Murder at the Academy Awards (R): A Red Carpet Murder Mystery

by Joan Rivers

  By giving one short statement to the press and sharing one measly box of brownies, the vultures now owed us one, and we might need the favor.

  I had one more errand to attend to, and then, I realized, I would be heading to Wonders. I began thinking of all the questions I should ask once I got there. Questions about Halsey and Burke. In just a few minutes, we slid out of the hills and, I realized, looking out the large, tinted windows, had arrived at the office of the V-E-T.

  I gave Malulu a significant look, as we had been through this trauma before. She may or may not have caught my signal.

  Barry pulled the gigantic stretch SUV into the small lot that served the Beverly Hills Veterinary Clinic and also an upscale Thai restaurant, both of which were located on a quiet side street off Wilshire. When the vehicle glided to a stop, I held my breath. The windows were tinted, after all, so the view was obscured, and I had great hope that our previous unhappy visits might be forgotten.

  But Killer, alas, is no fool.

  He had no intention of visiting the V-E-T that day. Or any day. As soon as the limo came to a halt, my tiny Yorkie started squirming and pulling this way and that.

  He really is the smartest dog in the world.

  Malulu didn’t want to crush him, of course, and in Killer’s frenzy to get free of her grip, his little legs wildly dug into her sides as if he were trying to retrieve a favorite bone. She loosened her fingers for just a millisecond, but that was enough. Killer broke free and began ping-ponging around the enormous interior of the limo, bounding off the lava lamps, the ebony bar console, and miles of fake zebra-skin.

  “Killer!” I shouted, as my tiny darling flew past me. “It’s okay, sweetheart!”

  Unaware of the chaos in the backseat, Barry chose that exact moment to open the limo door, presumably to let Malulu take Killer out, but at that point, my freaked-out bundle of fluff sailed right out the open door, never even hitting the pavement until about ten feet past the astonished chauffeur.

  15

  Best Performance

  Two hours later, we were all completely exhausted. Malulu and Barry had fanned out across Wilshire Boulevard after having checked out every single building and alleyway on this side, while Drew and I had literally bent down and looked under every car parked in a six-block area.

  “Mom,” Drew said, looking at her watch. “I have been getting calls all morning from Wonders. They think you are a no-show. Even our interventionist thinks you’ve gone into deep denial again. I know this is breaking your heart about Killer, but maybe we should leave. Just hear me out. We can be in Pasadena in an hour. Malulu will find Killer…”

  I stared at her.

  “Okay, I know. You can’t leave. But Killer might hide out for hours and hours. And the time…” Drew shook her head in frustration. “Don’t you realize that Burke is just hanging by a thread? I’ve gotten six texts already. The police are looking for him, Mom. They’ve been over to his dad’s office. They went to his sister’s house in Calabasas. They’ve gone out to Manhattan Beach and talked to all his friends that have houses there. And now that Killer has run off, you are clearly unable to focus on our plan to help Burke.”

  We were seated again in the back of the limo, taking a break from the search, sharing a bottle of Voss water from the minifridge in one of the bars. I held a cut-crystal glass filled with ice and water against my hot forehead. “We’ll find Killer pretty soon. God willing. He’s a very good boy. I don’t believe for a minute he would run into the street. He’s probably nearby, just calming down.” I prayed that what I was saying was true. He was a good boy. But the V-E-T had unnerved him.

  “I hope so,” Drew said, sipping straight from the clear-glass bottle.

  “And I promised I would help your friend. A promise is a promise.”

  “Thank you, Mom.”

  “Hey, Ms. Taylor,” said Barry, poking his head into the parked Hummer limo in the lot behind the vet’s, where we were sitting with the back doors wide-open. “Don’t worry. We’ll find your little guy. We’ve been up and down these streets like a hundred times, but we’ll keep looking. Your bodyguard, Malulu, has been going door-to-door, telling everyone to call her cell number if they see him, but nobody has. I told her to take a break, but she just won’t stop.”

  “They build them hearty in Samoa,” I said.

