Star Light, Star Bright

by Stanley Ellin

  “So he said. Would you know if anybody on the premises has a hypodermic outfit tucked away? Outside the staff, that is.”

  Maggie frowned at me. “Why?”

  “Curiosity. Is there anybody here who fills that bill?”

  “As a matter of fact, yes. Andrew for one.”

  “I thought you said he didn’t use heavy drugs.”

  “He doesn’t. It’s for vitamin shots. The B-12 treatment. Not that it seems to help any.”

  “You said Andrew for one. Who else is there?”

  “No big secret. The who else is a somewhat hard-boiled lady named Belle Rountree.”

  I said, “Belle Rountree, Scott Rountree, Cottage D,” and Maggie remarked approvingly that I had obviously been at my homework. She explained, “Scottie’s a novelist and maybe screenwriter. It’s his script that’ll be made into a movie if Andrew signs the check. Belle is Scottie’s wife. She’s a diabetic. On insulin. She’s loaded with those disposable hypodermics.”

  She waited for my reaction and looked baffled when I said, “I don’t see any typewriter. Where do you keep it?”

  “Right next-door in my own office. But don’t you want to hear about the Rountrees? Or the others?”

  “I just now heard about the Rountrees. What about the others?”

  “Well, Sid Kightlinger’s the producer who put this movie package together and wants Andrew to come in for half the costs. Corinthian Productions has already agreed to cover the other half if Andrew signs on.”

  “How much is half?”

  “A million. And the package is Scottie’s script he made from his book Two Plus One, with Lou Hoffman to direct and Mike Calderon to play the male lead.”

  I said, “That leaves a Holly Lee Otis, who’s shacked up in Cottage C with Hoffman. For what I suppose are the obvious reasons.”

  Maggie nodded wisely. “And some extra. There are three big parts in the picture, and Holly Lee’s in line for one. Not much more than a kid really, but rated a comer. At least by Lou Hoffman. To complete the package—or did Sharon already tell you about it?”

  “About what?” I said, and Maggie said with raised eyebrows, “That she’s supposed to play the main lead against Calderon.”

  “A comeback? And Quist’ll go along with it?”

  “If that’s what she wants. And if the picture’s made around here, not on the West Coast. That’s no problem. Sid Kightlinger would shoot it in Greenland if she signs up. His favorite word for her is bankable.”

  “It’s a word that has its charms. Now let’s take a look at that typewriter.”

  Her office had the same layout as Quist’s, same unpretentious furnishings, but it looked as if a lot of hard work went on here. Stacks of folders on every surface, well-filled bookcases, their contents in a disarray that suggested they were well-used. And unlike the other rooms here that I had seen so far, this one had pictures on the walls. High-quality reproductions. At least a dozen Van Goghs. A few Gauguins. A big one of Seurat’s “Grande Jatte.”

  “Nice,” I commented about the room in general, and Maggie said, “I used to think so too. Now it’s a place where somebody keeps sneaking in to write sick messages. I can’t even bear to use that machine anymore. I’ll have to get rid of it.”

  “Not yet.” I slipped a piece of paper into the Hermes and typed out a couple of test lines. I held up the paper before Maggie. “Sort of strains the eyes to read anything that pale, doesn’t it?”

  “I know,” she said defensively. “I hate changing ribbons. I make a mess of it every time.”

  “When was the last time? A week ago?”

  “I suppose. Somewhere around that.”

  I said, “Then you can stop worrying about people sneaking in here to write sick messages every few days. Those notes all have exactly the same pitch-black lettering, the kind you get from a nice fresh ribbon. Assuming you’ve been giving this machine a workout during the past week—”

  “I have.”

  “In that case,” I said, “we can also assume that those notes were all written at the same time. Probably last Monday.”

  Maggie puzzled over this. “Will that help you find out who wrote them?”

  “I can’t tell yet. But it does offer a profile of someone who’s laid out a precise, long-range plan of action and is seeing it through step by step. Which means someone who’s not quite the screwball those notes make him out to be. Or her.”

