“This place is cute,” Penelope said, sitting on the edge of one of the beds. The sheets were in a tumble like someone had jumped out of bed and hadn’t taken the time to make it again.
Abigail sniffed. “I guess. It’s convenient to work, at least. Zero minutes commuting back and forth.”
“So you’re under the weather today?” Penelope asked.
“I woke up with a fever, some kind of cold,” Abigail said. “I’m still recovering from a pulled hamstring, too. After yesterday…Martha thought I should stay home. I wish I could sleep all day, but…it’s too quiet here.”
“Hopefully you’ll be feeling better soon,” Penelope said.
“Physically I’m sure I will. Mentally on the other hand…” Abigail said. “I should’ve stuck to beauty pageants, they’re not as hard on the body. Or the mind.”
“Can I ask you…” Penelope began cautiously. “What was Elspeth like?”
“You mean the girl who claimed to be someone else?” Abigail said weakly. Sweat made her forehead shiny and her eyes were weary. “I’m not sure what’s been more traumatic: finding out my friend was killed or finding out my friend wasn’t who she said she was.”
“I know this must be hard. Why do you think she was pretending to be someone else?” Penelope asked.
Abigail shrugged her shoulders. “I have no idea. To me she was Elspeth. From Seattle. She liked sushi, and chai tea. I thought it was great, meeting someone from my home state all the way out here.”
“You’re from Seattle too?” Penelope asked.
“I never lived there but visited my cousins there a few times when I was younger.” Abigail sighed and dropped her forehead in her hand.
“Did she ever say anything that made you think she wasn’t from there?”
“No,” Abigail said, considering. “We didn’t talk too much about home, mostly about the show, the choreography, gossiped about the other girls. Not so much personal stuff.”
“Hmm,” Penelope said.
“One time she said something about Bucker’s Diner near her school, but I thought that place closed years ago. She said she meant when she was younger, that I didn’t hear her right, but I was pretty sure she was talking about high school, not elementary,” Abigail said. “She changed the subject and ordered a pizza.”
“Pizza?” Penelope asked, eyeing Abigail’s long muscular legs.
“Yeah, she could eat,” Abigail said. “Not that it showed up anywhere. Me, not so much. But I had a slice with her from time to time.”
“So maybe this woman had lived in Seattle at some point in her life,” Penelope said.
“Maybe. Or just visited. Or looked it up when she heard I was from there.”
Penelope considered that as she glanced at the twisted sheets behind her on the bed. “She slept here?”
“Yep,” Abigail said. “Cops took all her personal stuff. What little of it she had.”
“Do you have any idea where Elspeth Connor is?” Penelope asked.
“That’s the really weird part,” Abigail said. She stretched her legs out and placed her bare feet on the floor in front of her. Penelope could see hard calluses on the edges of her toes. “If you’re going to pretend to be someone else, why pick someone with a family, who will come looking for you? Why not just make up a new identity all together?”
“That’s what the police need to find out,” Penelope said. “And there’s also a danger of the real Elspeth coming forward and exposing her.” Penelope untangled the sheet, smoothing it out toward the pillow. A small dresser sat at the edge of the bed under the window and Penelope stood up and went over to it.
“That was hers, but like I said, they took everything,” Abigail said.
Penelope slid open the top drawer, revealing nothing inside. The same for the next one down too. In the bottom drawer were a few coasters from different restaurants in the city.
“Those are from places she’d stopped in for a meal or a drink,” Abigail said. “Her mementos, she called them. She liked to swipe coasters wherever she went.”
Penelope picked one of them up, the cardboard slightly damp and warped between her fingers. “McNulty’s.”
“Touristy Irish bar around the corner,” Abigail said. “There’s only like thirty of those in the neighborhood.”
Penelope knew she was exaggerating but she could see what Abigail meant.
“Do you feel safe here?” Penelope asked.
“Yeah. I’m hardly by myself,” Abigail said. “I can see my work out my window, and this place is like a dormitory at night. Girls everywhere, coming and going from the apartments.”
“So besides checking out local restaurants, what else did you guys do together?”
“Are you a chef or a detective?” Abigail said with a twist of her lip.
“Sorry, I’m just curious about her,” Penelope said. “I don’t mean to be nosy.”
Abigail considered her for a moment and shrugged. “We didn’t do anything secret or special. We danced, we slept, we rehearsed, we ate. That pretty much sums up the entire five weeks.”
“Did you go anywhere besides places?” Penelope asked.
“Elspeth said she wanted to see the Statue of Liberty up close, you know, take that boat tour out there. And she went for runs around the reservoir in Central Park a couple of times. At least that’s what she told me. Who knows now if that’s what she was really doing.”
Penelope sorted through the small stack of coasters she’d picked out of the drawer. “The Village Tavern. This place is in the park,” she said under her breath.
“Oh yeah,” Abigail said. “She stopped in there and swiped that one the day before…you know.”
“She swiped it?”
