Murder Can Ruin Your Looks (14 page)

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myself settled. You could stop by this evening, if you’d like.’’

‘‘Thanks, I’d appreciate it. Just say when and where.’’

‘‘Eight o’clock, if that’s agreeable to you. Three fifty-four East Forty-ninth Street.’’

‘‘I’ll be there.’’

I considered calling Larry Shields before heading over to the theater but decided that would give him the option of telling me he couldn’t see me that day—an option I was not willing to make available to him. So I occupied myself with some paperwork, then took a cab to the Berkeley around eleven-fifteen. Maybe I’d catch him right before a lunch break.

They were rehearsing when I got there. I looked around for Shields, but he was nowhere in sight. Then I heard a familiar voice bark some instructions at the actors. I was trying to figure out where the voice had come from when there was another bark. This time, I got a fix on the general direction. I walked toward the front of the theater, and there was Shields in the audience, seated off to the side some six or seven rows back. No wonder I hadn’t spotted him! He was slumped so far down in his chair that only about an inch or two of his head was visible over the back. I tiptoed over, then bent down and very softly said his name.

He damned near shot out of his seat. ‘‘Jesus!’’ he bel

lowed. Onstage, everything sort of froze.

‘‘I’m sorry,’’ I told him, ‘‘I didn’t mean to startle you.’’

‘‘You’re here again, huh?’’ he said, now sitting ramrodstraight. ‘‘You could scare the crap out of someone like that, you know?’’ Then, to the cast: ‘‘Okay, gang, let’s break for lunch. A half hour. And I
mean
a half hour, got it?’’ He looked up at me. (But not very far up, since Shields was almost as tall sitting down as I am when I’m standing.)

‘‘You got any news for me?’’

‘‘I wish. Look, can we talk for a few minutes?’’

‘‘Let’s go back to my office.’’

Remembering that office—and, most particularly, those tottering chairs of his—I was quick to offer an alternative.

‘‘How about if I buy you lunch instead?’’

‘‘There’s nothing I like more than having a woman spring

for a meal for me, but I don’t have much of an appetite

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lately. In fact, I haven’t even been
eating
lunch. Thanks, anyway, though.’’ He stood up. ‘‘But, hey, it’s not
all
bad; I lost almost ten pounds this past week.’’ With that, he turned around, making this pretense of letting me admire him. Then we headed backstage.

‘‘I didn’t see Lucille Collins up there,’’ I commented as we were walking.

‘‘She’s home nursing a bad cold,’’ he informed me. When we got to his office, I saw that, since my last visit, Shields had managed to accomplish the impossible: almost doubling the clutter in that incredibly cramped little space. He even had to dump a huge stack of papers from one of the two killer chairs so we’d both have room to sit down.

‘‘What did you want to see me about?’’ he asked immedi

ately after I’d perched
very
carefully
on the cleared-off chair. I had one cheek on the seat and the other sort of hanging out there in space, and Larry Shields was looking at me and trying very hard not to smile.

‘‘Why didn’t you mention that you and Meredith had broken up for a while not too long ago?’’ It was supposed to be a question, but somehow it came out sounding more like a challenge.

It put the director on the defensive. ‘‘I don’t know who fed you that garbage,’’ he countered testily, ‘‘but it’s not true.’’

‘‘I have it on good authority that—’’

‘‘I don’t care if your authority’s the pope,’’ he broke in.

‘‘Merry and I never split up.’’ A moment later, he was calmer. ‘‘Listen,’’ he said with exaggerated patience, ‘‘when we first started rehearsals, I was so wrapped up in getting the play under way that things may have cooled off a little between Merry and me. I just didn’t allow myself time for anything but my work. But it was only temporary.’’

‘‘Meredith told someone you’d broken it off because she’d done something unforgivable. She didn’t say what it was, but she did use the word
unforgivable
.’’

Shields’s forehead wrinkled up and his eyebrows came together, forming two deep lines just above his nose. But very quickly his brow cleared. ‘‘Oh, for God’s sake! I know what it was!’’ he announced. ‘‘Merry was having a little difficulty with her part in the beginning. She was great with the more dramatic demands of the role, but the part also called for her to be something of a comedienne, and Merry

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wasn’t that comfortable with comedy yet. She hadn’t done much of it, so her timing was slightly off, that’s all. I kept telling her that that’s what rehearsals are for.’’ His tone softened perceptibly. ‘‘But the thing is, Merry was . . .
is
. . . such a . . . such a damned perfectionist.’’

I hated poking away at him like this, but it
was
what I’d come here for. ‘‘I don’t quite follow you,’’ I told him.

‘‘What does that have to do with her feeling that she’d done something unforgivable?’’

‘‘You didn’t let me finish. I knew she’d be just wonderful by the time we were ready to open, but Merry was really worried about letting me down. And she told me she felt guilty because, unconsciously, she might have used our per

sonal relationship to get me to offer her the role. Which, incidentally, I gave her for only one reason: She was abso

lutely right for it. Anyway, that’s what she was talking about; it had to be,’’ Shields insisted, his eyes fastened on mine.

I must have looked skeptical. (I sure as hell
was
skeptical.)

‘‘Look, Merry has a flair for the dramatic—all actors do. What you’d maybe consider a
problem,
an actor blows up into a
catastrophe
. That’s what she was referring to—this business about our relationship influencing my professional decision. Believe me, there’s never been any trouble be

tween Merry and me.’’

Well, he certainly
sounded
convincing enough. And I had to admit it was a nice try. Still, the only thing Larry Shields made me believe that day was that he was a pretty good actor himself.

