Deadly directors cut, p.23
Deadly Director's Cut, page 23
“I suppose they come and go as they like, and no one clocks their movements when they’re not on set.”
“Not that I’ve noticed. They’ve got a couple more days of filming scheduled, and then the whole thing will be wrapped up and they’ll be gone. It’ll be hard for Dave to continue his investigation when they’re scattered across the country. Let’s hope your problem, our problem, leaves with them.”
“I hate the idea of never knowing what happened,” I said.
“So do I.”
A man tripped on the stairs; saved himself by clutching a potted plant; said, “Excuse me”; and burped. He then staggered off into the night. A woman ran after him.
“Can I buy you a nightcap?” Richard asked me.
“That would be lovely, but not tonight, I think. May I have a rain check? It’s been an emotional day.”
“I understand, and you most certainly can have a rain check. If you need anything, anything at all, feel free to call me. I mean that, Elizabeth.”
“Thank you,” I said.
The smile faded from his face. He rubbed at his jaw. Dark stubble was coming in fast, and his eyes were full of tiredness and worry. “As for our dinner plans tomorrow, I’ll understand if you need to cancel if there are any developments with your mother.”
“Why don’t I call you in the afternoon and check in? Would that be too late?”
“No. Not at all. Good night, Elizabeth.” He hesitated, and for the briefest of moments I wondered if—hoped?—he was going to kiss me. But whether he wanted to or not, too many people were around. He hailed a bellhop. “Can you get me a cab, please? Kennelwood Hotel.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good night,” I said.
The bellhop put his fingers in his mouth and whistled, and the lights of a cab parked in the approach to the entrance came on.
* * *
* * *
It had been an emotional day, but I wasn’t ready for bed. Instead, I went into the hotel. I wasn’t dressed for the ballroom, but I decided not to worry about that. I came in as Judy Rae was finishing her set to enthusiastic applause. The band struck up “Pennsylvania 6-5000” as the singer descended the set of stairs at the side of the stage. A man was waiting for her at the bottom. He bowed deeply, and she gave him a radiant smile. “May I get you a drink, Miss Rae?” he asked.
“That would be delightful, thank you. I’ll have a martini.”
“That song was beautiful, Judy,” I said.
“Thank you,” she said as her admirer bustled off, intent on his errand.
“Did you enjoy watching the filming earlier today?” I asked her.
“Only in that it reminded me, not that I needed reminding, that I made the right decision when I left Hollywood and an acting career behind me.”
“Did you see my mother after you got back here?”
“No, I didn’t. We separated at the steps of the hotel, and I went to my room and had a nap. I don’t want to complain, Elizabeth, but now that we’re on the topic, the rooms the Concord provides for the top-ranked entertainers have private bathrooms.”
“Good for them, but we’re not on the topic of entertainers’ accommodation. I hope you don’t mind my asking, but you told me you and Elias Theropodous had a relationship at one time.”
“Thank you so much.” She smiled at her admirer as he presented her with a perfectly crafted martini. He opened his mouth, probably intending to ask her for a dance. He glanced at my scowling face, thought better of the idea, and retreated.
“It never quite came to that, and the less said about that the better,” Judy said.
“Essentially, he ran you out of Hollywood.” I’d had enough of beating about the bush with these people. As had been mentioned, the movie shoot would be finished soon and they’d be on their way. Tonight was Judy’s last night with us. Tomorrow a comedian would take center stage. Time was running out if I was going to find out what happened to Elias Theropodous and, not incidentally, to my mother.
Olivia and I had an unusual relationship. She was my mother, but she’d never mothered me. Aunt Tatiana had taken that role while Olivia had always been more like an indulgent aunt. Dropping by occasionally, bearing lavish gifts; her clothes, her jewelry, her fame, making her the talk of our working-class Brooklyn neighborhood and, I had to admit, making me the envy of my circle of friends.
Did Olivia ever regret the years we hadn’t had together? I don’t know. When she inherited Haggerman’s and decided to make a go of it, she’d called immediately to ask me to come with her. Was that because she’d hoped we could, at last, have a mother-daughter relationship? Or because she needed someone to run her hotel for her and I came cheap?
I didn’t know.
It didn’t matter, not really. I was here, and we were slowly building a relationship that suited each of us.
That someone would casually attempt to destroy that newfound bond for their own ends made my blood boil.
“Run me out is a harsh way of putting it.” Judy sipped her drink. Her dark eyes watched me over the rim of her glass. I said nothing, and she shrugged. “Although accurate. I didn’t want to have an affair with him, and he got his revenge by making sure I never landed a part again. Not, I’m sorry to say, an unusual situation in Hollywood. You’re asking me if I carried a grudge toward the miserable man. It is absolutely none of your business, but as his death happened in your hotel, I suppose you think that makes it your business, so I’ll answer. I would have happily strangled him at one time, but that was long ago. I say strangled because I would have wanted to see the fear in his eyes as he died and him to know I was responsible. I’d not have administered something as remote as poison. Fortunately, for my own peace of mind, I’ve been lucky, and I was able to move on. I had a singing career to fall back on.” She lifted both arms, one hand still holding her glass, and indicated her surroundings. Music played, well-dressed couples swung past us, lights shone, and people laughed.
