If I Can't Have You (40 page)

Trevor stood up, shaking Charlie’s hand. The old man studied his face, and Trevor could feel a slight tremble in Charlie’s fingers. Had he recognized him, or had age t
a
ken the strength from his hands as well as his body?

“You must be Charlie Beck,” Trevor said. “Adriana’s told me about you, and my father mentioned you a time or two. I’m Trevor Montgomery—Junior. Adriana’s husband.”

Charlie pulled his hand from Trevor’s as if he’d been shocked, and gripped his cane with both hands.

“Why don’t you sit down?” Trevor moved away from the chair where he’d been sitting, and Charlie lowered his body to the seat.

“I didn’t know Trevor had had a son,” Charlie said. He looked down at his unsteady hands, then slowly looked into Trevor’s eyes. “I didn’t know.”

“No one knew,” Adriana interrupted. “Not even me, and I thought I knew everything there was to know about Trevor Montgomery.”

Charlie was quiet a moment, deep in thought, or so it appeared. “Is your father still...” Charlie’s words faded away, but Trevor knew the question. It was the same one he’d asked Adriana about so many of his old friends.

“He died about ten years ago,” Trevor said, repeating the story he’d told Stewart.

“I’m sorry. I wish I could have seen him again. I wish...” He shook his head, sighing deeply. “It was all so long ago.”

Charlie stood again, leaned over Janet’s bed and smoothed wrinkled fingers over her cheek. “Would you mind if I take your visitors outside and show them the gardens?” he asked Janet. “I can point out all the beautiful roses you’ve planted.”

“You won’t be gone long, will you?”

“No, dearest. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

He kissed her brow, his lips lingering a long moment before he pulled the covers closer to Janet’s chin.

“Why don’t you sleep a while. I’ll be back shortly, and we’ll talk.”

“Be sure to show them the Ingrid Bergman. That was always my favorite.”

Trevor saw the love in Charlie’s face as Janet closed her eyes. Again Charlie kissed her, then holding on to his cane, walked toward the door.

“She needs her rest,” he said, turning back to Trevor and Adriana. “I hope you won’t mind going outside.
It’s rather beautiful today, and the roses are at their loveliest.”

He didn’t wait for an answer, just walked out the door, and Trevor could hear the thump of the cane and the sound of Charlie’s slow, awkward step on the hardwood floors.

Trevor took one more look at the woman lying so helpless in bed. It seemed difficult to believe she’d once been the young woman who’d acted the part of his wife, the pretty young thing who’d giggled and smiled and wanted so much for him to love her.

And it was even harder to believe she could have murdered anyone, unless she’d done it in a moment of total madness. Human nature was often mysterious. He should know. Who would have ever dreamed that Trevor Montgomery, the man whose bravado made him look strong and heroic to millions of people around the world, could have attempted suicide?

Adriana caught his attention as she circled the bed and took his hand. ‘I wish we hadn’t come,” she whispered. “I want so much to prove your innocence, b
ut I don’t think we’re going to
learn anything from Janet. I don’t even want to try.”

“You want to give up the search?”

Adriana nodded slowly. “I know you’re innocent. There’s no doubt at all in my mind. But what about you? Can you stand not knowing the truth?”

“I don’t know.” Trevor led her from the room, taking one last look at the shell of a woman he’d known a long time ago. He didn’t want to cause Janet any pain. Whether she was a murderer or not, she’d already lived through enough grief in her life.

“Why don’t we talk to Charlie,” Trevor said. “He’s been with Janet for sixty years. If she did murder Carole, maybe she’s confessed it to him.”

“He’d never tell us if she had,” Adriana noted. “He loves her too much.”

“Charlie’s our only hope of learning what happened. If he can’t help us, we’ll go home and put it all behind us.”

“Can you do that?”

“I want a life with you, Adriana. I want to forget the past and move on. As long as you’re by my side, I think I can do anything.”

“I’m so glad you’ve joined me. You’ll enjoy Janet’s roses. She’s responsible for most every plant here. Of course, she’s been here a long time,” Charlie reflected. “Come, walk along the path with me. There’s a gazebo at the far corner of the property. We can sit there and talk.”

Trevor wrapped his arm around his wife’s waist, and they followed Charlie slowly along the flower lined path.

“I’d never paid much attention to roses until I met Janet,” Charlie said. “I was just barely nineteen the first time I saw her. I don’t think I ever looked at another woman after that. She was so pretty, all that thick, wavy brown hair and those big blue eyes. I asked her out over and over, but she was in love with your dad. She had no interest in me at all.”

They stopped beside a rosebush, abundant with long-stemmed red flowers, and Charlie leaned down slowly to sniff one of the wide-open blossoms. “She planted this Mr. Lincoln the first time she stayed here at Magnolia Acres. She had two breakdowns, you know. She recovered from the first. The second, well, that was a long time ago.”

He reached into his coat pocket, took out a pair of
clippers, and snipped off a rose. “This was just a scrawny, ugly plant in 1937. I didn’t have much money, but I remembered the way her eyes always lit up when someone gave her a rose. I figured giving her an entire plant was better than one little bud. She kissed me when I gave it to her. Of course, she had no idea who I was. She thought I was the college boy she’d had a crush on in her very first movie. She still mistakes me for others at times, but I don’t mind.”

Charlie wiped a tear from his eye and started to walk again.

Trevor glanced at Adriana and saw the redness in her eyes and the pools of tears at their corners. It took all his power to keep from having to wipe tears from his eyes, too. He didn’t think anyone could love a woman the way he loved Adriana. He’d never known love like that existed. But Charlie Beck knew how to love. He hoped Janet knew how fortunate
and blessed
she was.

