The bartender seemed relieved that he had company in dealing with O’Neal. He brought Frost the Scotch and soda he ordered and then retreated to the other end of the bar, as if to avoid being drawn into any confrontation or conversation with the two customers. He had barely gotten away when O’Neal demanded another drink.
“The same?” the bartender said.
“Yup.”
The bartender brought a bourbon and soda. O’Neal took a sip and then complained that the order was wrong.
“Bourbon and water,” he said. The bartender took the offending drink and replaced it. “Damn soda tickles my nose,” O’Neal explained to Frost.
“Thanks for coming,” O’Neal said. “Nobody will drink with me anymore. Not my wife, not my son, not anybody. Just you, good ol’ Reuben. Uncle Reuben.” O’Neal nodded slightly and took a deep sip from his new drink. “You like this place?” he asked.
“Well, Billy, it’s a little off the beaten path,” Frost said.
“Damn right,” O’Neal replied, “I suppose you’d rather be at ‘21.’ Or that damn club of yours.”
O’Neal was at least partly correct, but Frost did not admit as much.
“No, no, Billy. I’m perfectly happy to drink at Ninth Street and Avenue D.”
“I like it here. People leave you alone. And nobody’s tongue’s thwacking the next day about how they saw you drunk, blah, blah, blah.”
“You may have a point,” Frost said. “But why are we here, Billy? What are we celebrating?”
“What are we celebrating? Reuben, sometimes you’re dense. And a wizard Wall Street lawyer like you! We’re celebrating my taking over Andersen Foods, that’s what we’re celebrating!”
Frost was used to the irrational thoughts O’Neal expressed when drunk. But this one seemed particularly off base.
“What do you mean, Billy?” Frost asked.
“I mean I’m going to be the new CEO of Andersen Foods,” O’Neal answered. “Now that my old friend Flemming’s gone, God rest his soul, I can take over.”
“I thought Casper Robbins was going to have the job,” Frost said.
“Robbins, schmobbins. Casper Robbins is a little toady. As long as there’s somebody to suck up to, he can do that just fine. But he can’t be number one. He hasn’t got it in him.”
“Billy, I hate to say this, but where is your support going to come from? Sally will never vote for you.”
“Sally, schmally. She should stick to playing tennis. Playing tennis with ol’ Casper, probably.” O’Neal poked Frost in the ribs and winked at him. Frost ignored both gestures.
“Besides, she’s not the whole Board,” O’Neal added.
“No, she’s not. But do you think the Board is going to support you, when you go off drinking like this?”
“Drinking and screwing, Reuben,” O’Neal said.
“Yes, I suppose you’re still up to your old habits in that department, too.”
“None of your business. But look at that Company. In all honesty, Reuben, who’s going to run it? Who’ve they got left? Nobody. Nobody but their star salesman, Billy O’Neal. The man who made Max Beer a household name.” O’Neal was now speaking with some effort, nodding in his drink between sentences. “Besides, I can always go out to that hospital in California and get dried out, if that would make people happy.
“What hospital?”
“Oh, you know. The President’s wife.”
“Mrs. Reagan?”
“No. No. No. No. The other one.”
“Oh yes. Mrs. Ford.”
“Right—righto, Reuben. Betty Ford. I’ll go out and get all tidied up and then I’ll be President of Andersen Foods! Whadyya think—should we change the name? O’Neal Foods, maybe?”
“What about Laurance?” Frost asked.
“Not a chance. He’s too busy with his new California bunch. He’s not interested in AFC. Besides, he’s a nasty turkey just like his father. His late father,” O’Neal said. “Here’s to Flemming, good ol’ Flemming.” He lifted his glass, drained it and beckoned for another drink. Frost, seeing that he was not about to get O’Neal to go home, ordered another one too.
The two men drank in silence for some moments, Frost expecting his companion to continue his screed against Flemming Andersen and his branch of the family. But he did not do so. Taking advantage of the silence, Frost decided to feel him out.
“I know Flemming was not exactly your favorite person,” Frost said. “But who do you think killed him?”
