Soap Opera Slaughters (20 page)

“Bullshit. The lady who solved the Third Murderer problem in
Macbeth
can’t comprehend the language of a mere male?”

“Who in hell do you think you’re talking to?” Hilary tried to fix me with a steely stare, but for once couldn’t bring it off. She rose and bought a little time by fussing with the cassette, popping it out of her portable and slapping it on her desk. Lara’s attention was entirely focused on her cousin. Finally, Hilary sat back down and addressed me in a cool, flat tone of voice. “All right, just out of curiosity, what do you think you noticed between me and Lara?”

“At the time, nothing I could put a name to. Earlier, when that bitch Jess Brass showed Lara the news of Niven’s death, maybe I should’ve picked up on the effect, but I didn’t. Later on, though, at my apartment, I sensed some kind of subtext running between the two of you. Lara used my phone to talk with Florence in New York. After the call was over, Lara said Florence believed someone was trying to set herself up to take the blame for Niven falling off the roof. When you heard that, you acted absolutely stunned. Why?”

“No theories?”

“Obviously yes, and you know it, but I’d prefer you to say it.”

Hilary again looked at Lara. For the duration of a ten-second hour, no one spoke. Hilary’s fingers began to drum the arm of her chair, but she clenched her fist and dropped it to her lap. “I’m sorry, Gene, there’s nothing I can tell you.”

I sighed. “All right, then I’ll do the talking. Joanne Carpenter was not the other woman who came between Florence and Niven. It was Lara.” I turned to her to stifle the protest already on her lips. “Don’t bother with another of your performances. You’ve lost your audience.” Back to Hilary. “My guess is that your cousin dated Abel Harrison partly for the professional contacts he has on both coasts, but mainly as a convenient smoke screen for her romance with Niven. Lara was one of the few women Florence didn’t consider a threat, presumably because she was convinced that Lara was already answered for.”

“When did you come up with this notion?” Hilary asked.

“Today. Lots of little things fell into place. How Lara reacted to the news of Niven’s death. Your behavior with her at my apartment The casual things I heard Lara say that revealed she knew a hell of a lot about how Niven worked and thought. The men’s toiletries in her bathroom cabinet”

“All right Gene,” Hilary said, her lips and eyebrows both drawn down, “I guess there’s no point in pretending I don’t know what you’re talking about—”

“Hilary!
”

“Lainie, for God’s sake, he
knows.
Give the man credit for some brains, and level with him for once!” Hilary faced me. “Lainie and Ed kept their relationship quiet for fear that Florence would try to wreck Lainie’s career. But then the situation...the situation grew more complicated. Last weekend, while Lainie and I were out of town attending soap festivals, Ed promised he’d break off with Florence. Saturday, while we were on the road, he planned to meet her near the studio. Late that day, my cousin began to worry when Ed didn’t call back to say what happened. She phoned his apartment and office, but he wasn’t either place. She grew afraid he’d had a change of heart and was spending the weekend with Florence. We didn’t get any answers till that vulture showed the story to Lainie, and you saw how she almost went into shock.

“When I read about his death, I immediately suspected Florence of killing him in a jealous rage. Sunday, at your place in Philly, I acted strange because Florence asked my cousin to come see her in Brooklyn Heights. I thought she was trying to lure ‘the other woman’ into a trap. That’s why I insisted on going along, though as it turned out, that poor neurotic fool had no idea who ‘the other woman’ was. Or at least, that’s what Lainie said.” Hilary swiveled in her chair. “Why didn’t you tell me Florence suspected Joanne?”

“I didn’t see any reason to,” Lara replied. “Why mention something that isn’t true?”

Considering the source, I nearly laughed. Hilary began to berate Lara for using me to get over her grief for Niven, but for once she was off the mark, and I stopped her.

“Lara used me, all right, Hilary, but not the way you think.”

“What do you mean?”

“Look, Hilary, while you were waiting in Florence’s hallway, what do you think she was really telling Lara? The truth? Or some lie that Lara instantly saw through because she already knew Flo met Niven Saturday? I’d guess the latter, how about you?”

“Gene, what are you driving at?”

“Flo was a lousy liar, I have personal knowledge of that fact. Her story must’ve been so feeble that I suppose Lara figured it’d be seen through immediately by the police. Except that didn’t happen. That’s probably when Lara decided to go after Florence herself, with me as her principal tool.”

“That’s absolute nonsense!” Lara exclaimed.

