The Old Die Young

by RICHARD LOCKRIDGE

  Shapiro said, “Miss Abel, please.” He was asked if he had an appointment. He identified himself, and the pretty young woman said, “Oh.”

  “About Mr. Branson,” Shapiro said, and this time she said, “Oh, dear.” But she used the telephone and said that a policeman was there about Mr. Branson. Then she said, “Of course, Mrs. Abel,” and stood up. If the lieutenant, she said, would just come this way….

  Miss Abel sat with her back to a window at an uncluttered desk at the far end of a deeply carpeted room. She watched Shapiro as he walked the length of the room, with Tony Cook a little behind him. When he was a step or two from her, she stood up behind the desk. She was a white-haired woman, prematurely white-haired, Shapiro thought. The rest of her appeared to be in the mid-thirties, and she was almost beautiful.

  She said, “About poor dear Clive, but why the police?”

  “Because we don’t know the cause of Mr. Branson’s sudden death,” Shapiro told her. “And there seems to be no doctor to sign a certificate. So we have to look into things. We’re from Homicide, Miss Abel.”

  “And you think somebody killed Clive? Somebody at the party last night? By putting poison in his drink? That’s absurd, Lieutenant—Shapiro. That’s right, isn’t it? Shapiro?”

  Shapiro told her that was right. He said, “Absurd, Miss Abel?”

  “Of course. Clive was such a sweet man. Why would anybody want to?”

  “Kill him? I’ve no idea. And it’s not at all clear anybody did. It’s just a possibility we have to rule out. Or in. I understand you were at this party, Miss Abel. This birthday surprise party?”

  “Yes. Mr. Simon set it up, actually. Arranged everything. Getting Clive in his play was—well, what they call a feather in his cap, you know. Would have been in any producer’s. And the advance sale! Really, Lieutenant. And what will happen now, God knows. It’s—it’s a catastrophe.”

  “You mean, Mr. Simon will have to close the play?”

  She had continued to stand behind her desk. Now she sat down behind it. She looked down at the desk top. When she spoke, she spoke slowly. “I don’t know,” she said. “I really don’t know. They may try to keep it running with Ken Price. He’s the understudy—besides having the other male role. He’s good. He’s very good. But—well, people went to see Clive. More him than Bret Askew’s play. Not that it isn’t a very nice little play, but it was Clive they’ve been coming to see. And buying advance tickets to see. They’ll get a lot of cancellations, I’m afraid. And after only two weeks! Why, it might have run for two years. And now …”

  Shapiro made what he hoped was a sound of sympathy. He said, “About this party last night, Miss Abel. About what time—”

  He was interrupted. The door to Martha Abel’s office opened, and a man’s voice said, “Darling. I—”

  The man who followed the voice into the office was tall and noticeably handsome. He was, at a guess, in his late thirties. Vaguely, he reminded Shapiro of someone he had seen, and seen recently. Oh, yes, of a dead man. Not strikingly; this man was much younger. But he had somewhat the same actor’s face, the same definition of features. And an actor’s voice.

  The handsome youngish man stopped just inside the door; stopped, obviously, when he saw Shapiro and Tony Cook.

  “I say,” he said. “I am sorry, Miss Abel. Gracie’s taking a coffee break or something. Didn’t realize you were busy. So I just barged—”

  “It’s all right, Ken,” said “Darling”—or, alternatively, Martha Abel. “They’re from the police. About poor dear Clive.”

  “The police?” Ken said, with an inflection of entire disbelief. “Why on earth the police?”

  “This is Kenneth Price, Lieutenant,” the white-haired talent agent said. “The man who’ll take over poor Mr. Branson’s role if Mr. Simon decides to keep Solstice open.”

  “What I came to tell you about,” Price said. “Not tonight, but tomorrow night, looks like. With me in Clive’s part. Money refunded on demand, of course, to last-ditch Clive Branson fans. It’s too damn bad about old Clive. Swell guy and great professional. I couldn’t be sorrier. But how do the cops come into it? Clive just died, didn’t he?”

  This last seemed directed to Shapiro or Tony Cook. Shapiro identified himself and Tony to Price, then said, “He died in his sleep, apparently. We have to try to find out why, Mr. Price. Apparently he was in good health. Hadn’t been seeing a doctor, far’s we can make out. So—routine inquiry.”

