Murder of the Maestro

by Anna Celeste Burke

  “That’s the truth, isn’t it?” A smile crossed Pat’s face. “I often wondered how two of the biggest egos on the planet could fit into the same room at the same time. They respected each other on a deeper level, I suppose, even when they fought it out like a couple of spoiled children.”

  “Max’s saving grace is that he recognizes talent when he sees it. And, he knows his reputation along with Marvelous Marley World’s bottom line rests on the work done by talented people. In his own way, Max deeply admired and appreciated Dave on many levels,” I said. That was kind of an understatement. I couldn’t count the number of times Max had bragged about Marvelous Marley World’s legendary maestro and his genius.

  “You’re right. Some narcissists can’t do that,” Pat added.

  “Did the conflicts between Max and Dave ever become violent?” Pat and I both turned our heads in Jack’s direction and stared at him with our mouths hanging open. “Come on, I’ve got to ask.”

  “I doubt I caught every dispute, but I witnessed several real doozies. They involved lots of yelling, foot-stomping, and door-slamming. Dave would hurl his conductor’s baton or tear up a piece of sheet music he was working on. Not the real deal, mind you, but a worthless bit of paper with scribbling on it. It was quite dramatic although they left less damage in their wake than when Dave and Marla fought it out.” Something about the squabbles between Dave and Max brought another smile to her face.

  “Their behavior was more buffoonish than vicious. They once took it out onto the lawn and faced off like a couple of old-time pugilists—that’s the term Max used at the time. ‘Let’s settle this disagreement once and for all—like men, with a good old-fashioned round of pugilism.’ Dave said sure and ran outside with Max on his heels. They circled each other with their fists pummeling the air. Just when I became concerned they might punch each other, Dave laughed and challenged Max to a duel instead! I believe that involved trying to drink each other under the table.” The image of the men squaring off on Dave’s perfectly manicured lawn made me smile. It quickly brought me back to the present when I considered the possibility that a more sinister dispute had taken place out there.

  “Would Dave’s prelude to romance have involved a walk around the grounds and a moonlit stroll along the cliffs or on the beach?”

  “Oh, yes. I’m certain that was often part of his modus operandi.” Pat dropped her eyes, leading me to wonder if there was more to her assertion than eavesdropping or hearsay. I hesitated to pry with Jack scrutinizing her every word in full-blown detective mode. Jack did not.

  “How certain?” Jack asked.

  “Quite certain. This will all come out at some point, anyway,” she said, sighing loudly and making eye contact with me. “Years ago, before I became his Personal Assistant and before he married Marla, I fell under the maestro’s spell for a short time. He wasn’t as famous as he is now, but he was handsome, talented, and ambitious. I wanted to become a singer and he encouraged me. One thing led to another. He was renting a tiny beach house back then, but already had much of his routine in place—a single red rose, a glass or two of chilled champagne, a walk on the beach, and then ‘a little night music’ as he called it. That involved a private serenade on his violin. It was terribly romantic and almost before I realized it, I was swept up in a scene played out many times since then. One leading man with many female co-stars,” Pat shrugged and sighed once again.

  “What happened?” I asked softly. I could tell by the way she clenched and unclenched her hands, reliving that part of her past with Dave Rollins was still distressing.

  “What always happened with Dave. He moved on. I moved out.”

  “Weren’t you angry?” Jack asked.

  “Yes. I was more hurt than outraged. Forewarned is forearmed, as they say. I entered the relationship telling myself every step of the way that I was headed toward a dead end. He never made promises or hid the fact that he was seeing other women. For a short time, I deluded myself into believing he’d grow out of it, or he’d come to care enough about me not to chase after other women or give in when they chased him. When one of the women he’d been courting turned up at his cottage and moved into a guest room, I got the message. I packed up and left.”

  “That was heartless!” I cried before I could stop myself. If he’d pulled that stunt on other women, there must be a line a mile long waiting for a chance to get even. How would we ever find his killer?

  “How did you end up working for him as a PA?” Jack asked with an almost incredulous tone in his voice.