  “Her?” said Maggie. “Belle Rountree? Holly Lee? I don’t think either of them—”

  “Neither does Araujo. But for the time being we grant no exemptions. What we do is consider an interesting question. Why is the plan so long-range? Why did the note-writer allow nine days to H-hour? Why not just two or three at most?”

  “All right, why not?”

  I said, “A sadistic reason might be that this prolongs the agony for the intended victim. The trouble with that, according to you people, is that the intended victim isn’t suffering any agony.”

  Maggie stared at me. “Would you like him to?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “That you never will forgive Kalos for breaking up what you and Sharon had going. So if anything does happen to him—”

  I said, “I can see Sharon didn’t hold back on that Sir Galahad story.”

  “No, she didn’t. And the idea that you might deliberately let her down now when she—”

  I cut in: “Lady, you do have a low boiling point, don’t you? But look at it this way. If Daskalos does get his throat cut, it’ll make a hot news story from coast to coast. And I’ll be in the middle of the story looking foolish. That would sort of depress me.”

  “I wonder.”

  “Me, too. About this typewriter, for instance. It’s a beat-up manual, not a high-speed electric. And that’s not shorthand in this steno pad here; it seems to be some kind of home-cooked Maggie system. So you’re not a trained secretary?”

  “No, I’m not.”

  “Then how’d you land this job with Quist?”

  “Look, if you’re working around again to the question of what Andrew and I—”

  “It’s late,” I said tiredly. “And every minute it’s getting later. Will you stop defending your honor—and Andrew’s—and just answer the question?”

  “All right, I was trained as an art historian. I wound up with a job in the Miami Library art department. I did some moonlighting for Andrew while I was there, research and such, and when he founded the Quist Collection he took me on as curator. The rest—the confidential secretary bit—came naturally. Satisfied?”

  “If you are. Araujo also mentioned the Quist Collection. Is it on the grounds here?”

  “No. It’s in the original family home on Brickell Avenue near town. A mansion, really. Andrew spent a fortune having it converted into a proper museum. If it happens to come up when you’re talking with him, watch yourself. It’s a touchy subject.”

  “Why?” I asked. “Was he stuck with some fakes?”

  “Not at all. But the public isn’t allowed in. And now there’s a class suit pending against Andrew demanding open visiting hours because of the tax exemption. He’s sick about it. Especially since there was a case—”

  “The Barnes case,” I said. “Dr. Barnes, the Argyrol king. Had a great collection locked up on his estate in Pennsylvania until the courts made the heirs open it to the public.”

  Maggie gaped at me. “You know about that?”

  “I’ve been there. It’s a great collection all right.”

  She pressed her hand to her forehead. “Oh, God, I must have come on so poisonously condescending—”

  “I’ll survive it. I deal in art too, now and then. People have a way of stealing pretty pictures and, so to speak, holding them for ransom. Some insurers would rather have my agency handle the problem than the cops. Which leads me to wonder just how secure the stuff in the Quist Collection is. What’s its estimated value?”

  “About fifteen million. But Virgili
o feels it is secure. He’s the one who set up the system there: electronic and manpower.” She did a double take. “You mean those threats against Kalos could be a way of having us focus on him while somebody robs the collection?”

  “Stranger things have been heard of.” I laughed. “The way you look right now, I think if you had to choose between somebody’s throat being cut and one of those pictures being swiped—”

  She said reproachfully, “Not really. But, well, there are a couple of those pictures—those Van Goghs—and all I know is that nothing must ever happen to them. Nothing.”

  “Sold on Vincent?”

  “Completely. Desperately.” She wasn’t fooling about it.

  “Is that why you’re writing a book about him?” I patted the cardboard box beside the Hermes, half filled with typed pages, and I could see her tighten up. She said, “How do you know that’s mine? How do you know it’s even about him?”

  “I assume it’s yours because here it is. I assume it’s about him because the name Vincent shows up all over this top page.”

  “Very observant of you. But it has nothing to do with why you’re here. No, wait.” She gave me a speculative look. “With your experience you could help out with some advice on it.”