  “On the chance somebody killed Clive, Lieutenant? Wayout notion, I’d think.”

  “Very possibly,” Shapiro said.

  “Hey,” Price said. “You don’t think somebody at this damn party—well, put cyanide in his drink?”

  “No, not cyanide, Mr. Price. Probably nothing. The P.M. will tell us about that. The autopsy.”

  “Jeez!” Price said. “The old boy would hate that. Sowell, careful of himself, the old boy was.”

  “Don’t be so flip,” Martha Abel said. “You’re not playing comedy.”

  “Sorry, darling,” Price said, in a different tone. “Bad reaction to Clive’s death. So—sudden; so needless. Hell, he and I had a tennis date for this afternoon. I’m sort of knocked for a loop, I guess. Brings out the ham in me, apparently. Sorry about it.”

  “It’s all right, dear,” Martha Abel said. “I’m sure the lieutenant understands.”

  “Everybody gets edgy with a thing like this,” Shapiro told them both. “You were at this birthday party last night, Mr. Price? Why ‘damn’ party, by the way?”

  “Sure, we all were. Producer, author, cast. I don’t know why I said ‘damn’ party, Lieutenant. Actually, it was a very good party. Good drinks, all-right food, good people. Even Kirby.”

  “Bob Kirby directed the play,” Martha said. “And he usually stays clear of parties.”

  Shapiro said he saw. It was something he seemed to himself to be always saying, whether it was true or not. He said he was interested in the party. Had it been planned long? Who had planned it?

  “Mr. Simon planned it,” Martha Abel said. “Do sit down somewhere, Ken. Don’t just stand there glowering.”

  “Didn’t know I was, darling,” Price said. But he pulled a light chair nearer an end of the desk and sat on it.

  “Or Rolf Simon’s secretary, probably,” Martha Abel said. “Very efficient gal. She called me Friday, I think it was, and told me about it. Friday morning. Called you about the same time, I suppose, Ken?”

  “Afternoon,” Price said. “Yes, Friday.”

  “Said we seemed to be off to a flying start, and that Mr. Simon thought it called for a little celebration. Figured Clive had it coming on his birthday.”

  Everybody seemed to know the birthday of the late Clive Branson, and nobody seemed to know how old Branson had been on the last evening of his life. Did Price know?

  “Probably in Who’s Who in the Theatre,” Price said. “Got a copy here, haven’t you, Marty?”

  “Over there,” Martha said, and pointed toward a small bookcase against a wall. Price went to the bookcase and took a rather thick book out of it. He flicked pages. Then he said, “Yeah,” and, after a moment, “Comes out forty-two, way I figure it,” he said. “I’d have thought—” He did not say what he would have thought. He put the Who’s Who, open, on the desk in front of Martha Abel. She merely glanced at it and closed it up. Then she said, “Forty-two it is.”

  “What he told them,” Price said.

  “Yes, Ken,” she said. “What they have to go on, isn’t it? All right, maybe he fudged a little. Don’t we all? In the profession, we do. I suppose we do.” She looked down for a moment at the top of her desk. Then she looked at Shapiro. “Acting’s a physical profession. Women start off as ingenues and end up playing grandmother roles. With an interim as character actors. Men play juvenile leads, character actors, old fuddy-duddies. We—well, try to postpone the progression. Unless we get put out of it. As I did—almost before I even got into it, really. Marilyn Blake, rising
young star. Only she wasn’t, as it turned out. So now, actor’s agent. Flesh peddler, for short. And better off.”

  Price said, “Sure you are, darling.” Then, for several seconds, nobody said anything.

  “‘Off to a flying start,’” Shapiro said. “Meaning the play, of course. It was, Miss Abel?”

  “Of course. Advance sale into next year. And the notices! Raves!”

  There was another silence. Price broke this one with a cough, a stage cough, Shapiro found himself thinking. He followed it with, “Look, darling, the man can read. Probably will, I suspect. Raves, Marty?”

  “Damn good notices,” Martha Abel said. “‘Noel Coward at his most lighthearted.’ New York Chronicle.”

  “Branson is termed ‘some years too old for the role’ by the New York Sentinel,” Price said. “And the Chronicle said that he, ‘for all his competence, is still too heavy.’ Raves, darling?”

  “It’ll run for a couple of years,” Martha said. There was a warning note in her voice.

