

  It was a good thing we each had our own work. We didn’t get in each other’s way. We complemented each other. But for how long? My lips tightened as I tried to wrench my thoughts away from the shadowy future. The actresses were coming, arriving this week. The beautiful ones, graceful as butterflies, trained to charm.

  The Realtor’s address was temptingly close. I shoved my chair back, gathered my purse, and moved. Because I couldn’t stand thinking about all the pretty girls waiting breathlessly for the chance to be Ophelia, the pros, the amateurs, the endless stream of ladies-in-waiting to enchant Garrett Malcolm. Anything was better than imagining that beckoning chorus line. I got in the car and drove.

  Picarian Realty. A small, gray-shingled cottage with a large billboard. The sign featured the same script that flourished across the business card. I pulled into the gravel lot. Maybe you came here to do follow-up research. Maybe when I mentioned your name, the person behind the desk would snap to attention like a pointer sniffing the scent and reveal something that would illuminate your final days on the Cape.

  Across the road stood an old windmill, a wooden structure lifted from a children’s tale. As if to underline its picturesque quality, a bearded artist had established a work station slightly to the right from which he contemplated his palette, his canvas-topped easel, and the mill in turn. The wind was brisk, but the arms of the mill, the outspread wings, were bare, with no surface to catch the wind. I wondered whether the mill was undergoing preseason repairs, whether the artist would give it a great spread of canvas, like a sail, in his painting.

  Picarian Realty’s entrance was set at the top of three sagging wooden steps, a screen door that opened outward, a wooden door that opened inward. A sign in the dusty front window said OPEN. There was no doorbell, so I turned the knob and pushed.

  “Yes, can I help you?” The man at the desk extinguished a cigarette as he spoke, hastily stubbing it out in an ashtray concealed by a drawer.

  He had a fine voice, smooth but gravelly, and somehow familiar. Handsome in a blue button-down shirt and navy slacks, he seemed slightly older than Garrett, and when he turned to me, I suddenly felt as if all the sexual activity of the past weeks was tattooed on my face, that I smelled, reeked of intercourse, and that this was a man who would not only notice, but recognize the aroma.

  “Is there something I can do for you?”

  I studied my feet, hoping he’d mistake the color in my cheeks for sunburn. His question seemed laden with a variety of shaded meanings, and my prepared opening remarks, keyed as they were to an imaginary elderly and wizened Mr. Picarian, died on my lips.

  “Are you looking for a house?” he said when I missed the beat again. “Jim Foley, by the way. At your service.”

  Foley. No wonder you’d kept the Picarian Realty card.

  “Jim Foley,” I repeated. “James Foley the actor?”

  “My dear God,” he said. “Good lord. I knew that if I waited long enough, a girl like you would walk through that door and recognize me. Who hired you?”

  His timing was impeccable, his expression droll. I smiled in spite of myself.

  “My ex-wife is not that cruel, not quite that cruel, so I’m betting on a drinking buddy,” he continued. “Hank? Ernie, the bastard?”

  “No, no, I have seen you act.” My mind was spinning; I didn’t know what to tell him, what to ask first. “I recognized your name, and your voice. You’re Garrett Malcolm’s cousin. I’m, uh, working on a book about him. You met my partner, Teddy Blake?”

  “The Malcolm connection strikes again. Damn. I had a brief moment of hope.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. Then there’d be two of us at the pity party, and two’s a crowd for that kind of thing. But I didn’t know Teddy had a partner. Did they assign you to finish up the Malcolm book? Poor old Teddy.”

  “Mr. Foley—”

  “Jamie. Call me Jamie, since you’ve seen me act.” When he sat on one corner of the desk and arranged his lean face in a rakish smile, I saw a younger version of the man, the villain in Red Shot, looming up from under the bridge. He looked disconcertingly like his cousin, the same mouth, the same eyes.

  “You were terrific in Red Shot,” I said, “and I recognized your voice from the tape you did with Teddy.”

