by P. N. Elrod
“How did you two get together?”
He laughed. “It’s been so long I hardly remember, we both go so far back. His family had money and mine didn’t; he had the polish and I had the spit. I used to get him into a lot of trouble taking him off to pool halls and other fun places, then he’d show me how to look at things and draw them. We both had watercolors down by the time we were out of grade school. He’d won a few prizes and me, too, and then one day I sold something. It convinced me this was a way of making a living without working—that and the occasional crap game.”
“And if you left the crap games alone you could make a living,” said Sandra, coming in with a broom and dustpan. “Is he telling you the sad story of his life, Jack?”
“Not so sad,” defended Evan. “I enjoy every moment.” To illustrate, he drained off the rest of the beer and raided the box for another. Sandra rolled her eyes in mock suffering and left for the studio.
Evan grinned beatifically. “Before yesterday she’d have given me a five-minute lecture on gambling, drinking, and other forms of peaceable sport. Now she’s so occupied with Alex it takes the pressure off me. Isn’t love wonderful?”
I had to agree. “She and Alex have known each other just as long?”
“Not really. He was my friend mostly until we got older, then he went off to study in Paris for a couple of years. When he returned she started to notice him, but then he was off to New York getting established. He came back just after the crash; famous, quite thoroughly married to Celia, and off Sandra’s eligible list.”
“That’s a funny way to describe a marriage.”
“It applied to them. I liked Celia well enough, but she was a bit self-centered—no, that’s not the word….” He eyed the dwindling contents of the beer bottle. “I think this stuff is starting to get to me.”
Before he could decide on his definition, Bobbi, Sandra, and Adrian walked in. Bobbi was pulling on her brown velvet gloves.
“All finished?” I asked.
“Jack, you should see the things he has in there, it’s absolutely wonderful. Alex should have it in a gallery or museum. They’re all too beautiful to be shelved up out of sight.”
“Maybe you could talk to Reva,” said Evan.
Adrian shrugged it off. “Another time. You’re going to see her tomorrow, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, sure, first thing, but I’m having my doubts.”
“You promised, Evan, so don’t try to get out of it,” Sandra told him.
“I wouldn’t do that, it’s just I won’t be held responsible if Reva says no. She’ll be thinking of Leighton—”
“And Leighton thinks of himself,” Adrian concluded, twisting his ring around again.
“Well, it is her gallery, of course she’ll want to be selling his work and Reva might think my stuff would take away from his sales.”
“Even though the gallery gets a commission should your work sell?”
“Not as much as they’d get from Leighton. He’s very popular just now, you know.”
“We know, but we also know your work is quite different from Leighton’s and would attract a different audience. Reva will certainly want to widen the pool of prospective buyers.”
“Not that wide … Can you imagine someone like Mr. Danube walking in for a look?”
Adrian apparently could and wisely shifted the point of his argument. “Sandra expects you to try.”
“I will try, I’ve said so, but …”
“Yes?”
“Nothing, just hut.”
Sandra had her arms crossed and was leaning against a counter, watching the exchange with amusement. “Alex, he’s just having a case of the shakes.”
“Odd, that usually doesn’t happen until the morning after the debauch.”
Evan sighed dramatically. “They’re talking like I’m not in the room anymore, which means I’ve become invisible again. If I could learn to control it I’d go on stage and make a fortune.”
Sandra came over to put her arm around Evan. “You don’t have to worry. Even if Reva says no, it won’t diminish your work. You’re a wonderful painter; sooner or later more people than just Mr. Danube will realize it.”
“Sooner, I hope.”
“Right now Leighton is popular with the public, but these things come in cycles. Your turn will come. Look at Impressionism; when it first came out everyone hated it, but now look what it’s going for.”
“Right, but aren’t those artists all dead by now?”
She groaned. “Don’t be so morbid, Evan.”
5
“SO what did you think of the higher arts?” I asked as Bobbi finished off the last of her vegetables.
“Not so high. It’s a business, just like everything else. But I’m not saying that’s bad. Artists have to eat, you know, speaking of which, thanks for supper.”
We were in Hallman’s, one of Escott’s favorite haunts. It was a fancy place with potted palms and a staff that, in their bright uniforms, looked like fugitives from a Russian opera. Though the greatness of its food was forever lost to me, it was still a hell of a good place to impress one’s girlfriend.
Bobbi did proper justice to her meal, which somewhat compensated things for our waiter. To keep from insulting him or the chef, I said I’d eaten earlier and pretended to nurse a cup of coffee.
“Sure you don’t want a bite?” She offered a forkful dripping in rich sauce.
My throat constricted. “Not of that, no.”
“You don’t eat anything?”
“ ’Fraid not.”
She caught the look on my face. “Have I said the wrong thing?”
“Not you, sweetheart, you’ve a right to ask questions. I just don’t know if this is a private enough place for me to answer them.”
“You really think anyone here would take it seriously?”
“Why take chances?”
“Okay.” She shrugged and changed the subject. “What was all that talk you and Evan had in the kitchen?”