  “Heartless, is right. Like I said, though, he was always straight with me. Perhaps more honest than I was since I’m not sure how much of my initial interest in Dave was tied to my professional ambitions rather than romance. After a few years in Hollywood, I came to appreciate the fact that he wasn’t a predator, and that his lack of fidelity was out in the open and above-board—at least, with me. When it became clear I wasn’t going to have a career as a singer or actress, I bumped into him again. His career had taken off and he needed someone trustworthy to support him. The job as his Personal Assistant paid very well, too. His offer beat what I was earning reviewing scripts for an agent and waiting tables.”

  “That still must have been difficult.” I wondered how many women in Pat’s circumstances could have been so forgiving. I could imagine plenty of them wanting to hurt him back!

  “I took that second spin on the merry-go-round with Dave Rollins with my eyes wide open. No more wishful thinking. No youthful delusions. I had no interest in a romance, although we became friends. A few years later, he married. As I said, his wife was wildly suspicious of every woman in his life, including me. I never asked her if Dave had told her about us.” Pat paused for a moment, then looked from me to Jack, and back to me. “Marla once told me his troubles with women were going to get him killed someday, and claimed they almost did when he was young. At the time, I figured she was being overly dramatic. What if she was right?”

  “We’ll try to figure that out,” Jack replied. “I take it Dave never discussed the old troubles with women that Marla raised?”

  “No. You’d think if he’d experience anything that serious when he was young he would have learned his lesson and changed his behavior. As much heartache as he caused the women in his life, break-ups always took a toll on him, too.” Pat teared up. “I once asked him why he didn’t just try going it alone for a while. You know what he said?”

  “I can’t even imagine,” I replied.

  “‘I find my own company distasteful.’ Wasn’t that an awful thing to say?” A tear slid down Pat’s face as she uttered that last statement. There was a tone of doleful finality that signaled to me she was about done with the questions. Jack didn’t pick up on that.

  “Does anything about his trouble with women or anyone else in his life, for that matter, come to mind as a reason someone searched the place?”

  “Money must not have been the motive since there was plenty to steal that could have been turned into quick cash. To me, the destruction seems more about rage.” Pat glanced at me with a puzzled expression on her face as if responding to a question I hadn’t asked. “I’ve known unhappy women in Dave’s life who expressed themselves by dumping a drink on him or returning some gift in shreds. Marla, even at her worst, never caused this much damage.”

  “Was that rage directed at anything in particular?” I asked.

  “There’s stuff everywhere, so it’s hard to tell. Trash cans were emptied, storage bins upended, cabinets and drawers searched, and the contents thrown around. A couple of Dave’s collectible jazz records were smashed in the process of going through them—accidently or on purpose? I don’t know. Whoever did that also tossed his notebooks and sheet music onto the ground and poured wine all over them.” I must have reacted in a visible way to the idea of Dave’s music and memorabilia being damaged or destroyed. Pat shook her head.

  “Don’t worry. I doubt anything of great value related to his career is in
the mess. Maybe that’s what this was about—hoping to destroy some treasure from his legacy. He keeps the original sheet music for his important works locked up. His Marvelous Marley World memorabilia, too, like his Oscar and other awards, vintage movie posters, concert programs and other things like that have all been moved into the company vaults. Dave donated boxes and boxes of material this past year to the Marvelous Marley World archive. Those items aren’t just valuable like his vintage jazz records. They’re priceless and most are irreplaceable.”

  “From what you’re saying, at least some of the items had to do with his career and weren’t strictly personal.” Pat paused to think about what Jack had said before speaking again.

  “Yes, that is what I’m saying, although I’m not sure how you separate the man from his music. The police haven’t given me free reign to go through the place in a systematic way, so I don’t know what all is missing or destroyed. I noticed one thing that’s not where he usually kept it.”

  “Something important?” I asked. Pat nodded, yes, but shrugged a little too. “What?” I asked urging her to tell us.

