Death Before Bedtime

by Gore Vidal

  “I think I’d like a drink,” she said, thoughtfully, rolling two and one.

  “Later. You wrote me a very whimsical note which, if I’d been quicker, I should have spotted as being vintage Ellen. You directed my attention to Rufus Hollister, knowing that I would follow the lead, that I would also pass it on to the police. You were also in possession of the papers, having the night before assaulted a plain-clothes man, looted the library and sent me, on the return visit to your room, hurtling through space, a bit of predatory behavior I find in the worst taste.”

  “I’ll have Scotch,” said Ellen.

  “You are deliberately trying to diminish my one great moment,” I said irritably.

  “Well, if this proves to be your one great moment all I can say is …”

  “Shut up. You went, the night before I got the letter, to the study and took down a copy of the Congressional Record in which you, or perhaps your father in your presence, had hidden documents which, if certain affairs came to light, would be executed, absolving the Senator of guilt. You then made a mistake. You left the copy of the Record in your bedroom where I saw it and, though I must admit I didn’t quite get the point the first time I saw it, I realized later that it could only have come from your father’s study and since you had not the faintest interest in politics and since all the papers had been cleared out of the study, this volume must, in some way then, be connected with the Hollister papers.”

  She grunted; she kept on playing, though, rolling the dice and moving her men mechanically. I continued to take mine off as I talked.

  “So, then, you had the papers and suspicion was cast, rather cleverly, on Rufus even before the Pomeroy alibi was known to either me or the police. I suggest if you had left it at that, you might have got off. I suppose you lost your head. The case against Pomeroy was due to fall apart any minute. Even though you had cast suspicion on Hollister, you weren’t satisfied that that would be enough. So, instead of letting me chase the papers you sent the papers to chase me … and, incidentally, it was that phrase which first set me moving in the right direction. Do you know why?”

  “No, and I don’t want to hear.”

  “I shall tell you anyway,” I said serenely. “Your mother, by accident, used it to me a few minutes after I had got the letter, making me think she had written the letter. Later, when I was fairly sure she had not written it, it occurred to me in a flash of purest inspiration that a paper chase was an old children’s game which she had doubtless played and which she had taught her daughter. In other words, it was a family reference so immediate as to be common to you both.”

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake!” she exploited scornfully. “I can’t bear this on an empty stomach. Get me a drink or I’ll get it myself.”

  “Not yet. But that will not be a part of the case … I just thought you might be interested in how a superior mind can proceed through semantic association to a correct deduction.” I paused for some outcry but she went on playing, scornfully. “Now the plot moves quickly. You decide Hollister must commit suicide. You toy with the idea of forcing him into it by threatening him with exposure. But this won’t work. You telephone him at the office while I am there and you make a date to meet at midnight, in his room, implying no doubt that you have the papers, knowing he is terrified they may fall into the hands of the police. You keep that date, collecting en route your mother’s pistol you used to play with as a girl, shooting targets in the backyard.”

  “I thought we were all at the Chevy Chase Club that night?”

  “All but you; from eleven-thirty to twelve-thirty you were occupied not with that muscular Marine officer but with the murder of Rufus Hollister. You took a taxi home. You slipped in that unguarded side entrance which you unwisely told me about later. You waited, no doubt in the hall, until Ledbetter stormed out of Hollister’s room and then you marched in, shot him with that remarkably quiet pistol, typed a confession at great speed, left the house by the same way you entered, hailed a cab and rejoined Langdon at the Club. Total time elapsed: one hour.”

  “Very fanciful.”

  “This afternoon I paid a visit to the taxicab company where, I am happy to say, you were identified after three hours of rather discouraging confusion.”

  Only a sharp intake of breath indicated I had scored at last.

  “Yesterday, when I had my talk with Mrs. Rhodes and announced (inaccurately you will be sad to hear) that I knew who the murderer was, you were listening in the hall. In that direct way of yours you determined that my suicide was definitely in order, the sooner the better.”

  “Prove I was in the hall.”

  “Just a bit of circumstantial evidence. I heard someone run up the stairs. A few minutes later I went up myself; I got a strong whiff of your perfume.”

  She chuckled softly. “Sherlock Holmes by a nose. I’d like to hear that in a court.”

  “You won’t, though you’ll hear other things. I am merely trying to give you an intimate view of the way my mind works. You will have to listen to so much dull evidence that I thought I would treat you to those fine little points …”

  She told me what I could do with those fine little points as I rolled doubles and took my last three men off the board. The game was over.

  “Fortunately, you will not be executed, for which I am thankful despite the heartless way you tried to murder me. You will be removed to a private institution where you will spend the remainder of your life weaving baskets and causing no end of trouble for the other inmates.”

  “What do you mean?” Her lips had tightened in a thin red line; her eyes were large and dangerously bright.

  “I mean, Ellen, that after the court consults with that middle-aged analyst of yours, Dr. Breitbach, whom you only partly conquered, you will be declared criminally insane, which you are, and committed for the rest of your unnatural days.”

  “You son of a bitch,” said Ellen Rhodes, throwing her dice in my face.

  4

  The story was all mine and I made the most of it.

  The Pomeroys returned to Talisman City, and, I assume, barring an occasional excursion on Camilla’s part into extramarital situations, lived a contented and exemplary life, manufacturing munitions.

  Verbena Pruitt, untouched by scandal, proceeded to deliver the women’s vote to a successful candidate for President for which she was rewarded with the Bureau of Fisheries and a private car and chauffeur.

