An Inconvenient Woman

by Dominick Dunne

  In the years since their marriage, Jules and Pauline had become a renowned couple in the world of wealth and power, and all earlier misgivings on the part of Pauline’s family had long been forgotten. Pauline’s sisters even took pride in their fascinating brother-in-law and entertained the Mendelsons in grand style several times each year. Jules had been a prominent background figure at all of the economic conferences under two Presidents, and, on at least two occasions, in Paris and in Toronto, had been photographed in the Presidential motorcade, in deep conversation with the Chief of State himself.

  “Ask Jules,” people would say, when matters of finance were under discussion. When Jules spoke, Pauline gave him her full attention, not only at parties when people asked him questions about the economy or the elections, but also at home, alone, with no one watching. Her ability to listen so intently to the man she loved was considered one of her most attractive traits. Only she, and not a single soul else, knew that she was sometimes able to plan the seating of a dinner party in her head at the same time. Their marriage was considered perfect. And it was, in its own way.

  Jules had not wished to go to Rose Cliveden’s lunch at the Los Angeles Country Club after Hector’s funeral. Although there would be denials if such a claim were made in print, the club, a bastion of the old wealth of the city, had never taken more than a token member from the film industry or from certain religious and racial groups. In the case of the Mendelsons, it was felt that they were “perhaps too well known,” an excuse delivered by Rose to Pauline that amused both Jules and Pauline. But it was not that he was ineligible to join the club that kept Jules from wishing to enter its white colonnaded portal after the funeral. He would have been quite welcome as a luncheon guest of Rose Cliveden. He knew, however, that there would be gossiping in every corner of the rooms, all to do with the prevalent excitement over the mysterious death of Hector Paradiso, and he did not wish to be questioned about the circumstances of the death, which, he knew for a fact, was about to be officially declared a suicide. He was abetted in his decision not to go by Pauline, who was truly grieving for her friend Hector and was afraid that the lunch, meant to be solemn, would take on a party atmosphere, as did all the events in Rose Cliveden’s life.

  Philip Quennell, accompanying Camilla, was pleased to be asked to lunch quietly with the Mendelsons at Clouds rather than attend Rose’s lunch at the club, where there would be a lot of people he did not know and endless speculation about the demise of their beloved Hector, about which he knew a great deal more than they. He was pleased to be given a tour of the art in the house by Jules himself, while they were waiting for lunch to be served. It interested Philip to watch Jules gaze on each of his pictures as if he were looking at it for the first time. For every one he had a story about its provenance, or the state of mind of the painter at the time, or the subject matter, or even the price. They stopped beneath a Bonnard of Misia Sert sitting on a sofa in a drawing room. “That’s only one of several pictures Bonnard painted of the old girl,” he said. “Baron Thyssen has one in Lugano, and one of the Annenberg sisters has one in Palm Beach, but mine is the best by far. Look at her expression. I paid eight hundred thousand dollars for that picture only three, maybe four years ago, bought it at Boothby’s at the Elias Renthal auction when he went to the slammer, and just last week I was offered fourteen million for it. Pauline hates it when I talk money in relation to the art, but you can’t help not talking about it, when the prices are continuing to skyrocket the way they are. Of course, I wouldn’t dream of selling it, or any of the other pictures for that matter, except to upgrade the collection, because I want to keep the collection together.”

  Philip nodded.

  “This conversation is, of course, off the record,” Jules continued.

  “Of course,” answered Philip.

  “You are here as a guest of my wife, and with Camilla, who is an old family friend,” Jules said, as if reminding Philip of the obligations of being a guest in such a grand household.

  “Of course,” repeated Philip, knowing that Jules was thinking of the book that he had written about Reza Bulbenkian.

  “What kind of money do you earn?” asked Jules.

  “Not enough to become seriously involved with a girl like Camilla Ebury, if that’s what your train of thought is,” replied Philip.

  Jules chuckled at having been read through. He liked Philip’s answer. Since Pauline had pointed out to him that Philip had written the book that so enraged Reza Bulbenkian, Jules had, surprisingly, taken a liking to him, even though Reza was a friend, or, at least, a business friend.

