Murder, She Reported

by Peg Cochran

  Elizabeth was almost to the ladies’ room door when it was flung open and Gloria staggered out. Blood speckled the bodice of her white dress and stained bits of the tulle skirt pink.

  She looked at Elizabeth and began to scream.

  Chapter 3

  At first, Elizabeth couldn’t move. It was the shock of course, but for a horrible moment it felt like the paralysis of the polio that had suddenly, one lazy summer afternoon, stripped her of the ability to walk, leaving her bedridden for months.

  It wasn’t until Gloria grabbed Elizabeth’s arm that she was finally able to move.

  “Did you cut yourself?” Elizabeth asked, the only explanation she could think of for the blood on the front of Gloria’s white dress.

  Gloria didn’t respond. She tugged on Elizabeth’s arm and pulled her toward the door to the ladies’ room.

  “If you’re bleeding, you need to—”

  Gloria shook her head, abruptly cutting Elizabeth off.

  Elizabeth reluctantly followed Gloria into the ladies’ room. A woman was slumped in a chair in front of the vanity, with her back to them.

  Elizabeth recognized the embroidered flowers on Frances’s Schiaparelli gown. Her head lolled to one side, her platinum hair flowing over her bare shoulder. Her arm was resting on the vanity and she held a tube of lipstick loosely in her hand.

  Elizabeth forced down the bile that left a bitter taste on her tongue as she stared at Frances’s reflection. A bullet hole marred the bodice of her dress and blood was splattered across the mirror. A slash of Coty’s crimson Votre Rouge lipstick ran across her face like a hideous wound.

  Elizabeth backed away from the body, nearly colliding with Gloria, who was standing behind her.

  “We have to get help,” Elizabeth said, trying to convince herself there was still hope for Frances.

  She staggered through the ladies’ room door and ran to Kaminsky who was standing in the corridor smoking a cigarette.

  Elizabeth swayed as she felt the world spin around her. Kaminsky grabbed her by the shoulders.

  “What’s up, kid? What’s happened? You’re as white as a sheet of newsprint before it’s been run through the press.”

  “We need to call someone,” Elizabeth said.

  Gloria came out of the ladies’ room just then and Kaminsky stared at her openmouthed.

  “What the hell…?”

  Elizabeth rushed over to Gloria and took Gloria’s hands in hers. Her hands were cold and clammy and her eyes stared as if fixed on some point in the distance.

  Footsteps echoed down the corridor and a man in white tie and tails came into view. He was walking swiftly in their direction.

  “Daddy.” Gloria turned toward him.

  He held her at arm’s length, his hands on her shoulders. “What is it?” he demanded. “What’s happened to your dress?” He looked at Elizabeth and raised an eyebrow.

  “I’m Elizabeth Adams. I’m a friend of Gloria’s. Something terrible has happened, I’m afraid.” Gloria choked back a sob and gestured toward the ladies’ room. “It’s Frances.”

  “Is something wrong with Frances?”

  Gloria nodded mutely.

  “Wait here,” DeWitt said in a voice that made it obvious he was used to being obeyed.

  Kaminsky came up in back of Elizabeth and grabbed her elbow, pulling her aside. “That’s blood. Is someone hurt in there?”

  Elizabeth caught the excitement in his voice. “Yes.”

  By now several people had congregated outside of the ladies’ room and were staring at the drops of blood on Gloria’s dress.

  DeWitt emerged through the swinging door, his expression grave. “I’ll call the police,” he said as he elbowed his way through the large crowd that was forming.

  “A copper?” Kaminsky said, nearly vibrating with excitement.

  Elizabeth swallowed hard. “Frances DeWitt is dead. And it looks like…like someone shot her.”

  Kaminsky squeezed Elizabeth’s shoulder. “This is our story, kid. Remember I told you there was always a story? What a scoop this is going to be. The boss isn’t going to believe it. Here we are, right on the spot. Let everyone else cover Musica’s suicide. We’ve got something bigger and better. Murder of a society dame. The public will eat it up.”

