Death in the Fifth Position

by Gore Vidal

  “Stop who?”

  “The police … when you see them. I think they’re going to make an arrest.”

  “What makes you think so?”

  “First, because I’ve read the papers today. They want an arrest. And, second, because Jane is being watched by the police.”

  “I’m sure they don’t suspect her.”

  “It’s a toss-up, Mr. Washburn, between her and Eglanova.”

  He shuddered. “Don’t say that. Don’t even think it.”

  “I’m perfectly willing not to think it but some of these columnists won’t be so obliging. They’ve done everything except name names. ‘Jealous ballerina’ … that’s their line, and that could mean only one of two people.”

  “Let’s wait until we come to this bridge,” said Mr. Washburn, with the air of a man ready to fall into a river. Then he left the office.

  But I couldn’t wait. I wasn’t really worried about Jane. She was obviously innocent and if they indicted her they wouldn’t be able to convict. I was confident of that. But even if justice prevailed she would be marked all her life as the girl who had been accused of a murder. I can still remember what happened to a certain musical comedy star back in the Thirties.

  I sat at Mr. Washburn’s desk for several minutes, more worried than I’d ever been in my life. Idly, with a pencil stub, I began to write names: Eglanova, Wilbur, Alyosha, Washburn, Louis … I stopped; then I wrote Jane’s name at the bottom. I made a box around it, carefully, an elaborate doodle, like a wall protecting her. I was confident that one of those six had been responsible for the murders. But which one? I had to admit to myself that for all I cared the murderer could go free. The Suttons and Magda meant nothing to me; if someone disliked them or feared them enough to want to kill them, well, that was hardly my business. A callous way of looking at things but you must remember that I liked the suspects, most of them anyway, and I wished them no harm … I’m not a crusader or a reformer and I have no passion for justice: not the crazy way the world is now at least. Official murder, private murder … what’s the difference? Not much, except when you’re involved yourself or someone you care about is. The more I thought about it the madder I got.

  I was very grim when I wrote “Why?” at the top of the page; then, next to it, I wrote “How?” Just trying to be methodical made everything seem much better. At least it was all in front of me … like a crossword puzzle, or a double acrostic. If I could only fill in the blanks under each column I might be able to figure it out without leaving my desk … as you see, I have that happy faith in logic which only a liberal arts education can give.

  Eglanova. Why? Well, she didn’t want to retire. She knew that Mr. Washburn could not get another ballerina with her pull at the box office for at least a year … except Ella Sutton. That was motive enough for someone of Eglanova’s dedication. As for Miles and Magda, I was convinced that their deaths were connected with Ella’s, that they had been killed because they knew who the murderer was … which took care of the “Why?” of their deaths. So the only important motive was the original one: who wanted to kill Ella Sutton; who had the strongest known motive? The answer was Eglanova. When could she have done the murders? Presuming that Miles had been murdered in some mysterious way. Well, she was at the theater from dress rehearsal to performance, almost continuously. She could have cut the cable any time. And Miles? She was at the party Alma Edderdale gave and she could have left at any time, gone to his apartment and climbed the fire escape without being seen by the police. But even as I checked her in, made it possible for her to have visited Miles, I felt a certain misgiving: it was not in character. Anna Eglanova might in a rage eliminate a rival, but I could hardly see the great ballerina skulking up a fire escape in the middle of the night. Of course everything is possible. As for Magda … well, any of my six suspects could have pushed her out of that window. There was such confusion when the rehearsal broke up that someone could have followed Magda into the classroom, grabbed the purse, shoved her out the window and slipped back into the studio, all undetected.

  Sadly, I crossed out “How?” at the top of the page. It wouldn’t work, or rather it worked too well: no one had an alibi. Each time the doughty six had been in the same place at more or less the same time and all had equal opportunity to commit the murders. So, instead of “How?” I wrote a large question mark over the column next to “Why?” Here I recorded the mysteries.

  Opposite Eglanova’s name I wrote “Shears.” If she had sliced the cable, why did she leave the shears in her own dressing room? That was a problem which I left unsolved as I moved on to the next name on the list.