  Barry nodded. “Anyway, I’m going right back out. I just wanted to let you know what’s up.” He ran his hand through his thick, brown hair. No matter how many hours he’d been chasing around in the heat of the day, his gel stood up to the torture. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am,” he said for the third time that morning. “I could kick myself. I should have grabbed Killer when I had a shot. Damn.”

  “Here, sit down. Take a rest.”

  “We’ll find him soon,” he said, climbing into the back of the limo and sitting opposite us, where I suggested.

  Killer didn’t want to be found. That was clear. I wouldn’t put it past the dog to wait us out until after the vet’s business hours were over. At 5:05 p.m. we’d see Killer saunter up to the limo. I smiled to myself, hoping I was right.

  “Let’s talk about something else. Something that will help get my mind off poor Killer.”

  Barry nodded. “Sure. Whatever you want.”

  I said nonchalantly, “When you drove Halsey Hamilton to the Oscars, was she drinking or doing drugs in the backseat here?”

  He blinked. “No, ma’am. No. Not even a beer. Hell, I already told all this to the police and to my boss. I cleared out every bottle in the on-board bars before I went to pick her up. Mr. Hamilton is the one who made the arrangements with my boss, and he was very clear about what he wanted, so I made damned sure the bar was G-rated. There was nothing in there but soft drinks and mineral waters and juice. Shit. She was doing just fine, Ms. Taylor. Ask the police. They checked it all out.”

  Drew looked at me. “Then she must have been wasted before she got into the limo that night.” She turned to Barry. “Couldn’t you tell?”

  Barry shook his head, not quite sure how to answer. “She looked great to me.”

  I put my hand up. “Let’s start at the top. Where did you pick her up?”

  “I went to get her in Pasadena at nine a.m.”

  From Wonders. I wanted to ask more, but wasn’t sure how far he would go. “You don’t mind me asking?”

  “Why should I? You’re human, right? Everyone is asking me about Halsey. My agent is working on a deal with OK! magazine, I think. It’s pretty hot.”

  “Good for you. Then maybe you would tell us: did Halsey come out of Wonders with a guy?” Okay, it wasn’t an innocent question. I looked over at Drew, wearing her cream-colored peasant top over a pair of tight brown jeans, who suddenly realized where my question was casually leading. But what choice did I have? Drew wouldn’t believe anything bad about Burke until she faced a few cold, hard facts. Perhaps here was the first one.

  “Halsey was alone,” he said.

  Drew smiled at me and asked Barry, “Where did you drive Halsey when she left Wonders?”

  “I took her home. To the house above Sunset. And then I just waited. That’s what I get paid to do.” He smiled.

  “There must have been a lot of people coming and going to the house all day,” I said, and Drew gave me a glance.

  He cleared his voice. “I don’t mean any disrespect, Ms. Taylor, but I may be signing a big-money deal with OK!, and I don’t know how much more about it I should really be telling you. I mean, is this for your TV show or something?”

  Drew moved across the center aisle and sat next to Barry. She said daintily, “Barry, if I were a driver who worked with celebrities, and I had managed, through my own negligence, to lose the tiny darling dog that meant more than life itself to my celebrity client, I would try to do everything in my power to distract that worried client. Everything. Wouldn’t you?”

  Barry looked at the carpet and mumbled, “I’m awfully sorry about all this, Miss Taylor, I am,�
�� as I mouthed to my daughter, Class.

  “So,” I said briskly, “who did you see going into Halsey’s house that afternoon?”

  “Well,” he said, thinking about it, “kind of the usual crew. I’ve driven for her a few times before. Halsey’s hair and makeup people came in. And some fashion stylist carting in a bunch of new dresses. Plus there were other folks taking care of the rest of the family. You know. And then a limo came to take the rents to the awards.”

  I looked at Drew and she interpreted, “The parents.”

  Probably all part of Jimmy Hamilton’s master plan for maximum impact: Halsey arrives at the red carpet alone in this mammoth limo. “So then all the other people went home.”

  “Well, not her friends,” Barry said. “That guy she used to date was still there, I’m pretty sure.”

  I stopped pouring Barry a glass of water and stared. “What guy?”

  Barry smiled, reaching for the water. “I don’t know his name. But he drives a little Audi sports car.”

  “An Audi?”

