Death Before Bedtime

by Gore Vidal

  “I hope you really feel that,” she said softly. Then, since there was nothing else to say, I excused myself; I asked the guard at the door where Winters might be found. He gave me the address of the police headquarters and so, without further ado, I took a taxi downtown.

  I was escorted to Winter’s office, an old-fashioned affair with one tall window full of dirty glass. He sat at a functional desk surrounded by filing cabinets. He was studying some papers when I entered.

  “What news?” I asked.

  He waved me to a chair. “No news,” he said tossing the papers aside. “A report on your note from Mr. Anonymous. The handwriting isn’t identifiable, even though we have compared it to everyone’s in the house … the paper is perfectly ordinary and like none in the house, a popular bond sold everywhere, the red pencil is an ordinary red pencil like perhaps a dozen found scattered around the house, the fingerprints on the letter are all yours.…”

  “I didn’t rub off someone else’s, did I?”

  “There were none to rub off. I think sometimes that it should be made illegal for movies and television to discuss fingerprinting … since fingerprinting came into fashion, practically every criminal now wears gloves, and all because they go to movies.” He swore sadly to himself.

  “Well, you got a good press,” I said cheerfully.

  “It won’t be so good when it develops that someone murdered Hollister, if someone did.”

  “You don’t have any doubts, do you?”

  “When it comes to this case my mind is filled with doubts about everything.”

  “Well, here’s a bit of news.” I handed him the documents.

  We spent an hour going over them; neither of us was much good at reading corporation papers but we got the general drift: a company had been formed to exploit certain oil lands in the Senator’s state. Stock had been floated; the company had been dissolved at considerable profit to the original investors; it had been reformed under another name but with the same directors, more stock had been issued; it had been merged with a dummy company belonging to the Governor of the state. The investors took a beating and only Rufus Hollister, the Governor and the late Senator profited by these elaborate goings-on. Needless to say the whole subject was infinitely more complicated and the New York Times’ subsequent account of the deals gives a far more coherent account than I can. It was also clear that the Senator had fixed it so that he was in the clear should all this come to light and that Rufus Hollister was responsible, on paper at least, for everything; the Governor seemed in the clear, too.

  Winters called in his fingerprint people, also a lawyer; the papers were handed over to them for joint investigation.

  “It waxes strange,” I said.

  “Why,” said Winters, “would Mr. X want to send you these papers? And the earlier lead, if it was the same person who sent you both?”

  “I suppose because he thinks I will use them properly.”

  “Then why not send them to the police?”

  “Maybe he doesn’t like policemen.”

  “Yet why, of all the people in the house, send it to you?” He looked at me suspiciously.

  “The only reason I can think of, outside of my enormous charm and intelligence, is that I am writing all this up for the Globe … maybe the murderer is interested in a good press. I think maybe that’s the reason; then, perhaps, it doesn’t make too much difference to him who gets the information since he knows it will come to the police in the end anyway … it might have been just a whim … you have to admit the style of the first note was pretty damned whimsical.”

  Winters grunted and looked at the ceiling.

  “A number of people have seen fit to confide in me because of my position with the Fourth Estate. I may as well tell you that Camilla Pomeroy came to me the other night with the information that her husband was the Senator’s murderer; then, the next morning, Mrs. Rhodes gave me some exclusive information about the common-law marriage of Mr. Rhodes some years ago … you probably read all about it in my Globe piece.”

  “And wondered where you’d got it, too. What did Mrs. Pomeroy tell you exactly?”

  I repeated her warnings, omitting our tender dalliance as irrelevant.

  “I don’t undersand,” sighed Winters.

  “The only thought which occurs to me is that they are both beneficiaries. I’ve thought all along that we should be real old-fashioned and examine the relations of the three beneficiaries of the late Senator.” I had not of course thought of this until now; it seemed suddenly significant, though.

  “We do that continually,” said Winters.

  “It’s possible one of them killed him for the inheritance.”

  “Quite possible.”

  “On the other hand he might have been killed for political reasons.”

  “Also possible.”

  “Then again he might have been killed for reasons of revenge.”

  “Very likely.”

  “In other words, Lieutenant Winters, you haven’t the foggiest notion why he was killed or who killed him.”

  “That’s very blunt, but that’s about it.” Winters seemed not at all disturbed.

  I had a sudden suspicion. “You wouldn’t by any chance be thinking of allowing this case to go unsolved, would you? Stopping it right here, with a confession and a corpse who, presumably, made the confession before committing suicide.”

  “What ever made you think that?” said Winters blandly, and I knew then that that was exactly what he had in mind. I couldn’t blame him; by admitting that Hollister had been killed and the confession faked, he put himself squarely behind the eight-ball, a position which the servants of the public like even less than we civilians do. Though he might have proven to all and sundry that he was a pretty sharp character to guess that Hollister was killed, he would also be running the risk of never finding the murderer which would mean that public confidence in the police would be shaken, in which event he himself would be shaken back to a beat in Georgetown. I could hardly blame him for this indifference to the true cause of justice. After all who really cared if the Senator and Hollister had been murdered? No one mourned the passage of either to the grave. For a moment love of law and sense of right wavered, but then I recalled myself to stern duty (the fact that I would have the success of the year if I could unearth the murderer after the case had been nominally shut by the police affected my right action somewhat).