  Wilbur. Why? God knows. He didn’t get on with Sutton but obviously if he hated her, for some reason as yet unknown, he would hardly have come to work in the same company with her, create a whole new ballet around her. Was he jealous of her? No. He didn’t like women to begin with; nor did their love interests overlap. Professional jealousy? None that I could see. Something in the past, perhaps? Mysteries? Why did he quarrel with Ella the afternoon of the day she was killed?

  Alyosha. Why? Love for Eglanova and hatred of Ella his ex-mistress. That was clear-cut, a perfect crime of passion. He had been married to Eglanova, left her for Ella who had deserted him; then he went back to Eglanova, as official slave and acolyte, and now, seeing that Eglanova was soon to be succeeded by Sutton, he lost his head and removed Ella from this vale of tears. Mysteries? Why would he put the shears in Eglanova’s dressing room, implicating her if he’d done the murder for love of her? My head began to ache. Those god-damned shears … they made a mess of every theory. Then a new idea occurred to me. Suppose the person who had done the murder had put the shears some place else and then another villain had, for malicious reasons, put them in Eglanova’s room from which I moved them again … button button who’s got the button?

  Washburn. Why? Well, he is the most devious man alive. For all I know he may have wanted to get rid of both Sutton and Eglanova, and he saw this as a perfect way to take care of them. Among the mysteries was the fact of that letter I found from Armiger, the English ballerina. Why had Mr. Washburn wanted to engage a big star when the succession had already been arranged, when it had been all but announced that Sutton was to succeed Eglanova for the next season? And what was Mr. Washburn really up to at Miles’ apartment that night?

  Louis. Why? I could think of no reason. There was an old rumor in the company that Ella fancied him but since he was so obviously interested in the other side he could hardly have been disturbed by her love for him, presuming that glacier had ever experienced such a tender emotion. I made a note to ask Louis about Ella; it was possible that he had some unsuspected slant on her character. More and more I was convinced that her character would provide the clue to the puzzle.

  Jane? Well, despite the mysterious visit to Miles and her incriminating presence in the classroom with Magda, she had no motive. She was not in line to succeed Sutton even though she was the understudy in Eclipse. She had no professional reason for wanting Ella out of the way and after living a while with her, I was fairly sure she had no private reason as well; their private lives had never touched, as far as I knew.

  Gloomily, I studied the page, awaiting revelation. None came. The thought that my hypothesis might be wrong was chilling. I was going on the theory that X had killed Ella, that Miles had found out and was on the point of revealing X’s identity to the police when X, getting wind of this, jammed Miles’ head into that gas burner, not knowing that Miles had somehow gotten a letter or document off to Magda, his proof that X had done the murder. Then X had made a date with Magda to meet her at the studio to discuss the letter … perhaps, even to buy it from her. When she wouldn’t hand it over X had seized the purse which contained whatever it was the murderer wanted and shoved Magda through the window. That was my theory, the police’s theory, too. But suppose Miles had killed Ella and then died of a heart attack and that Y, for reasons unknown, killed Magda? Or suppose … But I made
up my mind not to think of any more difficulties. First, I would follow the obvious line; if that failed … well, it wouldn’t fail. As I look back on it now, I think my confidence in myself at that point was remarkably unjustified.

  I had reason to believe from Gleason’s behavior that morning at the inquest that he was planning to make an arrest in the next twenty-four hours … Elmer Bush had said as much in his column and he had undoubtedly got it from the horse’s ass. I looked at my watch. Three-thirty. I had less than a day in which to find the murderer.

  I spent about twenty valuable minutes on the telephone, lining up the suspects, making appointments for spurious reasons. Then I told the duo-typists that they would see me no more that day. If the press wanted news, I recommended they contact Gleason, or Elmer Bush. Miss Flynn wished me luck.

  Eglanova’s maid let me in without comment. I sometimes wonder if she knows any English. From the bathroom I heard Eglanova’s voice above a Niagara of bathwater. “Peter! I am right out in one minute!”

