[Celebrity Murder Case 05] - The Greta Garbo Murder Case

by George Baxt

  Joan Crawford had always been a pal and remained steadfast. Of all people, Norma Shearer, wife of the powerful Irving Thalberg, went out of her way to ask him to their parties despite her husband’s admonitions. But the morning Garbo called and invited him to lunch, that was overwhelming. Thinking about it now it brought tears of sentiment to his eyes. She’d invited Marion Davies, Salka Viertel and Mercedes de Acosta and they all got high on gin and orange juice. And thanks to Davies, there were kind words in Louella Parsons’s column a few days later that he was now busy considering offers from independent producers. Independent indeed. Poverty Row. And he did a few quickies because he needed the money. Greta had come through, another of her occasional contradictions. She wasn’t an iceberg. She did have a heart. He once saw her pat a gatekeeper’s little boy on the head. That must have taken quite a bit of courage on her part.

  “What? What did you say?” The chauffeur had penetrated his reverie.

  “We’re here. Miss Garbo’s.”

  “Oh. Well that was fast. I’ll go get her.” As he opened the limousine door he said over his shoulder, “Now don’t you be funny and drive away or I’ll cry.”

  The chauffeur watched Haines cross to Garbo’s front door and press the doorbell. Under his breath he voiced a vicious epithet and then sat back, dreaming of returning to Germany and the war, dreaming of the glory that would be his when he would decimate the enemy with bullets and bayonets and hand grenades and his bad breath.

  “Oh Billy, darling, Billy, why are we going to this suffocating dinner party?” She was sipping vodka on the rocks and Lottie was ready for him with his usual scotch highball.

  ‘‘Because you have to and I’ll be your immoral support.” He raised his glass high. ‘‘Here’s to absent friends.”

  “That is so sad,” said Garbo. “It makes me think of obituaries. The first thing, Billy, the first thing I read in the newspaper is the obituaries.” Her face was wreathed in a pained expression. “Do you read the obituaries too?”

  “I’d be dead without them.”

  “Have you noticed lately how many obscure nobodies are dying? It shouldn’t be permitted. Shall we be fashionably late to the dinner?”

  “Yes. Come sit by me.” She joined him on the couch. “Sweetie, you’ve been a wonderful friend.”

  “Oh please.”

  “You have. And I’m remembering you in my will.”

  She laughed. “Please don’t. I have so much of my own. Leave it all to your boyfriends!”

  “Those ungrateful sons of bitches? Let them all starve to death. Now let’s get serious.”

  “And Roebucks?” He glared at her. “Don’t you like my little joke?”

  He patted her hand. “It’s adorable. Let’s be selfish and keep it to ourselves.”

  “I should never tell jokes. Salka always says I don’t know how to tell a joke. You’re getting impatient with me. Don’t. I’m very nervous about this dinner. I’m very nervous about the whole project. I’ve made a terrible mistake and I can’t back out. If only I was capable of a nervous breakdown.”

  “Greta, please listen. I’m doing so well with the decorating that now I’d like a chance to branch out”

  “Branch out? But where?”

  “Set dressing. Let Cedric Gibbons and the rest design the sets, but let me choose the furniture and the decorations. Don’t you think I’d be great at it?”

  “Oh Billy. You could be great at anything you choose to be. You could be president of the United States if you weren’t so odd.”

  He took her hand. “Speak to them about me. Maybe they’ll give me a chance.”

  “You mean von Stroheim? God.” She was up and pacing. “I’ve already defeated him on the hiring of Alysia Hoffman.” She told him about the Hoffman problem that had been decided in her favor. “Now you ask me to defy the dragon in his cave again.” The look on his face was now so little-boy-lost, she put her drink down and threw her arms around him. “I enjoy defying the dragon. It stimulates my adrenalin. I will do it for you, Billy.” She withdrew her arms, looked at her wristwatch, and stood up with her arms outstretched. “How do I look?”

  “Sensational.”

  “You think the cut of the back is not too daring?” There was no back and it was indeed daring.

  “There are them in which it could bring on a heart attack.”

  “I will fascinate Albert Guiss?”

