A Motive For Murder (28 page)

T.S. heard Paulette Puccinni approaching long before
he saw her. Her piercing voice rang through the stairwell of the
Dance Center building in shrill indignation, directed, he
suspected, at a cowering Jerry Vanderbilt.

“How dare you inform the police of those ill-founded
accusations?” she was screaming. “And how dare you sneak into
class late just so I can’t tell you exactly what I think of you—you
piano-playing worm.”

“Unfounded?” Jerry shouted back, his figure unseen
but his deep voice easily recognizable. “Who’s kidding who? You
know as well as I do that you’ve been selling old toe shoes and
pocketing the cash for years and blaming the corps. Now you’re
about to get caught, so you plaster warnings all around to throw
everyone off your trail.”

If the pair thought that arguing in the stairwell
afforded them privacy, they were very much mistaken. The empty
space amplified their voices for anyone within fifty yards to
hear.

“You are despicable. I ought to slug you,” Paulette
screamed in very unartistic terms. “Don’t you talk to me about
stealing. You tried to heist a piano! Wait until I tell them all
about that!”

“Go ahead. They won’t believe you. You already told
them about me and Gene and you were dead wrong,” Jerry countered
angrily. “You’re just jealous I have a friend.”

“That’s exactly right, Jerry,” Paulette shot back. “A
friend as in
one
friend. Because you and I are through!” She
burst out the exit doors at the base of the stairs, flinging them
open with such enthusiastic force that T.S. was flattened against
the concrete wall. His head reverberated with a terrific boing as
the hollow metal met his skull.

“Now see what you’ve done,” Jerry cried. “I think
you’ve killed him!”

“My God,” Paulette fluttered, rushing to T.S.’s
side.

T.S. slumped against the wall, somewhat dazed, but
coherent enough to know that he did not want this overblown,
overperfumed, and overgauzed woman fussing over him in front of
dozens of strangers. He had never met the ballet mistress up close
and was starting to wish he had kept it that way. “I’m fine,” he
groaned, holding a hand over his nose.
Was it broken?

“I’m so sorry,” she repeated over and over as a small
crowd gathered. She loosened his collar as he tried to swat her
away, and then she sat on the floor next to him and pulled his head
into her lap as if he had the vapors instead of a bloody nose.
Oblivious to most people’s desire for privacy in such matters, she
stared at T.S. with eager eyes. “Why, I recognize you now by your
hair. Such a distinguished silver mane. I’ve seen you at the ballet
with that Hubbert woman. You’re her bachelor nephew, aren’t you?
You live in a fabulous apartment on York Avenue, but you have no
one to share it with. I heard you retired early from some Wall
Street job with scads of money.” She peered at him more closely and
he could smell peppermint on her breath. “You are still her
bachelor
nephew, aren’t you?”

Dazed, he stared at her without comment, struck dumb
at hearing his entire life tumble from her lips so
unexpectedly.

“Don’t you remember me?” she asked breathlessly. “We
met across the lobby at intermission during
Giselle
last
year. At least our eyes met. I had on a midnight-blue caftan
sprinkled with silver moons and stars. Very cosmic. I felt a spark
of electricity leap between us. I know you remember.”

T.S. touched his nose and cringed. “You’ve disfigured
me,” he said.

“Why were you doing lurking behind the door?”
Paulette demanded, her sympathetic demeanor disappearing as fast as
it had arrived.

“I wasn’t lurking, I was waiting for you,” T.S. said
angrily, sitting up and glaring at the gathered crowd. He felt
something sticky on his fingers and realized his nose was bleeding.
Thank God he always carried a handkerchief. He balled it up and
tilted his head back, pressing the linen firmly over his nostrils.
He couldn’t bleed on his jacket or sweater. He had that dinner date
with Lilah.

“You are a dangerous woman,” Jerry declared from his
prime viewing spot at the head of the pack. “How many men have
fallen at your touch?”

“Get out of here before you’re next!” Paulette warned
him. The pianist took her at her word and scurried away, head held
high as if he, for one, were above this low-class fracas.

“I’m so terribly, terribly sorry,” Paulette told
T.S., her fluttery persona returning as she realized that a lobby
full of people were watching her closely. She stood and grabbed
T.S.’s free arm, jerking him upright. “Is there any permanent
damage?”

