“That was just her stage name. Claimed she was Constance Holt of Peoria, Illinois. Slightly older than the rest of the girls. Twenty-eight or nine. Dark hair, dark eyes, and built. According to Miss Minna, in a very pleasingly plump sort of way. Remind you of anyone, say someone who has a reward out for a fat cat?”
“Monica Seagraves isn’t twenty-nine.”
“She looks old for her age.”
He eyed the cat. “And he looks hungry.”
I petted the kitty between his ears. He pressed against my thigh and purred with contentment. “After being abandoned in a cathouse for two days, you would be, too.”
The Buick pulled into the curb and braked on a squeal of rubber. Except for its entrance off Michigan Avenue, the Auditorium Theater was enclosed by an encapsulating hotel and office complex. Rising from a foundation of beveled granite and limestone fascia, the street-side frontage evoked Romanesque lines. Festooned and bejeweled, theatergoers congregated near the entrance, enjoying balmy evening breezes before heading inside.
“Still have the ticket on you?”
Grinning, he fished inside his breast pocket and held it up. I snatched it from his slack grip and hopped out of the Buick. “Hey!” He reached out to stop me but was a hand length too short and two seconds too late. I had already presented the ticket at the box office and scurried inside before he scrambled out of the Buick.
The usher showed me to orchestra seating. I settled into one of the best seats in the house: center section, five rows back from the stage, and superb sightlines. The seat beside me was conspicuously empty.
Feeling out of place among the finery of an exulted upper class, I sat straight-backed and hoped no one would notice my business attire. As chic as it was for the office, it faded amidst silver brocades and scarlet voile. The hall hummed with a chorus of intimate conversation.
Distinct from its ponderous outer shell, the theater’s interior reflected ample light and delicate embellishments. The vaulted ceiling was reminiscent of the Byzantine cathedrals of old. Ornamental arches accentuated the dome. Roundels of art glass broke up diamond motifs, and finial wall flourishes traced geometric patterns. Veneers of plaster, carved wood, cast iron, and mosaics filled spaces between intricate half-rosette decorations.
Presently, a woman occupied the seat next to me. Dressed in a floor-length gown, she was slim as a blade of grass. Diaphanous chiffon emphasized her plunging neckline, and an empire waist completed the elegant, avant-garde package. Elbow-high white kid gloves encased lissome arms. Abundant tawny hair, flipped at the ends, emphasized her graceful throat. She sat with practiced grace. She browsed through her Playbill, eyes lifting periodically toward the stage.
In the orchestra pit, the musicians began to tune their instruments.
My seatmate inclined towards me and spoke softly. “Have you seen this before?” Her regular features were enhanced by a flawless complexion, an upturned nose, and an easygoing demeanor. She’d been born with self-assurance or else acquired it through tough lessons and tougher compromises. She stared out from an inner peacefulness more ordered and less glittery than the finery adorning her body.
“My father took me when I was eight,” I said.
“Sweet.” She fanned herself with the Playbill. “Do you remember the ending?”
“The heroine is abandoned by a jealous suitor and dies of consumption in the arms of her one true love.”
“Typical, isn’t it?”
“For opera, yes. For life, it depends.”
We introduced ourselves. Her name was Delilah Lanz. Her husband was an obstetrics physician on staff at one of the city hospitals. Dr. Lanz was her second husband, her first being Richard B. Byrnes, whom she divorced three years ago. The ‘B’, she further explained, stood for Bernard.
“The poop had it that he was a confirmed bachelor,” I said. “Or homosexual.”
“In fact,” she said, “he was a Roman Catholic who didn’t believe in divorce. Tell me. How did you come by the ticket?”
“It was found in his personal effects.”
“I see. And you’re with the Standard.” She gathered up her purse. “Shall we go to quieter quarters, Miss Grenadine, where we can talk?”
The curtain was about to go up, but without further ado, we slid out of our seats and retired to the ladies’ lounge. Occupying chairs on opposite sides of a small table, we lit up cigarettes. I had to scrounge off her since I was trying to stop. “You must have known,” I said.
“About Dick? Of course. I read about it in the papers.”
“Why did you come, then, when you knew he wouldn’t be here?”
