by Kari Bovee
Grace read the words again: someone whom I have wronged. Several people came to mind. There was the obvious: the man with the scar and shabby brown coat. Then Lillian Lorraine had claimed Sophia stole her role in the upcoming show, and Liane Held claimed Sophia stole her legacy. Billie could have felt that Sophia had stolen her man, as well, especially since Sophia had held a more valued place in Flo’s heart than the other girls. And then there was Flo himself, the man who stood to lose the most by Sophia’s marriage and move to California.
It would only put you in more danger.
So it was true. Grace was in danger—and heading back to New York. She had to find some answers and find them fast.
That evening Grace had wanted to dine alone in her suite, but Chet had insisted on staying just outside her door. As she picked at her salmon, Grace tried to convince herself that keeping Chet and Flo in the dark about Sophia’s suicide note—possibly a fake—the handwritten note stating she might be in danger, and the man with the scar was for the best. Both Chet and Flo had proven untrustworthy. She’d have to forge ahead alone as best she could without raising suspicion.
When someone lightly tapped on her bedroom door, Grace dropped her fork, which clanged against the plate, further jangling her nerves. She exhaled in relief when Lucile entered the bedroom.
“Ooh, that dreamy man let me in,” she said, closing the door behind her.
Grace pushed away from the small table and rose to greet her friend.
“Dining alone?”
“I just needed some quiet time.”
“You’ve heard the news, I suppose,” Lucile said.
“Yes. I know we’re leaving day after tomorrow on an express train. Are you ready?”
Lucile shrugged her shoulders. “Not really. I’ve met with a few producers, but I was hoping to stay on a bit longer to see where those meetings would take me.”
“Why don’t you stay, then?”
“Darling, Flo insists your new show has to be ready to open in a few weeks. That’s money in the bank for me. These movie producers move like molasses. They have little interest in the costumes until they recognize that movies can’t be made without them. The wardrobe designers have very little pull, so we must wait . . . and wait.”
“Lucile, do you have access to a car?”
“Why, yes. Whatever for, my dear?”
“I’d like to run an errand in the morning. I’ll need the car for the day.”
Lucile tilted her chin upward and narrowed her eyes. “Alone?”
“Yes.”
“Rift with Prince Charming?”
“You might say that.”
Lucile’s expression turned concerned. “Is that a good idea for you to go alone? Would Flo approve of this ‘errand’?”
“Does everyone have to know and approve of my every move, my every thought, my every breath?” Grace plunked her fists on her hips.
Lucile frowned. “I’m sorry, darling. I didn’t mean to offend you.”
“I feel like a bird in a cage, Lucile. I can’t breathe. Everything I do is monitored. Please, could I just use your car for the day, no questions asked? Please be the one person who trusts that I wouldn’t do anything foolish, that I can handle myself for a few hours without a chaperone. Please tell me you are that person.”
“Indeed, I am. I’ll send my driver. What time?”
“Don’t have him come to the room. Have him drive up to the reception area. I’ll meet him there at 6:00 a.m.”
Grace spent the rest of the night packing her trunk and plotting how she could leave the room without Chet asking where she was going, or without him tagging along.
The next morning, after room service had picked up her breakfast tray, Grace had told the waiter to inform Chet that she had a headache and would spend the day in her room.
She splashed her face with water, hurriedly put on her trousers, and slipped out the window. A tall wall of bright pink bougainvillea pressed up against the panes, making her escape difficult with its thorny branches grabbing at her clothes. But it also kept her hidden from view. After a busboy passed by on the garden path, Grace stepped out, straightened her coat and hat, and headed to the lobby.
Grace kept her head down, so as not to be recognized, and made her way to the large glass doors that led out to the hotel’s drive. Once outside, she noticed several very sleek, very expensive cars parked along the U-shaped driveway. A small, thin man in a chauffeur’s uniform stepped out from behind the door of a black Cadillac Town Sedan with its curved rolling fenders and outdoor driver’s cab.