  “Among art experts, lady, I am no art expert.”

  “Not that way. I mean as a professional investigator. An expert in searching out people and documents.”

  “Some other time.”

  “Tomorrow?”

  “Tomorrow. In return for the offer, how about lending me some bedtime reading?” I looked over the bookshelves. “Anything here you’d recommend? Besides a life of Van Gogh?” The shelves at eye level were filled with books on art, most of them studies of Impressionists and Post-Impressionists.

  Maggie motioned toward the lower shelves. “One of those possibly. But what about the knife? Virgilio put it away in the wall safe here. Don’t you want to see it?”

  “Well, my feeling is that when you’ve seen one bloodstained carving knife you’ve seen them all. I’ve seen one.” The bottom shelves contained a hodgepodge collection of books on travel and exploration, and interestingly, a line-up of true-crime cases, several about the Jack the Ripper case. When I pointed at those and asked, “Another one of your favorite people?” Maggie said, “He’s got to do with what I’m writing. I’ll explain it tomorrow.” And when I settled on a newish-looking book titled Bligh and the Bounty she pulled it out of my hand and replaced it with a Jack the Ripper. “Freshen up on it,” she instructed. “It’s relevant.”

  I easily put down any temptation to ask her how it was relevant. I said, “Will there be one of Daskalos’ sunrise shows on the beach in the morning?”

  “Uh-huh. If the weather is clear.”

  “Ah, yes,” I said, doing a W. C. Fields. “Due to inclement weather Saint Kalos may not perform any miracles today,” and I learned that when Maggie Riley smiled broadly she looked a fast sixteen years old. I said, “Anyhow, I want to be there. Have someone get me up in time for it.”

  “Sure.” Then she asked soberly, “Mind if I confide something to you, Milano? Something highly personal?”

  “I’m braced.”

  “All right, when Sharon insisted you be called in on this business, I thought it was the dumbest move possible. I mean, knowing so much about you two, knowing how she still feels about it—”

  “Whoa, lady,” I said. “Still is a very heavy word in that context.”

  “It’s the honest word. Anyhow, knowing all that, I had a feeling she could be letting herself in for some dangerous complications if you did show up.”

  “I see. And now you’ve changed your mind about that.”

  “No,” said Maggie, “I haven’t. It’s just that now that I’ve finally met you I can understand why she wanted you here.”

  I waited.

  “That’s all,” said Maggie.

  I was roused from sleep by the click of the lamp on my bedside table. I opened my eyes and found myself surveying by lamplight a great pair of legs. The legs were topped by hacked-off jeans. Above them was a bulky black turtleneck sweater. Above that was a freckled face leaning over me, half hidden by a curtain of long blond hair. “It’s after six, Milano,” said Maggie. “If you want to attend services, rise and shine.”

  When, showered and clothed, I went into the sitting room she was waiting for me at a wheeled service table. There was orange juice and coffee on the table and some slightly charred, heavily buttered pieces of toast. “Emergency rations,” said Maggie as I sat down to them.

  From the seeds in it, the orange juice was real orange juice. I said, “Last night you let it out that you and Sharon were—in your own words—totally simpática, and for good reason. What’s the reason? Quist give you both a hard time?”

  “Which is what you’d like to believe, isn’t it?” Maggie said wickedly. “Especially about Sharon.”

  “Clever girl. What’s the reason?”

  She loudly crunched a piece of toast. “You know what Sharon came out of, don’t you? Shantyville, Arizona? Brutal father, mother who screwed around?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, trade sand for swamp and that’s what I came out of. Maggie Riley, girl of the Everglades. That’s me. Except my father wasn’t a childbeater, just a useless drunk. And my mother didn’t screw around. She didn’t have time to. She was mostly in the county hospital getting parts removed.”

  “You’ve come a long way, baby. How’d you manage it?”

  “The same as Sharon. But not with men. There was this art teacher in high school—a big old butch—who took a shine to me. Hooked me on art, hooked me on high living, like having a toilet right there inside the house, took me out of town on museum trips, dressed me up like her own pretty dolly. Helped me get the scholarship to Miami U. when the time came.”

