Listen for the Whisperer

by Whitney, Phyllis A. ;

  Now that the mood was right, she could go back to the cot in her dressing room and go to sleep as she would not have slept at home with the day’s failure hanging over her. She stepped out of the set and turned off the lights, leaving only those two bare bulbs burning at this end of the big stage.

  There were three small dressing rooms inside the stage, not far away, her own slightly more luxurious than the other two, and she walked toward it through the faint light. At another place on the lot her trailer dressing room waited—almost a bungalow on wheels, complete with shower and tiny kitchen. She always used that on location. But this smaller room was close to the set and more convenient for the makeup men, her dresser and hairdresser. She liked staying here where the work was being done.

  Once more, just as she reached the door of her dressing room, she heard a sound behind her. A sound almost like footsteps. She was still for a moment, holding her breath. But nothing else followed and she knew it was only the usual creakings. She went into the room where warm lamplight and a cozy interior awaited her. With the lines of her scenes still running through her head, she got ready for sleep. The sound stage was apt to grow cold at night, and she had brought a long, warm nightgown, and an extra blanket for the cot.

  Running through her part had soothed her and put all that was irritating and distracting from her mind. She went to sleep easily, deeply.

  When the crash resounded through her dreams, it brought her floating to the surface, not sure whether the sound had been real or not. She sat up in bed—and for a few moments there was, by comparison, silence. But it was not complete silence. Someone seemed to be moving about out there, and Laura wondered whether to go and see what was happening, or to stay here and lock her door.

  Then she head the running steps, and a voice calling her name. A girl’s voice.

  “Miss Worth! Miss Worth!”

  She sprang out of bed and flung open the dressing room door. Rita Bond, the bit actress who played the maid, almost fell into the room. Her young, plump face was ashen, her eyes wide with shock and terror beneath the frizzy hair they’d given her for the part. For a moment she couldn’t talk, and Laura took her by the shoulders and shook her into making sense.

  “It’s—it’s. Mr. Alroy!” the girl stammered. “He’s been hurt. There was another man—a big man. I saw him running toward the fire escape door. I—I think it was that Dr. Fletcher who was here this afternoon.”

  Laura asked no questions about Rita’s own presence, but drew on her robe and slippers and went with the girl back to the set. Though it was dimly lighted, she could see the black sprawl of shadow on the floor of the parlor scene. She gave Rita a little push.

  “Go turn on that lamp over there,” she said, and as the lamp came on she stepped into the set.

  Where Helen Bradley would have found the body of her husband, Cass Alroy lay, with a red stain spreading outward on the carpet. Laura knelt beside him, felt for a pulse. There was nothing. No breath, no heartbeat, as far as she could tell. If Miles had done this, it would have been because of her and the scandal would be tremendous. Her quick mind was already seeking among the possibilities, searching for a way out.

  Rita stood near a towering camera on its dolly, and its eye seemed to watch the set. The girl was shivering, her teeth chattering, and Laura stared at her speculatively. Could she use the girl, trust her? Involuntarily, her gaze was drawn to the two chairs with the name plates which faced the scene of the Bradley house. This afternoon she had sat there beside Cass while they stormed at each other. A thousand years ago.

  She moved about the set, thinking. The gun was there, near Cass’s outstretched hand, and nearby lay the brass candlestick, one end of it wet and shining. Laura felt cold, frozen, but she was thinking, thinking. She had no pity to waste on Cass. He had come here to harm her. The gun told her that. She had been increasingly afraid of him during work on the picture.

  She spoke to Rita out there among the cameras. “Did you see what happened?”

  “No!” The girl managed to still her chattering teeth. “I heard the crash, and when I came toward the set to find out what had happened, I saw that big man running away.”

  “You’re not to mention him to anyone,” Laura said flatly. “We must figure out what to do. Why are you here? How did you get in?”

  Rita made a choking sound and fought to answer. “I—I wanted to be near you, Miss Worth. I knew you meant to stay here tonight. You said you were going to rehearse your part. And I wanted to watch you. Perhaps to talk to you. You’ve never noticed me much, except when we’re playing a scene. And I thought—”

  “So you hid in the building? You watched me rehearsing?”

  “Yes! Please don’t mind. If you only knew how much I—”

  Laura waved her into silence. “There’s no time for that now. They’ll say I did this, you know. There’s been friction all through this picture and Cass has been treating me badly.”

  “I know,” Rita whispered. “I know very well. He would have killed you tonight.”

  Laura moved about the set, her eyes searching. “Yes. He deserved what has happened to him. But we must save whoever did it. And we must save ourselves.”

  Her eyes lighted upon the doorstop that held open the door to the dining room at the rear. She leaned over and tugged at the iron cat. It was very heavy. She could never have used it to strike at anyone, but she could manage to lift it in both hands. She felt stronger than she had ever been before, thoroughly clear-headed and in control of her own actions and everything around her. She did not need to think frantically, to try to reason. She simply knew without any doubt what had to be done, and knew she was strong enough to do it.

  She carried the doorstop over to where Cass lay and held it several feet above his head. Then she let it drop.