  The maid withdrew and, feeling like a Pinkerton man, I covered the living room and the bedroom with the speed of an Electrolux vacuum cleaner. Needless to say, I found nothing of interest. The rooms were an old-fashioned clutter of photographs and bric-a-brac and antimacassars, establishing, as her legs did not, that Eglanova was an Edwardian, a displaced person in time.

  “If I keep you waiting, I am sorry,” she said, sweeping down on me in a creation of mauve satin, her head wrapped in a towel. “I wash my hair. First, soap and water. Then gasoline. Gives marvelous luster. Even during the war I use gasoline. I tell authorities Eglanova’s hair important, too. They give me little coupon book … so nice of them. And people say Americans are barbarians!” She sat down in her usual place by the window. I sat opposite her. The inevitable hot tea and lemon was brought us.

  “You like nougat?”

  I shook my head and watched, fascinated, while she devoured two large awful-looking pieces of nougat. “From admirer,” she said, her mouth full. “He sends me nougat from Rome, Italy. Only place for nougat … and Parma violets: I eat pound of violets at one sitting once when I dance in Florence.”

  “I’ll stick to tea.”

  “You never be big and strong,” she said and took a swig of tea. Outside the sun glared, like a globe of brass in the afternoon.

  I decided the direct approach was best. “I think they’re going to arrest Jane.”

  Eglanova blinked, as though I had made a move to strike her. Unsteadily, she put her tea beside the gaily painted nougat box on a marble-topped table. “What … why you think this?”

  “She’s being watched every second by a plain-clothes man … the way they watched Miles when he was to be arrested.”

  Eglanova smiled wryly. “They watch me, too, Peter. I am no fool. I know all along they suspect me. I have engaged two lawyers … in case.”

  “Yes, they suspect you, too, but they’re making a case against Jane. Like a fool, she went to see Miles the evening he was killed, or died. She was with Magda in that classroom before Magda died.”

  “But, child, she is so safe! She had no reason to kill Sutton. She never has reason. Surely even that brute who asks questions must know this thing.”

  “I’m sure he knows it and I’m also sure that he has to arrest somebody or there’ll be trouble for him and the police department, from the papers, from the public.”

  “So they give her trial and she is innocent.”

  “In the meantime her reputation is ruined. All her life people will say: ‘Oh, yes, she was mixed up in that ballet murder.’ Because by the time the case falls flat, the real murderer will have covered his tracks and the case might never be solved and she’ll always be suspected. People will say a smart lawyer got her out of it. You know the way they talk. They always want to believe the worst.”

  “Poor little Jane.”

  “I want to stop it before we really have to say poor little Jane.”

  Eglanova laughed. “And I help you? They arrest poor Anna Eglanova instead?”

  “They would never arrest you.”

  “I am not so sure of that. Of course I did not kill this vile woman but I tell you one thing: if I did kill her I would do such good job there be no talk of murder. I know ways,” and looking like a real murderess she shut those Asiatic eyes of hers until they were like black slanting lines drawn on her white face.

  “Then who did kill her?”

  “Meaning if I did not? Ah, you are not gallant.”

  “No, I didn’t mean that.”

  “I don’t know. I think sometimes I know but I am afraid … very afraid.”

  “Think back to that night at the theater. Can’t you remember anything which might help us, you and Jane and me?”

  “I try. God how I try all time! I go to Greek church and pray something happen … that whole thing be forgotten by a miracle. But no miracle, and I remember nothing. I am in dressing room almost all time. I go for little dinner across the street. I come back. I stay in dressing room. Why I never even know where cable is until afterward. After all, I am not in ballet. I pay no attention to ballets in which I am not dancing. I had no idea I was connected with whole thing until Ivan told me about shears and how you save me embarrassment. For which I am so grateful.”

  “Then try and help now.”

  “I pray for miracle. Otherwise I can do nothing.” She had never seemed so oriental to me before … like a peasant woman in Samarkand.