  “From what I can gather, he’s already fascinated. Interested in landing yourself a mysterious billionaire?”

  “I don’t know.” Lottie held the front door open for them. “I have to see what he’s like in person. I must study him very carefully. I must converse with him. And he already has a mistress.”

  “I’m sure there’s room for one more.”

  “Ha ha ha ha. Don’t wait up for me, Lottie. I’m not sure when we’ll be back. If God is good, it will be early. So darling, just set out a glass of milk and some Hydrox for me.”

  SEVEN

  The atmosphere was charged with electricity. Garbo felt it the minute the massive front doors swung inward to admit her and Haines. She had felt it when the limousine drove up the road leading to the castle, and it was surely a castle, in the exclusive Bel Air compound. When they reached the wrought-iron gates that protected Guiss’s castle from unwanted invasions, an electric eye found them and triggered the gates to open. Haines was surprised there were no armed guards. On the other hand, the ramparts and turrets of the magnificently imposing structure could easily camouflage any number of dangerous gunmen.

  Garbo commented with equanimity, “Very impressive.” She had had her share of castles. She had portrayed Sweden’s Queen Christina. The limousine parked at the bottom of a wide flight of stone stairs.

  Haines counted thirteen as they ascended. Sweet. Somebody isn’t superstitious. And then the massive doors swung inward. There was no burst of organ music and Haines was disappointed. But there was a butler and six footmen and four maids and Haines wondered if they had been choreographed.

  Surely the butler was from Central Casting, a replica of the celebrated character actor Gustav von Seyffertitz. His accent was pure Herman Bing, Bing being an actor who played mostly comedy waiters. The manner in which he directed the footmen and maids had to be a God-given gift. His name was Kriegman and when Garbo was curious about his origins he told her his family originated in East Prussia.

  Kriegman led them up a long flight of richly carpeted stairs, surrounded on both sides by tapestries whose values she was sure had to be estimated in six figures or more. She whispered to Haines, “A bit ostentatious, don’t you think?”

  Haines nodded and wisecracked out of the side of his mouth, “The big showoff. What do you bet the main dish is frankfurters and sauerkraut.”

  “Oh I do hope so!” she said with sincere enthusiasm, “I do hope so.”

  Haines asked her, “Where’d he get the extras holding the spears?”

  The spear holders loomed ahead of them standing on each side of a set of double doors to which Kriegman was leading them. They wore black uniforms trimmed in gold braid, and Haines wondered when a soprano and a tenor would appear. As the three approached the doors, the guardsmen became animated and swung the doors open. Garbo suppressed a gasp. The huge room was a dazzling display of somebody’s magnificent taste.

  “I’m jealous,” said Haines.

  Garbo knew at once that the tall, elegant, impeccably dressed man approaching her with arms outstretched was Albert Guiss. “We meet at last,” he said in a voice meant to be seductive. “I’m Albert Guiss.” He kissed both her hands. “I see you are overwhelmed by the decor, but you dwarf it all with your own special brilliance.”

  What a line, thought Haines, I’ll bet it has caught a lot of fish. He could see Garbo was somewhat hypnotized.

  “Mr. Guiss …

  “Oh please. You must call me Albert.”

  “And you must call me Greta.” Her teeth sparkled like her smile. “I want you to meet my fri
end, William Haines.”

  “You must call me Billy,” said Haines with his celebrated smirk which some innocents accepted as a smile.

  Guiss stepped between them and took Greta by her right arm and Haines by his left, and guided them to the other guests. “Here Greta, seated on the love seat, are your two producers, my watchdogs, heh heh. Risa Barron and Werner Lieb.”

  Lieb stood up and bowed stiffly from the waist. Risa Barron extended her hand, which Garbo touched slightly in friendship. Haines wondered how Risa could raise her arm, it was so weighted down with jewelry.

  “Miss Garbo, at last,” said Risa Barron.

  “Greta. Everyone must call me Greta. After all, we’ll be working together for many many months, we must be on first name terms and become good friends.”