  Kaminsky pulled a grubby notebook and the stub of a yellow pencil from his pocket and began making notes.

  Elizabeth shivered.

  Kaminsky paused and turned to her. “Are you going to be okay? Don’t faint on me now.”

  She nodded.

  “Then get going. Get some pictures while I talk to a couple of people. This is going to be big.” He looked over to where Gloria was slumped against the wall, her eyes vacant, oblivious to the strand of hair half obscuring her famous face. “Get a couple of snaps of your pal Gloria. That’s front-page material if I ever saw any.”

  “I can’t do that. It wouldn’t be right.”

  “Kid, this is the newspaper business. There is no right or wrong. What counts is getting the story and the picture to go with it.” He grabbed Elizabeth by the shoulders. “This could be your big break. You want to be a gal Friday forever?”

  Elizabeth took a deep shuddering breath. She couldn’t take Gloria’s picture. She didn’t want to admit it, even to herself, but Gloria was one of her own. It would be like breaking an unwritten code—her friends and family would never forgive her.

  Was the job worth it? If this was what it took, she didn’t know if she could do it.

  She glanced at Kaminsky out of the corner of her eye. He was busy talking to a middle-aged woman in a navy blue, long-sleeved gown. As long as flashbulbs went off, he wouldn’t know what she was photographing. She would deal with the consequences later.

  Elizabeth hadn’t taken more than a handful of pictures when two burly patrolmen in navy blue hustled down the hall. A murmur went through the crowd and they parted to let the policemen through.

  Elizabeth heard a man in dinner clothes say in a commanding voice, “See here, what is going on?”

  The policemen ignored him as the shorter one went into the ladies’ room. The other stood at the door, a formidable barrier, his arms folded across his broad chest. His partner returned moments later. Beads of sweat had formed on his forehead, and he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed at them. He and his partner were talking in low voices when one of them pointed down the hall.

  A man was coming—he was wearing a tan raincoat and had an air of authority about him.

  Kaminsky jerked a shoulder toward him. “Looks like the dick has arrived.” He glanced at Elizabeth’s face. “The detective. You know, like Dick Tracy. Only this one’s named Sal Marino. I know him from the Blandford case—rich old dame living on Sutton Place who appeared to have died a natural death, tucked up all nice and tight in her own bed, when come to find out she’d actually been strangled.”

  Marino disappeared into the ladies’ room as faint strains of “I’ve Got a Pocketful of Dreams,” Bing Crosby’s big October hit, drifted out from the open doors of the ballroom.

  Murmurs rippled through the crowd and they shifted restlessly waiting for Marino’s return. Marino finally emerged from the ladies’ room, his hands shoved into the pockets of his damp raincoat. Elizabeth got a photo of him talking to the two policemen before one of them gestured toward Gloria, who was still leaning against the wall.

  Marino walked over to Gloria. Elizabeth couldn’t hear what he was saying, but the look on his face was sympathetic. He dug in his pocket, pulled out a handkerchief and handed it to Gloria.

  She dabbed her eyes with it and then blew her nose. She looked up at Marino, who was obviously asking her questions. She was either nodding her head yes or shaking it no.

  Finally, after several minutes, Gloria pointed to Elizabeth. Marino nodded briskly then b
egan walking toward where Elizabeth was standing.

  “Quick. Give me the camera,” Kaminsky said, holding out a hand. “The cops may want to see the pictures and we won’t get the film back until every rag in town has already written the story to death.”

  Kaminsky grabbed the camera and sauntered down the hall humming “Whistle While You Work.” Elizabeth saw one of the cops go after him, but the elevator doors closed behind Kaminsky before the policeman caught up with him.

  “Excuse me.”

  Elizabeth turned at the sound of his voice. Up close, Marino had eyes nearly as dark as Gloria’s and black hair with a wave running through the front. His face looked as if it had gone a few rounds—there was a faint scar bisecting his lower lip and his nose appeared to have been broken more than once—but Elizabeth still found him attractive. So attractive that she feared she was blushing.

