by Shirley Lord
It was enough to stop her tears. “He was no sugar daddy,” Ginny snapped. “He was a tyrant, a devil.”
“Oh, Gin,” Esme sighed. “I know you’re keeping something from me. If you can’t tell me everything, at least tell me something to stop us both going crazy. You know I’ll never tell. I never have, have I? If you rushed off and left your cloak behind at the library because you had a fight with Johnny, perhaps I can think of something to bring him to his senses.”
Dear Esme. If only she was concealing a lovesick problem with Johnny. If only she was living a normal life like Esme and most of her friends. If only, instead of trying to crash her way to success during the last couple of years, she’d concentrated on settling down, getting married to a nine-to-five guy, having children, living in the suburbs, worried only about getting fat and saving enough to send the kids to college.
But she wasn’t like anyone she knew. For months she’d lived like a felon, terrified that someone might discover Alex’s cache of jewels, and now things were much worse. Svank had been murdered the same night she’d discovered the jewels had been removed—definite proof that Alex had returned to town. To settle a score with Svank? To recoup his investment?
Esme little knew how well she was putting it, except she was already up to her ears in this “terrible murder business.”
In the tiny kitchen, as she made some coffee, Esme repeated, “Why don’t you just go and claim your cloak, then you can tell the papers you designed it and get a lot of publicity and-”
The shrill ring of the phone made both girls jump. Ginny could feel her face flushing scarlet. If it were Alex, what could she do? There was nowhere in the loft to have a private conversation. On the fourth ring, the answering machine picked up.
As soon as Ginny heard Johnny’s voice, she grabbed the receiver, forgetting that because she’d let the machine answer, everything Johnny said would be broadcast into the room. It was too bad that Esme would hear every word, but there was nothing she could do.
“Oh, Johnny, where are you? I’ve been so worried.”
“Why, babe? There’s nothing to worry about. I had to fly down to Washington. I never had a chance to ask you if you read my Next! piece or tell you anything about what I’m working on, but the trail’s hot again because of, believe it or not, old man Svank’s demise.” His voice softened. “But how are you doing, baby doll? Did you get your cloak back? I hear it’s been confiscated by the police…”
“No, Johnny,” she moaned. “And it’s all over the tabloids today… who’s the mystery owner, that sort of thing.”
She heard him tell someone to wait, that he’d be there in a second. She wanted to cry, no, no, no, Johnny. I need you. If you can’t be here, at least stay on the line for a while, I’m so terribly alone, but when he came back on, all she said was, “Johnny, I’m nervous. Will you be in Washington long?”
“I may have to go back to Puerto Rico. As soon as I know I’ll call you or I’ll be on your doorstep. What were you saying about the papers?”
She read the headlines to him and some of the copy, relieved that when the message time was up, Esme could no longer hear what Johnny was saying, especially as he was becoming exasperated.
“For God’s sake, Ginny, what is there to be so mysterious about? Call ’em up and go get your damned cloak back,” he said sharply. “If the papers like your cloak so much, this could be the exposure you’ve been waiting for. Surely you can easily convince the cops you didn’t even know a murder had taken place… I still can’t fathom why you left the damned thing behind in the first place.”
Without thinking, although Esme was there, Ginny cried, “Because I was scared-I thought the police would find out I’d crashed the party.” She heard Esme gasp. It was too bad, but she had more to lose now than Esme’s respect. “Once I admit why I left the cloak behind, the papers will go to town… the world will know.”
“So what! Here’s your opportunity. Use it to explain to the press why you crash-to get exposure, recognition for your designs. You can go into the brush-offs, the promises which never produce anything except passes from Seventh Avenue lechers…”
Ginny shivered. If only he was with her. It would be so easy to confess about Stern, to tell him everything, to crawl into his arms for protection, but again he broke off to speak to someone else. “Okay, okay, I’m coming.” Then, “Ginny, I’ve got to go, but I promise I’ll see you one way or another before I leave-if I leave. I’ll come by to hold your hand and give you courage to face the music.”