  “You wonderful woman,” said Risa, sounding like steam escaping from an overheated radiator. Billy Haines wondered how so many ugly features could be set together to create a fascinating face. She had a long nose, wide mouth, a pointed jaw, and eyes with an oriental cast to them. Her lips were ruby-red luscious and there was just enough eye shadow to give her a suitably mysterious aura. This babe knew how to sell herself, thought Haines with admiration, and he could understand her conquest of Guiss. The head happened to be on top of a very stunning body.

  Werner Lieb was something else. Haines thought he should be an assistant checker in a sausage factory. He was pale, slim, wore his evening clothes with panache and managed the monocle in his left eye like a veteran of monocle managing. He too kissed Garbo’s hands, gushing, "This is a dream come true, Greta. To meet you at last, but also to work with you.”

  “Thank you. I’m sure the film will be more than memorable for all of us. But look, Billy! An old friend of mine!” Gustav Henkel stood near the massive fireplace holding a glass of champagne. She prayed he wouldn’t smile. He did. “This is Gustav Henkel, who wrote the script which Brecht is rewriting and it does not seem to bother Gustav. See! He’s always smiling!”

  "Kriegman!” barked Guiss, “Drinks for Miss Garbo and Mr. Haines.” She asked for champagne and Haines asked for his scotch highball.

  Greta took Guiss by the arm and walked him around the room, pausing here in front of a Tintoretto, here in front of a Picasso, here in front of a Renoir, then a Degas, and surprisingly, a few moderns like Max Ernst and Salvadore Dali. “What a fabulous collection, where did you acquire your unique taste?”

  Haines wished he could find out where he acquired his unique fortune, but instead busied himself in small talk with Risa Barron. “I’m stunned by your emeralds.”

  “Thank you. What about the rubies?”

  “Blood red and knockouts.” He wondered if they were gifts or trophies.

  “Billy? Weren’t you the movie star William Haines?”

  “Ah yes, back in the Middle Ages.”

  “But why did you stop acting? You were sometimes funny.”

  “That about sums up my career, sometimes funny.” He accepted his highball from Kricgman, who he thought could use a pair of roller skates to get across the enormous length of the room to Garbo before her champagne went flat. Haines asked, “Excited about producing the film?”

  “Who wouldn’t be? It was so wonderful of Albert to ask Werner and myself to co-produce.” She bent her head and whispered, “Of course there is von Stroheim to contend with.” She laughed. “I have contended with worse. Hitler and Mussolini, for instance.”

  Haines was impressed. “You knew them?”

  “But of course,” was the matter-of-fact reply. “Hitler wanted me for his mistress. This was before Eva Braun. But I could not live with a man who sucks his teeth. Now there is a price on my head. I am on Adolf’s hit list. Oh well, let us hope that is not my epitaph.”

  Garbo was saying to Guiss, “Yes, I am delighted we’ll be shooting in Technicolor, but von Stroheim must make tests of me. I must have Westmore devise suitable makeup for the color cameras. After all, Joan can’t be rosy-cheeked with orange lips and green eyes. True, the script is witty here and there, but Joan must never be an object of fun, or else how can we expect the audience to sympathize with her?”

  “That is absolutely true. I’ll convey all this to Von. By the by, now that we’re doing it in color, he’s thinking seriously of your suggestion to show her burning at the stake.”

  She laughed. “Of course he would. Joan roasting in glorious Technicolor. A riot of cerise and orange and brown and yellow. Von Stroheim will revel in it. Someone who knows Technicolor must be brought in to advise and moderate him. He will go too far.”

  “I know that.” Guiss lit a cigarette and then jammed it into a pearl-studded holder.

  They were standing next to a Botticelli. “Albert,” said Garbo, “how come you settled on von Stroheim? Don’t get me wrong, we worked together once as actors and it was fine. But no one else in the industry will buy him as a director, and along comes generous you giving him five million dollars to play with.”

  “He better not play with them.” The eyes were narrow and the voice rasped and Garbo took this as a sign the man was not playing the dilettante. The sudden flash of cruelty sent a small tingle jogging down her spine. In a more genial tone he advised her, “Believe me, von Stroheim was not my first choice. First I approached the most obvious man for the job. Cecil B. deMille.”