  His glance kept darting around the room. Elizabeth had the impression that he was feeling distinctly ill at ease in the luxurious surroundings of the Waldorf Astoria Hotel. He was probably more used to dealing with bodies found at the end of dark alleys or in dismal rooms in an SRO hotel.

  “Mind if I ask you a few questions? I’ve been told you’re a friend of Miss DeWitt’s and you were with her when she discovered her stepmother’s body.”

  “Not a friend exactly. We go to some of the same parties and know some of the same people.”

  “Still, you probably know more about this crowd than I do. Not exactly my world, if you know what I mean. They’re uptown and I’m Lower East Side.” Elizabeth thought he seemed almost proud of it. He looked at her closely. “Would you like to sit down? I saw a bench over by the elevator.”

  Elizabeth became aware of the trembling in her legs. She nodded.

  Marino didn’t sit but paced in front of Elizabeth, jingling the coins in his pocket. Energy came off him in waves.

  “So you were with Miss DeWitt when she found—”

  “No. I saw her run out of the ladies’ room and when I saw the blood…”

  “You followed her into the bathroom?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you touch anything?”

  “No. I don’t think so.”

  Marino stopped pacing for a moment. “How did Miss DeWitt get along with her stepmother?”

  “I don’t really know. I hardly know Gloria. Fine, I suppose,” Elizabeth said, trying to ignore thoughts of the scene between Frances and Gloria earlier. Debuts were stressful—undoubtedly it had only been a case of nerves that had had them at odds with each other.

  Marino jingled the change in his pocket. “Do you know of any reason why someone would want to kill Mrs. DeWitt?”

  “No. I’d never met her before tonight.”

  He pulled a notebook from his pocket that was almost as battered looking as Kaminsky’s and a yellow pencil that had teeth marks on it.

  “Mind giving me your name and address?”

  “Elizabeth Adams—it’s spelled just as you’d imagine. I live at Seven seventy-seven Madison Avenue.”

  Marino raised his eyebrows but carefully wrote down Elizabeth’s information.

  He exhaled loudly. “This case is going to be a doozy.” He fished around in his pocket, pulled out a dog-eared card and handed it to Elizabeth. “Here. Give me a call if you think of anything, okay?”

  He looked Elizabeth in the eyes, and this time she knew she was blushing. She didn’t know why she found Marino so attractive. Was it because he was so unlike the boys in her set? Was it the energy he projected that crackled in the air around him like lightning? Or that he was a man and not a boy?

  “May I go?” Elizabeth asked.

  “Yeah, sure. One thing if you don’t mind. Didn’t I see you with a camera a moment ago?”

  Elizabeth felt the heat rising to her face. “Yes. My…my partner took it with him. He’s a reporter for the Daily Trumpet. I’m—”

  Elizabeth was about to say “gal Friday” but stopped herself just in time.

  “I’m a photographer for the paper.” She lifted her chin slightly.

  “I see. Well, I might send one of my men over to take a look at the pictures after you’ve developed them—in case there’s anything useful in any of them.”

  “Sure.”

  “Meanwhile, remember—call me if you think of anything.”

  “I will.”

  * * *

  —

  The red safelight in the darkroom turned everything the color of blood and Elizabeth had to force herself to continue. Fatigue made her frustratingly slow and clumsy and she was afraid of ruining the film.

  Kaminsky had stolen a couple of dinner rolls and an orange off a room service cart while going down in the elevator at the Waldorf and had saved them for Elizabeth.

  Her hunger had long since abated, but she forced herself to eat the rolls and pick at the orange. Fainting wasn’t going to help her get the job done.

  Kaminsky was out in the newsroom banging out his story on his Royal typewriter while Elizabeth worked. She knew he was waiting anxiously for the pictures.

  She slipped her film into the developer and watched as the image slowly revealed itself—Gloria was happy and smiling, her head thrown back as she danced—before Frances’s murder had ruined everything.