“Some nut,” O’Neal replied.
“Do you really think that?”
“You saw the note the guy wrote. And the one he wrote after Sorella got it. Certainly sounds like a nut to me.”
“But couldn’t the notes be a red herring? A false lead to put people off the trail?” Frost asked.
“Maybe. But who do you think did it, then? Who’s the big smarty-pants?”
“I wish I knew,” Frost answered.
“Maybe it was me,” O’Neal said slyly, then shooting Frost a defiant look. “Maybe I killed my dear uncle.”
“No, I don’t think so,” Frost said.
“Why the hell not?” O’Neal answered, as if hurt that he was being ruled out.
“If it wasn’t a nut, it was somebody that wanted Jeffrey Gruen’s tender offer to succeed. That’s the only way you can explain both Flemming’s death and Sorella’s. They were both stubbornly against the offer and had to be gotten rid of.”
“Frosty, I’m ashamed of you,” O’Neal said, using a nickname for Reuben he had made up years before and which he used only when extremely drunk. (Frost, it goes without saying, hated it.) “You’re jumping to conclusions. I still say I could be the killer.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Frosty, lookit. I want to be the head of Andersen Foods. How do I get there? Number one, I got to get rid of the guy who’s sitting in the seat right now. Flemming. Flemming but not Robbins. Robbins will take care of himself. Robbins will shoot himself. In the foot, but he’ll shoot himself.”
“But how about Sorella?”
“Easy. The best chance I’ve got of taking over is if there’s one helluva lot of confusion. A real mess. And what better way to start a mess than to screw up the Foundation? Get that hand-wringing jerk that advises the Foundation—what’s his name? Hedley. Randy baby. Get him all hot and bothered and you’ll have a real circus. Giving me my chance to come in and be the ringmaster.”
“Hmn,” Frost muttered.
“A ding-a-ling idea, you say? Well, you think about it. Don’t sell ol’ Billy O’Neal short.”
To Frost’s relief, the bartender announced the last call for drinks. O’Neal ordered one, Frost did not.
“Where we going next, Frosty?” O’Neal asked.
“I don’t know about you, but I’m going home,” Frost replied. “Drink up and I’ll give you a ride.”
“No more bars? What’s the matter?”
“Old age, Billy.”
“You’re prob’ly right. Home it is.”
Frost was again relieved; it seemed that he would be able to deliver O’Neal uptown without a struggle. Leaving the Red Rose, they were lucky enough to get a taxi without much of a wait. At Fifth Avenue and Sixty-fourth Street, where O’Neal lived, Frost guided his charge to the door, rang the night bell and almost literally dumped O’Neal into the arms of the night porter who answered the ring. By this time O’Neal was mumbling incoherently. Frost said good night but did not expect, and did not get, a reply.
Frost got back into the taxi for the short ride to his town house. O’Neal was gone, but one line from the evening’s conversation—“Maybe I killed my dear uncle”—lingered in Frost’s mind. Could it be true? Had O’Neal just now been so uncontrollably drunk that he had confessed to Reuben, his drinking companion? Frost did not think so, but there was an uneasy doubt; tired as he was, he stayed awake for a good hour wrestling with it.
PURPLE PROSE
18
The next
morning, Reuben Frost sat in his library. Cynthia had gone off to an early meeting, leaving him to read the morning papers at his leisure.
Sprawled out on the library sofa, wearing the red silk paisley bathrobe his wife had given him the previous Christmas, Frost tried to get ready to face the day. But the reality was that he was extremely hung over. He had behaved relatively abstemiously at the Gotham dinner, but the drinks with which he had topped off the evening at the Red Rose Bar had been enough to cloud his head right through to the morning.