“No, no. I’m fine,” T.S. said, pulling his arm away.
But Paulette could not be dissuaded. Every time he drew free, she
clamped back on, securing herself as efficiently as a lamprey eel
to his side. In the end, he staggered out the lobby with Paulette
adhered to his side like an overblown goiter.

“I can’t walk with you hanging on me like that,” he
complained through the bloody handkerchief.

“Let me help you walk, then,” she suggested, looping
her second arm over his. His entire right side was losing feeling
thanks to her tourniquetlike support. “I’m so terribly sorry this
had to happen.” Her eyes lit up as a new thought occurred to her.
“You did say you were waiting for
me,
didn’t you?” she asked
in a teasing tone. “I thought I felt a spark between us back there.
I have quite an instinct for such things.”

A spark between them? T.S. wished there was a
blowtorch between them. He could use the breathing room.
Preoccupied with his nose, he allowed himself to be led out into
the chaos of Broadway during rush hour.

“A woman can sense these things so much better than a
man, don’t you think?” Paulette asked in a conspiratorial tone as
she pressed her body against his. The sleeve of her giant caftan
was caught in a sudden updraft and the corner lashed out, whipping
in the wind and narrowly missing his eyes.

Not content with maiming him, she was now intent
on blinding him,
he thought. The multipronged assault was
confusing. “Yes, I did come to see you,” he admitted, unaware that
this confession invited gross misinterpretation.

“You’re attracted by artistic women, aren’t you?” she
asked. “The fiery temperament is sexy, don’t you think?”

His sanity returned in a rush. He realized with
horror that Paulette thought he had romance on his mind. Panic
flooded through him and he blurted out, “Where are you taking
me?”

She stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, causing a
ten-person pileup behind her. “What do you mean, where am I taking
you? I thought you were taking me somewhere.”

“I came to talk to you about Bobby Morgan,” he
explained, still pressing the handkerchief cautiously against his
nose. He thought the bleeding had stopped.

Paulette patted his arm reassuringly. “Of course you
did,” she said. “It’s as good an excuse as any. Shall we avail
ourselves of the dancers’ lounge at the Metro? It’s only a few
blocks away and we’ll have some privacy.”

She wanted to dangle him in front of the other
members of the corps, T.S. realized with a rare flash of insight
into the female mind.
She wants to parade me as her beau, like I
was some sort of prize tuna catch.
But at the same time that he
was grasping her intent, another part of him—probably the one
genetically linked to Auntie Lil— also surmised that allowing her
to do so would mean he could get more information out of her. He
made a decision to go along.

“Sure you’re not stunned?” she asked.

He had failed to answer. Better act quickly. T.S.
stashed his handkerchief away and pulled out his personnel-manager
smile and agreed to the dancers’ lounge. At least he wouldn’t have
to watch her eat. But as they neared Lincoln Center—and Paulette
insisted on taking a tour of the plaza first—he realized his error.
Suppose Lilah happened past and saw them? The thought made his
stomach flip. Or suppose another board member recognized him and
then told Lilah? That was even more likely. He ducked his head
lower and lower, putting his nose in danger of bleeding again, as
he attempted to maintain a discreet profile. Never again, he swore
to himself. Next time he needed information, he’d leave the
flirtatious approach to others.

Mercifully, they reached the dancers’ lounge without
being seen by anyone he knew. It was a small room tucked between
two rehearsal rooms on the first floor, just off the long hallway.
Paulette plopped herself down on the worn couch and arranged her
caftan around her like she was a queen receiving homage.

“Right here, love,” she directed, patting a cushion
beside her. “This talk is probably pretty confidential. Am I
right?”

Shelley Winters in
Night of the Hunter.
That’s
who she reminded him of, T.S. decided grimly. He suppressed a gulp
and obediently perched beside her, his rump so close to the edge
that he’d tumble to the floor if he so much as sneezed.

“What is it you wanted to say?” she prompted
brightly. “Go on. You aren’t the first, you know. Others before you
have found difficulty finding the right words. I quite understand.
It’s important to express the feelings like we’re having in just
the right words.”

