The Fourth Wall (35 page)

“Abby, what's this all about?” he said as he walked toward me. “Why did you want me to meet you all the way out here?”

“I have to talk to you, Hugh. I wanted to meet in … in an open place.” Uncertainty, a touch of fear—Ian had coached me carefully on the delivery of this line.

Hugh looked at me oddly. “Well, I'm beat. Let's sit down, at least. Over there.” He pointed to an old Fiat Spider with its top down. Hugh took the driver's seat while I slid in the other side, trying not to read any symbolism into our relative positions.

We'd prepared a story; I took the plunge. “A friend of mine arrived from California yesterday. I met her at Kennedy Airport—it was that American Airlines flight that gets in around four-thirty. I saw you, Hugh. You were among the passengers getting off that plane.”

His eyes narrowed, but he said nothing.

“You were wearing a false mustache and glasses, but it was you. And you told Ian you hadn't been in California for twenty years.”

He wasn't ready to commit himself yet, either to denial or admission.

“But that's not true,” I persisted. “You were in California yesterday morning—at the time Loren's house was burned down.”

“Loren's house—you mean Loren Keith? Burned down?” So he'd decided on denial. “I didn't know—Abby, you don't think
I
had anything to do with that, do you?”

“I want you to tell me you didn't.”

His jaw worked in amazement—and then he drew back from me, his face a mixture of hurt and anger. I watched his chest move up and down as he took deeper and deeper breaths. When he spoke, he wasn't looking at me. “You really think I could do a thing like that, Abby? Is that what you really think of me?”

I almost apologized. Either this man was the most convincing liar in the world or I had him all wrong. “I saw you at the airport,” I insisted. “Why did you lie to Ian? Why were you in California?”

He stared at me with such dislike that I began to squirm under his scrutiny. “Abby, all I can tell you is that you are mistaken. You did
not
see me at the airport yesterday morning because I wasn't there. Nor was I in California.” Up to now he'd been speaking in a tight, controlled voice. But then—without warning—he blew up. “Goddammit! Who the hell do you think you are! Accusing me!
Me!
Because that's what you're doing, you, you—you're accusing me of being the one who, who set fire to, who … Do you think I bombed Cavanaugh's house? Or put acid in the cold cream? Abby—
do you think I killed Rosemary?
”

His anger was so strong my resolution almost wilted. What if we did have him wrong? But we'd expected him to deny it.

Time for the second volley. “There's something else,” I said. “I know you're homosexual.”

He looked as if I'd spit in his face. But he recovered fast: he reached out and grabbed one of my breasts, roughly. “Shall I show you how homosexual I am?”

I knocked his hand away. “I'm sure you can swing both ways when you have to. All that fawning over Rosemary—that was just an act, wasn't it? You didn't care for her at all—she was just something you could use. Hugh, I think you were Michael Crown's lover.”

For a moment I thought he was going to hit me. But he calmed down and let some time pass. Then he said, in that too-reasonable voice one adopts when speaking to someone who's not quite rational, “Abby, we're all under stress. That's the only excuse I can make for you. Maybe someday I'll be able to forgive you for this. But you're wrong, dead wrong. I was not in California yesterday morning, I am not homosexual—”

“I know about Tony Fisher.”

He turned ghost-white—and that I
knew
wasn't an act. A jet whined by, an abrasive intrusion into a suddenly quiet world. “Who's Tony Fisher?” Hugh said automatically.

“Oh, Hugh, why do you keep lying? I know about the apartment on West End Avenue, I know you lied about your name. Tony Fisher may never have heard of Hugh Odell, but he knows
you
. He knows an insurance adjuster named Bill MacNeal.”

The anger and resentment suddenly drained out of Hugh, as if someone had pulled a plug. The tension was gone from his body as he turned his head, casually gazing around the parking lot like a bored tourist tired of looking at the scenery. He actually chuckled as he fished but an inhaler and used it. “My, you've been a busy little bitch, haven't you? What else do you know? I can just see you sneaking around, spying, nosing into matters that don't concern you. Is that how you get material for your plays? What else do you know?”

“I know you've killed eight people,” I said leadenly.

“Really? I make it only seven. How do you get eight?”

“Only
seven? Oh, I beg your pardon,” I said sarcastically. “I count eight. Jake Steiner, Ian Cavanaugh's wife and daughter, the guard Ian had hired, the old woman who lived next door to them, Rosemary, Preston Scott, and Alfred Heath.”

“Ah, that's where you got off. I didn't kill Alfred Heath.”

“You didn't?”

“Scott, yes. Ask me how. Excess potassium, that's how. Can't be traced because there's already potassium in the body. Good, hah? But Heath died in a traffic accident. I had nothing to do with it. But it was Heath's death that made me rethink my plan.”

“What do you mean?” I knew what he meant.

“I mean, you stupid woman, that originally I'd set out to kill you all, all you murderers on the governing committee. Remember that year I was in Switzerland? I spent that whole year thinking, deciding to get even with you for what you did. You waited until I was out of town and then you called Michael in and—”

“Hugh, no one knew you were lovers, how could—”

“But it wasn't right,” he went on, unhearing. “Preston Scott never knew he was being punished. But I was so keyed up about pulling off a successful murder that I didn't realize it at the time. Then I heard Heath was killed in a traffic accident. I felt let down. Disappointed. I should have been elated—but it wasn't right, something was missing. I had to make you understand. I wanted to
see
you hurting.”

“So you married Rosemary just to provide yourself with a victim. To cover yourself.”