Looking about the library, he spotted Edmund Wilson’s American Earthquake, part of a large, admiring collection of the works of a Princetonian of an earlier generation. (All the books in the Frost library were relentlessly shelved alphabetically by author. No matter that this juxtaposed Aristotle with Renata Adler, Chekhov with Julia Child or Proust with Mario Puzo, the point was that a book, regardless of its subject, could be readily found, as Reuben ceaselessly pointed out to those who found his subjectless regime eccentric.) Frost rapidly leafed through the Wilson work, finding with satisfaction what he was looking for—an essay detailing the almost endless number of slang words used in the twenties for being drunk: “lit, squiffy, oiled, lubricated, owled … canned, corked, corned, potted … full as a tick, loaded for bear, loaded to the muzzle … to burn with a low blue flame.”
As he read the short essay, Frost gradually came fully awake, realizing to his great surprise that it was almost ten o’clock. Painfully reconstructing the previous evening, he decided that the most immediate task was to get in touch with Christopher Terry, the editor of Diana Andersen’s “memoirs.”
Ordinarily, he couldn’t imagine that Diana’s writing would attract much attention. That book by Joan Crawford’s daughter was one thing; Joan Crawford was a household name. But no one would really care about Diana Andersen’s views of her parents. Except now that Flemming had been murdered, there would be a macabre interest in it; the splattering of blood would rally the public round.
It was essential that he have a chance to look at Diana’s manuscript; the family must be warned about it, and what it said. And besides, could there possibly be a clue to the family murders buried in its pages?
Frost had no idea whether there was some sort of publishers’ code of ethics that would prevent Terry from showing him the work. From what little he knew about the industry, he assumed there was not; from what he had ever been told by some of his literary friends, the relationship between author and editor was more like that of prisoner to jailer than penitent to priest or client to lawyer. It was his best guess that he would get to see the manuscript.
He looked up the number of Terry’s publishing house and placed a call. Eventually he got through to the editor and asked if he might come and see him. Terry agreed, out of deference to their Gotham friendship.
The offices of Miller’s were located in a tower on the lower edges of midtown Manhattan and one that had been recently renovated in a cheap and ugly manner that made the building less attractive than it had been before. The building was owned by a consortium headed by a young realtor with enormous intellectual pretensions. Frost had met the fellow, Dennis Flachman, on a number of occasions. The developer had always been accompanied by a woman novelist, professor or playwright, acting as an offset to his less than sparkling presence. Flachman was a name-dropper and a climber eager for public recognition not of his money but his intellect. Unfortunately, despite his recently acquired ownership of a highbrow movie company and enthusiastic backing for difficult off-Broadway plays, his intellect was generally recognized: it was pedestrian and unexciting. And, try as he might to conceal his real estate connections, everyone who mattered to him knew exactly the source of his fortune—buildings as monumentally bland as he was.
Miller’s, one of the oldest and most prestigious publishing houses in New York, had offices that belied the vulgar modern exterior of Flachman’s building. They were narrow, cramped and paper-strewn; the only cheerful note in the reception room of the offices, on the eighteenth floor of Flachman’s revamped steel-and-glass sheath, was provided by framed dust jackets from the firm’s books currently on the market.
Christopher Terry came out to meet Frost once his arrival had been announced. The office area was surprisingly dim; Miller’s seemed to be exacting a small saving on lighting—an odd position for a publisher to take, Frost thought—and the walls were paneled in dark wood.
Terry’s office was minuscule, though Frost noted the lettering on his door included the title “Deputy Editor.” The piles of manuscripts, galley proofs and actual bound books left very little room to accommodate a guest. Terry hastily removed a pile of detritus from the only extra chair in the office and invited Frost to sit down.
“Sorry about the mess,” he said.
“Don’t worry, my office used to be almost as bad,” Frost answered with a smile.
“I always like to say I have a very orderly mind and a very disorderly office,” Terry noted. Frost did not reply, and the young editor continued:
“I suppose you’re here about Diana Andersen’s book. I should have been more discreet and not been blabbing about it last night.”
“Yes, you’re right. I mean, yes, it’s the manuscript I’m here about,” Frost said.
“I’m afraid I can’t let you see it. You’re the lawyer for the Andersen family, isn’t that what you said?”