  “How long will you hold the crew together?” I asked, writing Winters off as an ally.

  “Another day or so, until all the evidence is double-checked … the autopsy and so on completed.”

  “We will then be free to go?”

  “Unless something unforeseen happens.”

  “Like another murder?”

  “There won’t be another murder,” he said confidently and I wondered if he might have some evidence which I didn’t have. After all it was just possible that Hollister had committed suicide … driven to it by Mr. X, the possessor of the documents, a whimsical cuss who was obviously enjoying himself immensely.

  “What about the gun?”

  “Well, what about it? It belonged to Mrs. Rhodes, didn’t it?”

  “That’s right … no prints on it except Hollister’s. Mrs. Rhodes kept the gun in the table beside her bed. She hadn’t looked at it in over a month. Anyone could have gone in there and taken it.”

  “But how many people in the house would have known there was a gun in that night-table?”

  “I haven’t any idea. Hollister knew, though.” He smiled contentedly. “He knew where everything was.”

  “Except the papers which the Senator had hidden in the study, which someone else found first.”

  “But who?”

  “The murderer.”

  “I see no evidence.”

  “The evidence is in front of you or rather in the other room being gone over by your lawyer. How does this Mr. X know so much about the case? How did he know where to find the papers? Why did he send
them to me at all since Hollister’s death was intended to finish the case?”

  “It may be,” said Lieutenant Winters in the voice of innumerable Mary Roberts Rinehart heroines, “that we shall never know.”

  “Go to hell,” I said.

  He frowned. “Why don’t you stop fussing around, Sargeant? This is none of your business, we all have a perfect out. Let’s take it. I am as dedicated to duty as anyone and I don’t intend to drop the case, really; but I’m not going to beat my brains out over it and I am going to pretend it’s all finished. I suggest you do the same.” This was a threat, nicely phrased.

  “I will,” I said. “But I’m not going to let it go unsolved if I can help it.” We sat staring hostilely at one another … conscious of the righteousness of my tone, I was almost ready to recite the Wet Nurses’ Creed in a voice choked with emotion. But I let it ride.

  “Well, I better be going,” I said, standing up.

  “Thanks for letting me have the papers.”

  “Think nothing of it.” Full of wrath, I departed.

  3

  Mrs. Goldmountain lived in a large house of yellow stone, mellowed with age, in Georgetown, the ancient part of the city where, in remade slums of Federal vintage, the more fashionable Washingtonians dwell. Her house, however, was larger than all the others, the former residence of some historic personage.

  I was shown to an upstairs sitting room, hung in yellow silk, all very Directoire. After a moment’s wait, Mrs. Goldmountain appeared, neat in black and hung with diamonds. “Mr. Sargeant, isn’t this nice? I was so happy you could come to the party last night with darling Ellen … poor shattered lamb!” I could see now why I had been admitted so quickly, without hesitation: I was straight from the Senator’s house and would know, presumably, all about the murders. I had every intention of indulging La Goldmountain.

  “She’s taking it very well,” I said, which was putting it as nicely as possible.

  “She was devoted to Lee Rhodes. Of course they never saw much of each other but everyone knew of their devotion. They were so alike.”

  I failed to see any resemblance but that was beside the point. I mumbled something about “like father like daughter.”

  “Of course some people were shocked by her going out so soon after his death but I said after all she is young and high-spirited and there is nothing, simply nothing she can do about his being dead. I love tradition, you know, but I see no reason for being a slave to it, do you? Of course not. They must all be relieved that that horrible man who killed himself confessed.”

  “Yes, we were pretty happy about that: I mean, justice being done and all that.”

  “Of course. Is it true that poor Roger Pomeroy was nearly arrested?”

  I said that it was true.

  “How frightful if the wrong man had been convicted! I have always liked Roger Pomeroy, not that our paths have crossed very often, just official places, that’s all, especially during the war when he was here on one of those committees. I never took to her I’m afraid; I always thought her rather common, never having the slightest notion that she was really Lee’s daughter, like that! What a cross it must have been for her to bear: it could explain everything. My analyst, who studied with Dr. Freud in Vienna, always said that whatever happens to you in the first nine months before you’re born determines everything. Well, I mean if the poor little thing knew before she was born that she was illegitimate (and they’ve practically proven that we do know such things … we later forget them during the trauma of birth, like amnesia) it would certainly have given her a complex and explained why I always thought her just a little bit common.”

  I stopped the flow gradually. I diffidently explained my proposition to her.

  “For some time now my clients, the Heigh-Ho Dogfood Company, have wanted an outstanding public relations campaign. I’ve tried any number of ideas on them but none was exactly right. The campaign we had in mind must have dignity as well as public appeal and, you will admit, those two things aren’t easy to find together. The long and the short of it, Mrs. Goldmountain, is that I think we could make a dandy campaign out of Hermione.”