Before she could answer, he put the phone down. She had never felt so bereft, and Esme’s look of shocked disbelief didn’t help.
“Oh, Ginny, I can’t believe you crashed the library. I thought… you made me think you were going with Johnny. Why, Ginny, why?”
“Because I thought he wouldn’t take me, that’s why.” She was sick of pretending. “Because I wanted to meet his saintly father, who disapproves of him because of his gossip column, his choice of women, his expensive divorce, everything. I wanted a chance to meet the almighty Quentin Peet to start proving I’m the kind of person Johnny needs.”
“How?” Esme made a face.
“God knows what I was thinking. I had it all planned out. I was a fool… and now I know Johnny was planning to take me after all. He wanted to give me a surprise.
“And that’s not all… I… I met Arthur Stern there.” Ginny started to sob again. “Lee Baker Davies, you know my friend from Bazaar. She told me Stern had just set someone up in business, some California designer who’d run out of money, who Stern rescued, someone, Lee said, with nothing like my kind of ideas… Stern Fashions… you know… with his wife he runs this powerful fashion conglomerate. I’d met him once before and blown it. This seemed too good to be true and-”
“Stern? You mean the man the police took-” Esme stopped short, looking stunned.
“Yes, Stern, Arthur Stern,” Ginny sobbed.
Her handkerchief sodden, she got up to look for a tissue, rubbing her eyes with the only one left in the box. “He… he wanted to talk to me about my designs, but because it was so noisy, he took me to this place where he said we’d be able to talk in private. He… tried… he very nearly raped me.” She could hear her voice high, hysterical; she was losing control.
Esme knelt beside her, cradling her, rocking her backwards and forwards. “Oh, poor Ginny, darling Ginny, how terrible. How absolutely terrible. But what happened? Did Svank try to rescue you?”
“No, no, no-”
Ginny stopped. In seconds she would be telling Esme everything, including her nightmare that it had been Alex she’d seen fighting with the man she now knew had been Svank.
“Go on,” Esme said softly. “I understand everything, Ginny, honest I do. Go on…”
She thought quickly. “I had to fight for my life. I got away through an exit Stern didn’t know about… I left him there. I don’t know what happened after that. All I know was I had to escape… I ran all the way home. Look…” She slipped off her mules. “See, my feet are still cut up. Oh, Esme, don’t you understand, that’s why I can’t claim my cloak. I can’t tell the world what a fool I was to go with a man like Stern to a dark, deserted floor. I can’t let Johnny know what I was prepared to do for my stupid, ugly, useless ambition.”
As she spoke, she wanted to die. It was true. Johnny could never know. If he ever found out, he’d be convinced forever she was nothing but a tramp.
Esme confirmed it. “No, I suppose you can’t.” She shuddered dramatically. “To think you were with the murderer just before it happened. I can’t bear to think of what might have happened to you if you hadn’t escaped.”
When Ginny didn’t answer, Esme said slowly, “It may have to come out, Ginny. It’s all part of the evidence, pointing to the violent kind of man Stern is. Perhaps you should speak to a lawyer-one of Ted’s cousins-perhaps he could help.”
Cousin! If only Ginny had never had a cousin.
Ashamed sh
e was allowing Esme to believe Stern was guilty, Ginny cried again, “No! I don’t know why I told you, but I had to tell someone.”
“What about your own cousin, Alex, the cousin you love so much? Can’t he advise you what to do?”
Was Esme reading her mind?
“You always say he knows what to do about everything,” Esme continued. “Can’t you tell Alex what you’ve just told me?” There was often a suspicion of sarcasm in Esme’s voice when she mentioned Alex’s name, but not today.
Sure that her stricken expression must be giving Esme some idea of the fear her words conjured up, with a big effort, Ginny smiled weakly. “Oh, Alex and I don’t see each other much anymore. He’s got more important things to do than visit his unemployed relatives.”
Esme was looking at her searchingly. Did she suspect something, or was Ginny, as usual, being paranoid?
Ginny suddenly desperately wanted to be alone. “I don’t feel too good, Es,” she said. It was true. “I think I’ll take a sleeping pill and try to get some sleep. This whole business has really shaken me up.”