“Miss Michelle?”
Grace nodded and waited for him to open the door to the passenger’s cab.
“And where would the lady like to go this morning?” he asked, starting the car.
Grace looked him directly in the eye through the rearview mirror.
“The Los Angeles Police Department.”
After speaking to a plump woman in a frumpy suit with a demeanor like a pile of wood, Grace waited in the reception area of the police station. The room smelled of stale cigarettes and burned coffee.
A man resembling a scarecrow wearing thick glasses peeked his head out the door and then walked up to her, his hand outstretched. “So you’re the sister.”
Grace flinched. “Excuse me?”
“Sophia Michelle’s sister?”
“Yes.”
“Joe Barnett, Detective. Sorry for your loss, Miss Michelle. What can I do for you?”
“I want to know what has been done about my sister’s case.”
Detective Barnett pushed his glasses up further on the bridge of his nose, placed his hands in his pockets, and rolled back and forth on the balls of his feet.
“I’m sorry, Miss, but as I told the PI nosing around here a few days ago, whom I thought worked for you, the case has been closed. Coroner ruled it accidental suicide. Didn’t the fella tell you that?”
“Yes, he did.” Grace swallowed back her annoyance. “But I have evidence that might change your mind about the case.”
“Oh, I doubt that.” Barnett frowned.
“Look.” Grace pulled the crinkled note out from her purse, thrusting it into his hands. “Sophia was writing to me, explaining that someone she had wronged was after her. I think it was a lover. That’s why she left New York.”
He perused the words. “How do you know that this is from her?”
Grace tapped the paper still in Barnett’s hand. “It’s her handwriting, and I found it stuffed into the pocket of one of her coats. She was obviously interrupted when writing the note. See how it trails off?” She looked into Barnett’s bleary, smoke-bruised eyes. “No one planted this. It’s likely no one knew anything about it and, thus, couldn’t anticipate that I’d find it.”
The detective pressed the note into her palm.
“Miss Michelle, I know this is a bitter pill to swallow, but we’ve looked at all the evidence in this case, and I’m sorry but it has been ruled an accidental suicide. This note has a vague mention of a threat, but it proves nothing. Could have been written by anyone. Could have been written by you, for all I know.”
Grace shook her head. Why didn’t he understand?
“Please, can’t you look into it again?”
“Here’s what I can do,” he said, “because you’re next of kin, I can show you the postmortem report. But that’s all I can do.”
She nodded. “Yes, yes, please. I’d like to see it.”
Barnett turned and pushed open the door that led to the inner sanctum of the office. Grace waited in the hallway, nervously biting her nails. After a few moments, Barnett returned with a manila file and handed it to Grace. She opened it and scanned the papers within and then read it again more slowly. It stated just what Barnett—and Mary—had said.
Grace slumped her shoulders. “Mercury bichloride. This just can’t be.”
Barnett removed the file from her hands. “If you don’t believe our medical examiner, there’s a library just down
the street—three blocks, on your right. Look it up yourself, see how lethal that medicine can be.” Detective Barnett gave her a dismissive look. “This case is closed, and I’m not about to reopen it without concrete evidence. I’m sorry, Miss. Now, if you will excuse me, I have genuine crimes to solve.” He turned and disappeared behind the swinging doors.
Grace watched him leave. She refused to believe Sophia had killed herself, accidentally or not. Grace ran out to the car and hopped in.
“Take me to the library, fast. I don’t have much time,” she said. “The detective said it’s only three blocks down, on the right.”
When they reached the library, Grace looked at her watch. Fifteen minutes to spare before she had to head back to the hotel. She asked the driver to wait, dashed up the steps, pushed open the heavy, brass-framed doors, and stopped at the information desk. A curvaceous young woman with bright red lipstick and spectacles hanging down over her ample bosom greeted her.
“Where can I find information about mercury poisoning?” Grace asked.
The woman lowered her spectacles.
“I’m doing some research,” she rushed on. “For my boss.”