  “Oh, but I could never consent …” She began, but I knew my Goldmountain.

  “We would arrange … Heigh-Ho would arrange … for her to give a recital at Town Hall. As a result of all that publicity she would appear on television, on radio and perhaps even a movie contract might be forthcoming. You, as her owner, would of course lend considerable dignity to all of this and though the publicity might be distasteful …”

  That did it. Any mention of publicity made Mrs. Goldmountain vibrate with lust.

  “If I were to accept such a proposal, I would insist on supervising Hermione’s activities myself.”

  “I think that is a fair request … I’m sure Heigh-Ho would consult you on everything.”

  “I would also insist on having final say about her program at Town Hall. I know what her capacities are and I know the things she can do. I would never permit her to sing any of these modern songs, only the classics and of course the National Anthem.”

  “You will be allowed to choose the repertoire of course. Also the voice coach.”

  “You feel she needs a coach?” I had made a blunder.

  “All the stars at the Metropolitan have voice coaches,” I said quickly. “To keep their voices limbered up.”

  “In that case, I would be advised by you,” said Mrs. Goldmountain graciously, her eyes narrowing as she saw the spread in Life as well as the image of Hermione and herself flickering grayly on the little screen in millions of homes.

  “What songs does she do best?” I asked, closing in.

  “German Lieder, and Italian opera. If you like we can hear her now.”

  “Oh, no,” I said quickly, “not now, some other time. I know her genius already. All Washington does and, soon, the whole world will know.”

  “You may tell Heigh-Ho, that I shall seriously entertain any offer they wish to make.” And so our treaty was fashioned. I asked permission to telephone the Vice-President of Heigh-Ho in New York. It was granted. The official was delighted with my plan and made an appointment to meet Mrs. Goldmountain the next afternoon, in Washington.

  Everyone was happy and my firm was again on solid footing. Mrs. Goldmountain invited me to take tea with her and a few guests who were at this moment arriving. One of them turned out to be the new Senator, former Governor Johnson Ledbetter.

  “Remember you well!” he boomed, pumping my hand. “A much less unhappy occasion I am glad to say.” He beamed vaguely and accepted a drink from the butler. I took tea, as did our hostess and the two other guests; one a political commentator of great seriousness, the other Elmer Bush who had arrived while I was greeting the Senator. Elmer was every bit as cordial as the old political ham, both slices off the same haunch, as it were.

  “Well, it looks like you’re all innocent,” said Elmer toothily as we stepped back out of the main line of chatter which circulated around the new Senator and Mrs. Goldmountain.

  “It certainly does, Elmer.”

  “I suppose you’ll be going back to New York?”

  “Very soon.”

  “Winters, I gather, is very pleased about the way the case shaped up, very pleased.”

  “I should think so.”

  “Quite a trick of his, pretending to arrest Pomeroy while really making a trap for Hollister.”

  “Trap?”

  “Isn’t that what happened? Wasn’t Hollister driven to commit suicide by the police? Naturally, they wouldn’t admit anything like that but it seems clear: they pretended to have evidence which they didn’t have, forced him to confess and then to kill himself, an ingenious, a masterful display of policemanship.”

  Elmer Bush never joked so I assumed that he was serious and left him rigorously alone.

  “I’ve already discussed it on my show. You probably saw it night before last, got a good response too. The public seems unusually interested in this
affair, something out of the ordinary, Senator being murdered and all that, very different. I thought I might drop by and take a few shots of the house on film to be used in my next program …” And he tantalized me with promises of glory if I would help him get in to see the house and Mrs. Rhodes. I told him I would do what I could.

  Across the room the Senator-designate was booming.

  “Dear lady, I will be saddened indeed if you don’t attend the swearing in tomorrow at the Capitol. The Vice-President is going to do it, in his office, just a few friends will be there, very cozy, and the press. Say the word, and I shall have my secretary send you a ticket.”

  “It will be a moment to be cherished,” said our hostess, looking up into his full-blown face, like a gardener examining a favorite rose for beetles.

  “I am only saddened that my appearance in the halls of Congress should have been like this … in the place of an old and treasured friend. How tragical!”

  A murmur of sympathy eddied about him. “Lee was a man to be remembered,” said the statesman.

  His oration was shorter than I had suspected; when it was over he and Elmer Bush fell into conversation about the coming convention while I chatted with Mrs. Goldmountain.

  “You’re going to be in Washington a little while longer?”

  “Two days at least … so the police say.”

  “Why on earth do they want you now that it’s all over?”

  “Red tape. You know how they are.”

  “Well, give my love to darling Ellen and tell her to come see me before she goes back.”

  “I certainly will.”

  “And also to Mrs. Rhodes.” She paused and sipped some tea, her black eyes dreamy. “She must be relieved.”

  “That the case is finally over?”

  “In every sense,” said Mrs. Goldmountain significantly.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Only what everyone in Washington knows and has always known, that she hated Lee Rhodes, that she tried, on at least two occasions, to divorce him and that he somehow managed to talk her out of it. I’m quite sure it was a relief to her when he was killed, by someone else. That awful Hollister really did do it, didn’t he?”