  Price said, “Sure. Maybe three or four. Speaking of which—Clive had run of the play, you know. You got him that.”

  “Branson was a star, Ken.”

  “And I’m not,” Price said. “Which you won’t, I hope, be pointing out to dear old Rolf, since, after all, I’m in your stable too. Not Clive’s salary. All right. But run of the play, anyway. O.K., darling?”

  “We’ll see how it goes tomorrow night. You’re up on it, aren’t you?”

  “Of course I’m up on it,” Price said. “Lines and—”

  The telephone on the desk interrupted him. Martha Abel let it ring several times. Then she said, “Damn that girl,” and lifted the receiver. She said, “Martha Abel Associates,” then, “Yes, it is,” and listened for a moment. “Yes, happens he’s right here,” and listened again. Then she said, “All right, I’ll send him along,” and put the receiver back in its cradle.

  “Kirby called a rehearsal, Ken,” she said. “Simon will be there.”

  Ken Price stood up. He said, “Now?”

  “An hour ago’s more like it,” his agent told him. “They’ve been trying to find you. So you’d better get going. You’re sure you’re up on the part?”

  “Lines and business, darling. And you’ll talk to the old boy?”

  “After tomorrow night. Mr. Simon will try to get the reviewers back for it. The Chronicle man, anyway—there’s nothing opening tomorrow. On your way, sweetheart.”

  Ken Price got on his way.

  “Nice boy,” Martha said, “and an all-right actor. Almost as good as he thinks he is. So?”

  “About the party?”

  “Drinks and sandwiches. And a hot dish I didn’t try. And patting one another on the back. And singing happy birthday, dear Clivey, and many happy returns. Jesus!”

  “Yes,” Shapiro said. “For about how long, Miss Abel?”

  “It’s Mrs. Abel actually, Lieutenant. Was until a couple of years ago, anyway—two years and six months, to be precise. After ten years. Good years for the most part. But you don’t want the story of my life, do you? Just of last night, right?”

  Shapiro nodded.

  “Ken picked me up a little before ten. At my apartment. It’s in the East Sixties. Ken lives at the Algonquin—where else? We got down to Clive’s house about—oh, say ten fifteen. The party was already rolling. Scotch, bourbon, and champagne. And everybody ‘Darling!’—the way they all talk. Some try for ‘dahling,’ like the late Miss Bankhead, and don’t quite bring it off. Except for Rolf Simon. They were saying, ‘So glad you could make it, Mrs. Abel.’ And I said I wouldn’t have missed it, and Scotch and water, please, to a waiter Mr. Simon had brought along, and I clicked with Clive and wished him many happy returns. Jesus!”

  “Yes,” Shapiro said again. “Mr. Branson was your client?”

  “Why you’re here, isn’t it? In my stable, yes. And a friend. And a hell of an actor—all right, a few years ago, anyway. After a while, everything gets to be a few years ago, doesn’t it? Stage direction: Marilyn Blake weeps for the vanished past into a fragile handkerchief.” She stopped and shook her head. “And I told poor Ken not to be flip,” she said. “Sorry, Lieutenant. I’m—I’m shaken up too, I guess. So Clive kissed me on both cheeks, and some more people came in and wished him many happy returns, and it went on that way.”

  “For about how long, Mrs. Abel?”

  As far as she was concerned, until about half-past twelve, at a guess.

  “I keep office hours here,” she said. “So when Arlene said she was going to call it a night, I decided to too.”

  “Arlene?”

  “Arlene Collins. Plays the female lead, opposite Clive. Or opposite Ken now, if Mr. Simon decides to keep it on. Sweet kid and an all-right actor. Better than that, actually. Had a bit part in a small stinker last season, but a couple of the critics gave her raves. Happened to Hepburn years ago. Did you know that, Lieutenant?”

  “No,” Shapiro said. “I’m afraid I don’t know much about the theater.”

  “Heard of Hepburn, all the same?”

  Shapiro admitted he had heard of Miss Hepburn. He said, “So you and Miss Collins left the party about half-past twelve?”

  “About then, as I told you. The waiter got us a cab. I dropped her off at West Ninth and went home. She insisted on paying what was on the meter that far. Nice kid. Annie Burbaum, originally. Can’t blame her for the change, can you?”