  They passed through the open doors of the library out onto an awninged terrace. A Rodin sculpture of a naked woman stood at the top of the stone steps leading down to the lawn. Beyond, on the lawn and beneath the trees, was Jules Mendelson’s sculpture garden.

  “Good God,” said Philip, looking out at the sight.

  Jules, pleased by Philip’s reaction, chuckled again. “It’s amazing how many people don’t notice this, you know, just think it’s statues in a garden. Over there is my latest, the Miró. One of the few he ever made. Exquisite, isn’t it? I’m not sure I have it placed correctly yet. I have them moved around several times until I finally decide. The Rodin here was my first piece of sculpture. Years ago it belonged to my grandfather, and then it went out of the family, and when I saw it in an auction catalog, I bought it back and started the sculpture garden with it. Then came the Henry Moores. If you’re interested, walk over behind the orange tree and look at the rear of the Maillol. It’s my favorite.”

  Philip walked behind the round and sensuous lady, amused that Jules had asked him to view the rear of her. From nearby came the sound of dogs barking and jumping against a fence.

  “That’s a fierce sound,” said Philip.

  “The watchdogs. Nothing to worry about. They’re in the kennels. They’re only let out at night to patrol the grounds,” said Jules.

  “They sound as if they would tear you apart,” said Philip.

  “They would, if you were the wrong person,” said Jules, very matter-of-factly.

  Behind them, Pauline came out onto the terrace. She had removed the hat she wore in church. “Jules, I want to borrow Philip, and Camilla wants to talk to you about Hector’s will before lunch,” she said. “She’s in the library.”

  “That means Pauline wants to show you her garden,” said Jules, smiling. As he went back up the steps to the terrace, he affectionately put his arm around Pauline’s waist. “Did you like Freddie’s eulogy?” he asked.

  “Most of it,” replied Pauline. “I could have done without flights of angels singing Hector to his rest. I didn’t believe that for a minute.”

  Both Jules and Philip laughed.

  “Scratch my back, will you, darling. I have an itch,” said Jules, pointing over his shoulder to a spot on his upper back.

  Pauline moved over to him and rubbed the area where he had pointed. “Here?” she asked.

  “No, higher. A little to the left. That’s it. Harder.”

  “Who was that girl you were talking to at the funeral, Jules?” Pauline asked, as she continued to rub.

  “What girl?” asked Jules.

  Philip, who was watching them in their marital moment, almost answered, “Flo. Flo M.” But he didn’t. He understood when to listen.

  “When you were looking for the chauffeur,” Pauline continued.

  “I don’t know, which one? I talked to a lot of people at the funeral,” answered Jules.

  “Quite pretty. Red hair. Rather vivacious, I thought,” said Pauline. “I wondered who she was.” She said “vivacious” in a way that only a very acute ear might have taken as a synonym for “common.”

  “Oh, yes, her. Some friend of Hector’s, she said she was,” said Jules. There was a vagueness about his answer, as if the person was not of sufficient consequence to spend time discussing.

  “That was a very good-looking Chanel suit she was wearing. I almost order
ed it myself,” said Pauline. She was totally unaware that the girl she was talking about was her husband’s mistress.

  Neither Jules nor Philip responded, nor did they look at each other. Jules did not know that Philip knew Flo, but Philip, ever watchful, had the beginning of the idea that Jules might be somehow connected with the expensive red Mercedes that he had seen Flo drive.

  “I don’t remember her name,” said Jules, shrugging, and went inside to Camilla.

  “I’m rather touched by Jules’s concern for Hector,” said Pauline to Philip.

  “How so?” asked Philip.

  “In the beginning, Jules couldn’t abide Hector. Jules never likes men who, as he puts it, talk about dresses, and parties, and who sat next to whom at dinner the night before, all that sort of thing, and he is absolutely intolerant of any man who doesn’t work, so poor Hector had everything going against him, as far as Jules was concerned. But Hector was an awfully good friend to me when I first moved out here. Women like me need a Hector in our lives, to tell us we’re still pretty, or look good that night, the sort of things our husbands are often too busy to remember to say.”