“To honor his memory. And what we once had together. He adored the opera. We hold season tickets together.”
“And your current husband?”
“Doesn’t know we ...” she hesitated, “... met on occasion.”
“By met on occasion, do you mean in a romantic way?”
“It’s complicated.” She exhaled smoke from the corner of her mouth. “We loved each other, but we couldn’t live with each other.”
“Where were you the night of the murder?”
“You’re asking if I killed Dick.” She nodded in an appreciative manner, as if my question were logical and only right to ask. “God knows I thought about it once or twice. As I said, with Dick, it was complicated. His mother. His work. He didn’t know what to do with a wife or how to treat her. Ironically, after the divorce, we became best of friends.”
“Good enough friends for him to confide in you?”
“About someone who hated him enough to want him dead?” She tapped her cigarette against the ashtray. “You probably want me to say it was Darlene. I never liked her much. She’s shallow and self-centered. Okay, a bitch. Still, my bet is on Kirk.”
“Not the mayor?”
“Jerry?” She shook her head. “You’d have to understand their history together ... Dick’s and Jerry’s ... to know why that could never be. Dick started out as a volunteer for Jerry, stuffing envelopes and licking stamps. When Jerry won a seat in the State House, he brought Dick down to Springfield with him. Dick has stuck by him ever since, even when Jerry lost a bid for Cook County Sheriff and a run for State Senate. He loved the man. Would have done anything for him, short of murder.”
“Like putting Kirk away in the big house for a long, long time?”
Her laughter was filled with irony. “Hell, he would have done that just for fun. Every time Moore ran for office, Kirk backed his opponent. Dick took it personally. He was that kind of man. Loyal. That’s why I still love him. And why I’m here when he can’t be.” A tear sprang to her eye. Just one tear. Just one eye.
When I emerged from the theater, the Buick was parked at the curb. The cat welcomed me back into the passenger seat and curled into my lap. Starr would have, too, if I let him. He asked, “Where to?”
“My car’s still at the Big Dive.”
He took off with a lurch. On the way, I filled him in on what Delilah told me. “Maybe you were right,” he said. “Maybe the missus did in Byrnes, after all. The ex-missus, I mean.”
“She doesn’t have a motive.”
“Ditching the first wife for a prettier and younger version is motive enough.”
I shrugged. “One thing we know for sure. Dick Byrnes went for blondes.”
“Should’ve switched to brunettes.” He dropped me off and waited until I collected my car. The Big Dive was doing a bang-up business. Customers were streaming inside for their chance at a poke, and if they were unlucky, a swan song. A parking ticket was anchored down by the Bel Air’s wiper blades. I tossed it away and drove home. Starr tailed me for most of the distance and then jetted by. He must’ve had a date. I was almost disappointed.
When I arrived at my apartment building, he had already pulled up a seat on the front steps, arms slung over knees and fedora pushed back. As I drew nearer, he removed the hat, shy as teenager on a first date. He half smiled and half frowned, counting on a ‘yes’ but dreading a ‘no
’. Reaching down, I took him by the hand and led him inside. The kitty scampered after us just before the vestibule door swung shut and locked.
Chapter 26
IN THE MORNING, I cautiously opened one eye and then the other. The window side of the bed was empty. Instead of hugging Starr, I was hugging the cat. “Dick,” I swore.
I pulled the covers over my head and drew into a fetal position. When the phone rang, I groped for the receiver, dragged it under the blanket, and put it to my ear. “Yeah?” It took a while before my faculties caught up with the information being relayed over the phone. When I hung up, I was wide-awake.
After taking a bath, I threw on an off-white circle skirt embellished with black velvet roses sewn across the diagonal, a linen jacket with ruffled peplum, and black-and-white sandals with faux bows affixed at the toes. I struck a pose in the door mirror and was stunned to catch a glimpse of my mother staring back at me. Daddy once remarked how he saw Lilith in me. I never noticed the resemblance until last year when I came across an eight-by-ten glossy of Grace Kimball before she eloped with John Grenadine and her family disowned her with the stroke of a pen. We even wore our wavy hair the same way, parted on the side and flipped over the right ear. The only significant difference between us was that my eyes were blue like my father’s and Lilith’s were hazel. The reflection in the mirror spooked me, but after straightening my posture, the vision disappeared in the blink of a mocking eye.