“I was just letting him know some of his financial worries were over.” I explained about the roughhouse with Dimmy Wallace’s boys the night of the party. “Now you know why Sandra and Evan were camping out with Alex.”
“How did you get the shark off his back?”
“I talked to Gordy about it and he did all the hard work. Guess I owe him a favor now.”
“Maybe. He might not collect.”
“Yeah? Why not?”
“Because of all that business with Slick. I think he still feels bad about slugging you around.”
“I never felt a thing.”
She didn’t look convinced.
“Honest, he hardly laid a hand on me.”
“Now you’re sounding like Evan.”
“Let’s hope he’s not catching. What were all those paintings like that Alex showed you?”
“It’s hard to say, you just have to see them. He had everything: mountains, cities, there were dozens of portraits that he’d done for magazines—really famous people.”
“And now you’re going to be one of them.”
“You think having Alex Adrian do my portrait will make me famous?”
“More likely the other way around.”
“Why, thanks! But he’s already famous.”
“And he hasn’t worked since January. Sabbaticals like that can ruin a career. You have to keep producing or risk being forgotten.”
“Not this guy. His stuff ought to be in a book or something. With someone like him I’ll bet hundreds of galleries would jump at the chance to exhibit his work.”
“Maybe you can mention it to him during your sittings. Who you taking along for moral support?”
“You were my first choice.”
I nodded a modest acknowledgment of my status with her. “And your second?”
“Probably Marza.”
“You sure she won’t curdle his creative process?”
“She’s okay, except where you’re concerned.”
<
br /> “Tell me what I’ve done this time.”
“Nothing, as usual. Once Marza has an idea lodged in her head about someone, it’s impossible to get it out.”
I waved a playful fist. “I know a great way to—”
“It’s a lost cause, Jack. She’ll either have to get used to you or lump it.”
“Lump it,” I concluded. “Is it just me or does she hate all men?”
“Well, there’s Madison, but I suppose he’s so tied up with his politics he doesn’t really count. She’s not really a man hater, she just hasn’t met a nice guy yet.”
And with her attitude it seemed likely she never would. Where Marza was concerned, charity was not one of my stronger virtues.
“I think I’ll ask Penny instead of Marza,” she said thoughtfully. “She’s a giggler with nothing in her head but clothes talk, but meeting Alex Adrian might keep her subdued.”
“She’s the skinny redhead I met at your housewarming?”
“Slender. And yes, that’s her. You’ve got a good memory.”
“She nearly dropped her drink on me. I tend to keep track of potential disasters. Just keep her from tipping Alex’s paints over, he’s got a temper.”
“I don’t doubt it.”
“Why’s that?”
“When he was showing me his canvases he came across a portrait of a woman and sort of froze. It was like I was next to a block of ice and I could feel the cold coming off him.”
“And you think it was anger?”
She nodded. “Then he shook out of it, shoved the painting back, and brought out something else as though nothing had happened. I wanted to ask him about it, but it wouldn’t have been polite, so I pretended not to have noticed. He was aware of it, too; damn social games.”
“A portrait, you said?”
“I think it was his wife.”
“Why?”
“Just a feeling from the way he acted. It’s like those times when you say Charles can read your mind.”
Escott was no swami, he just had his own method for figuring our people by the way they talked and moved. It was all based on deliberate and analytical observation and could sometimes be pretty spooky if you’re not used to it. Bobbi wasn’t as scientific minded, but I could put as much stock in her intuition as Escott’s logic. Both were pretty reliable.
The evening ended very pleasantly at Bobbi’s and I almost didn’t need the elevator to float down to the lobby and out the door. The euphoria was enough that I hardly noticed the ghost-town streets during my leisurely drive to Chicago’s huge library. I parked under one of the multi-globed lamps and made a cautious sweep of the area for watchers. The last thing I needed was a beat cop taking notice.
Things were clear and I slipped inside. Literally. Vampirism has disadvantages, but sometimes it can be fun. The whole place was mine, no interruptions, no distractions; all I had to do was remember to get home before dawn, which was hours away yet.
I headed for the newspaper section and located their morgue, searching out all the editions from the previous January. They were very informative about the usual New Year’s celebrations and stories on the first babies born after midnight.
The Celia Adrian suicide made the front page on the afternoon of the third. Details were sparse: her husband, the famous painter and magazine illustrator, Alex Adrian, had found her slumped in their car in their closed garage early that morning. The car had apparently been started and left to run until the gas was gone, but by then it was long over. He’d called an ambulance, but efforts to revive her were futile; she’d been dead for some hours.
It gave a few more crumbs about Adrian’s career and that was all—no hint of suicide, much less murder.
ADRIAN TURNS VIOLENT! screamed the next day’s paper. On the surface the story was of a man so beside himself with strong emotion that it came boiling out onto the streets of his peaceful neighborhood with an attempt to assault a member of the press. Read between the lines: the reporter had gotten too nosy and Adrian had kicked him out the door.