  Johnson Ledbetter was allowed to take his seat in the Senate though everyone deplored the necessity of seating him for several days. But now his pronouncements on the economic structure of the nation are taken with great seriousness; he is already on the Committee of Spoils and Patronage. His nephew is employed as his private secretary while his niece draws a considerable salary as a typist in his office, a task for which she has demonstrated a remarkable skill since she lives in Talisman City, her salary being collected in absentia by the Senator.

  Mrs. Rhodes conducted herself with great dignity during the trial, which was mercifully short. No family skeletons were rattled in public and the court speedily brought in a decision that the defendant was indeed paranoiac, placing her for life in a shady institution in Maryland where she would receive the best of care.

  I did not appear in court. My testimony was handled by the prosecutor and though I should have liked the glory it was wisest, all things considered, to let it fall upon the sturdy shoulders of Lieutenant Winters whose photograph appeared in the papers many times during the week, giving him an illusion of celebrity which the passage of time, I knew, would dispel. He had had his moment, though.

  I had mine when the Globe hit the street the following afternoon with the exclusive story. We had beaten every paper in town and my intimate descriptions of the murderess at bay were very fine. The sort of thing which ordinarily would have broken Ellen up with laughter.

  Walter Langdon and I went back on the train to New York together and he allowed me to read the first draft of his study in political mu
rder. I thought it very fine and suggested he make an epic poem of it. He did not take this kindly, but I was quite serious: there hasn’t been a decent narrative poet since Byron.

  I had moments of remorse when I thought of Ellen in that insane asylum. It had been, after all, no business of mine. I would have dropped the whole thing if she hadn’t tried to kill me which, I thought, had been carrying her role as the Lucrezia Borgia of Massachusetts Avenue too far. We had been, after all, fond of each other.

  Two weeks later, just before the poodle’s recital at Town Hall, I met Mrs. Goldmountain backstage. It was the first time I had seen her since Washington, since the trial.

  She rushed up to me. She was magnificently dressed, with a diamond butterfly in her hair and gold dust sprinkled over her eyelids.

  “I couldn’t be more nervous!” she said, clutching my hands.

  “There’s no cause for alarm,” I said calmly. “We’ve got the whole show under control. I’ve been in consultation with Heigh-Ho all week. We have television cameras in the lobby to televise the celebrities, Look to take photographs, and all the news services are represented; nothing can go wrong.”

  “I hope not. Hermione has been practicing like mad these last two weeks. Oh, we can’t let her down.”

  She twisted a bit of black lace nervously between her fingers. “Alma Edderdale is here and I asked Margaret Truman especially to come. There’s to be a whole trainload of Washington people.” Photographers, newsmen, officials of Heigh-Ho pushed by us. There was a great racket. From where we stood in the wings we could see the stage and part of the house: it was nearly filled already.

  “Oh, by the way, how clever you were about the Ellen Rhodes thing. Who would have thought it? And according to everyone you worked it all out.”

  “Just luck,” I said, quietly.

  “I’m sure it was more than that. You know I went over to Maryland to see her yesterday.”

  “Who? Ellen?”

  “Certainly. I was always very fond of her. I thought I’d go and console her … nasty girl.”

  “What did she do?”

  “Do! She barked at me and pretended she was a dog!” Ellen Victrix, I thought … the ending was not so unhappy after all. I pitied the younger doctors.

  But then Hermione, wearing a black velvet bow decorated with seed pearls, was led past us. Mrs. Goldmountain gave her a parting hug.

  There was loud applause when she appeared on stage with her accompanist.

  A moment later the piano broke into one of the very grandest arias from Norma and Hermione’s voice, unearthly and loud, floated in the air.

  Her subsequent stardom in nine movies is known to all; after the ninth she lost her voice and was forced to make personal appearances until the grim reaper laid her low. Her Town Hall debut was a public relations success though artistically her press was mixed. Virgil Thomson in the Herald Tribune summed up the general view when he said that her voice was a small one and not well trained; nevertheless, despite her unreadiness, he found her stage presence utterly beguiling and her graciousness, especially during the curtain calls, remarkable.

  ALSO BY GORE VIDAL AS EDGAR BOX

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  In Death in the Fifth Position, dashing P.R. man Peter Sargeant is hired by a ballet company on the eve of a major upcoming performance. Handling the press seems to be no problem, but when a rising star in the company is killed during the performance—dropped from thirty feet above the stage, crashing to her death in a perfect fifth position—Sargeant has a real case on his hands. As he ingratiates himself with the players behind the scenes (especially one lovely ballerina), he finds that this seemingly graceful ballet company is performing their most dramatic acts behind the curtain. There are sharp rivalries, sordid affairs, and shady characters. Sargeant, though, has no trouble staying on point and proving that the ballerina killer is no match for his keen eye and raffish charm.

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  DEATH LIKES IT HOT

  In Death Likes It Hot, Peter Sargeant travels out to a posh beach community to help a wealthy socialite plan an end-of-summer party. His enjoyment of the sun, the surf, and the company of a lovely young fashion reporter is interrupted by the death of the socialite’s niece: she mysteriously drowns while swimming on a crowded beach. No one suspects murder until the police find a lethal dose of sleeping pills in her system. As Sargeant watches the police’s investigation unfold, he keeps an eye on the grieving socialite; the victim’s famous painter husband; a suspiciously cheery brother and sister; and a garrulous tabloid columnist. Now, instead of planning guest lists, wine choices, and menus, Sargeant is faced with a killer unlike any he’s ever faced: highly sophisticated, devilishly clever, and just as smooth as he is.

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  VINTAGE CRIME/BLACK LIZARD

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