“Yeah, she came home all worked up, said she’d ordered two glasses of wine and ate lunch at the bar, then pretended she was going to the bathroom and pulled a dine-and-dash,” Abigail said.
“Why would she do that?” Penelope asked.
Abigail shrugged. “I have no idea. Me and a lot of the other girls, we live pretty tight through the year. Getting a job dancing in a show doesn’t pay a lot, unless you’re at a certain level, or you become a Big Apple Dancer. This show pays well…well enough to not have to steal.” Abigail tilted her head toward the windows in the direction of the theater. “Elspeth always seemed like she had money to spare, she treated me to dinner a couple of times.”
Penelope turned the coaster over, considering.
“Elspeth came into town with money,” Abigail offered. “At least it seemed that way to me. She never worried about it at all, and she was generous with all of us.”
“If she had money, why not get a better apartment with more privacy?”
“I got the feeling she really liked being with the other girls,” Abigail said. “If it were me, I wouldn’t be cramped up in here, but I need the free room. If I had to pay rent in the city…I’d have to have two or three roommates at least.”
“So there was no need for her to skip out on a check,” Penelope said, holding up the coaster.
“I don’t think so,” Abigail said. “I think she did it for the thrill.”
Penelope looked at the black and gold lettering on the coaster that spelled out The Village Tavern, one of New York’s most celebrated restaurants, nestled in the green beauty of Central Park. And one of the last places Elspeth Connor’s impersonator was seen alive.
Chapter 24
Penelope stood backstage with Arlena and watched the opening scenes of the Christmas Extravaganza. Watching the dancers from that vantage point was much different than when they’d been in the audience seats during rehearsal. The music sounded different, more muted. The orchestra pit was built to project the sound outward toward the audience.
“Aren’t they wonderful?” Arlena whispered as she clasped her hands under her chin. Her
diamond ring twinkled in the shadows thrown by the curtains where they stood backstage.
It was a sold-out show, all of the seats in the auditorium full of well-dressed theater goers. Many families with small children were in attendance, their little faces glowing from the stage light as they watched the magic unfold on the stage.
Armand and Randall watched from the opposite end of the stage. Arlena’s father was just as mesmerized by the production as Arlena was, it seemed.
When the number ended, and the dancers hurried offstage to reset for the next scene, Arlena clapped along with the audience and said, “We’re going to begin filming tomorrow,” Arlena said. “The crew will report in first thing in the morning. I want to film rehearsal, behind the scenes stuff with the performers. You can be ready, right?”
Penelope nodded. “Absolutely. Sounds good, Director.” Arlena leaned into her, tapping shoulder to shoulder.
The dancers moved into their places for the second number and the applause petered out. The music rose from the orchestra pit in a wave, washing over the audience as the Snow Queen made her first appearance on the stage.
Meredith had on her Christmas tree headdress and a long sequined gown with long slits on either side, revealing her long muscular legs beneath. She shimmered like nighttime snow in the moonlight as she made her way toward the front of the stage, the other dancers trailing her and matching her steps.
Penelope heard a pop somewhere overhead and she looked up, briefly dazzled by a stage light, that had swung downward and was now aiming right at them. Someone who appeared to be with the lighting crew scaled the rigging above the stage, stopping in front of a motherboard.
There was another pop from somewhere above and then suddenly the entire theater was plunged into darkness.
For a moment, the musicians continued, and the dancers stayed in their routine.
There were a few shouts from the audience, as the emergency lights came on, illuminating the edges of the aisles. Four exit signs glowed in the dark, two near the stage on either side, and two leading toward the lobby.
Armand looking up at the light tech, his palms raised in the air in a questioning manner.
Several more loud pops shattered the silence, followed by a pause and then more.
“Someone is shooting!” a man in the audience yelled. Several people screamed and began shouting as the patrons jumped to their feet.
Penelope’s brain refused to let her think someone was shooting a gun inside the theater, with all of the children and innocent people present, but at the same time she couldn’t think of what else could be happening.
The dancers rushed from the stage, stumbling over one another on their way to the exits. A few of the musicians leapt onto the stage from the pit, the lanky violinist who had spoken up the day before, helping one of the ladies to her feet after she twisted her ankle in the rush to escape.
“Come on,” Arlena said, grabbing Penelope by the arm and pushing her toward the nearest exit.
Chaos broke out as everyone fled. Several people fell in their hurry to escape and were nearly trampled in the aisles.
The same loud pops sounded again. Something struck Penelope about the sound, how each time it was exactly the same pattern of pops.
Suddenly Randall was pulling the two of them behind a wall backstage.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“What is going on, Daddy?” Arlena asked.
“It sounds like it’s from up above,” Penelope said, pointing to the scaffolding over their heads. The sound tech she’d noticed earlier was gone, but his headphones swayed at the end of a cord on the catwalk.
“Armand called the police,” Randall said.
Just then the lights came back on in the theater. Many people had already made it through the exits, but Penelope could see a few people had stayed behind, crouching between the seats, unsure of what to do.
A shout came from up above and they all looked up.