What in the world was she talking about?
T.S.
had to end this debacle quickly before he found himself in front of
a Las Vegas judge dressed as Elvis, exchanging I do’s with a white
lace caftan-clad Paulette.

“I understand that you and Bobby Morgan had words,”
he said quickly.

Her face fell. “Are we going to talk about that
again?” she said. “I thought I had exhausted the subject at lunch
with your aunt last week. Are you sure that’s what’s on your
mind?”

“Quite sure,” T.S. said emphatically. “I heard that
you and Bobby Morgan fought quite often over the subject of his
son’s dancing skills.”

Paulette sighed, a prolonged and dramatic offering of
breath that any martyr would have envied. “Jerry is so obvious
sometimes. I suppose he’s been blabbing to you. Of course Bobby
Morgan and I fought. His son had no talent. He didn’t when he was a
student here six years ago and he doesn’t now.”

“But you agreed to his dancing the role,” T.S.
pointed
out.          

Paulette was indignant. “I most certainly did not. No
one asked my opinion. I would never, never have agreed to Mikey
Morgan being put in that role.” Her anger was genuine. “I was
appalled at the board’s interference. Performing roles should be
awarded based on talent alone. Not politics. Not ticket sales. Not
pity. Just talent. If we are to allow other influences to
interfere, then what is ballet? Ballet should remain pure, a
living, growing entity apart from such concerns. Attach strings to
the ballet and what do you have? You have puppets!” She mimed a
marionette and the effect was not the least bit comical. She
passionately believed in her point.  “Worse than allowing
that abomination to dance was removing Fatima Jones from the role
of Clara. That child is the finest ballerina I have ever trained.
The absolute finest. I don’t care if she is green, purple, brown,
blue, or black. She should have danced that role from the
start.”

“She’s in it now,” T.S. pointed out, taken aback by
her fury.

“She most certainly is. And I have never seen a finer
Clara.”

“What did you think of Julie Perkins?” T.S.
asked.

“She’s a competent student. Perhaps the next best to
Fatima. But nowhere close. And we did not do her a favor by
thrusting the role of Clara onto her. I believe it has undermined
her confidence to an irreparable degree.”

“She is dancing badly now?” T.S. asked.

Paulette waved a hand impatiently. “Not badly. Just
with disinterest. She never had enough emotion. Now she is a robot.
She simply goes through the motions. Perhaps she is burned out. I
have seen it happen before at that young an age. She was brought
en pointe
too early, I suspect. Though not by me. I see her
massaging her feet when she thinks no one is looking. I intend to
give her a few more days and then confront her. She may be hiding
some serious physical problem. Or her problem may be
emotional.”

T.S. remembered something that Mikey Morgan’s mother,
Nikki, had revealed. “If you think Mikey Morgan is such a horrible
dancer,” T.S. asked, “why are you letting him dance as one of the
toy soldiers?”

“How do you know about that?” Paulette asked coolly,
her gaze turning suspicious for the first time.

“His mother,” T.S. explained.

The ballet mistress relaxed. “I promised her I would
keep it quiet.”

“But why?” T.S. asked.

“You wouldn’t understand,” Paulette said, smoothing
the skirt of her caftan out primly over her knees.

“Try me,” T.S. suggested

Paulette sighed again, this time wistfully. “I know
what it’s like to be a child star,” she said slowly. “It seems
incredible looking at me now, I know. But I was something of a
prodigy in my time. And I paid a heavy price. I had no friends my
own age. Not one. I deeply regret that now that I am older. I find
I don’t know how to have a friend.”

She wiped one eye and T.S. fervently hoped the memory
would not trigger a flood of tears. “When Nikki Morgan approached
me about her son, I understood his desire to be with his friends.
After all, his father had just died. So I agreed to teach him a
small toy soldier role. He handles it fine.”

“What happened to not polluting the art with outside
influences?” T.S. asked.

“Oh, who cares,” Paulette snapped back. “We’re
talking about one crummy toy soldier out of twenty, thanks to the
hordes that Raoul pours on stage each night. You call that
art?”

Her rapid lapse back into acerbic observation was
comforting to T.S. He much preferred the sarcastic version of
Paulette Puccinni to the coquettish and sentimental versions.