“Is
it? Tell me this, dear Cousin Lainie—‘who could always get away with things without being caught or scolded’—do you intend to have an abortion?”

Lara stiffened.

“Well,” I said, “isn’t that what Hilary meant just now by saying the situation got ‘more complicated’? I hope you weren’t counting on me to make you an honest woman.”

Lara looked as if I’d punched her. I had to keep reminding myself what an actress she was, or I couldn’t’ve continued. I faced Hilary again. She was as pale as her cousin. “I imagine Lara planted the idea in Florence’s head of hiring me to track down evidence of Joanne’s guilt. Of course, Flo pretended my job was just to clear her of suspicion in Niven’s death, but it didn’t take long to surmise what she actually wanted me to do. Yet my real assignment—the one Lara scripted for me—was to nail Florence. To make it easier, she slipped Joanne a dose of Antabuse.”

Lara stood up. “I don’t have to stay and listen to this.”

I shrugged. “Suit yourself. But if you go, you’ll just have to wonder what else I said to Hilary.”

Lara sat down.

“Florence’s hatred for Joanne,” I resumed, “was well known at ‘Riverday’ So was her habit of going off by herself to prepare for upcoming scenes. All anyone had to do was look at a taping schedule and consult a floor plan of the day’s shooting to see that Florence could’ve been near the hospital set unobserved before Joanne got sick.”

“Gene,” Hilary said, holding up a hand for silence, “maybe you’d better not tell me anything else. Unless you’re prepared to back up what you’re saying.”

I shook my head. “I don’t have anything that’ll hold up in court. But call Joanne and ask her about the lunch she and Lara had on Monday.”

“Why?”

“Because when
I
phoned her earlier today, Joanne said she remembered how Lara steered the conversation around to the subject of illnesses. She seemed especially interested in finding out whether Joanne ever had any serious physical problems. Such as heart trouble.”

“For God’s sake,” Lara objected, “since when is personal health a taboo topic? What in hell does this prove?”

Hilary answered it “It suggests you might’ve done homework on the contraindications of Antabuse and wanted to make sure Joanne wouldn’t be in any genuine danger.”

“Hilary, you’re not starting to believe him?”

I said, “When I jumped in front of the cameras because Joanne looked ill, Lara was right behind me, urging that we take Joanne straight to Polyclinic. Manny the druggist advised the same thing on the phone. You don’t treat an Antabuse reaction solely with first aid.”

“And then,” Hilary murmured, half to herself, “there’s the matter of one Joseph T. Ames.”

“Yes.” I nodded. “Besides you and me and Micki Lipscomb, the only other person directly to hear about Tommy Franklin’s proposed ‘Bible’ was Lara—and she immediately told Florence. Franklin intimated he thought he’d come up with a way to write the part of Mother Jennett out of ‘Riverday.’ Lara must’ve figured the suspicion naturally would fall on Florence if Franklin’s pages disappeared from Ames’ desk.

“My guess is that Ames came in unexpectedly and Lara had no choice but to hit him so she wouldn’t be discovered going through his things. In a way, it was my fault. Lara heard me say the poisoning was at a stalemate, there didn’t seem to be any way to pin it either on Florence or Joanne herself. So Lara tried another ploy, one that culminated in Ames getting his head bashed.”

That was all I had to say. I waited for one or the other cousin to move or talk or do something, but neither one did, so after a long time, I got to my feet.

“I’m feeling marginally better,” I told Hilary. I’m going to splurge on a taxi to ‘the Heights’ and get my car.”

“What about Lara?”

“What about her?”

“You have no real proof she did anything to Ames or Carpenter.”

I’m aware of that, Hilary.”

“You also realize I’m going to ignore whatever you’ve said?”

“That’s your privilege.” I grasped the knob of the front door. “Or maybe your duty.”

“Gene, what about this tape? How can I give it to Lou Betterman without landing you in trouble for removing it from Florence’s apartment?”

“You can’t. Better let me have it back.”

Hilary handed me the cassette. “Maybe,” she suggested, “you can mail it to him anonymously.”

“That’s a possibility,” I agreed. “Or I might just burn the damned thing.” I turned to Lara, steeling myself against the artful vulnerability she was projecting. “Which do you suggest, ‘Cousin Lainie’?”

I left before she answered.

But as I expected, Lara caught up with me in the lobby.

“Gene,” she began, “you can’t really believe there was nothing more between us than—”

“Than what? Can you even find a name for it? Do you really want to? The only thing I believe is that you took me to bed to gain my total cooperation and trust.”