  “Who do you think killed Ella?”

  She looked away, very pale. “Don’t ask me this question.”

  “But you want to help.”

  “Not like this … not to hurt people I care about.”

  “If you don’t help, Jane will be hurt … maybe you will be, too.”

  “I have good lawyers,” she mumbled, looking away, out the window at the sunlit yard, at the garbage pails gleaming dully in the light.

  “And so has Jane,” I lied. “We’ve already discussed what their strategy will be if she is indicted. They intend to incriminate you as the person with the greatest single motive.” This was wild but it had the effect I wanted.

  Her head jerked around toward me and the narrow eyes opened wide … I saw, I think for the first time, that Eglanova’s eyes were as gray as metal, as silver as steel.

  “Let them. I am not afraid.”

  “Not even of the publicity, of the months in and out of court? Because they won’t be able to convict her and they’ll indict you next and maybe they’ll be able to make the conviction stick, lawyers or no lawyers.” It is not possible for a white face to turn pale but if it were I could have seen the change right then and there … as it was her face sagged.

  “Then they find out truth,” she said at last, slowly, looking at me all the time with those silver cat’s eyes of hers.

  “And the truth?”

  “Don’t you know? Can’t you guess? It is so plain. It is why I have not slept for weeks. Why I grow sick. Why I almost fall off arabesque in Swan Lake on the last night … I am so weak … not because those terrible men throw things at stage, like I said, but because I am frightened for some person I adore!”

  “For whom?”

  “For Alyosha.”

  I said nothing for several minutes and Eglanova, as though shocked herself by the enormity of what she had said, drank tea quickly, a thin trickle of it on her chin.

  “Why did he do this?” I asked at last, softly, respectful of the panic which had brought her to make such an admission.

  “We were married,” she said at last. “For a number of years. I am bad on time. I don’t remember how many years, but a long time, in this country, after I come with Grand Saint Petersburg from Paris. Then we grow apart. He is old man and I am young woman. He is tired and I am in my prime so we part, on good terms. I have my private life but I do not marry again. Alyosha falls in love with Ella and he loves her a long time, but like an old man … a mistake I tell him but he doesn’t listen, no, he think
s he can hold this little corps de ballet girl, but of course, she sees better opportunity and marries Miles, poor stupid Miles, who is fooled by tricks as old as woman. Then she becomes great star and Alyosha hates her, worse even than Miles. And he comes to me and I comfort him … we have no bitterness, Alyosha and I. He is like a brother to me always. When Washburn tries to replace me with Sutton, Alyosha is just like a madman …”

  “And Alyosha killed Ella?”

  She nodded, not looking at me. “I think that is what happened.”

  “Do you mean to tell me that after he killed Ella he put the murder weapon in your room … to throw suspicion on you?”

  “I don’t know … I don’t know … I don’t know what happened after that … maybe he uses something else to cut with. I only tell you all this now because I have very little time, because I can dance only one two more seasons and because I have so little time I cannot be involved for many months in courts, with lawyers. I put dance ahead of Alyosha … ahead of me, child, ahead of everything. It is the big thing … and though I love Alyosha I never ask him to kill this Sutton.” She stopped abruptly and put her empty tea glass on the table with a click. “He was not wise but he is old man and very bitter. You should have seen him the way he was in Russia … yes, I am almost old myself. I remember him when he was young dancer … so handsome, such man! you have never seen such man! Women, men, children they fall in love with him, follow him in streets everywhere he goes. Then we leave Russia and go on tour and all Europe loves him. Not because he is such good dancer like Nijinski but because he is so beautiful, because he is so good … but that was a long time ago, child. We are old now.” And I saw the tears in her eyes. She did not speak to me again and so, with a murmured good-by, I left her.

  3

  I had made a date to see Jed Wilbur after rehearsal, at four-thirty. I arrived at the studio just as the place was breaking up. It looked strange seeing our dancers in their tights running in and out between plain-clothes men in double-breasted suits with snap-brim hats worn like uniform caps.