Following Polly

by Karen Bergreen

  Mother was not a big fan when I first moved there. Although a lot of her actor friends lived in Hell’s Kitchen, she thought it wasn’t necessarily the place for her daughter. The neighborhood, which at one time was inhabited only by prostitutes and drug dealers, has recently become trendy. It still retains much of its seediness, as Mother was well aware. It was Barnes who convinced her that the apartment was perfect for me.

  “Angela, this is a very busy street. It is also quite elegant,” Barnes told her. “The building across the street is an exquisite and rare example of urban Gothic architecture.”

  Despite his pedantry, I appreciated Barnes’s enthusiasm. When I signed my lease, he offered to buy me drapes to lend a little drama to my room. I think Barnes really liked the apartment, but he also liked the fact that it wasn’t right next door to Mother’s. Getting from Hell’s Kitchen to the Upper East Side is time consuming. Barnes knew that if I moved into their neighborhood, I would probably be around a lot more. Barnes and I got along better when geography was on his side.

  Whether it is a passing feeling of fondness for Barnes or vague sentiment, I have a hankering to check out my street, my building. But I am certain that I’ll be spotted by McGruff the Crime Dog or the neighborhood watch. I just have to remember that I was lonely there. And now, lonely I’m not.

  So here I am in the no-man’s-land of Eleventh Avenue. I’d fear for my safety if not for the dog park across the street. I see two boxers pummeling a German shepherd mix. I think this is supposed to be fun for the dogs, but it makes me uncomfortable.

  It’s been two hours and Rosalie hasn’t emerged. I hope to have more luck with her than I did with Oxanna, Trini, and Justine. I could be here for days, but it’s the least I owe Charlie. The man has given me his clothes, for crying out loud.

  I’m lucky. Rosalie finally exits the building. She walks east up Fifty-second Street, trying to negotiate her way through broken bottles and used condoms. She makes a right and goes into the ninety-nine-cents store. I follow her in. She buys some junky-looking floor cleaner; I get a soda. We both leave. She heads back to Fifty-second Street, but keeps going east all the way to Eighth Avenue. She heads uptown. We’re dangerously close to my apartment. She stops at the Duane Reade on Fifty-third Street. Again, I follow her in. This would probably be a good time for me to buy some hygiene products for myself, but I don’t want to get distracted from Rosalie. Also, this was my Duane Reade. I don’t know if the cops have come by and told the cashiers to keep an eye out for me. I guess it depends. She goes to the baby section and pulls a jumbo-size package of Huggies diapers. She pays for them and heads back to her apartment.

  I wait outside for several more hours. I see that the boxers have returned. They are a little less vicious this time. Or maybe I have become hardened to it over the course of the day.

  It’s eight P.M. now. Maybe there’ll be more action now that it is nighttime, but I wonder what Rosalie does with the baby. Maybe I’m wrong to assume she has a baby. Maybe the diapers are a gift or something.

  It’s midnight, and there has been no movement. I head back to Charlie’s house.

  He seems disappointed.

  “Walter,” I’m starting to get used to his name, “this is going to take a while.”

  “It has been a while,” Charlie tells me. “I’ve been patient. I’ve tried to put faith in the system. That failed me. I’ve tried to appeal to these girls on a personal level. That has failed me. I don’t think I can move on with my life until I get to the next level.”

  “Not to be insensitive, but you’re not accused of anything here.”

  “True. But I did lose my job over it. And it’s bigger than that. I’m a lawyer. That’s all I’ve done. I’ve always wanted to be a lawyer. I’m one of the few that considered it a noble profession. Not anymore. I’ve invested my trust and time into the system and it has failed me. Whether or not they take me back at Pennington and Litt, or I find a new job at some other place, is irrelevant. I can’t continue to practice law if I think it produces this kind of injustice.”

  Charlie, motivated by his own speech, starts reviewing his notebooks.