  Rita screamed shrilly, thoroughly demoralized. “You’ve killed him!” she cried. “If he wasn’t dead before, you’ve killed him!”

  Laura scarcely heard her. There was too much to be done. The worst part was wiping fingerprints off the doorstop. She used the hem of her robe, but she had to be careful because of the blood. When she was through, she picked up the gun and the candlestick and carried them back to her dressing room. The gun she placed in a purse. It would be safe enough there until she could hide it later. It had not been fired, and no one would be looking for a gun. The candlestick she set openly upon her dressing table. There were candles in a drawer, and she placed one in the holder. She would have to tell the prop man she’d borrowed the candlestick for the night. He’d think nothing of that. She wiped the base carefully with cleansing tissue which she burned in the candle flame. All these things she did quickly and efficiently, while Rita watched, wide-eyed and sick and terrified.

  Laura looked at her coldly. “You must say nothing at all about what I’ve done. When we found Cass you saw only the doorstop lying there. Do you understand? And you saw no one, you heard no running steps.”

  The girl nodded wildly. “Yes—yes! I won’t say anything.”

  “If you say anything at all, I’ll tell them you killed him. I’ll say you killed him to save my life.”

  Rita’s eyes were wild with fright. “But that’s why I did kill him! To save you! I saw him creeping across the set with that gun in his hands. I’d walked about the set after you left, pretending I was doing your scenes, pretending I was you. When I heard him coming, I hid. I knew he was going to your dressing room. I felt as though he was going to kill me. So I struck him down. I had to stop him—I had to!”

  Laura stared at her across the small room. All emotion had been frozen in her. She could look at the girl and feel nothing—neither gratitude nor angry condemnation. Nothing.

  “We will tell the same story,” she said in that voice drained of all feeling. “I was asleep and you were bedded down near my dressing room. When we heard the crash, I rushed out to the set, and you came right after me. We saw no one, heard no one running away. But obviously neither of us could have wieided
that doorstop as a weapon while Cass was standing. Do you understand all this?”

  The girl was trembling, but she nodded her frizzy head.

  “We’ve just found him,” Laura said. “There was no candlestick, no gun. Now I’m going to call for help. Come with me.”

  Together they picked their way over cables and around pieces of spare equipment and old sets. There was an airlock at the door of the sound stage. That meant there were two doors to open. Heavy doors. Laura let the two of them through with the last draining of strength from her body.

  The night was cool outside, the moonlight very bright. The sleeping village that was the studio stretched away on all sides. Laura stiffened herself and grasped Rita firmly by the arm as she began to scream.

  It was the same screaming she would use later when they finally shot the scene where Helen Bradley came upon her husband’s body. And while she screamed the words Rita had spoken earlier came sharply home to her.

  “If he wasn’t dead before—you’ve killed him!”

  Inside the Norwegian cottage there was silence, except for the crackling of the fire Miles had built in the grate. Laura sat closest to the fire, seeking its warmth as she told her story. Donia had curled herself cross-legged on the floor on the other side of the hearth, while Miles had stayed well back in the shadows. Gunnar sat beside me.

  When Laura’s quiet voice, carrying so much emotional impact, fell silent, Miles took up the story.

  “If you had told me the truth, so much could have been spared you. I’d had trouble finding Stage 5, and I came through the doors just in time to hear Cass crash to the floor. I heard someone running and I found my way to the set. I saw the gun and the candlestick, and I thought Laura had killed him. My presence would not have helped her—it would have made everything worse. I got away as quickly as I could, and held to my silence later. I told my sister nothing, and all these years Donia has believed that I was guilty of Cass’s death. Sometimes she has even held this over my head—and I let her. Because of this, she has hated Laura, hated my marriage to her, blaming her for everything.”

  Donia wriggled her small person. “Even if I’d been sure it was Laura and not you, I’d never have spoken out. I was in love with Cass once. I knew what he was like. I couldn’t regret his death.”

  Laura went on quietly. “The worst part of all was not knowing for sure if I had killed him. Rita could so easily have been right. Perhaps she wanted to blame me and thus save herself. I was still her idol, but she thought of her own self-preservation too. She had strength in her, even then, and she began to nurture it so that she got through the investigation. Her trembling and fright were natural enough, but not once did she let anything of the real secret escape her.”

  “Do you know what became of her?” I asked.

  “She dropped out of my life. I was ill and Miles and Donia were taking care of me. When I recovered I went abroad alone. She came to me in Dubrovnik—my trip was much publicized. Rita Bond was only the name she used for films. When she went home she took back her real name of Irene Varos.”

  I stared at her in astonishment. “Irene! But—I’ve just seen her in the film, and there was no resemblance.”

  “There wouldn’t be,” Laura said sadly. “She was only seventeen at the time of the picture, and she altered greatly in maturing. All that frizzy hair she wore for the film, the round, plump face, the terrified air—these were not like the Irene Varos she grew into—thin and gaunt, with all emotion repressed. Of course the investigation uncovered her real name, and it was mentioned in some of the later newspaper reports. It was brought out that she came to America as a child with her parents and grew up there. Because of these reports, I had to clip sections out of those scrapbooks when you came to my house, Leigh. I wanted no journalist to discover who she was and try to explore the past. Miles and Donia knew her identity, but they had no knowledge of the real role she played. Miles thought it was his sister playing all these recent pranks.