  Elizabeth moved her film from the developer to the stop bath and waited. She yawned. She was yearning for the blessed relief of bed and sleep. She’d called home—Mother and Father were out for a dinner party and a game of bridge with the Mortons—and had left a message with Jones, the butler, that she would be late.

  The timer dinged and Elizabeth moved the film from the stop bath to the fixer. After a rinse in water, she clipped the photograph—it was a good one and Kaminsky would be pleased—to the carousel overhead.

  Elizabeth inserted another clip of film into the developing solution and went through the process again almost without knowing what she was doing. She was about to hang the photograph from the carousel when she realized it was the one she’d taken of Gloria emerging from the bathroom stall, clearly in distress, with her face stained by tears.

  Poor Gloria, Elizabeth thought. She couldn’t allow the paper to print the picture. She tossed it into the waste can.

  Later, she wished she’d torn it to shreds.

  Chapter 4

  Elizabeth stared at the painting across from her on the dining room wall—a landscape by a minor artist of the Hudson River School, which had been in the family for generations. She was seated at the breakfast table, which Mrs. Murphy had set before any of them were up.

  George Adams was cutting the top off his four-and-a-half-minute boiled egg with a gilt egg topper made for just that purpose—exactly the way he did every morning. His newspaper—they took the Times—was precisely folded and placed to the left of his plate, never to the right where it might be in the way of his coffee cup.

  Helen Adams, already dressed for the day in a tweed wool suit with a black velvet collar, was carefully sectioning a grapefruit with a serrated spoon.

  Elizabeth’s younger sister, Rose, was stirring sugar into her bowl of hot cereal.

  In exactly seven minutes, George would put down his spoon, Helen would put down her coffee cup and Mrs. Murphy would appear to clear the breakfast dishes away.

  The scene was so much like every other morning—Father and his egg and newspaper, Mother and her grapefruit and black coffee, Rose with her bowl of oatmeal sprinkled with brown sugar and raisins—that Elizabeth found it hard to believe the events of the previous evening had actually taken place.

  Her parents had been in bed by the time she had arrived home last night, and while the Times might have reported on the murder at the debutante ball, it certainly wouldn’t be on the front page or in the Financial section—the two parts of the newspaper that Elizabeth’s father regularly
read.

  Her parents refused to take the Daily Trumpet—her father deemed it a scandal sheet—but her mother would read the society pages in the afternoon paper and the story would most certainly appear there.

  Elizabeth toyed with her boiled egg while fatigue pressed down on her like a weight. She stifled a yawn and picked a piece of shell out of the glistening egg yolk with the tip of her spoon.

  “Elizabeth, darling, mind your elbows and do please sit up straight,” Helen said without taking her eyes off her grapefruit. “By the way”—this time she looked up and fixed Elizabeth with her pale blue eyes—“whatever happened to that nice boy you were seeing? Phillips Sloan, wasn’t it? His grandmother was a Woodward, I believe.”

  Elizabeth barely managed to curb the desire to roll her eyes.

  “I still see him. He’s part of our set. I danced with him last week at the party the Pawlings gave.”

  Helen patted her lips with her napkin. “You might give him some encouragement, you know. You’ve turned twenty-two, Elizabeth. Your father and I were already married when I was your age.”

  Helen glanced at George, but his eyes were glued to his paper and he didn’t even glance up at the mention of his name.

  Elizabeth put her soiled linen napkin beside her plate and pushed back her chair.

  “I don’t want to be late for work.”

  “But darling,” Helen said. “You were home so late last night. Surely under the circumstances…”

  “I’ll see you tonight.” Elizabeth kissed her mother’s rouged and powdered cheek before Helen could say anymore.

  Her father glanced up from his paper briefly and nodded his head as Elizabeth left the room.

  Jones was waiting by the door with Elizabeth’s coat. He helped her into it.

  “Will you want your brown felt?” he asked, his hand hovering over several hats on the closet shelf.

  “I think I’ll have my red with the feather today. Thank you, Jones,” Elizabeth said as he handed her the hat.