  “Maybe if we go through the police reports to see the supposed times these woman were ‘dating’ my father, you can narrow your tracking to that certain time.”

  “Sounds good to me,” I tell him.

  But it doesn’t.

  My brain has finally started to function again. I realize I have a resource that is better than Charlie, better than Jean, better than Kovitz even. Charlie’s computer. I convinced him to let me use the Internet for one hour a day. Let me digress for a moment to say that Charlie’s only flaw is his possessiveness over the computer.

  “It’s the only thing I have left,” he said with despair. “Now that I have no job, no business at all, it’s the one thing that is mine.”

  “On the one hand, I understand you,” I finally told him. “On the other hand, you are telling this to a fugitive from justice.” I then gave him a pretty good sob story about how I too have nothing, except for confidence in my own innocence, and that is all I need to feel whole. Clearly moved, Charlie caved.

  “One hour a day. The Internet. You start your own account. I don’t want you going through my stuff.”

  “But going through your stuff is what I do,” I joke with him.

  He doesn’t laugh.

  “One hour, and if you abuse it, no more.”

  So here I am, attempting to do investigative work without moving my feet. This is not my forte. Where to begin?

  First I have to create my own e-mail account. I could use my old account, but it’s more than likely that the cops are tracking it to see if I have accessed any of my e-mail. I’m certain that it’s what led them to Dr. Moses. They’re probably reading all of my messages to see if they can provide any clue as to my whereabouts or any evidence against me in Polly’s murder. Too bad for them, I’m not a big Internet user. As I said, I like to do my research on foot, and when I’m trying to relax in front of a screen, I will undoubtedly choose to watch TV.

  If only I had mentioned following Polly to Dr. Moses I might not be in this boat. She could be my alibi witness. But if I had told her she would have directed me to stop, or at the very least made me feel guilty about following. Of course, then I wouldn’t have been in Otto & LuLu’s when Polly was killed, Kovitz would never have investigated me, and I would be back in my own apartment.

  And Charlie wouldn’t even know I’m alive.

  I can’t worry about this stuff. I set up the account. It’s easy. My user name is TheFollower. How could it not be? My password is Charlie. (My password has always been Charlie—at Mona’s, at K.I.N.D., even at Pennington & Litt.) All set. Then, I do a Google search. I type in Polly Dawson’s name. The number of results is practically infinite. I decide to go to the Principessa Web site. Who knows where that might take me?

  The Web site hasn’t been updated since Polly’s death. This is kind of eerie given Polly’s narcissism. There are three photographs of her on the home page alone: Polly as a sexy Santa, Polly as a sexy reindeer, and Polly as a gift—sexy, of course—because she is wearing nothing but a huge red bow. I go to the Principessa collection. Polly models most of her own lingerie. I read about Principessa. This is supposed to be about the lingerie collection but it’s really all about Polly. There’s a whole biography of Polly and the site gives you the option of playing a musical accompaniment while reading. I choose not to, in fear that it will be Polly herself singing and that she’ll have a perfect voice.

  So far, nothing.

  Finally, the site does have a little contact option. It says that I can e-mail polly@principessa.com.

  At least we have an e-mail address.

  The site does little to assist me in my investigation, but it does remind me of why I disliked her so much.

  “Time is up.” Charlie is standing behind me.

  “But I was just getting started.”

  “Tomorrow.” Charlie
comes over to me and pulls my arm a little.

  “Okay.” I give in. And in truth, I was a little stuck as to what to do next.

  I go to my spot on the couch and pull the blankets over my chin. I turn the television on with the volume muted so that I don’t disturb Charlie while he researches on the computer. I love hearing him type. Maybe because I am the worst typist in the world. That’s one of the reasons a casting job seemed so appealing to me. Of course, I didn’t foresee the amount of correspondence and notes involved in my job. And then there were the menus. Mona told me she was helping me by forcing me to practice.

  “Your fingers lack grace, Alice. It is very unbecoming.”

