ALM02 The Death of a Celebrity

by Hulbert Footner

  “I’m so sorry!” she murmured. “Try to put yourself in my place. Every hour something new happens. I am dragged this way and that. I scarcely know what I am doing.”

  “I know what you’re going through,” he said. “I wanted to stand by you. But you preferred Mr. Mappin.”

  “Why can’t I have both of you?”

  Siebert shook his head. “Mappin suspects me. Mind, I don’t blame him for that. He’s got to go by logic. But you ought to have known me better.”

  “You have not forgiven me,” she said sadly.

  “Yes, I have! I can’t help loving you whatever you do.”

  “Then it’s all right,” she said, slipping her arm through his.

  He pressed it hard against his side. “You haven’t said that you loved me,” he murmured diffidently.

  “Ah, don’t ask that now,” she said painfully. “There is no room inside me now for a personal love. But I want you for my friend.”

  “Okay,” said Siebert.

  They drifted into the sunroom with linked arms.

  As time passed and Hillman did not appear to say that he was going home, Lee went in search of him. He found the servant standing in the pantry in a distracted state. “Haven’t you finished your work?” asked Lee.

  “Yes, sir. Quite finished.”

  “Then why don’t you go home?”

  ” I was just going, sir.” Hillman took his hat and coat from the cupboard where they hung. “Goodnight, Mr. Mappin. Please say goodnight to Miss Cynthia for me.”

  Lee made sure that he left the apartment.

  Five minutes later Hillman was back again, shaking with fright. “Mr. Mappin, sir,” he stuttered, “would it be all right with you if I stayed here to-night?”

  “Why?” asked Lee. “I believe there are men laying for me in the street, sir. Friends of that man .. of Cagey’s. If they don’t get me here they are certain to get me in the empty streets that surround my home. I’m afraid, Mr. Mappin.”

  “Nonsense!” said Lee. “When a thief is killed while breaking into a house it is part of the chance he takes. You never heard of his friends trying to avenge a killing of that sort. It is only when a gangster is murdered by a rival that his mates look for revenge.”

  “I’m afraid,” wailed Hillman.

  “I see no reason for your staying here all night.”

  “I have a room, sir. Everything is prepared. I used to sleep here sometimes when Mr. Dordress was alive.”

  “No, Hillman.”

  “Please! Mr. Mappin.”

  “It does not suit my convenience to have you sleep here,” said Lee coldly.

  Hillman shuffled away, fairly blubbering with fright.

  EVER since Gavin’s body had been carried to the Hamilton Funeral Parlours, a curious crowd had been milling around the establishment, and Lee, dreading the scenes at a public funeral, had arranged to have his friend carried secretly to a little chapel in Valhalla. There he was to be buried on Wednesday morning. Only a dozen of Gavin’s closest friends were notified of the place and time, and all were pledged not to divulge it to the Press.

  Hillman arrived for work as usual on Wednesday morning. He looked like a man on the verge of a nervous breakdown. “So you escaped from the gangsters,” Lee said dryly.

  “It’s no joke to me, Mr. Mappin,” he whined. “I am watched and followed wherever I go.”

  Lee and Cynthia breakfasted. Afterwards, while Cynthia was making ready in her bedroom, Hillman came to Lee. “Mr. Mappin, would it be asking too much for me to go with you this morning? I could ride outside with the chauffeur.”

  “Why do you want to go?” asked Lee.

  Hillman looked at him in surprise, and Lee noted with astonishment that there were tears in his eyes. But of course there are men as well as women who can cry to order. “I … I worked for Mr. Dordress for nine years,” he stammered. “I was very strongly attached to him.”

  “Hum!” said Lee. “We will have to ask Miss Cynthia.” When Cynthia entered the room he said: “Hillman wants to know if he may go to the funeral with us.”

  Cynthia stared at the servant. “Certainly not!” she said. “I wonder that he has the face to speak of such a thing!” She hurried out of the room to hide her feelings.

  “You have your answer,” said Lee to Hillman.