  “When I met Irene again in Dubrovnik, she wanted to come back to the States. She told me she was still devoted to me, and she wanted to go with me wherever I went. She had nothing to keep her in her own country. The man she had wanted to marry had not died, as she claimed. I learned later that she had told him the real story of what had happened in Hollywood, and he could not bear the thought of marrying a woman who had killed. As the years went by she began to blame me for his loss too. And what had happened to her, reinforced my own reluctance—when I met Miles again—to ever let him know the possible truth about me.

  “I took Irene along when I went to Norway. We were bound together in a sense. One of us had killed. And recently she never let me forget that it might have been me. She hated and opposed my marriage to Miles, who was connected with that time. I don’t know what may have been churning in her mind all these years, but after I married Miles it began to surface. She began to make me believe that I really had killed Cass Alroy, and she told me she meant to pay me off for spoiling her entire life. In a sense”—Laura paused and flashed a quick look of affection at Miles—“I married Miles for protection against Irene. But that was futile. She made me believe that it was only a matter of time before she told him the truth about me, and caused me to lose him, as she had lost the man she loved. I’m afraid I gave up. I retreated from reality, stopped wanting to live. She began to play torturing tricks on me, trying to push me into some desperate act. Perhaps she would have been satisfied with my suicide. She wanted my death at the end.”

  Mutely Laura looked across the room at Miles, begging his forgiveness. He smiled at her, and all the harshness was gone from his face.

  “All this time I could have told you the one thing that would have freed you,” he said. “I’m a doctor, so of course when I found Alroy lying there in the parlor of that set, I examined him. I made sure that he was dead before I went away. What came out in the investigation about the iron doorstop made me know that the second weapon had been planted. But he was dead before that.”

  “And now I am free,” Laura said. “I began to believe I could escape from Irene when my daughter came into my life. Leigh gave me courage and belief in the woman I used to be. Even when she showed me her distrust and resentment, she challenged me. She made me want to prove myself to her. Have I done that, Leigh?”

  “You’ve done a great deal more,” I said, and heard the catch in my own voice.

  She came to me across the room and put a light hand on my shoulder, looked into my eyes. “Ever since you came, I’ve been afraid of you. Afraid because you had every right to hate—and you had the power to hurt me. I tried to cut you down at every turn so that you’d expect nothing of me—as I expected nothing of you. But after today there can be no more pretending.”

  “No more pretending,” I said. “And now you’ll go back to Hollywood and prove what Laura Worth can do. You’ll show the world who you are, and—”

  She was looking at me in loving surprise. “Oh, no! Not now. Not when I have everything that’s real for the first time in my life. I won’t want the other any more. It was only an escape from Irene. That’s not to say I couldn’t succeed if I chose to go back”—she flashed us all a smile of proud assurance—“but I don’t want to try any more. There’s something more important. So let Laura Worth stay a legend, while Laura Fletcher begins to live.”

  She turned to Miles. Gunnar caught me by the hand and beckoned to Donia. She came with us through the door, and then wandered off by herself, turning her back on us. I felt a little sorry for her because she was alone, and because malice was part of her nature, as it was no longer mine.

  As we stood outside the door for a moment, watching Donia wander away, a car drew up to the gate and a police officer got out. He came to us and spoke in English.

  “The woman has been found. She is completely demented and does not know who she is. She thinks she is a child who has broken her favorite doll.”

  I shivered as Gunnar directed the officer into the cottage. T
hen we turned away together.

  There was a path that led steeply down to the water from the outcropping of rock on which the cottage had been built. We went down the curving way, with my hand in Gunnar’s.

  “What will happen to Irene?” I said.

  “She will be examined. Obviously she will not be released to stand trial. The seed of imbalance has been in her since she was a child. It has already borne terrible fruit.”

  “Then nothing will need to come out?” I said. “The past can be left alone—Laura can be left alone?”

  Gunnar nodded. “I believe we can see to that. It will not be necessary now. Everyone has suffered enough. Even Irene.”

  We were silent for the rest of the way down the path. It led out upon a narrow, rocky spit, and we sat down on the rocks with the water lapping gently at our feet—and looked at each other.

  “We must make plans,” Gunnar said. “Are you going to write about Laura Worth?”

  I nodded. “Of course. I want to more than ever now. But only a chapter. A chapter about Laura Worth, the actress. I couldn’t do a book because there’s too much that can’t be written about. I could never really do her justice. First, I’ll have to go back to New York. I’ll write it there, where I can find some perspective.”

  “But you will return,” Gunnar said. It was a statement, not a question. Then he went on, as though he found his own words inadequate. “It will be necessary for you to return.”

  He was solemnly in earnest, and I laughed at him with a slight choke in the laughter. “Yes, I’ll return,” I said.

  He would not move too fast, my Norwegian, but he knew exactly where he was going, even if he was not ready to tell me yet. I would wait until he was ready.

  “You are sitting too far away from me,” he pointed out, and I moved properly close. “Even in the wintertime you will like Norway, Leigh.”