  “In return for—?”

  “That’s obvious, isn’t it? I didn’t mind. In fact, it was highly pleasurable at times. Not that I ever bought it as a way of life.” She looked at me quizzically. “How old do you think I am anyhow, Milano?”

  “What’s the difference?”

  “Plenty. Because there’s a poor-little-girl look in your eye, and I am no little girl. I’m thirty-three. Thirty-four next month. And very tough in my own way. When I was twelve I was already out with my daddy and my own rifle poaching alligators. And putting together a busted-down swamp buggy with baling wire and spit.”

  I said, “Tough and very touchy. About a lot of things.”

  “Like getting sympathy when it’s not needed? Save that for Sharon. Emotionally, she’s still back there in shantytown rubbing where it hurts. Unlike me, she never did get herself unscrambled.”

  “And you’re big sister, trying to unscramble her.”

  “No,” said Maggie, “I just listen and understand. And sometimes I say to myself ‘There but for the grace of God—’” She looked at me steadily over her coffee cup. “I’ll tell it to you right out, Milano. I think you would have been good for her over the long haul. I think it was a mistake for Kalos to get in your way.”

  I grunted something noncommittal and looked at my watch. I asked, “When does the curtain go up on his show?” and she answered, “Pretty soon. And you’d better wear more than that jacket. It’s cold out. At least for Miami.”

  It was cold out for anywhere, a strong onshore wind making it that much colder. Although there was a graying of the sky to the east, the rest of it was dark, the stars very bright. We walked by the pale glow of ornamental gas lamps along a flagstone path across lawns, around shadowy flowerbeds, past a series of tennis courts, and it was a long walk. The end of the line was a wooden stairway leading down to the beach eight or ten feet below.

  Maggie leaned back against the railing of the stairway. “Balcony seats,” she said. The sea was running high, the waves breaking on the beach with a rhythmical boom and hiss. She had to raise her voice to be heard above them.

  The sky ahead was showing pink
now. On the water’s edge in line with the stairway was a bathhouse and an L-shaped dock, a few small boats moored to it. Fifty yards to the north, on the grassy rise over the beach, was a handsome ranch house. That would be the empty Cottage B. Beyond it I could make out its mate, Cottage A, domicile of the good teacher. Southward were the other two cottages: the nearer where director Lou Hoffman and starlet Holly Lee Otis kept company, the farther housing the Rountrees. Cottages in Quist’s enchanted garden, they would have been hundred-thousand-dollar homes on Long Island’s north shore.

  The sky reddened. From the southward buildings two couples emerged and moved in our direction. The Rountrees were both plump and on the short side. Hoffman and girl friend were tall and skinny. All were bundled up against the weather, all looked miserable. They came up in turn, surveyed me openly, and went down the stairway to the beach, making a semicircle there, facing the waves at a safe distance.

  Maggie nodded a greeting over my shoulder, and I looked around to see that Quist and Sharon had made an appearance. Quist was in the wheelchair, a lap robe over his legs. Sharon, standing beside him, was swathed in mink. To her, mink coats—sable coats too—were a way of keeping warm. In Devon she used to play at gardening—awkwardly snipping, weeding, digging—in a sable coat. Like Maggie Riley, girl of the Everglades, she too had come a long way, baby. But when she had suddenly cut and run that unbelievable morning she forgot to take the sable coat. Just left it lying there on our bedroom floor. I had a feeling that Maggie would never make that kind of mistake.

  Further up the path a big, leather-jacketed man hove into view and took his position there. The black hair cut low across the forehead, the mandarin mustache, the craggy features added up to an instantly recognizable mask. Michael Calderon, superstar. Even more bankable than Sharon, if it came to that.

  Sharon patted her husband’s arm, then, without any sign of recognition, walked past Maggie and me and down the stairway. At its foot she shed her sandals and joined the semi-circle on the beach.

  I put my mouth close to Maggie’s ear. “Do they all show up like this every morning and evening?”