  Hillman stood, an abject figure, hanging his head and twisting his hands together. “Mr. Mappin,” he whined, “surely it isn’t possible that I am suspected of .. of …”

  “O, say it out,” Lee broke in. “Suspected of having had a hand in the murder of your master. Certainly you are suspected.”

  “O, Mr. Mappin, this is too terrible!”

  “We know that Miss Garrett has paid you large sums of money during the last month. What was that for, if it was not to connive at the murder of your master?”

  “No, sir! No, sir! I have never taken a cent off Miss Garrett!”

  “You have paid fifteen thousand dollars for your restaurant.”

  “No, sir! Only five thousand has been paid. That was my savings and my wife’s savings, and some we borrowed.”

  “Who did you borrow it from?”

  “My wife took care of that, sir.”

  “How are you going to pay the balance?”

  “Out of earnings, sir. A thousand dollars a month.”

  “The place doesn’t earn that much.”

  “Then we’ll have to borrow again.”

  Lee smiled grimly. “Furthermore,” he said, “this man Cagey whom you shot last night was also in Miss Garrett’s pay. A man of his reputation in the criminal world doesn’t rob the house of a butler or a small restaurant keeper. What was he after?”

  “I don’t know, Mr. Mappin. I swear I don’t know!”

  “All right,” said Lee. “Until these questions are answered you must expect to be under suspicion.”

  Hillman went out.

  When Cynthia returned to the room Lee’s eyes dwelt on her with affection and pain. Grief had given her beauty an other-world quality; the clear pallor, the enlarged eyes were not like those of a common flesh and blood woman. Her plain black dress and hat set it off with heart-breaking poignancy. She had refused to hide herself under a funeral veil. “Ah, my dear! . . my dear!” he murmured.

  “What’s the matter?” she asked anxiously. “Don’t I look all right?”

  “You look like an angel! I would be more comfortable if I saw you with red eyes and swollen nose like a common woman.”

  “I shan’t cry to-day. Lee. Plenty of time for that.”

  He said: “This is going to be a painful ordeal for you.”

  Cynthia, guessing what had prompted his words, said quickly: “She won’t dare to come.”

  “She will certainly be there,” said Lee gravely. “She wouldn’t dare to stay away.”

  As if to give point to his words the telephone rang. He answered it, and over the wire he heard the slightly husky voice that had charmed the ears of millions. “May I speak to Miss Dordress, please.”

  “Good-morning, Gail.” Lee’s voice was very dry. “This is Lee. Cynthia is really in no shape to talk over the telephone. Can I take a message for her?”

  “Ah, the poor child! My heart is with her!”

  “She will be grateful,” said Lee.

  “I called up to say that I was driving up to Valhalla alone with my chauffeur. Can’t I take Cynthia and you with me?”

  “You are very kind, but we have already engaged a car. We are taking several people with us.”

  “I see,” said Gail. “Well, I’ll see you up there.” She hung up.

  Cynthia listened to half of this exchange, stiffening with anger. She should be stopped!” she murmured. “It’s not decent for her to be there!”

  “I will prevent her from coming if you are ready to face a show-down,” said Lee gravely.

  “O, no!” said Cynthia, turning away. “Let him be buried first.”

  “Why do you go?” he asked affectionately.
“It’s not necessary, my dear.”

  “I’m not going to let her keep me away!” Cynthia flashed back.

  He said no more.

  In Greenlawn Cemetery rain dripped slowly from the naked branches of the trees. The grass was as vivid as freshly-applied green paint, contrasting with the blackish green of the ivy trained over the grave mounds. Not a dead leaf was allowed to remain on the ground nor a spray of ivy to creep beyond its grave; no spear of grass rose above its fellows. The place was too well-kept; it had a smug and trivial look out of keeping with the stark fact of death.

  Immediately inside the gates stood a sham gothic chapel connected by a covered way with a receiving vault. As the hour for the ceremony approached, two spruce young undertaker’s assistants wheeled a rosewood casket through the corridor on a nickel-plated travelling bier of the latest design. Placing it just so at the chancel steps, they stood one on each side in decorous attitudes of grief and watchfulness, beautifully dressed and thoroughly pleased with themselves. The little church was still empty and their attention wandered. One glanced at his finger nails; the other stroked a budding moustache.