  I usually dismissed these types of comments as sheer Monaisms. But as I hear Charlie, I know exactly what she was talking about. I listen to the little ballet his hands do as they partner with the keyboard. I don’t need the TV volume. This is my lullaby.

  I’m asleep when I hear the doorbell ringing. And I just start to wake up when I hear Jean’s voice coming from the kitchen.

  “I’ve completed my first assignment,” she says proudly. She starts handing out coffee and bagels as I walk into the kitchen dressed in Charlie’s pajamas. Charlie’s with her.

  “I hope you didn’t think your first assignment was catering,” I tell her.

  “Well, don’t you two make a perfect pair?” Jean says to us, referring to the fact that Charlie and I are wearing the exact same pajamas.

  Charlie laughs, but I just feel embarrassed.

  Jean senses my discomfort and starts our meeting.

  “I conducted my own investigation, and I found out that Polly was about to sell her company.”

  “Any reasons?” I ask.

  “I fished around a little. This lawyer from another firm is working on a deal with me, and, coincidentally, he represents a potential buyer for Polly’s company. He wasn’t really close with her, but he has been friends with her lawyer for years. And she was definitely on the verge of unloading the entire thing.”

  “Any reason?” Charlie asks my question.

  “My source says that Polly was fickle.” Jean has relaxed again. “I think the term he used was ‘a fucking yo-yo.’ One moment she’d become obsessed with something and then after a while she’d get bored. I asked how she could’ve achieved so much. He told me that she was one lucky bitch. He liked to swear. She was thinking of moving into interior design.”

  “As opposed to posterior design.” Charlie seems so proud of his joke that it makes me laugh. The aroma of French Roast fills the room.

  “Did your source say that her volatility extended to her personal relationships?”

  “Do you mean was she sleeping around? He didn’t say.”

  “I guess you guys are focusing on the love kill theory,” Charlie concedes. I feel bad for him. He was counting on his theory about the business competitor. “So where should we start?”

  “She could have been sleeping with anybody.” Jean takes a huge bite of bagel. “Should we just go through the phone book?”

  “No, let’s start with what we know. I feel as if her extracurricular romantic life was related to Only at Sunrise. We know that Polly was spending an inordinate amount of time on the movie set. Let’s start there. We still don’t know the identity of the Chambers Street fellow. Do you want to look into that?” I ask Jean.

  “I would rather look into Preston Hayes,” Jean says a little too quickly. “I mean, we had that connection at the party.”

  I give her a slightly condescending look.

  “I would hardly call Preston Hayes a contender.” I may sound a bit too dismissive. “I don’t even think he slept with her. Even if he did, from what I read in the paper, he has these meaningless flings on a weekly basis. He probably doesn’t have the passion for Polly that would inspire him to kill her. Or he never had anything to do with her.”

  “So you think these other male stars didn’t talk to Humphrey at the service because they killed his wife?” Charlie asks me, incredulous. “Maybe they just hated Humphrey after working for him.”

  “You put that aside when there is a death,” I say. Although I know I would shed no tears if Mona Hawkins were to die.

  I’m just theorizing, but as the words trip off my tongue, they make so much sense to me.

  “What if Humphrey was having the affair, and it was a woman who killed Polly?”

  “I didn’t get that vibe at the service,” Charlie says.

  “It would have to be a strong woman. That body was attacked pretty hard.” I think aloud as I hand him his extra-sweet, extra-light cup of coffee and start to prepare my own.

  “But the police think you were strong enough to do it?’ Charlie looks at me.

  “The police are fools,” I say. “I saw the body. If the killer was a woman, she did not have this body.”

  I acknowledge my wimpy physique to my best friend, who by the way is still in perfect shape, and to the man I secretly love.

  “That,” I continue, “was somebody strong and somebody who was filled with rage. They think I was that distraught over being fired from a job as a casting assistant.”