“Follow me.” The woman led Grace up a long staircase with two landings, past several shelves of books, turned left down a row of shelving, then took a right, and stopped. This particular section of the library was small and dark and smelled of old dust.
The woman held out her hand. “Here’s where you’ll find most of the information. If you need more, come find me.”
“Thank you.” Grace stared at the myriad book spines. After the woman left, she settled on one titled Everyday Poisons and opened it up. Her heart lurched when she turned to a section devoted solely to mercury bichloride. She read fast, her eyes skimming the pages, pausing when something caught her attention: When ingested, the toxin often burns the patient’s esophagus and stomach wall.
Grace lowered the book. The postmortem mentioned nothing of a damaged esophagus or stomach lining. Perhaps Sophia hadn’t ingested enough to harm her esophagus? Grace hadn’t really known what to look for when she read the postmortem, though. She placed the book back on the shelf and sighed.
“Now I’m more confused than ever.” She looked at her watch. Seven more minutes before she had to leave to get back to the hotel.
Grace started slowly down the stairs, thinking. Sophia had died the night of John Barrymore’s party. Perhaps something at the party had led to her death. At the moment, Lillian Lorraine stood out as someone who would want Sophia gone more than anyone else. She had been the most vocal about her negative feeling toward Sophia, too. Had Lillian been at Barrymore’s party?
Grace reached the bottom of the stairs, lost in thought. The librarian approached her. “Are you all right, Miss? Did you find what you were looking for?”
“In a manner of speaking,” Grace said, her voice distant, her mind whirling. She looked at the bespectacled woman. “Where would I find back issues of Variety Magazine?”
The librarian crooked her finger, bidding Grace to follow. This time they took a flight of stairs down to the basement stacks. Their heels tapped loudly on the tiled floor. The industrial, gray metal bookshelves made the atmosphere cold, austere, like Grace imagined a hospital morgue would feel and look.
The woman led her into another small room lined with wooden dowels, newspapers strewn across them like clothes on a laundry line.
“Do you have a date in mind?” The librarian lowered her spectacles to look Grace in the eye.
“Yes. April 15. Of this year.”
The librarian scanned the papers, her finger held aloft to guide her eyes. In seconds, she snapped a paper off the line.
“Here you go. Published a week later. Should have information on anything happening around town on the fifteenth.”
“Excellent, thank you.”
“Will you be able to find your way out again?”
Grace waved a hand. “Yes, yes. Thank you for your help.”
The librarian left the room, the click of her heels echoing throughout the sterile basement.
Grace flipped open the paper. Inside the first page she found an index. Her eyes landed on the words, Gossip and Events, Page 5. Quickly, she turned the pages. As she’d hoped, she found an article with the headline Barrymore’s Boisterous Ball. Below it was a photo of a crowd of people gathered in what looked like a foyer of a grand house with marbled floors and an ornate metal-and-wood staircase. A small group of people clustered at the bottom of the stairs. Grace peered closer to see the faces and gasped out loud when she recognized Jack Pickford. Standing next to him was a woman in a white fur coat dotted with spots.
She held her breath, her eyes focused on the woman. It had to be Sophia, and she had to be wearing the ruby-and-sapphire studded fur cape. But Grace couldn’t be sure because she could only see the woman’s profile. Then Grace recognized the hair clip that their mother had given Sophia for her birthday, right before her parents embarked on their fatal second honeymoon. Grace moved her gaze to the tall woman standing across from Sophia. She towered over Sophia, her dark hair cut into a short curly bob, pointing a finger in Sophia’s face.
“Liane Held,” Grace said out loud, studying the woman’s face. It portrayed an expression that could only be described as murderous.
Chapter Twenty-Five
JUNE 24, 1920 - NEW YORK CITY, NY
Molly, the new show, a Cinderella love story about an orphaned girl resigned to the streets, working in a factory until she was “discovered,” mirrored Grace’s own life. She wondered if Flo had done that on purpose—yet another way to exploit her.