Arlena put a hand over her mouth. A man fell to the stage and landed with a thud in the center of the floor and lay unmoving. It was the light tech Penelope had seen on the scaffolding.
Four police officers entered the theater from the main lobby and began ushering the remaining patrons outside. Penelope could see the officers were also looking around, sizing up the threat, trying to pinpoint exactly what was happening. Penelope rushed to the man on the stage as Randall waved the officers forward.
The light tech groaned and tried to lift his head.
“Try not to move,” Penelope said urgently. His leg was pinned under him at an odd angle. She reached for his hand and placed hers gently on top of his. “Help is here.”
“Bainbridge,” he murmured, his eyes fluttering closed. “Bainbridge.”
Penelope heard sirens from outside. “They’re here. You’re going to be okay.”
“I didn’t think it was true. The ghost,” the man said with a raspy chuckle. “This is what I get for not believing.”
Chapter 25
In the aftermath of the incident, Penelope stood on the stage and stared at the personal debris left behind in the theater seats. Playbills littered the floor, items of clothing had been dropped in aisles. A tiny patent leather Mary Jane lay on its side near the front row.
“Who is this Bainbridge?” Detective Doyle asked, bringing her back to the present.
Penelope shrugged and shook her head. “They say there’s a ghost who haunts the theater. That’s who I think he was talking about.”
“You said you saw him up on the scaffold before he fell?” Doyle asked.
“Yes,” Penelope said. “I heard the first set of pops, and noticed him working on that big board up there.”
“That’s exactly what he was doing,” Armand said, walking briskly toward them. His normal gentile manner was a bit frayed at the edges after the evening’s events. “An unfortunate accident, his falling like that. He must have become disoriented when the lights were turned off.”
“Did you blow a fuse?” Penelope asked.
“No, someone pulled the main switch and…poof,” Armand said, splaying his fingers in the air.
“Are you sure that’s what happened?” Doyle asked.
“Quite sure,” Armand said.
“And what were those popping noises?” Penelope said.
Armand shrugged. “I heard them too. Whoever sabotaged our show must have mimicked the sound of a gun to cause the most panic.”
“My guys haven’t found any sign of a shooter, or a gun,” Detective Doyle said, motioning to the officers who were searching the main auditorium. “The only injuries so far from the theater goers are from falls. A few people got stepped on trying to get out. And an older lady broke her ankle in the rush out the door.”
Armand put a hand on his forehead. “And my employee.”
Doyle nodded. “If someone did this on purpose…”
“Why would someone do that?” Penelope asked. “Armand?”
“Who knows why people do anything these days? Who in their right mind would disrupt a holiday show—one that brings joy to families, in such a crass and terrible way—putting the lives of children in danger? I’m sure I don’t know anyone like that.”
“Okay, let’s take this one step at a time,” Doyle said. “Where is the main breaker for the theater, Mr. Wagner?” Doyle said.
“Right this way,” Armand said, leading them further behind the scaffolding on the main floor. He pulled a set of keys from his pocket and chose a small one the size to fit a padlock.
The small gold lock dangled from the metal box, a shiny slice through the arm of it.
“You won’t need that,” Doyle said, bending at the waist slightly to eye the lock. “Someone has broken in.”
Chapter 26
Arlena, Randall, and Penelope sat in silence at the large table in their suite a
cross from the theater.
“What should we do?” Arlena asked.
Penelope folded her hands in her lap and looked down at them.
“We move forward with the project,” Randall said. “That’s my gut instinct.”
“There was a murder, Daddy,” Arlena said. “And now an accident during a show.”
Penelope cleared her throat but otherwise stayed quiet.
“An even better reason to press forward,” Randall said. “Maybe we add a true crime element to the documentary, cover the murder and blend it with the storyline of the history of the theater.”
“What are you saying?” Arlena asked. She placed her elbows on the table and rested her chin in her palms.
“The death of the girl…”
“Jane Doe,” Penelope interrupted. “They still haven’t identified the woman pretending to be Elspeth Connor.”
“Right,” Randall said. “A mystery tied to the theater. I say we look into it, and maybe to some past incidents, for a more in-depth documentary.”
“What other incidents?” Arlena asked.
Randall sighed and leaned back in his chair. “Aunt Tula told me Ruby died of a broken heart. But really, she died of an accidental overdose, maybe suicide. Sleeping pills and whiskey, is what my uncle told me. He made me promise not to say anything to Tula, but wanted me to know when I got older, so I wouldn’t start on the booze. I know Tula was trying to protect me, but…I think she Ruby got wrapped up with someone. A married guy, is my guess. A powerful married man.”
“But what would her death that happened over forty years ago have to do with the woman in the alley?” Penelope asked.
“It’s just the angle.” Randall held his hands up wide, reading an invisible marquee between his thumbs. “Death visits the theater, past, present, future?”
“I spoke with Abigail again yesterday,” Penelope said. “There might be more to Elspeth’s story. She was into some weird behavior during her time in the city.”
MURDER WITH ALL THE TRIMMINGS Page 11