  Fifty yards from the church waited the freshly-opened grave, with mats of artificial grass like stage properties carefully laid down to hide the uncovered earth, as it the sight of anything natural in that place were an offence. A knot of village women gathered under the portal of the church. The dead man was nothing to them; they didn’t even know his name; but it was clear from their expressions that they enjoyed a funeral, any funeral.

  Two taxicabs arrived from the railway station, the first bringing Alan Talbert, a protege of Gavin’s, and two other young men, the second two girls of a highly sophisticated type, who smoked cigarettes incessantly, and were inclined to smile at the barbarous funeral customs of our forefathers. They were all young playwrights. Not liking to be the first to enter the church, they remained standing outside along with the village women.

  An expensive custom-built brougham drew up and Mack Townley stepped out. All the playwrights put themselves in a posture to attract his attention, but Mack walked between them looking neither to right nor left, and seated himself in a side aisle as if to avoid all contact with his kind. There was something savage and terrible in the aspect of the ravaged face under the conventional silk hat. The young people looked at each other in surprise, for Mack was reputed to be an unfeeling man. Their heads drew together; they whispered. In spite of Lee’s care, word had gone around Gavin’s circle that there was something queer about the manner of his death.

  Two handsome limousines arrived together. From the first stepped the very blonde Miss Gail Garrett, delicately worn, and most beautiful in her black costume. Some of the village women recognised her, and finding herself stared at, she dropped a long crepe veil over her face. The gesture of the famous hand was perfect in its grace. She waited in the vestibule for those who were behind her. Lee Mappin, Emmett Gundy, Cynthia Dordress, Louella Kip and Fanny Parran got out of the second car. As Cynthia entered the vestibule, Gail drew back her veil, revealing a face suffused with tenderness. She picked up the girl’s hand, murmuring: “Darling child!”

  Cynthia allowed her hand to rest limply in that of the older woman, but the eyes that rested on Gail’s face blazed up with startling intensity. She said nothing. Gail, frightened, dropped the girl’s hand, and let the veil fall back quickly. The onlookers did not miss this brief exchange. Even the village women felt that there was something strange about this sparsely-attended funeral. They were repaid for coming.

  Cynthia entered the church. Emmett Gundy on one side solicitously supported her elbow with his hand. From the other side of the girl Lee regarded Emmett dryly. He knew that Cynthia detested all such displays, but he said nothing. Behind them, the gentle Louella in a black hat that had turned rusty with age, was unaffectedly weeping. Hers were the only tears shed. They took places in the first pew on one side of the aisle, and Gail sat alone on the other. Nobody could see behind the latter’s crepe veil. Cynthia looked stonily ahead of her.

  The other people entered the church. Presently Siebert Ackroyd drove up in his little convertible, and went in. His eyes sought out Cynthia. Seeing her flanked on both sides, he sat down glumly at the back of the church. Observing Emmett’s officious attentions, how he pushed up a hassock for Cynthia to kneel on, how he found the burial service for her in the prayer book, Siebert scowled. Over on the side aisle Mack Townley sat apart looking at nobody.

  The clergyman entered, and the undertaker’s assistants retreated into the background. It was an unimportant, ill-paid clergyman, and he was not clever enough to conceal the fact that this was an everyday matter with him. Even so, the beautiful words of the burial service had a moving effect, and the sound of suppressed weeping could be heard. Louella Kip’s head was down, and under the all-enveloping veil, Gail Garrett’s shoulders were shaking. Cynthia, with dry eyes, looked stonily ahead of her. “We brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”

  When he came to the end of the first part of the service he started slowly down the aisle, and the two young undertakers came after, wheeling the casket. The mourners followed and after them the sightseers. At the church door waited six soberly-clad workmen of the cemetery who lifted the casket and bore it to the grave. Here it hung suspended in a cradle while the service was resumed. On one side stood Gavin’s closest friends, Lee and the four black-clad women in front, with the tall figures of Siebert Ackroyd, Emmett Gundy and Mack Townley looking over their heads. From the other side of the grave and a little back from it, the eyes of the village women greedily searched the faces of the mourners. The clergyman continued: “Man that is born of women hath but a short time to live, and is full of mystery. He cometh up, and is cut down like a flower, he fleeth as it were a shadow, and never continueth in one stay.”