“Luck, plus a heck of a lot of hard work, and I got over Elias Theropodous and his manipulations. When I heard he was going to be here at the same time I was, I realized I hadn’t spared a thought for him in a long time. If you’re looking for his killer, Elizabeth, you’ll have to find someone he wronged more recently. That won’t be difficult. Now, if you have nothing more to accuse me of, I’ve finished this drink and I’m sure I can find a gentleman to buy me another.” She pushed her way past me.
I hadn’t expected Judy to break down and tearfully confess to poisoning Elias. That didn’t mean I didn’t think she could have done it. I suspected she wasn’t quite as blasé about the ruins of her acting career as she put on. As we talked, I’d been watching for signs of some curiosity on her part concerning Olivia’s condition. If Judy had poisoned Olivia I didn’t think she’d have been able to keep her curiosity in check. She’d need to know how Olivia was doing. She’d showed no interest in my mother’s well-being or her whereabouts.
That didn’t mean she hadn’t been responsible. Maybe Judy Rae was a better actress than anyone gave her credit for, but I decided to give her the benefit of the doubt, and I left the ballroom.
* * *
* * *
The note attached to our door meant someone had added the poison to Olivia’s food after it had been prepared, dished up, and brought to the house by Al the busboy. Between five o’clock, when the tray was delivered, and five thirty, when Olivia brought it in, someone had been at our house.
Who was the question. Who, and why.
The why I thought I knew. To stop me from poking my nose into the police investigation.
I was getting absolutely nowhere, but did Elias’s killer think I knew more than I did?
The lights of the hotel fell behind me as I walked to the staff quarters. The waters of the lake lapped softly at the shore, and from somewhere in the darkness a loon called.
Undergrowth rustled and Winston stepped onto the path. Before leaving the house to take Olivia to the hospital, I’d asked a bellhop to free him from my bedroom. I crouched down, and he ran to me, ears up, rear end wiggling. I scratched his head. “Silly dog. Let’s take you home.”
I headed away from the lake and walked up the narrow path running parallel to the woods as the dog trotted beside me. I glanced through the trees in the direction of our house as I passed. All the lights were off, so Gloria must have gone to bed.
Our house is located after the sign that reads staff only, but more than one guest has decided that doesn’t apply to them. The house itself is a few steps off the path, tucked against the edge of several acres of untouched woodland. We have no plans to expand the hotel, but if the popularity of the Catskills keeps growing by leaps and bounds, the way it has since the war, we might consider it someday.
A handful of trees provides some degree of privacy, but it’s obvious to anyone passing that a house is situated there. The porch itself isn’t big, only large enough for a small table and a few armchairs. The living room’s at the front, facing the porch and the path, with Olivia’s bedroom next to it, and mine tucked in at the back, against the solid line of the forest.
I shivered as I thought of someone watching our house, crouching beneath the trees, waiting for the chance to attack Olivia. Had they come with the intention of poisoning her food? They must have. No one wanders around with a bag of . . . whatever it had been . . . in their pocket.
Or maybe they do.
How long had this person been waiting for the opportunity to act? All day? Or did he know what time to arrive? Five o’clock’s early for anyone to have supper. Had he, or she, been listening under the windows and heard Olivia call the hotel and tell them what time to bring her tray?
That had to be it. This person knew what time to come back and set the trap with a note stuck to the door.
I’d check with Olivia first thing tomorrow and ask if she’d noticed anyone hanging around our house, paying it any particular attention.
The other alternative, of course, was that the person responsible had overheard Olivia from the other end. Meaning, they’d been in the kitchen when she called. If a guest, anyone from the movie crew, or one of the entertainers, such as Judy Rae, had been in the kitchen, they would have been noticed. Noticed and evicted instantly, with much fuss and a lot of attention. Everyone within earshot would have remembered.
I looked down at the dog, trotting happily beside me. “You’re no help,” I said. “If you’d seen someone creeping around our house, you should have chased him off, or at least warned Olivia.” I wondered if we should get ourselves a guard dog.
Winston lifted his hind leg and peed against a scruffy old pine tree.
Aunt Tatiana lives by herself, along with Winston, in a two-room cabin not far from the female employees’ main residence. The roof sags on the eastern side, the windows don’t quite fit into their frames, and the walls lean toward one another like drunken sailors in Times Square on a Saturday night, but she’s made it homely and cheerful with the use of a lot of cleaning supplies and a lifetime of things she brought from Brooklyn when she arrived to take over housekeeping at her sister’s resort. The cabin’s not insulated or heated, and in the fall Tatiana moves into one of the guest cabins closer to the hotel.
Lights burned in the living room window, so I knew my aunt was still up. I knocked on the door, and it opened immediately. Winston ran inside and headed straight for his dishes in the small alcove that contains her samovar as well as a hot plate, kettle, toaster, and ancient icebox.