A day later in one of the tabloids was a picture of Adrian and Celia with the headline question: is THIS THE PORTRAIT OF A KILLER? The story went on to report again on Celia’s death, with heavy emphasis on innuendo. Adrian was not available for comment, the police were keeping quiet, and there was a possibility of further startling developments in the case. The question in the headline was clarified down at the end of the article as they puzzled over the tragedy of Celia Adrian and why she may have killed herself. There was no by-line, which was hardly a surprise.
It was an unfortunate piece, escalating things enough so that the more respectable papers noticed and joined in on the smear. A story on the coroner’s report appeared in one, most of it padding. Celia Adrian had died on January 3, between the hours of midnight and four A.M., of asphyxiation caused by carbon monoxide exhaust from her car. The note found beside her on the car was such as to indicate that she had killed herself. No other evidence was available to the contrary, but the tabloid strongly suggested that the police were being lax in their duty. Later I found an editorial with the theme of there being a different kind of justice for the rich and famous as opposed to the poor and oppressed. Stirring stuff, but not so noble when in conjunction with their apparent campaign against Adrian.
There was one last story a day later on Adrian’s house being the focus of an innocent prank by some schoolchildren. It vaguely alluded to a broken window that may have been the result of an off-course baseball and condemned Adrian for wasting the resources of the police department in calling their assistance to the scene. This one had a by-line, somebody named Barb Steler, which I noted down before looking for more of her work.
Yesterday’s tabloid carried her name, so it wouldn’t be too hard to find her, something I had an inclination to do. I wanted to know why she had it in for Adrian.
Flipping back to the screamer headline, I studied the grainy shadows of the photo. It was obviously a file shot, taken at some social function. Adrian was in a tuxedo, the woman next to him wore a shiny evening gown. Celia had a model’s aristocratic face; short, light hair; and beautiful, searching eyes. I tried to see if there was a hint of self-destruction in them, but whatever I saw was inevitably my projection onto her. This was a picture in a newspaper, not a crystal ball or even a mirror.
The tabloid offices were larger than I’d expected, but it probably took a large and imaginative staff to keep their pages filled with more than ads for invisible lifts and rejuvenating face creams. It was getting late, but there was still a skeleton crew working the phones and typing up tomorrow’s scandals. At the receptionist’s desk a large man with a morose, leathery face noticed me come in and stopped eating his horse burger long enough to ask what I wanted.
“I’m looking for Barb Steler.”
“Gotta ’pointment?”
“Get serious, at this hour?”
“Then why try here?”
“Thought she might be working late.”
“Maybe, but not this shift. Tomorrow she might be in.”
“I want to find her now.”
“You got that in common with a lot of guys, but I can’t help you.” He sounded all broken up about it, heaving a sigh and giving me the bracing benefit of the raw onions in his dinner. He made it easier by looking me square in the eye, daring me to start something.
I smiled and leaned in closer. “Listen to me, this is very important …”
Like I said, sometimes it can be fun. A minute later I had Barb Steler’s home address straight from their personnel files and the advice that she wouldn’t be there, but in a boozer down the street called Marty’s.
“What’s she look like?”
“You’ll know her. Only real broad in the joint.”
I thanked the man and told him to go back to his meal and forget he ever saw me. He did so, and by the time he shook it enough to be able to notice me again I was out the door.
Marty’s was a dark, comfortable place, and
its proximity to the tabloid offices must have made it the main watering hole for the workers there. One of the deep, padded leather booths was loaded with a group swapping lies over their drinks. I could tell they were newsmen a mile off because I used to do the same thing. A big brown case on the floor identified at least one of them as a photographer. They’d sooner be hanged than part with their Speed Graphics, on or off duty.
I was about to ask the bartender for help when I saw Barb Steler. Her co-worker had been right when he said I’d know her, and it wasn’t just because she was the only woman in the place. No mental image I had conjured would have fit the reality.
She was in the booth with the boys, blowing cigarette smoke with the best and holding her own in the conversation. She wore a severely tailored suit, a mannish hat, and a worldly expression. Her bronze eyes were very large and predatory rather than vulnerable. Her skin was the palest I’d ever seen, but didn’t look unhealthy. It set off her short jet black hair and generous bright red mouth.
I must have been gaping; she saw me and those seeking eyes flicked up and down and then turned to one of her party.
“Friend of yours, Taylor?” she drawled in a husky voice that could carry. She had meant it to do so.
Taylor gave me a once-over and shook his head. “You got a problem, buddy?”
“Barb Steler?” I said, making it less of a question than a statement. I ignored Taylor because I hate drunks.
“Give the kid a nickel,” said Taylor, and got a chorus of approval from the audience.
“Who wants to know?” she asked.
“My name’s Jack Fleming and I’d like to talk to you for a moment.”
“You and half of Chicago,” added Taylor. More hilarity.
“About what?” There was a hint of a smile, but it was a distant hint.
“I’d rather not say.” Weak, but it was the best bait I could come up with under the circumstances. The way I’d said it indicated I had something interesting to tell and that she might not want to share it with her gin-soaked colleagues.
She tilted her head to one side, studying me with amusement. I studied her right back and she didn’t seem to mind.