Chapter 11

I came back to the office with a crumpled sheet of paper on which Shields had reluctantly scrawled the home telephone numbers of the cast.

Lucille Collins answered the phone with what sounded like a death rattle. She was not what you’d call anxious for a visit from me. But with a little determination and a lot of nagging, I persuaded her to let me drop by her apart

ment for lunch the next day. First, however, I had to prom

ise—twice—that I’d be accompanied by a container of homemade chicken soup.

It wasn’t until after five, just as I was about to leave work, that I remembered I’d intended to call Stuart Mason that afternoon.

I should probably explain about Stuart, just so you un

derstand what’s going on. I’ll make it brief, because it’s really kind of awkward for me—discussing my sex life, I mean (even though there’s pathetically little
to
discuss, es

pecially lately). But anyway, here goes. . . .

Stuart Mason’s my accountant. He’s also my friendturned-lover-turned-back-to-friend. I’ve know him about a hundred years, since before there was even an Ed in my life. And I liked him (I’m talking platonically) from the first day he started poking his nose in my books, although in the beginning our contact was pretty much relegated to business hours. That changed soon after Ed and I got mar

ried. That’s when the four of us started having dinner to

gether pretty regularly—with the fourth party being Stuart’s beautiful wife, Lynne. Then, quite suddenly, beautiful wife Lynne took off (I have no idea where or why), and we became a threesome. Until Ed died.

It was more than a year after Ed’s death—and I won’t go into the details—when, somehow, my friendship with Stuart took on the added dimension of
physical
closeness.

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I guess it happened because we’d both suffered a loss that hurt us deeply and we were lonely and we liked and trusted each other. What I’m trying to say is that there was never a real romance or anything like that between us. Just a lot of pleasant moments shared by two very good friends. Anyhow, whatever started it, things went on that way for

a long time. But then these circumstances occurred that I’d rather not even think about, and I got to feeling guilty about the physical aspect of my relationship with Stuart. And so we reverted to being platonic friends again. Which is where we were now. Whether I liked it or not. But about the phone call . . .

Wednesday was Stuart’s birthday, and I was taking him out to dinner. We’d made our plans so long ago, though, that I thought I’d better confirm.

I was a little surprised to find him at his office. ‘‘I was
hoping
you’d still be there,’’ I said.

‘‘Are you kidding? I’ve got a long night ahead of me here. April fifteenth is practically around the corner.’’

‘‘I won’t keep you. I just wanted to be sure we’re still on for tomorrow night.’’

‘‘That’s okay, I can talk for a couple of minutes. And yes, we are
definitely
still on. Tell me, how’s everything going?’’

I screwed up my face, then realized that wouldn’t com

municate too well over the phone. ‘‘So-so,’’ I answered.

‘‘Is anything wrong?’’

Now, I don’t like to complain—not more than two or three times an hour, anyway. Besides, I’d already gotten some bolstering from Ellen just the night before. So I merely said, ‘‘No, nothing’s wrong. It’s only that I’ve taken on a new case—one that’s a real challenge. And once in a while I get a little concerned about being up to it, that’s all. I’ll tell you about it when I see you.’’ Then, in an attempt to put the topic to bed, I added lightly, ‘‘Whether you want to hear it or not.’’

‘‘I definitely
do,
’’ Stuart responded, chuckling, after which he immediately turned serious. ‘‘Look, Dez, you’re an extremely competent investigator. The way you solved those murders in your niece’s building should have proved that to you, if nothing else ever did.’’ There was the briefest pause before he tagged on, to ensure that I was sufficiently encouraged, ‘‘I have no doubt you’ll do the job this time, too; you’ll see.’’

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I was really touched. But not surprised. Stuart’s a very sensitive, caring person. It’s just too bad he’s so good-looking (and you know how I feel about
that
!); otherwise, we might have had a future together.

I gave him the address of the restaurant, which had been

highly recommended by Ellen, and told him I’d see him there on Wednesday at seven. Then we hung up, and I went downstairs to fortify myself with a sandwich for my eight o’clock meeting with Eric Foster.

I didn’t have the trouble I usually run into in getting a cab at that hour, so I arrived at Foster’s building—an older, but well-kept high-rise—ten minutes early.

Now, I, personally, am not too thrilled when people show

up at my place before they’re expected. Invariably, it’s while I’m in the middle of doing battle with this unbeliev

ably perverse hair of mine. Or when I’m trying to clean up the mess under my eyes that I seem to make more often than not when I’m applying mascara and which leaves me looking like I play outfield for the Mets. So I decided to take a nice, slow walk around the block. After all, I didn’t want to start off on the wrong foot with Foster. When I finally gave myself permission to go upstairs, it was just eight o’clock.

Eric Foster was a tall man, lean and trim, and, like his sisters, he was fair. Although at first glance he appeared to be quite young, when I looked again I noticed the sharp lines that ran from his nose to his mouth, and I saw that his light brown hair was liberally flecked with gray. I put him in his late thirties somewhere, maybe twelve or thirteen years older than the twins.

He showed me into a small, almost totally beige living room, and I sat down on this ugly modern sofa, which was obviously not built for anyone under six-foot-three. It was so deep I had to move all the way to the edge so my feet would touch the floor. Foster settled into the matching club chair opposite me, and as soon as I was through squirming around, he apologized at length for not having anything but Diet Pepsi and instant coffee to offer me. I really wouldn’t have minded the coffee, but I decided to wait until I got home so I could pair the last cup I was allotting myself that day with what I had left of the lemon souffle´. I did think he had perfectly lovely manners, though. (But then,