“Your dad used to visit her here,” Charlie continued. “No one else from the studios ever came, and she felt abandoned. Jack Warner sent her flowers once, but no one else, just Trevor, me, and her parents. She didn’t deserve that.”

Charlie stopped at another rosebush, picked off a few dead flowers, and tucked them into his coat pocket. “Did you know that she’d been asked to star alongside your dad in
One More Tomorrow?”
he asked, looking directly at Trevor.

“No.” Trevor shook his head. “I... my father never thought Carole Sinclair was right for the part of the wife,” he said, not seeing even a flicker of concern in Charlie’s eyes over the instant correction of his mistake. “My father thought they should have cast a sweeter woman.”

“They did—originally. When Carole got wind of it she went screaming to Jack Warner. I have no idea
what happened, but one of Jack’s assistants told Janet she was out of the picture. Shortly after that, she came here. She used to recite the lines to me. She would have been perfect for the part. She might have even gotten an Oscar—like your father did.”

If he had only known, Trevor thought, maybe he could have done something. He hadn’t wanted Carole to play his wife. God, if he’d just made his feelings known, maybe things would have been different. Maybe Janet wouldn’t have had that first breakdown, or the second, which had left her a permanent guest at Magnolia Acres.

Trevor looked at Charlie. The old man was studying his eyes, looking deep down, as if he could read his mind, as if he knew the truth of who Trevor really was. Then he frowned, turned away, and walked farther along the path.

“I never talk about those things with Janet. It’s all in the past. We try to remember only the good things—like the gardens.”

He stopped again. “Ah, here we are. This is Janet’s favorite. The Ingrid Bergman. She planted it twenty, maybe thirty years ago. Gardening and remembering her past—those are her favorite pastimes. She never was cut out for-the stress of Hollywood. She should have been a housewife with half a dozen children. That would have made her happier.”

“What about you, Charlie?” Adriana asked. “What would have made you happier?”

“I try not to think of what could have been. All I’ve ever wanted since I was nineteen years old was to be with Janet and make her happy.” He sighed deeply. “All my efforts haven’t been successful, but I’ve tried.”

They reached the gazebo, and Charlie labored up the two steps and sat inside on one of the benches circling the white wooden structure woven with vines of pink and yellow roses.

“I built this gazebo right after the war. I was away from Janet for a few years. She didn’t remember me at all when I came home from Europe, but one day I brought her a climber and she said she thought it would be nice to have a gazebo covered with vines. She helped me hammer and nail when she was able to, but mostly she just sat and talked to me about the roses she wanted to plant.” Charlie looked at Adriana and smiled. “We’ve planted at least one rosebush a year ever since.”

Charlie leaned over and rubbed his knees with knotted fingers, then looked across the gazebo at Trevor, who was leaning against one of the uprights, holding Adriana close.

“I suppose you’ve been told quite often that you look just like your father.”

“It’s been mentioned a time or two,” Trevor quipped. “Did you know him well?”

“I was a cub reporter with the desire to be a photographer, and hanging out at the studios and at the parties was one of my favorite pastimes. I took a lot of photos of your dad. I didn’t know him well, but he always had a friendly word for me. Some of the others snubbed me, but not Trevor Montgomery. Everyone liked him. It was hard not to.”

“The press didn’t say much of anything good about him after Carole Sinclair was killed,” Adriana said. “They said he was a murderer, even though the police never found any evidence.”

Trevor watched Charlie’s brow furrow while Adriana spoke, he listened to the depth of his sigh, and watched him hang his head and stare down at the wood plank floor.

“I always felt bad about that,” Charlie said. “Trevor didn’t deserve it.”

“You don’t think he was guilty, then?” Adriana asked.

“No, I never thought he was guilty.”

Holding on to his cane, Charlie pushed himself up from the bench and walked to the edge of the gazebo. He cupped a rose in his palm, inhaled the fragrance, then stared off toward the magnolias and deodora pines lining the property.

“I wrote several books about Trevor Montgomery,” Charlie said. “I included the best photos I had, ones that would show his charm and friendliness. I wanted people to know what he was really like.”

“I have every one of your books,” Adriana told him. “They’re some of my favorites. It’s nice that you’ve included so many photos of Janet and Mr. Montgomery’s other friends.”

“I wanted to do a book just about Janet, but the publishers weren’t interested in her story,” Charlie related sadly. “I wanted people to remember her, though. She was so beautiful. So sweet.” He turned, balancing himself on his cane. ‘I made sure there were no pictures of Carole Sinclair in my books. I could never forgive her for the things she’d done to Janet, and I wanted people to remember the good things about Trevor. There were enough books written about him that glamorized Carole and sensationalized Trevor’s part in her death.”

“My father’s been dead for a long time,” Trevor said, noting the sadness in Charlie’s eyes when Trevor said the words. “All the rumors, all the books claiming that my father killed Carole can’t hurt him any longer, but they still hurt me. He was a good man. I don’t think he killed Carole, and now I’d like to prove that he didn’t.”

“I don’t know if that’s possible. No prints were ever found. No one saw him there. No one saw anyone else there, either. The only evidence the police had against your father was that he was the one who’d taken Carole home. Your father’s guilt was mere speculation by the police and the newsmen.”

“Pretty flimsy evidence,” Trevor said sarcastically.
“If he hadn’t disappeared...” Charlie began, then stopped. He looked into Trevor’s face. “If he hadn’t disappeared, maybe someone would have come forth and confessed.”