  “You’re not going to use any of that, are you? I thought I was deep background.”

  “Your cousin doesn’t want to focus on his childhood.”

  “Oh, it wasn’t so bad. Nothing alcoholism or a lifetime of therapy couldn’t overcome. Do you mind if I smoke?” He retrieved the cigarette from the ashtray and regarded its mashed end regretfully.

  “It doesn’t seem to have damaged him,” I said. “His childhood.”

  “Don’t let the actor in him fool you. I take it you haven’t come to rent or buy a house?”

  “No.”

  “Want me to open a window?” he said as he lit up. “Or we could go for a walk? I do quite a mean tour of Ye Olde Ancient Windmill.”

  “Can we talk here? I don’t mind the smoke.”

  He nodded me into a straight-backed chair by the side of his desk. I wondered where Mr. Picarian was, or if a Mr. Picarian existed. The room was far from spacious, just the lone desk, a worn credenza, two filing cabinets, and a computer. I hadn’t thought to bring the recorder, but I was able to pull a small notebook and a pen from my purse.

  “I’ve got a lot of properties to rent,” Foley said wistfully. “May’s wide open and that’s unusual this late in the year. Economy sucks and with gas prices high, people are going nowhere. Plus the kiddies are still in school in May. You could get a real deal.”

  We stared at each other in silence.

  “You want me to talk about my cousin?”

  “Yes.”

  “Everyone does.”

  “It annoys you.”

  “Just because he’s famous and talented and I’m obscure, if not untalented? Just because he owns half the damned Cape and I own a teensy sliver grudgingly forked over by Uncle Ralph?”

  “Like Shakespeare’s second best bed.”

  His smile was a flash of white teeth. “So Teddy did take a gander at the will? There was a brief and glorious moment when it looked like I might come into a windfall, but the old man came to his senses. His lawyer did, anyway. Not that I’d have wanted to do Jenna out of the land, not like that, but I’d certainly be willing to do a deal, split the spoils. She can have plenty for the theater. I’ll just take a bit of the seaside for a small resort hotel, maybe a few upscale condos. Think she’d go for that?”

  “I haven’t met her.”<
br />
  “And you won’t. Not with cousin Garrett keeping her safely out of the country. A small chunk of Cranberry Hill and I wouldn’t be slaving away at a desk on a day like this. Doesn’t seem fair, but then ‘Fair is a word for weaklings,’ that’s what Uncle Ralph used to say. ‘Talent isn’t fair, life isn’t fair.’”

  His face as well as his accent altered as he spoke and I understood that he was acting, doing Garrett Malcolm’s father as the old autocrat.

  “So I hear he’s doing Hamlet again? The old revenge tragedy. What’s he thinking? Modern dress? Rags? Leotards? Fire? Planning to outdo Branagh with fire and brimstone?”

  “You should ask him.”

  “Yeah. Sure.”

  “Did Teddy tape you here?”

  “We went to the Cove over on Twenty-eight. Nice quiet bar. Little early for that now.”

  “And I think you mentioned you were writing a screenplay? With Brooklyn Pierce?”

  He glanced at me warily. “Did I? Well, let’s just say we’ve talked about collaborating on a few things.”

  “And you asked Pierce to get in touch with Teddy. That was kind of you.”

  “Brookie’s a decent guy for a superstar. Hasn’t forgotten the debt he owes to Lady Luck. And he’s got plenty of tales to tell about old Malcolm.”

  “Ralph Malcolm?”

  “No. Dear Cousin Garrett. Only a tad older than I am, but I rub it in whenever I see him. And when I don’t.”

  “What kind of tales?”

  “The kind he won’t repeat. Brookie doesn’t leak other people’s personal stuff. Or his own, for that matter. He’s smart that way, gabs just enough to keep the press interested. It’s a neat trick. Give ’em the shit they think they want, not the shit you know. Give ’em stuff you make up out of thin air. If you don’t, they’ll make it up themselves. Brookie does a good job.”