  Philip turned to look at Pauline. Her lovely face was momentarily sad. Seeing him look at her, she smiled and continued talking. “In time Jules, although he wouldn’t admit it, grew rather fond of Hector. The fact is, Jules really adores hearing all the gossip about everybody; he just pretends he doesn’t. Last summer, in Greece, Hector was really a godsend on the boat. He was so funny the whole time, kept us in stitches.”

  As she talked, Philip and Pauline walked across the lawn to the orangerie, which had trellised walls and espaliered trees. Through the orangerie was a cutting garden, in full bloom.

  “This is very beautiful, Pauline,” said Philip.

  “What’s a house without a garden? I always say. I brag about very few things, but I do brag about my garden and greenhouse. Look at my perennial border here. Roses, peonies, delphiniums, poppies, asters. Heavenly, isn’t it?”

  Philip nodded.

  “Come see the greenhouse, and then we’ll go back to lunch,” said Pauline. “The cook says if we’re not seated by one on the dot, the soufflé will fall. She is always full of dire predictions.”

  They walked inside. There were orchids everywhere. An older man in jeans and a sweater came up and nodded a greeting to Pauline.

  “Hi, Mrs. Mendelson,” he said.

  “This is Jarvis. My treasure. People say about me that I am the most expert of orchid growers, but it’s not true at all. It’s Jarvis who does it all, and I get all the credit. This is Philip Quennell, Jarvis.”

  The two men shook hands.

  “That’s not true for a minute, Mrs. Mendelson,” said Jarvis, smiling at Pauline. He turned to Philip. “Mrs. Mendelson knows more about orchids than anyone.”

  “Jarvis and I are perfecting a yellow phalaenopsis that we hope will startle the orchid world,” said Pauline.

  Philip nodded, but he was interested in people, not orchids.

  “You see, Jarvis,” said Pauline, laughing. “Mr. Quennell has no interest whatever in our botanical experiments.”

  Walking up the lawn to the house, Pauline turned to Philip and saw him smiling.

  “Why are you smiling?” she asked.

  “I suppose that less than one percent of the country lives the way you and Jules live, Pauline, and I’m just glad I got to look at it,” said Philip.

  “Do you think that’s true?” she asked. “Less than one percent?”

  “Certainly, I do.”

  “I never thought of that.”

  “It’s just us,” Pauline said when they entered the garden room for lunch, as if Philip might have been expecting a lunch party. It was a semicircular room, entirely enclosed in glass. “You come here by me. Camilla there. And Jules there.”

  They sat around a glass table on Regency bamboo chairs, looking out on the lawn. For a time Camilla and Pauline talked about the service: the eulogy, the music, the flowers, and the crowds of people. Dudley, the butler, passed the wine. Philip put his hand over his glass. Blondell, the maid, passed the poached salmon and cheese soufflé.

  “It amazes me that the papers have not played up this case more,” said Philip. No one replied, and he continued. “It has all the elements for front-page stuff.” Again there was no reply. “Who do you think killed Hector, Mr. Mendelson?” asked Philip.

  There was silence at the table.

  “No one killed Hector,” answered Jules, quietly. “Hector killed himself.”

  “Oh, but I don’t believe that,” said Philip, in a dismissive voice.

  Jules was a man unused to having his statements challenged, let alone doubted. “The facts are incontrovertible,” he said. There was a tightening of his neck muscles, and his voice was purposely measured. “There can be no reasonable doubt. I have checked this out with Detective McDaniels, who solved the shooting of poor Madge White’s father two years ago in the garage of her house in Bel Air. You remember that, Pauline?”

  Pauline, silent, nodded.

  “Incontrovertible.” Jules repeated the word. “It was the word Detective McDaniels himself used.” He put stress on the word detective, as if that proved his point. “Suicide, he said. And the coroner agreed, a Japanese, I’ve forgotten his name. I was there. I heard.”

  “But certainly you don’t believe that, do you, Mr. Mendelson?” asked Philip.

  Jules looked at him without answering. It was a look that Philip remembered long afterward.