  “The drawer to his writing desk upstairs in his master suite caught my eye because it was open. That’s where he kept his checkbook day-to-day. I mentioned it to Sgt. Bardot, but it could be in another drawer or under items tossed onto the floor. Why take his checkbook and leave his Rolex and the diamond stick pin he wore to the gala last night lying there?”

  “Unless there’s something in that checkbook someone wanted to see or to hide,” I suggested.

  “I don’t deal with his finances if I don’t have to, so I could have it all wrong.”

  “Who handles money matters?” I asked.

  “His accountant, Jennifer Wainwright.”

  “I know who that is. I’ve met her, Jack. She works at the same firm as Max’s accountant.”

  “That’s how Dave found her. The police also asked me about next of kin and beneficiaries of Dave’s estate. I stayed out of those matters too. I told them to ask Jennifer. If she doesn’t have the answers, she can find out. I believe his Estate Attorney works at her firm, too.” Pat’s shoulders drooped, as if too exhausted to straighten them.

  “I’m sorry you’ve had to be on the frontlines with all of this.”

  “That’s nothing new.” She shook her head. “And, it’s not over. Max has asked me to organize a tribute in Dave’s memory. Maybe Marla or his kids will object and ask to do it instead, but I have a feeling it’ll fall to me. My last act as his PA will be to help bury him.”

  “Well, I’m sorry too about the burden placed on you,” Jack added. “I wish I could say the police are done with you, but that’s not true. You were about as close to Dave Rollins as anyone. When you get a chance, if you could jot down a list of names of the women with whom Dave had bad break-ups? Let’s start with the unhappy women in his life as we try to figure out who may have had it in for him.”

  “I will. The police sergeant who’s roaming around upstairs already asked me if he had any enemies. I don’t remember anyone, male or female, threatening to kill him. I promised to think about it. I’ll come up with as many of the women’s names as I can and maybe a light will go on about one of them or a man in their lives will come to mind.” Another sad, exhausted sigh escaped her lips. I couldn’t stand it.

  “Listen, I’ll help you with the memorial service for Dave. Carol, my Executive Assistant, can help, too. We’re both adept at dealing with the organizational challenges that might come up at Marvelous Marley World, depending on what Max is asking you to do.”

  “If you can run interference for me with Max, that would be a big help. He’s more tyrannical than Dave!”

  “Sure,” I said, although “sure” was never a word anyone could use with any real certainty when it came to “Mad” Max Marley. Narcissism was only the tip of the psychoneurotic iceberg that comprised his mercurial mind. “Let’s meet for lunch early next week and we’ll talk more about it. In the meantime, Jack and I will speak to Marla. We’ll ask her what role, if any, she or Dave’s kids want to have in planning the event. I bet you’re right that they’ll be more than happy to leave the tribute in your capable hands.”

  “If you can do that, it would be an enormous relief. I don’t relish dealing with Marla any more than with Max.”

  “Jennifer’s going to get a call, too,” I added. Jack fixed his gaze on me. “She may have names of other people we don’t want to overlook as we plan a Marvelous Marley World farewell for Dave.” Jack suppressed a smirk. I wasn’t fooling him one bit. I was as eager as he and the police were to find out if there was anything of interest in that missing checkbook and who stood to gain by Dave’s death. Pat didn’t catch any of the byplay between Jack and me. A note of relief registered in her voice as she spoke again.

  “Thanks, Georgie. That’s great, too. I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings or step on toes, but I would like to get this done quickly. Lunch on Monday or Tuesday should be fine. Maybe by then I can tell you more about what’s been stolen or destroyed around here. Odd, isn’t it, to be planning another tribute to the maestro so soon after last night’s retirement gala? That’s life, I guess.”

  “I was thinking almost the same thing.” That’s Life, an old song made famous by Frank Sinatra, ran through my mind as she uttered those words. Written about the ups and downs faced by entertainers, it resonated with the sudden change of fortunes Dave had experienced in the past twenty-four hours. Up one day and down the next is the natural order of business in the fickle fields of art, theater, and music.