Grace hadn’t seen Flo since she’d returned a few days prior, but he’d called them all together for a meeting and line rehearsal that afternoon. A long dining room table had been placed on the stage for the meeting.
One of the first to arrive, Grace purposely chose a chair to the left of center at the table. She knew Flo always sat at the head of the table and the star of the show always sat directly to his right. She wanted to make a statement that would jostle Flo and everyone else.
Joe Urban, the set designer, arrived next. Then Fanny, Irving Berlin, Lucile, Nicole, Charles, and some of the other actors filtered in.
Finally, Flo arrived, his appearance shocking her. He’d lost weight, and the pallor of his skin looked dirty-dishwater gray. Purple, upside-down crescent moons framed his lower eyelashes as if he hadn’t slept for days.
He went straight to Grace, knelt down to her seated level, and took her hand. “Darling, I’m so happy you’ve returned.” As he reached over to give her a dry-lipped kiss on the cheek, Grace could smell the stench of stale cigarettes and bourbon on his breath. “I know you have some concerns about how fast we’re going with this, but we’ll have a nice, long talk later, yes?”
Grace gave a slight nod and pulled her hand away from him. God, but he looked awful. Smelled awful, too. She’d heard rumors of another affair, another starlet—and this time, his paramour was married.
Wearing a velvet smoking jacket and his hair slicked back shiny and neat, Charles slipped into the seat next to her. “Nice to have you back.” He kissed her on the cheek. “How are you?”
“Fine. Much better than Flo. He looks terrible.”
“I’ve never seen him like this,” Charles said. “He stands outside her dressing room door, pleading for her to let him in.”
“Who?”
“Macy Arnold—his new lover. She’s temperamental, spoiled, and never satisfied.”
“Begging?” Fanny leaned in closer to join the conversation, the feathers on her hat dancing above her eyes. “I never thought I’d see the day that Flo would beg.”
“Pfft! Oh please, he’ll be fretting one moment, and then fly into a rage the next,” Charles said. “It’s been hell, I tell you, hell.” Charles turned to Grace. “He’s missed you terribly. He was so worried when he learned of your horseback riding accident.”
Grace smiled through gri
tted teeth. The rest of the cast didn’t need to be burdened with her problems.
Flo could not sit still. He’d rise from the table, pace a few steps, and sit down again. Goldie passed out the scripts, and everyone bent their heads to peruse them, searching for their lines. The more Grace watched Flo’s frenetic dance, a cloud of cigarette smoke hovering over his head, the more Grace’s hurt and anger gave way to the slightest bit of concern.
Someone entered stage left. Grace turned to see who had come out of the wings, and her heart stopped. Liane Held approached the table, her arms tightly crossed, her lips downturned in an angry frown. She wore the same expression Grace had seen in the photograph of John Barrymore’s party. Grace turned to look at Flo, whose face had drained of color.
“Liane, darling,” he said, but stood frozen in place.
“Let’s dispense with the niceties. I need a word with you.”
“My dear, when did you arrive?” Flo approached her, arms outstretched. “Have you come from Europe? Why are you here?”
“We have unfinished business to discuss.”
Flo touched her sleeve, a look of utter helplessness and bewilderment on his face. She pulled her elbow away. Grace consciously made an effort to keep her mouth from hanging open. Had Liane been on the train with them? How had she not seen her?
“Of course, of course,” Flo said, steering her off the stage. “Let’s talk tonight.”
Liane gave him a sullen look and walked back into the wings. Flo turned around to face the table of actors and crew, and he clapped his hands together. “Shall we begin? Goldie, another drink, would you?”
Grace noticed the twitch at the side of his mouth. Liane’s presence rattled him—rattled her, too, for that matter. Did this have something to do with the ermine? With Liane’s inheritance?
They commenced with the line rehearsal, discussed costumes and choreography, and all the while Flo paced, smoked, and drank. When he called for a short break, the group scattered, all but Grace, Charles, and Fanny, who knitted themselves into a tight knot.