  “I mean,” continued Philip, persevering, “we’ve all seen enough movies to know that a single shot in the mouth or the temple would do the trick far more effectively than five shots in the torso, not to mention the fact that it is virtually impossible for a person to shoot himself five times in the torso.”

  There was silence again. Then Jules, red in the face now, threw his napkin on the table and slid back his bamboo chair on the marble floor with such force that the action produced a screeching sound. He stood up without speaking and headed toward the hall that separated the garden room from the house. Passing through, his massive body hit against the Degas sculpture of a fourteen-year-old ballerina, her feet in the fifth position, her hands held gracefully behind her back, with the original pink satin ribbon in her hair. It toppled from the marble pedestal on which it had stood in the Mendelsons’ garden room for fourteen years.

  “Jules, the Degas!” screamed Pauline, rising.

  Turning, amazingly agile for such an enormous man, Jules reached and grabbed the head of the ballerina at almost the same instant that it hit the marble floor.

  “Oh, marvelous, Jules,” said Pauline. “Is she all right?”

  He turned the piece of sculpture over in his arms as if it were a child he had pulled from a wreck or a fire and stared at it. When they were alone together, Jules and Pauline called the young dancer Clotilde. When he spoke, he spoke very quietly. “You were right, you know, Pauline, you always wanted me to have a Lucite case made for her, and I thought it spoiled her to be encased.”

  “Is she broken, Jules?” asked Pauline.

  “Cracked,” he said.

  “Oh, Jules, how disappointing,” she said, with a concern that was less for her devalued treasure than for her husband’s concern for that treasure.

  “Well, we can love her more, I suppose,” he said. He spoke gently, in a father’s voice.

  “I’m very much afraid this is all my fault,” said Philip. “I had no idea I was making you angry, sir.”

  Jules looked at Philip and left the room without replying, carrying the sculpture with him.

  Philip looked to Camilla for confirmation of his position. She had been with him on Humming Bird Way. She had seen her uncle’s body, the blood on the walls, the shots in the mirror and on the ceiling.

  Camilla, silent until now, lowered her eyes. “Certainly if there were something awry, Philip, the coroner and the detective would not have both arrived at the conclusion they did,”
she said.

  “I don’t understand you people,” said Philip, differentiating himself from the others. His voice had become perturbed. “A man has been murdered, and a cover-up is taking place, and you are all buying it, or participating in it.”

  “You must understand, Philip,” said Camilla. “Jules believes it is for the best.”

  “But the best for whom?” persisted Philip.

  “You must not misunderstand my husband, Philip,” said Pauline. “There is no ulterior motive to what he has said. He is simply trying to protect the reputation of a great family. You heard him yourself say that the coroner said it was suicide.”

  Philip nodded his head. “There’s something wrong,” he said simply. He pushed back his chair. It was clear he was going to leave, but he had more to say. “Let me for a moment accept the theory that Hector’s death was a suicide, which, of course, I do not believe. I was there. I saw the body. I saw the number of shots. Five. The suicide of a prominent man from a distinguished family who shot himself five times is a story in itself, and yet no such story is being written. It smacks to me of cover-up.”

  “I really don’t understand why it should concern you so,” said Pauline, quietly, as she moved a spoon back and forth over her linen place mat. She was torn in the conversation, knowing Philip was right, but unwilling to counter the position of her husband.

  “I’ll tell you why,” replied Philip. “I do not believe that powerful people have the right to decide what the public should and should not know.”

  “Sometimes it’s necessary,” said Pauline.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “If it comes out, it could cause a great deal of grief.”

  “If it doesn’t come out, that means I will be party to the same concealment tactics as you, and I can’t do that.”

  Philip rose, aware that he was a guest who had overstepped a guest’s boundaries, but still unwilling to make anything less than a dignified exit. “Of course, I will leave, and I am very sorry for the trouble I have caused you, Pauline, but I have to say before I leave that the reason it is so hard for me to say that it is all right for all of you to foster this bogus story is that a killer is being allowed to walk free. Remember that. I find that unconscionable. Good-bye.”