Humidity hung over the city. Asphalt melted. Roadways shimmered. Pedestrians sagged. Buses groaned. Cicadas buzzed. The Bel Air protested. And my temper boiled. I was still steamed about Starr. Lovers didn’t walk out on me. I walked out on them.
When I arrived at the white cottage on its serene neighborhood street, it was clear something bad had happened. Squad cars ringed the block. Neighbors and curiosity seekers huddled in groups, watching with interest. I double-parked and hurried inside. A volcano greeted me at the door.
Someone had methodically gone through the house and destroyed it inch by inch. Everything had been turned over, ripped apart, slashed open, or rifled through. Books, furniture, picture frames, lamps, tables, TV set, walls, windows, spinet ... nothing was sacred.
Police officers prowled the premises for evidence while the elder Mrs. Byrnes followed them around like a hen after her chicks. In the midst of chaos, Darlene Byrnes lounged on an upturned couch, her legs crossed and free leg kicking while she held an ashtray in her lap and smoked. She wore a terry robe and slippers. The robe made her seem vulnerable. Despite a nasty bump on her forehead and the reddened scrape on her cheek, she appeared as cool and collected as ever. I picked my way through rubble and broken glass, and sat beside her.
After a while, she said, “I didn’t see who it was. Mother and I were coming home from the funeral parlor. He came out of nowhere. The house was dark.” She used an economy of words that conveyed the essential information. It had been done on purpose, a way for her to disengage. A plume of cigarette smoke unfurled from her mouth, and she went on. “He was dressed in black. A silk stocking had been pulled over his face, making him look ...,” she searched for the right word, “... grotesque. He struck me across the face. Hard. Backhanded. The way Herb ... someone I used to date ... did. Hurt like hell. I saw stars. I fell. Mama hit him with a lamp, that lamp over there. He staggered. I remember thinking, Good for Mama. I must have passed out. When I woke up, she was pressing a washcloth to my forehead. She’d already called the police. I was covered in blood, a nosebleed from the wallop. I bathed. Changed.” She fingered the robe. “It was the only thing he didn’t rip to shreds.”
She wasn’t wearing makeup. Without a thick layer of powder to hide behind, she appeared young, as young as Doris Ann Marbrey must have been the day she left home. Her eyes were red with exhaustion. Her face, though, exhibited more than fatigue. It showed the barest inkling of fear. She was human, after all.
“There’s nothing valuable here. Nothing’s missing that we can see. Why did he do it, Miss Grenadine? Why?” She needed an answer.
“My hunch? He found what he came for. Or else he didn’t. In either case, I think your attacker satisfied himself.”
“About what?”
“The dossier your husband put together.”
“What dossier?” Her eyebrows arched with interest. “On what?”
“On whom,” I answered.
Darlene became as wide-eyed as a fish caught on a hook in a muddy stream. She wasn’t curious any longer. Or afraid. She was angry. “I don’t believe it.”
“He never said anything?”
“He’s not that cunning. Smart, yes. Calculating? Okay, I’ll grant him that. But not devious or underhanded. It’s not in his character. He’s an accountant. He believes in numbers. Facts. Provable logic. So ...why?” she asked again. Her cigarette hand trembled. She made the trembling stop by putting out the cigarette and setting the ashtray on the floor.
“I think someone was politically gunning for your husband,” I said. “I think he took out insurance.”
She nodded as if it all made sense. Perhaps for the first time, she understood that her deceased husband was more than he appeared. He wasn’t as naïve as she presumed. Or as trusting. A glimmer of respect poured from her eyes, along with glassy tears.
“The going theory is that your husband was killed for it.”
Her mouth twisted with derision. “And not because of a scorned wife’s revenge?” Her hair was pulled back into a bun that had come undone in an attractive way. Her weary state had done nothing to diminish her beauty. At that moment, any male over ten would have rushed in to protect her. Her eyes slanted toward the ceiling. She was thinking, and coming to an important decision. “There’s something you ought to see.”