“I bet it has. Can’t I do anything?”
It took another twenty minutes before she could persuade Esme that all she really wanted was to be left alone to get some rest. “You won’t tell anyone, will you? Especially not Ted?” Ginny pleaded as Esme still hovered in the doorway.
“Cross my heart and hope to die, but do think about seeing a lawyer. I’ll come by tomorrow or perhaps it would be better if you tried to act normally? Why don’t you let me take you out to lunch? We could meet at Mortimer’s.”
“Let’s talk in the morning.”
When Esme finally left, Ginny had a warm bath and tried to think what she would be doing if, as Esme put it, she acted normally. One thing, for sure. She would have called Poppy by now to offer her condolences, comfort, something.
With a jolt she again realized she hadn’t seen Poppy at the library, although, for once, she’d been sure Poppy would be there, wearing the georgette wraparound she liked so much, because she wanted a version in black “without a fitting, Ginny darling.”
Ginny frowned. It was strange. Despite the crowd, Poppy was always such a standout, but right up until the fateful moment when the first gong had rung for dinner and she’d made the sickening mistake of agreeing to go “somewhere quiet” with Stern, there had been no sign of Poppy Gan. She’d been so intent on breaking through the maelstrom to meet Quentin Peet, could she have missed her? Surely not, but then something else had been on her mind. What was it? A cold wave of terror went through her. Oz. She’d been intent on giving Oz the slip, too.
Ginny sank back on the bed. How could she have forgotten Oz, the man she’d already offended publicly at Esme’s wedding, the man who’d admired her cloak and taken it to the cloakroom, who’d said he would meet her at her table, hoping they could get together later?
Why hadn’t she heard from him? Had he already gone to the police, the press? Would she read all about herself in the next day’s papers?
Calm down, Ginny. Act normal, Ginny. For all you know Oz is off in some far-flung place on assignment or too busy in the studio to read the papers or to think about you or your cloak.
She picked up the phone to call Poppy.
An answering service picked up. “Who’s calling?”
“An old friend…”
“I’m afraid Ms. Gan isn’t here at the moment. What’s your name and number?”
Quickly Ginny hung up. She went over to her sewing machine, determined to pull herself together. There was a yard of poplin on top. For the new dart she’d been experimenting with, a dart curved like a crescent moon, a dart she intended to place in strategic places on a form-fitting dress, to increase body consciousness.
She sat down, trying to concentrate, trying to summon up her usual enthusiasm that could turn a piece of material into high fashion.
After a few tries, she gave up. Perhaps in the morning. Perhaps next month or next year. It was time for the sleeping pill.
When she woke up it was cold and dark and just after midnight. Oh, Johnny, where are you when I need you so badly?
She threw on a sweater and walked the route she’d run so feverishly only the night before, this time to the late-night newspaper stand, where she bought first editions of the morning papers.
They were all full of the arraignment of Arthur Stern in connection with Svank’s death. There was a picture of Stern looking browbeaten beside a mountain of a woman, his wife Muriel. She was glowering at him, although she was quoted as saying her husband had her unswerving support and the city would live to rue the day they’d “tried to frame my Arthur.”
Described in the News as ‘the bulldog billionaire,” Svank was now pictured in all the papers, several times with glamorous women, including two ex-wives Ginny wondered if Poppy had ever known about.
In the Post there was a picture of Svank with Poppy. “In happier days,” wrote the Post. Oh, yeah, thought Ginny. Poppy was wearing the dress which had garnered such enormous press coverage with its “derrière siren skirt,” the skirt she’d saved after Svank had tried to rip it apart.
Even the august New York Times devoted a good chunk of space to the story, reporting that “Svank, one of the library’s biggest donors, had been the honored guest of the library’s president that night”
Nowhere in any of the reports did it mention that Svank had brought Poppy to the dinner-or anyone else for that matter. Finally she found the sentence she was looking for. “A close friend of Svank’s, the model Poppy Gan, has been questioned by the police, although she did not attend the dinner because she was out of town at the time.”