  For Dave Rollins, though, there would be no comeback. Had his prelude to romance turned out to be a prelude to murder instead? Was the recipient of that red rose the one who killed him or had someone else orchestrated the sad finale to the maestro’s life? I wondered if Jack was as curious as I was about the comments Pat claimed Marla had made about the maestro’s troubles with women in his youth. It was hard to imagine anyone hanging onto revenge for decades, but maybe the key to his murder was in a secret from his past.

  4 The Good Agent

  As Jack and I said our goodbyes to Pat, we heard the doorbell ring. Raised voices followed. Jack didn’t hesitate to go toward what sounded like an altercation. I could have hung back, but I had to know what was going on, too, so I dashed after Jack to the front door. A young uniformed police officer, with a weary expression on his face and a Lost Hills logo on his shirt, was blocking the way of a well-dressed man.

  “I’m going to say it again. This is a crime scene. You can’t come in here,” the officer said, holding his arms out wide to prevent the man from gaining more ground on the inches he’d claimed of the stunning foyer. I recognized the bespectacled man with salt and pepper hair and a cleft in his chin.

  “What kind of a crime scene?” He asked, trying to peer around the officer into the house. “I’m Dave’s agent. Where is he? I heard there was trouble. People are depending on me to tell them what’s going on.” He took a step forward. Or tried to. The officer did not give ground. They were eyeball to eyeball. Then Bernie Morse glanced up and spotted me. “What’s she doing here? I have as much right to be here as she does! Georgie, tell him who I am!” That command was issued in an imperious manner.

  “Sorry, Bernie, I’m not in management around here. You need to do as the officer says.” The beleaguered officer straightened his shoulders and stood a little taller.

  I’m sure I sounded annoyed because that’s how I felt. Who did Bernie think he was? One of my least favorite aspects of working with people in the entertainment industry is a “Do you know who I am?” sense of entitlement some adopt. Maybe after a year with a detective in my life, I’d also learned a little about how hard it is to figure out what’s gone on at a crime scene even without uninvited people traipsing through it.

  Bernie wasn’t done yet. Instead of yielding, he stepped to one side as if preparing to barge in past the officer. Jack must have decided he’d had enough. Jack stepped forward a
nd stood next to the uniformed officer who must have felt emboldened now that he had backup.

  “I don’t care who you are, you can’t come in here without permission of the lead investigator, Sgt. Bardot. He’s busy upstairs, so you’ll just have to wait.”

  “Let’s step outside, Bernie, and sort this out, okay?” Jack asked, motioning for me to follow as he flashed his badge at Bernie. The agitated agent shifted from one foot to the other. A jumble of papers he was carrying slid in his arms. He struggled to reorder them and dropped what looked like a checkbook. I glimpsed the initials on it as Bernie made a move to retrieve it.

  “You’d better leave that right where it is,” I said.

  “Who suddenly put you in charge? You’re not in management around here, remember?”

  “Pat!” I hollered, rushing toward the kitchen. Pat came running and hustled after me when I did an about-face and headed back to the front door.

  “What is it?” She asked as we reached the foyer.

  “That’s what I hope you can tell us. That wouldn’t happen to be Dave’s missing checkbook, would it?” Pat leaned over and examined the object on the floor.

  “It sure looks like it. Most checkbooks are pretty much the same, but Dave had his monogrammed. See?” She pointed to gold letters I’d seen in one corner of the checkbook.

  “What are you doing with Dave’s checkbook?” I asked. Bernie gritted his teeth and grew antsy again, shuffling from one foot to the other. Then his shoulders slumped, and he stopped two-stepping. “I’m just trying to be a good agent for my client.”

  Yeah, right. The jig is up, I thought, wondering what sort of song and dance he was cooking up as Jack took charge.

  “You’re going to get your wish after all, Mr. Morse. Come on in and have a seat in the kitchen. I think we’d all be interested in hearing what you have to say in response to Georgie’s question.” Jack took Bernie by the arm and the two of them moved through the foyer and the great room, into the kitchen.