  As he pronounced the benediction, Gail Garrett drew from beneath her coat a single white rose. She extended her graceful hand, but Cynthia was too quick for her. The girl’s eyes blazed in her white face. Wrenching the flower from the other woman’s hand, she cast it on the ground and trod on it. “For shame!” she said in a low, quivering voice.

  All the others looked on as if turned into stone. Gail shrank away. There was nothing theatrical in this gesture. “No! No!” she whispered. “You are wrong! I did not! I did not!”

  “Go!” said the blazing Cynthia, pointing to the cars.

  Gail turned and ran stumblingly to her car. Nobody else moved. She collapsed on her knees on the running-hoard, but contrived to get the door open, and to drag herself inside. The car sped out of the cemetery.

  ON his return to town, Lee went to Police Headquarters, where he put the whole story before Inspector Loasby. The Inspector was appalled by the task that lay before him. “Gail Garrett!” he exclaimed. “Good God! It is terrible to think of dragging down a name like that!”

  Notwithstanding her demoralisation at the cemetery, Gail was actually playing the matinee at the Greenwich Theatre. Lee had satisfied himself of that by telephone. “She has courage,” he remarked dryly.

  “She must keep up appearances at any cost,” suggested Loasby.

  On matinee days it was Miss Garrett’s custom to remain in her dressing-room between the two performances. She would have friends in to a light meal that she called “tea” and would afterwards sleep for an hour in preparation for the evening performance. Knowing this, Lee timed his call at the theatre with Inspector Loasby for half-past six. He wanted to save Cynthia from the ugly scene, but she insisted on accompanying them. “My being there will break her down quicker than all the questions of the police,” she said, and Lee submitted. Loasby was in plain clothes.

  On their arrival at the stage-door they were told that Miss Garrett’s friends were still with her, and they sat down on property chairs behind the scenes to wait. Of the three the professional police officer was the most u
neasy. “I don’t like this! I don’t like this!” he kept muttering. The star dressing-room opened directly off the stage. Smiling, and apparently her usual self, Gail came to the door to say good-bye to her friends, and she had therefore no excuse for refusing to see these other visitors. She silently stood away from the open door to allow them to enter. The room was furnished as a charming boudoir in the style of Louis Seize.

  Gail’s face changed at the sight of Cynthia. “You might at least have spared me this until tomorrow,” she said bitterly. “I have another performance to go through with.”

  “If the people are not satisfied with your understudy their money can be returned,” said Lee bluntly. “Our business is more important than a missed performance.”

  “Who is this gentleman?” asked Gail.

  “Inspector Loasby of the police.”

  All the colour drained out of Gail’s face. She ordered her maid, Catherine, to wait outside, and to prevent anybody from entering. She led the others to an inner room which was furnished in more workmanlike fashion for the actual business of dressing and making-up. Feigning to be pushed for time, she threw a stained kimono over her negligee, and sat down in front of her mirror, letting her visitors find seats where they could. Thus she had her back to them. She drew on a cap to protect her hair, and commenced to dab cold cream on her face. The familiar occupation gave her courage. “What do you want of me?” she asked in a strangled voice. The mirror was ringed with electric lights and the smeared face reflected in it no longer looked human.

  In the presence of the great lady of the stage, the embarrassed Inspector looked almost guilty himself. “I am sorry to have to say it,” he muttered. “You are charged with the murder of Gavin Dordress.”

  She expected this, of course. Her busy hands trembled violently, but she attempted to laugh. “How perfectly ridiculous! Who makes such a charge.”

  “Mr. Mappin.”

  Gail’s agonised eyes were still fixed on her reflection in the mirror. Her pretence that she had to make ready for the stage was preposterous. “He had no basis for such a charge!” she said shrilly. “There is no evidence! There couldn’t be!”