“How can you think a woman could be that calculating?” The classic feminine Innocence Wronged act, and she was very good at it “Yes, okay, I loved Ed, and I was hurting. I turned to the nearest decent and sympathetic man. If that’s what you call being used, then all right, Gene, I’m guilty. But—”

I cut her off. “But you weren’t too upset to forget you had to get up early next morning for work.”

“Wh-what”

“I doublechecked. You keep your alarm clock in your bedroom. Except for Monday night, when it was in the living room where I was bunked out. Signifying you knew that’s where you’d end up before morning.”

A few seconds while it sank in, then I started to walk away, wondering how far I’d get before—

“Gene, don’t go...
please!
”

Halfway to the front door was how far. I waited while she caught up with me.

“Yes, Lara? What now?”

“It...it doesn’t have to be over, you know.” She rested her fingers lightly on my arm. “Isn’t there anything I can do to...to make things up? Anything?”

I was tempted to call her bluff, just to see if I could shock her, but it wasn’t worth it. I shook my head. That’s when Lara finally stopped acting. Stepping backward, she brought her eyes up level with mine. I saw nothing tender in them.

“How much?” All the warmth was gone from her voice.

“You can’t buy it.”

“Then you’re going to the police?”

“That’s how little you know me,” I said, equally cold. “You’re still Hilary’s cousin.” I put the cassette into her hand. ‘I’m not about to drop the last shovelful of dirt on her—though neither of us can prevent her from reading a newspaper or catching a telecast and drawing her own conclusions about that contradictory ‘suicide note’ you stuck on the front of Florence’s aquarium.”

Lara snapped her purse shut on the cassette. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Not much you don’t. There’s no reason why Flo would’ve left two notes. The one we just listened to is exactly what she said it was, a memo to her lawyer, Willie Frost, nothing more.” I ruefully shook my head. “I really bought the whole bit, didn’t I? Dragging in Willie so Florence might get off as lightly as she could, because I thought that’d please you most. The irony must’ve infuriated you.”

She ignored the remark. “And why,” Lara asked, “would I stick up a message on the fish tank? What possible reason—”

“Come off it. You murdered Florence and you know I know it.”

“For Christ’s sake,” she snapped, “lower your voice!” She glanced nervously about to make sure no one in the lobby was listening.

“Maybe you don’t consider it murder,” I conceded. “Possibly you regard it as an execution. You might be right.” Possibly. I had grave doubts about Flo’s ability to shove Niven hard enough to kill him. Especially when there was a sharp knife nearby, the same knife I saw resting across the top of the open peanut butter jar, its blade thickly smeared with the sticky stuff. Admittedly conjecture, but something else was a fact: Lara was Jess Brass’ spy on “Riverday,” and Florence knew it. It took some wrangling to verify it, but Brass finally decided to protect herself, not her source. Lara, already annoyed that Flo might get off lightly for Niven’s death, suddenly was faced with her “friend” threatening her for bringing me into the case in the first place. If Flo divulged Lara’s secret to the producer, Lara’s career in soap opera (and possibly on TV) would be over. So after we all left Brooklyn Heights and Florence—sitting in front of her aquarium waiting for the Valium and the graceful mesmerism of the goldfish to lull her to sleep—recorded her memo to Willie, not even noticing when the tape ran out. Lara, meanwhile, affected a convenient anger at me. It enabled her to enter her building alone, wait a while, then return to Brooklyn and let herself in with her key. By then, Flo must’ve been perfectly catatonic and Lara could do what she wanted without fear of disturbing her. Of course, Lara couldn’t risk signing the fake suicide message, but then everybody on “Riverday” was aware that Flo never willingly put her name to any piece of paper.

Lara knew I knew she did it—her need to get her hands on the cassette gave it away—but she was brazening it out, anyway, now that she had the tape safely in her purse. “I wonder,” she said, “how you can possibly believe I killed Flo when you talked to her on the phone from my apartment less than an hour before we found her today?”

It’s simple forensics, Lara. If she’d really been talking to me on the phone this morning, she never would’ve been so stiff thirty or forty minutes later.
Rigor mortis
sets in pretty fast during hot weather, but the degree of its progress was suspicious, to say the least. On top of that, Flo’s skin had a waxy, pallid appearance. Conclusion, lividity was already far advanced That’s the pooling of a dead body’s blood at the lowest level gravity can draw it The process tends to take a lot longer than half an hour.