  Drew looked up at me. “That Audi could belong to anyone, Mom. I mean, they sell hundreds of them. Thousands.”

  I pulled my bag open and withdrew my wallet. As I had been packing for rehab this morning, I found a picture of Drew and Burke from two Christmases ago, the happy new couple, and folded it in half so that only Burke’s image showed. I turned this shot of Burke, smiling into the camera with his arm around an unidentified shoulder, toward Barry. “Was this the guy who was driving the Audi?”

  Barry took a look. Drew held her breath. I waited.

  Barry said, “Sorry. I hardly looked at the guy when he went into the house. But I think the Audi guy I saw was not as big as this dude.”

  Drew exhaled and said, “So, let’s get back to when Halsey was leaving for the Oscars.”

  I exhaled, too. This might have been enough. If Drew discovered Burke was with Halsey on the afternoon of her death, it would prove he had lied to Drew, perhaps lied about everything. But we weren’t there yet.

  On the other hand, Burke drove an Audi TT. It wasn’t a rare car, but it wasn’t that common either. In time, I reminded myself, we would stumble across something really conclusive, and my dear daughter’s eyes would be pried open. I would stay focused on helping her see the truth, even if it meant that I had to check into rehab to do it.

  Drew picked up the questions. “So what was the story with Halsey’s missing evening gown?”

  Barry shook his head, his big smile reappearing. “Making a big entrance, I guess. Didn’t matter what that lady wore, she looked hot. Going to show her dad something, that’s what she said to me. But she came out of the house really late. I had to concentrate on just getting us to the Kodak. I mean, I was driving on Sunset Boulevard going seventy. But we made it.”

  None of it made sense. Halsey wasn’t drinking. She didn’t seem high. She was playing a game with her outfit. My goodness, if the girl hadn’t actually died the other night, all of this would actually be believable. I squinted at Barry, wondering if he was a much better actor than I’d given him credit for.

  Malulu came up to us, huffing a little as she reached the open door of the limo. “Mrs. L. I am sure that Killer didn’t get far. I think it is better if you all stay in one spot. I think Killer might return here after his little walk-around. And he will not be too frightened if he sees it is only me coming to look for him.”

  “Thanks, Malulu, but you need to rest. I’ll go looking now.”

  Malulu gave a snort. “As if,” she muttered, then took off at a trot down the side street. Barry, not to be outdone by a tall, large woman in a bright-colored pantsuit, took off after her. But Malulu stopped, turned Barry around, and ordered him to stay behind. Sheepishly, he returned to the limo and, leaving us to our privacy, got into the driver’s seat.

  Drew had been quiet.

  “What’s the matter, Drewie? We’ll find Killer. He’s just—”

  “It’s not Killer, Mom. It’s Halsey. That day of the Oscars. Something doesn’t seem right.”

  I reviewed what we’d just heard. “Isn’t this just what we thought must have happened? She stayed behind while her parents took their own limo to the event. She must have taken some pills or been drinking.” I left out, for the moment, any question of who the young man in the Audi was or what he might have had to do with Halsey’s erratic behavior. And death. Let this all sink in for Drew in its own time.

  “Mom,” Drew said, reaching for my arm, her eyes bright. “Wait, wait, wait a second.”

  I waited.

  She looked at me. “Remember when Halsey’s dad said he’d been calling Halsey all night, trying to find out why she was so late to the Oscars?”

  I nodded.

  “Maybe they were fighting, you know, and when she saw his phone number on the incoming calls, she chose to ignore him.”

  “Makes sense,” I agreed. “Unless she left her phone at home that night.”

  “But remember? She texted me right before her car pulled up to the theater. To arrange our exclusive interview.”

  “Of course.”

  “So the question is—where is that phone now?”

  It was curious. With the minuscule garments Halsey had on that night, we’d have certainly seen a small, rectangular, phone-size bulge somewhere on her if she’d been carrying a phone. And she hadn’t had an evening bag. So…

  Drew looked around the interior of the limo, taking in the dizzying sight of animal print gone wild, along with the shiny surfaces of two bars. “In here?”

  I hit the remote-control button to open the privacy window, hit the intercom switch, and said, “Barry. Could you tell me one more thing? Who cleans the limo after an event?”