“Lastachka, is everything all right?” My aunt was ready for bed in a tattered, belted housecoat, slippers, and a head covered in pink rollers. A mug of tea, still emitting steam, sat next to a thick hard-covered book on the side table near her chair. The chair had been Uncle Rudolph’s. The one he sat in every night after they closed the store downstairs and he settled down with his pipe to listen to the increasingly bad news from Europe on the radio while Aunt Tatiana bustled about in the small kitchen making borscht or syrniki and I bent over my homework on the kitchen table.
I smiled softly at the memory before bringing myself back to the here and now. “If you mean with Olivia, I haven’t heard anything more. I brought Winston back.”
“You needn’t have,” my aunt said. “Winston knows his way home.”
“So he does, but I was out for a walk, thinking over everything that happened.”
“Would you like a cup of tea? Kettle’s hot.”
“No tea, but I’ll come in for a few minutes. I want to ask you a favor.” She stepped back and invited me to have a seat. “You told me your friend who’s the head housekeeper at Kennelwood said something about the movie people sneaking between rooms. I’m wondering if she meant anyone in particular.”
“You have to leave Velvet to make her own mistakes,” Aunt Tatiana said.
“You always were a mind reader,” I replied. “But in this case, you’re off base. I’m worried about Velvet, yes. I know it’s none of my business, but she’s totally enamored of this moviemaking, not to mention Todd Thompson, who, I’ve been reliably informed, is a cad. But that’s not why I’m asking. I’m trying to get a feel for the people involved in this and who’s sneaking around with who might give me a clue.” As I’d walked and thought earlier, I remembered Richard saying he hadn’t observed anything untoward on the part of the movie crew. Then again, unless they paraded their peccadillos and indiscretions in public, management wouldn’t be any the wiser.
The source of all knowledge in a hotel, as in most other things in life, is the cleaning staff.
“You want me to ask Irena?” Tatiana said.
“Please?”
“Is late, lastachka.”
“Not all that late. You’re still up. Does she have a telephone in her room?”
“She doesn’t live at the hotel. She lives in town with her husband. Yes, she has a telephone.” Aunt Tatiana’s cabin might be falling down around her ears, but it had a fully functioning mini kitchen and a telephone. She went to the little phone table and flicked through her address book. She dialed. Her friend picked up almost immediately, so I didn’t feel too bad about disturbing her.
Aunt Tatiana and my mother had grown up in a Russian-speaking home, but once they started school, their parents had insisted they speak English to each other and to their friends. Tatiana and her husband, Rudolph, also a child of Russian immigrants, spoke only English in their house, and my mother never uttered another word of Russian once she started to dance professionally. On visits to my grandparents when I was a child, they spoke to me in heavily accented, broken English. To my continual regret, my Russian is poor to nonexistent. After Aunt Tatiana greeted her friend, I didn’t understand another word.
They didn’t talk for long, and soon Aunt Tatiana put the phone down. “The movie people are the talk of the hotel, so there’s no shortage of gossip. The chambermaids say the young woman, the blond one, has her own room, but she does not sleep alone. The evidence is there for anyone to see in the morning.”
“Todd Thompson. The rat.” It had to be Todd sneaking into Rebecca’s room. I hadn’t been trying to find out anything that affected Velvet and the feelings she was developing for Todd, but now I had to worry about whether I should tell her that as well as what I knew about his marital situation and his flirting with Lucinda.
Aunt Tatiana shook her head in disapproval. “The old man. The one who died.”
“Elias?”
“She doesn’t know the name, but that’s the man who died, right? He was not trying to pretend he wasn’t in her room. He left things behind. His things.”
So Elias was visiting Rebecca in the night. Naughty, naughty.
My mind whirled. I thought back to the Monday dinner. Rebecca had not been happy that evening, not at all. She hadn’t smiled at Elias as though they were lovers, or as if she even liked him. She’d barely looked at him. He’d told her he wanted to go over her lines with her later. She’d pulled a face, and he’d snapped at her.
I guess “go over her lines” meant something different to him than it does to everyone else.
Rebecca had every opportunity to put the poison in Elias’s food or drink. Certainly she had as much opportunity as anyone else there that night.
Did she hate him that much? She could have asked the hotel for another room; she could have locked her door and refused to open it when he came knocking.
If she’d done that, or taken any other measures, such as telling him she wasn’t interested in him, would he have fired her? The way he fired Judy Rae all those years ago? What had Judy said to me earlier? Not an unusual situation in Hollywood.
Whether he would have fired Rebecca or not doesn’t matter. Not if she thought he would.
“Lastachka?” Aunt Tatiana said.
“Sorry. I’m thinking it all over.”
“You think the young actress killed the old man?”
“It’s possible.”
“More likely her husband or boyfriend.”
“Yes, that’s true. Except that there’s no husband or boyfriend on the scene. I haven’t noticed anyone paying any particular attention to Rebecca, and I can’t see Rebecca trying to kill my mother.”
“Someone tried to kill O!” Tatiana shrieked.
I grimaced. “Gosh, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that out loud.” I’d decided not to tell Tatiana that we suspected Olivia had been poisoned, not until—or even if—I got to the bottom of it. I didn’t want my aunt to worry. And now I’d blurted it out. “Her dinner tonight was poisoned, the doctor’s sure of it. We believe she was given the same substance that killed Elias.”