Darlene Byrnes led the way along an unlit hallway. The damage toward the back of the house was as bad as the front, possibly worse. The burglar had done a thorough job. More telling than the destruction was the underlying condition of the house. From the faded wall paint to the worn floorboards and yellowing wallpaper, the décor didn’t gel with the younger Mrs. Byrnes’s taste, though it entirely suited the elder Mrs. Byrnes. Everything was dated, shabby, and secondhand. Even the walnut furniture, though solid and practical, revealed decades of service. All the same, and even with all the damage, anyone could see how immaculate and sparse the house had been kept. Overly so. In fact, so clean and tidy, it lacked personality. Something, maybe everything, was missing. No bric-à-brac cluttered the bookcases. No unpaid bills were stacked on the escritoire. No discarded clothing was thrown onto an unused chair. No remnants of the Sunday paper lay scattered on the floor. This was a house where nobody was home.
I couldn’t help asking myself what kind of man would bring a woman like Darlene Mandeville née Marbrey home to his mother’s house. But that begged a more curious question. What kind of woman would change her name to her husband’s so she could live in his mother’s house?
Then I saw something that answered much, if not all.
Exhibited at the far end of the hallway—on a pedestal table that perfectly suited the piece—sat a woodcarving. The statue had been made of an unusual wood, dark in hue, the color rich and exotic, the knotted markings unique, and the surfaces sculpted and polished with loving care. Positioned to catch the brooding, crosscutting light emanating from a nearby window, the pietà stood perhaps one foot tall and two feet in circumference. The sunbaked mother figure, accustomed to hard toil and backbreaking work, was clearly of Semitic origin, as was her tortured Son. Hacked out of grief, the statuette breathed. The piece wasn’t one of those stylized souvenirs manufactured by the thousands but a one-of-a-kind artist’s rendition, painstakingly crafted. The sculptor had poured his life into the wood, carved a masterpiece using the sweat of his brow and the skill of his hands, just as his own life must have been similarly shaped. Imperfect. Brimming with hardship. A testament of endurance.
Even the burglar must have appreciated its inspired workmanship since he le
ft the objet d’art untouched.
I paused to admire the artwork. Mrs. Byrnes came abreast of me. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”
“Are you a religious woman, Mrs. Byrnes?”
Emerging from a self-imposed reverie, she blinked. “Not particularly, no. I ran across it in Mexico. On our honeymoon. The artist was trading on piety, but I saw the sculpture as something different. I thought Dickie would like it since he wanted to be a priest as a boy. Unfortunately, he didn’t appreciate the piece the way I did. So I put it here, to remind him.”
“Of what?”
“Of why he married me.”
The master bedroom was the glaring exception to the house’s otherwise stark furnishings. My eye was drawn to frilly doodads, ruffled curtains, amethyst lampshades, hydrangea wallpaper, crystal figurines, heart-shaped pillows, and a chiffon dressing gown hanging from a hook on the closet door. Chaos reigned here, as well, but the intruder had been more careful, as if reverencing the woman who slept in the bed.
Darlene opened the closet door and switched on a light. Dick Byrnes’s garish seersuckers and bland brown tweeds lined both sides of the narrow room like carcasses hanging from hooks. Mothballs smothered any latent odors of the man, as if he had been marked for banishment long before his wife cast him out and an assassin smoked his brains.
At the far end, she produced a key. The connecting door led to a room lined with cedar shelving on four sides. The intruder failed to find this cache. Nothing had been touched. Shelves and clothes rods were stacked and packed with the noteworthy wardrobe of a woman-about-town. Sequined gowns glittered. Shoeboxes climbed to the ceiling. Mink coats and fur stoles hung from satin-padded hangers. Beaded purses twinkled in a glass case. Armatures supported hats of every color, shape, and design. Silk blouses wove a rainbow. Cashmere sweaters were neatly stacked on custom shelving. Suits twirled on racks like sales day at Saks Fifth Avenue. Floor-to-ceiling mirrors evoked an Orson Welles film, overhead lighting as bright as stagecraft, and our reflections larger than life.
The Green-Eyed Dick Page 18