  He turned in his seat to talk to us. “I do, Ms. Taylor. Why?”

  “Did you find a phone when you were cleaning up after Halsey’s last trip?”

  “No, ma’am,” he said, his eyes clear and his voice steady. “Not too much in the limo that night. Some papers and junk like that. Empty water bottle. Not much, really.”

  I thanked him and closed the window again, giving us a chance to confer in private. Drew was getting excited. “Halsey must have had her phone with her in the limo that night. I know it. Her little Prada phone—she loved that thing. They’ve only come out in Europe right now, but she got one anyway, of course. A gift from some royal sheikh, she said. Covered in diamonds. Custom.”

  I got down onto the floor of the limo. “Okay, if it’s covered in diamonds, I’m searching for it.”

  Down on all fours, looking behind every banquette, I rubbed my hands over the thick, white shag carpet. Drew looked at me and sighed. She sank down on the floor and took up the hunt on the far side of the limo. She giggled, “This is absurd.”

  I squeezed my hand far behind the bar, where it was pushed up against the wall. I felt something hard, pulled at it, and came up with an ancient pretzel. “If I knew any of Malulu’s curse words in Samoan, I’d use them.”

  “Mom, this limo has been vacuumed within an inch of its life. I can’t even find lint behind the seats.” She sat down on the shag carpet.

  I sat down too and faced her. “Drew. You have Halsey’s phone number. Call it.”

  She looked at me, and in an instant she pulled out her phone and hit a few buttons.

  We waited in silence.

  And we heard nothing. No little ring. No little tune. Nothing. I looked at Drew, and she pointed to her phone. “It’s connecting, I hear her ringback thingie.”

  Damn. This type of thing worked so well in the movies.

  Drew flipped her phone closed.

  “Wait.” I reached up on the seat for the remote control. I hit the button for the privacy window, which noiselessly opened.

  Barry turned in his driver’s seat and looked back at us, now sitting on the floor. “Is there something I can get you, Ms. Taylor?” he asked, suppressing a smile.

  “No, no.” Then I casually gestured to Drew, pointing to h
er cell phone. Pointing. And pointing.

  She finally pushed the redial button.

  In ten more seconds something amazing happened. We could faintly hear the muffled opening notes of a far-off cell phone.

  “Rihanna,” Drew said, listening hard. “‘Shut Up and Drive.’”

  I froze, trying to hear the almost-impossible-to-hear bars of music. Just then, Malulu returned to the back of the limo and, with the ears of a hunting dog, cocked her head to the side and asked, “What’s dat tune?”

  “A cell phone,” Drew whispered.

  “Dat’s not from in here,” Malulu said, pointing to our passenger cabin. “It’s from up there.” She pointed to the front of the limo. Just as I had imagined! Barry, that old liar, had Halsey’s Prada cell phone somewhere up by him. Was it coming from his pocket? But by then the music had gone quiet.

  In the little parking lot that our Hummer limo had dominated all day long, hogging three spaces, a patient Volvo wagon with two Weimaraners in the back was waiting for a spot. A Benz with a Siamese in a carry-case had just pulled out, and the Volvo was inching into the tight spot. Before we knew it, Barry was clambering out of the driver’s seat, and the three of us, Drew, Malulu, and me, were barreling out of the back.

  “Ms. Taylor,” he said as the Weimaraners cut behind him, and we blocked his path forward.

  “So,” I said, “you don’t know where Halsey’s phone is?”

  “Me?” he asked, doubling his dimples.

  I turned to Drew. “Hit call again, sweetie.”

  Drew pulled out her phone, and in a few seconds we heard the sound of Rihanna singing “Shut Up and Drive,” this time a little more distinctly, but not actually coming from anywhere on Barry’s person.

  I looked at Barry closely. “Open the glove box, please.”

  Barry could drive naughty starlets to grand events with the girls wearing nothing more than their undies. He could handle drinkers and druggies, I supposed, and even celebs on their hands and knees in the back of his limo searching for God knew what. But Barry had had enough. He looked left and right, then jumped over the Weimaraners in the parking lot and took off running as hard as he could.