  “Look at the people who are fired from assembly lines and then they go and kill all their coworkers,” Jean says.

  “Maybe you can say that when you are called as a witness for the prosecution,” I tell her, “but remember those people are always men. I don’t recall a woman ever going on a killing spree after being terminated.”

  “What about Mona?” Jean asks. “You say she is mean and has a temper, and that she’s always in love with all of these guys. Maybe it finally got to her. She may have thought that the only thing that stood in the way of a delicious future with Humphrey was his wife.”

  As much as I long for Mona to go through the public humiliation of a murder trial, I know she didn’t kill Polly.

  “She doesn’t have that stabbing personality. She’s without passion. She’s more likely to watch you get run over by a car and laugh. But let’s check out some of these other leads, too. That D.M. woman seemed to really detest Polly. Maybe I could find something out about her. At least preliminarily it looks like an Internet job, and since I’m sort of housebound, I can do that one. As for you guys, Polly seemed to be spending a lot of time over at Silvercup Studios, hanging around the movie set even when Humphrey wasn’t there. Maybe she was cheating on her downtown boyfriend with one of the movie stars. You guys can get close to them and do some poking around.”

  “That sounds easy, because movie stars typically befriend just anybody who wants to get near them,” Charlie says.

  “Oh, I forgot. It’s National Sarcasm Week,” I say. “Please do what you can. You guys were so amazing at the service. I have utter faith in you.”

  “Why don’t we focus more on these men who are involved with the movie?” Charlie says. “I’ll see if Kovitz has anything. He told me I could call him.”

  “I know you guys don’t believe he’s a suspect, but I was wondering if it was a conflict of interest for me to see Preston Hayes?” Jean says. “He asked if he could see me again.”

  I look at Charlie.

  “Please,” Jean says. “You’ll like this, Alice. He lives in your neighborhood, just two blocks away from you. That way, when everything is normal again, and Preston and I are an item, I can see you all the time!”

  “Sure, use my plight as an opportunity for romance.”

  “I’m not the only one,” Jean says, and she looks from me to Charlie.

  Charlie doesn’t notice.

  Jean’s back at work today. I miss her.

  And I miss Mother. I wish I could include her in our little sleuthing party, but I’m not sure she would keep her eye on the prize. And, there is a 97 percent likelihood that Barnes would turn me in.

  Am I sure that Mother will tell Barnes my whereabouts? I am. When I was eighteen years old and a senior in high school, all my friends had “boyfriends.” These were boys that they met on vacation or at school danc
es or in after-school programs. My then–best friend, Daphne, was totally in love with Stan Markham, the man she would marry five years later. My other close friends were involved in much less serious, albeit time-consuming romances. I felt left out. Mother, who by this time had been dating Barnes for three years and was fairly happy, noticed that I wasn’t myself. I confided to her that I was the only one without a boyfriend.

  “Don’t worry, you’re a fantastic girl, Alice, you’ll meet someone,” she said. I wanted to tell her that it wasn’t so much that I didn’t have a boyfriend myself but that I felt abandoned.

  Before I had a chance to respond to her, Barnes showed up.

  “What are you two young ladies talking about?”

  “Nothing,” I said quickly, and gave Mother a look to indicate that I didn’t want Barnes in on this conversation.

  Six hours later, Barnes came into my room. He told me that I shouldn’t feel weird about not having a boyfriend. He said it in a way that made me feel like a loser.

  He chuckled a little and said in a casual tone, “Your mother doesn’t keep secrets from me, capiche?”

  So now I keep secrets from Mother.

  I’ve given up on Rosalie. If she was ever a prostitute, she’s taking a sabbatical, and I don’t see her talking to anyone who might be in on the Kelt conspiracy. Today, it’s LaDonna’s turn.

  I have a bit of a spring in my step as I head over to the subway. Charlie has given me a present. Gloves. Two nights ago, when I got home from my freezing night outside Rosalie’s apartment, Charlie was staring at my hands.