  “Of course, he’s so deliciously banal.”

  “He did consider it for a while. It seems he’d already done Joan as a silent with Geraldine Farrar.”

  “Oh yes? I must try and find a print. I’d like to see it.”

  “I’ve seen it. Terribly primitive. I tried many others, even Alfred Hitchcock, but he waved me away with a very cryptic. ‘There’s no suspense.’”

  ‘True. like Hamlet, there’s no changing the ending,” Garbo said. “My next choice was Josef von Sternberg.”

  “And he wanted Marlene to play Joan.”

  “Oh not at all. They barely speak these days. He wanted Ingrid Bergman.”

  “Oh? But you couldn’t get her?”

  “I didn’t even try. I wanted you and only you.” His voice was smooth and seductive. He took her hand and caressed it while his eyes devoured her face. “And now I have you.”

  “You have Greta the actress.”

  “And if I want Greta the woman?”

  She saw another guest arrive and cut him off abruptly. “Who is that man?”

  “Martin? Martin Gruber is my personal secretary. He is late because I sent him on an errand. Martin! Come meet Greta Garbo.” Gruber hurried across the vast expanse to join them.

  “Poor man,” said Garbo. “He’ll be out of breath before he reaches us. What a vast expanse. Was it once a ballroom?”

  “No, the ballroom is in the north wing. I plan to throw a party there when the film completes shooting.”

  “That could be years from now,” she said mournfully.

  “Miss Garbo! Miss Garbo! You leave me speechless.” Gruber never shut up. “I am one of your greatest admirers. I have seen all of your films at least a dozen times.”

  “Really? No wonder you wear such thick glasses.”

  “I have an awful myopia.” He said to Guiss, “I have taken care of the matter.”

  “Good. I sec Kriegman has opened the doors to the dining room. We are ready to serve dinner.”

  “Wunderbar. Frankfurters and sauerkraut!”

  “Frankfurters and sauerkraut? What ever gave you such an idea? Such food is for walk-ons and extras,” he said proudly. ‘Tonight I am serving pheasant under glass and Chateaubriand and trout Marie Antoinette.”

  Garbo said, “I have never heard of trout Marie Antoinette.” Guiss smiled suavely and said, ‘That’s trout with the head removed.”

  They found their place cards and were seated. Garbo could tell, from the number of empty glasses and the amount of silverware at each place setting, that it was going to be a very long evening. Already before her was a plate of pate de foie gras with truffles and gherkins (“aliv
e alive oh,” whispered Haines to Risa, who was quite befuddled) and she dug in with her celebrated enthusiasm.

  “Greta does love her food,” said Haines to Risa. “If she’d been born in Africa, she’d have been a cannibal.”

  Manin Gruber feasted in equal parts on the pate and Garbo’s face. He was enchanted by her throaty laugh, the way she seemed so riveted to every word Guiss said and how she gently touched his sleeve every so often. If she was insincere, he was witnessing a truly magnificent performance.

  Werner Lieb cursed Guiss silently for having placed him next to Gustav Henkel. The scenarist preferred his fingers to a fork and showed little respect for the royal truffles. He ate with his mouth open, accompanied by ugly sucking noises that recalled to Werner the ugly noise of the automatic dredges on his grandfather’s farm in Alsace. Werner attempted conversation. “Have you seen any of Brecht’s rewrite?”

  “I tried to. He was very polite when I introduced myself. Then he threw me down the stairs.”

  “I heard he’s terribly temperamental.”

  “And he’s always chomping on those stinking cheap cigars. And his teeth!” Henkel displayed his own and Werner shuddered. “He has the most awful teeth!”

  The soup and the fish elapsed uneventfully. The pheasant under glass caused Haines to comment, “I saw them move.” Risa Barron covered her mouth with a hand and excused herself for a few moments. Haines looked across at Garbo and Guiss. He could tell they were holding hands under the table. He wondered why that disturbed him.

  He heard Martin Gruber asking, “Do you ever contemplate returning to acting, Mr. Haines?”