“In a manner of speaking. My firm has been counsel for Andersen Foods for many, many years and, while I was in active practice, I handled AFC’s affairs for the firm. As AFC’s counsel, I inevitably got to know members of the family and have advised some of them on occasion. But I’m not the regular personal lawyer for any of them.”
“After you called, I talked to our attorney—Ed Dunning, our house lawyer—and he advised me against showing you the manuscript. I’m sorry, but I’m afraid that’s our answer.”
“Is there any appeal?” Frost asked. “Could I talk to Mr. Dunning myself?”
“I don’t know. Let me call him.” Terry did so and, judging by the expression on his face as he talked, was not getting a positive response. He looked pained as he put down the telephone. “I’m afraid Ed feels there’s nothing to talk about.”
“So he won’t see me?” Frost asked.
“That’s right.”
“Christopher, I don’t want to put you in an awkward position, but could you call Mr. Dunning back and ask him whether he would rather deal with me or the police in this matter?”
“Police? I don’t get it,” Terry said.
“My friend, there have been two murders—your author’s father and your author’s sister. Both are unsolved, and I think the police, at this point, would be interested in any evidence that might be even remotely relevant to the killings—including the manuscript in your possession.”
“Will you wait here a minute?” Terry said. “Dunning’s office is just down the hall. Let me talk to him.”
Terry disappeared, leaving Frost alone and awash in the editor’s sea of paper. Presumably the disputed manuscript was readily at hand, but Frost decided not to snoop.
“Reuben?” Terry said, returning and poking his head in the door. “Come with me. Ed will be glad to talk to you.”
“Certainly,” Frost said, following his host down the hall. They went into an office no bigger, but considerably neater, than Terry’s.
Edwin P. Dunning, Jr., General Counsel of Miller’s, stood up to greet Frost. As if to compensate for a baby face that made him look exceedingly young, Dunning wore a severe, dark three-piece suit, in contrast to the shirtsleeve and even open-shirt informality Frost had observed about the office.
Dunning’s tone was not especially friendly, and Frost soon pigeonholed him with those pompous, self-important house lawyers who give their branch of the profession a bad name.
“Mr. Frost, I know Christopher has explained our position to you. I’m sure it can’t surprise you terribly. But if it will help, I’ll explain the position ag
ain. Though I think it’s a waste of everyone’s valuable time to do so.”
“Mr. Dunning, I don’t think that will be necessary,” Frost said. “I understand your position. Undoubtedly you feel I stand on the other side from you and would have an interest in stopping Diana Andersen’s book from being published. Not having read it, I cannot comment—though I suspect that might well be the case.
“But let me assure you that stopping publication is not what I’m interested in. What I am interested in is whether there is anything—anything—in her book that could shed light on the murders. I give you my personal word that I will not take, or advise anyone to take, any action to stop publication, no matter what’s in that manuscript.
“If that’s not enough to satisfy you, so be it. Don’t show me the manuscript. But I can assure you that if you don’t you’ll have half the detectives in Manhattan South Homicide up here turning your offices into a reading room.”
“You sound very knowledgeable about what the police might do,” Dunning said.
“I’ve worked with them before, and I’m working with them now on the Andersen murders. I think I know what I’m talking about,” Frost replied crisply.
“How do we know you won’t change your mind about trying to stop the book?” Dunning asked. “Terry tells me it’s pretty negative about your friends and clients.”
“You have two assurances,” Frost replied. “First, I have given you my word. And second, the Andersens would have to be idiots to try and stop publication. As I need not tell you, Mr. Dunning, it is nearly impossible to enjoin publication of a book. There’s very little chance a legal action could ever succeed. All litigation would do is call more attention to what she’s written.”
“You really think the police would be interested in the manuscript?” Dunning asked.
“Yes I do,” Frost said. “It’s an unfortunate fact that members of the family cannot be excluded as suspects. That being so, any clues that can be gathered from any source will be of interest to the police.”
“Mr. Frost, I want you to realize that your request is most unorthodox,” Dunning said.
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