  Shapiro couldn’t. “Leaving how many at the party, Mrs. Abel?”

  She counted on her fingers, giving a name to each finger. “Clive, of course. And Mr. Simon. And—”

  Shapiro let six names tick into his memory and, presumably, out of it. Tony Cook would be getting the names down, along with their roles in the production of Summer Solstice.

  Three of the five were actors. One was the director. Bob something. Kirby? Tony would have the rest of it in his notes. Something Askew. Bert? Tony would have it down. He was the playwright, author of Summer Solstice.

  “Askew was with them during the tryouts,” Martha Abel explained, “here in town. Got to be one of the family, pretty much. For all he kept changing the script. Nice enough kid. First time he’s got to Broadway. Off a couple of times. Even off-off once, Bret was.”

  That was it. Bret, not Bert. So. Helen something. “Plays Carol’s mother. You haven’t seen the play, have you, Lieutenant? Carol’s the young wife. Part Arlene plays. Married to Louis Derwent. Clive’s part. Supposed to be twice his wife’s age, you see. Summer solstice, after which the days get shorter. Sun sets earlier, doesn’t it?”

  Shapiro agreed that after June twenty-first the days get shorter; that the year has passed its zenith.

  “Carol’s supposed to be twenty. Which is about what Arlene-baby really is.”

  “And her husband’s around forty? I mean this Louis Derwent?”

  “Precisely forty. Bret’s script makes a point of it. Same birthday, actually. Only, Carol’s is really the winter solstice. It plays—well, simpler than I make it sound.”

  “But the ages of the two are essential to the—the story of the play?”

  “Yes. What it’s all about, really. The husband—well, trying to keep up with his young wife. Not that forty’s all that old, is it?”

  Shapiro agreed that forty was not all that old. “Mr. Branson seemed to be all right when you and Miss Collins left, Mrs. Abel?”

  “Exceedingly. He’d just done the ‘To be or not to be.’” She looked at Shapiro for a moment with doubt in her eyes. “Hamlet’s soliloquy, you know,” she said. “Shakespeare.”

  As he had nodded at Lord’s mention of Hamlet, Shapiro nodded again, to show that his ignorance of the theater was not quite complete.

  “Mr. Simon asked him to, Lieutenant. I don’t know why, exactly. As part of the celebration, maybe. Clive’s Hamlet was a hit in London a few years back. Before he went to Hollywood, that was. Anyway, Clive read it—beautifully, I thought—and everybody gathered around and listene
d. And applauded afterward. Yes, when Arly and I left, Clive was—oh, on top of the world. Also, I suppose, a little spiffed. But weren’t we all? Not really. Just a little. It was a celebration, after all.”

  “Yes, Mrs. Abel. I suppose, before everybody gathered around to listen to Mr. Branson reciting Shakespeare, people had just been sitting around and talking and—”

  “Drinking champagne, Lieutenant. Mostly, anyway. Very good champagne. The waiter kept filling glasses. Only we didn’t just sit. We moved around, of course, the way people do at parties. Circulated, you know.”

  “Yes. Carrying your glasses, I suppose.”

  “I carried mine. If you left your glass on a table, the waiter would fill it up. Some of us did, of course.”

  “Did Mr. Branson, did you notice?”

  She said, “Oh. You mean somebody could put cyanide in his glass? Have a chance to?”

  “We don’t know, Mrs. Abel. Not cyanide, certainly. Probably nothing at all. We’re just feeling our way around, you see. Because Mr. Branson’s death was so sudden, so unexpected. Sort of thing we have to do, you know. You didn’t happen to notice whether Mr. Branson left his glass standing somewhere when you were all, as you say, circulating?”

  “No. Why should I?”

  “No reason. I just thought you might have.”

  “I don’t watch what people drink. Oh, Clive was drinking whiskey when Ken and I first got there. Bourbon and water, from the color. He usually did. When I’d take him to lunch, it was always bourbon and water. Last night—I think it was bourbon—to start with, anyway. Maybe champagne later. Does it matter?”

  “Not at all, Mrs. Abel. Just trying to get the picture. People moving around and talking. Sometimes leaving their glasses where they’d been sitting, sometimes carrying their glasses along when they—well, joined another group.”

  “Precisely. Just a relaxed sort of party.”

  “And Mr. Branson was, as you say, on top of the world when you left?”