Stranger and stranger. Ginny closed her eyes wearily, remembering Poppy’s often-repeated explanation for not keeping her promise to include her at various events. “I never know where I’m going to end up. I get the week’s agenda, but that doesn’t mean I’m always invited. He’s gotta lotta business, you know.”
Did he fall or was he pushed? On the Times Op-Ed page a famous defense attorney gave a case history of another sensational death, explaining the finer points of the law and how, if Stern’s defense lawyer could prove it was not premeditated, a manslaughter charge, Murder 3, could lead to the accused’s release after a comparatively short sentence.
Guilt overwhelmed Ginny. She had to go to Caulter and tell him everything, that Stern should not have been accused of anything, except attempted rape. Even as she thought about it, she visualized the look on Johnny’s face when the facts came out.
She quickly flipped the pages over. To her amazement, anger, and frustration, on the Style page a sizable fashion box was devoted to the “new chic swagger of a cloak.”
Here was the golden chance she’d longed all her life to achieve, and she couldn’t claim an inch of credit.
In the morning she called Esme to say she couldn’t lunch; she’d forgotten she had a long-standing date to help Lee with a fashion shoot out on Long Island.
Ginny was dreading that Lee would want to gossip about Arthur Stern, but luckily the clothes came late, the model had a rash, and Lee had too much to contend with to talk about anything except the job in hand.
When Ginny arrived back in the loft, she saw on the local TV news that a camera crew had been combing New York City streets to capture every cloak-wearing woman in sight. In less than forty-eight hours cloak wearing had become a major trend.
Another sleepless night, and worse was to come. Esme brought Women’s Wear Daily to lunch the next day. It carried a spread on the most fashionable cloaks in town, with Barneys offering an almost exact replica of the Mystery Woman’s Napoleonic version, “in fabric,” a store spokesman pontificated, “similar to that used in Napoleon’s campaign tents.”
“You’ve got to do something,” Esme said fiercely. “Other designers are stealing your ideas, claiming them as their own, while you’re cowering in terror, all because you don’t want Johnny to know you nearly lost it to the murderer at the l
ibrary-”
“That’s not the reason.”
“Well, what is it, then? Stern’s out on bail, living in high luxury with his old battle-ax of a wife, who’s bound to know what he gets up to when he’s off the leash, and you’re as usual the one who’s suffering. It’s not right, Ginny. How about me telling Johnny what happened?”
“Are you out of your mind? If you even mention doing such a thing again, Esme, I’ll never forgive you.”
Where was Alex? Where was he hiding? Was he still in the country? Round and round her mind went, over the same ground. Once she would never have believed Alex could be a thief. Now she accepted the fact, horrifying though it was. But a killer? No, she couldn’t, just couldn’t accept that the cousin she’d so looked up to, respected and adored, would deliberately take another man’s life, even if it was the loathsome Svank.
She remembered Alex telling her he’d been wrong; she’d been right. Svank was-how had he described him? “A greedy, dangerous fiend.” But Alex had gone on working for the fiend. “He’s still someone very much to know if you have something he wants.”
Someone had had something Svank wanted-badly enough to fight over it. If it hadn’t been Alex in the hallway, who could it have been? It was someone who knew that she and only she could prove Arthur Stern had never laid a finger on Svank. Someone who right this second could be thinking she and only she could identify him as the real killer, someone who wouldn’t hesitate to eliminate her-once he found out who she was. Why wasn’t Stern using her as an alibi? Had he been too drunk to remember?
As she went back over the same old ground, increasingly the evidence pointed to Alex. He must have seen her face illuminated by the lightbulb on the stairwell. He must have guessed she was the mystery woman in the cloak, because he was one of the few people in the world who knew about her crashing. Because she hadn’t come forward to exonerate Stern, he must think she was still willing to protect him and, determined not to give her any more agony, he’d taken the jewels and escaped.
She prayed she’d got it right, that Alex, at last, was thinking of her. She prayed, for the good of Alex’s soul, that Svank’s death had been an accident, despite the gunshot she’d heard.