He leaned toward me and spoke intensely. “Abby, you've always underestimated me as an actor. Everyone has. Well, if you'd looked more closely you'd have seen how good an actor I am. I went on working and holding it in—and not one of you ever suspected how I hated you!”

I didn't know what to say.

“As for Rosemary,” he smirked, “you watched me giving the greatest performance of my life—
and you didn't even know I was acting!
That role of doting husband ran for one solid year and I was
on
all the time. Twenty-four hours a day! A year of living with stinking female smells and acting like a love-sick fool every time somebody looked at me. I hadn't planned to kill that bitch so early in the game, you know. But it got to the point where I just couldn't spend one more night with her. So I killed her. The stupid stinking bitch never suspected a thing.”

Hugh laughed when he saw he had shaken me; I'd never encountered sexual hatred that strong before.

“And afterwards,” he went on, “do you remember how much weight I lost afterwards? Grieving for my lost love.” His nostrils widened in distaste. “I practically lived on vitamin pills, almost no food at all. How's that for discipline? Do you have any idea of the kind of self-control that took?” He snorted contemptuously. “Of course you don't. You'll never understand.”

“California,” I said faintly. “Loren. Asthma.”

“Filter mask,” Hugh said. “I can go three or four days with one of those. Gave me the idea for the ski mask, as a matter of fact. A mask masking a mask. The ski mask worked so well in California that I used it again in the steam bath.” He laughed loudly. “You should have seen John Reddick! He was
crying!
Just like some spoiled little brat losing his favorite toy. Crying like a baby.” Hugh laughed again. “He should have come out years ago.”

“Oh, Hugh,” I said, shaking my head. “The cold cream. Was that meant for Ian?”

“Of course it was,” he snapped, jerking his head in disgust. “Pretty Boy couldn't act his way out of a paper bag, but he got the lead in
Foxfire
because of that face and I had to support him.
I
had to support
him
!” His face darkened. “Even Michael thought he was bee-you-ti-ful. That time Cavanaugh acted in Michael's play—all Michael could talk about was how graceful Cavanaugh was, how handsome. Finally I had to tell him I never wanted to hear the name of Ian Cavanaugh again. But it worked out all right. It put her out of action—she was next anyway.”

It took me a second to realize he'd switched back to the cold cream, that “she” was Sylvia Markey.

Hugh turned his dark gaze back on me. “I wasn't finished with you, Abby, you know that? You're the one who started it all. If you'd just kept your big mouth shut about that play, nothing would have happened. But no, you had to go running to the governing committee screaming
plagiarism!
Don't tell me
you
never borrowed from another playwright. All writers are thieves, you all are. Well, do you know something? I was going to see to it that you never had another successful production again. I was going to bomb every theater that dared put on one of your plays. How long do you think Gene Ramsay would stick by you when
that
started to happen? Hah?”

I was feeling dizzy. I wanted to put my head down but there wasn't room in the cramped little Fiat.

“That little mess I made in your place—that was just a taste of things to come.” He grinned and used the inhaler again. “Your place was a challenge, I'll give you that. Wrecking the
Foxfire
set was child's play compared to Abigail James's books and papers. You missed your calling, Abby. You should never have become a writer. You have the soul of a librarian.”

He smiled. “And you were so concerned about me! So solicitous. You remember giving me your sandwich right before the final performance of
Foxfire?
I had you all fooled, every one of you. Poor Leo Gunn.” Again, that snort of contempt. “I could tell you some things about poor Leo Gunn that would curl your ears. Leo Gunn's not the saint you like to think he is.

“You know what you did, Abby? You closed your own play. I was going to let it run a little longer, a few weeks, maybe a month. But then you gave me that little pep talk about how we shouldn't let ourselves be made to feel guilty, how we should all
resist
. You needed a lesson, Abby. So I pushed the button. Closed the play and got Cavanaugh at the same time. You've nobody to blame for that but yourself, bitch.”

There was something I had to say. “Hugh, do you realize you've said almost nothing about Michael Crown? He's supposed to be the reason you're doing all this, isn't he? But you've barely mentioned him. Do you see what's happened to you? You've found out you can destroy people's lives and get away with it—
and it's made you a king!
Don't you see what's happened?”

He laughed in my face. “Oh, yes, you do love those big moral questions, don't you, bitch? But only in the abstract—mustn't look into particulars too closely.” He spoke slowly and deliberately. “You were quick enough to jump into bed with Ian Cavanaugh once I'd got rid of his wife for you. You're no different from those silly housewives at matinees who fantasize over Cavanaugh and go home leaving the theater seats wet. And you judge
me?
Look in the mirror, bitch. You're dirtier than I am.”

The sheer ugliness of what he was saying beat me down. What answer could I possibly make? What point was there in arguing with a man who saw my sleeping with Ian as worse than murdering seven people? “You're scum, Hugh,” I finally said. “You're not even human any more. You've abdicated your humanity. What happens to you now, you've earned it.”

“Is something going to happen to me?” he asked, feigning alarm. “Oh, do tell me about it. You're going to rush off and tell the police, right?” He reached out and placed a hand casually on my arm. “Abby, dear, you don't think you're going to walk away from here, do you?”

“Ian knows,” I said quickly.

“Sure he does,” Hugh grinned crookedly. “And he let you come all the way up here by yourself. Sure.”

“No,” I said softly, “he didn't.”

We both heard the car door open. We both heard two sets of footsteps approach the Fiat, taking their time. But neither Hugh nor I turned our heads to look. I watched Hugh closely as it sank in on him that this time—
this
time, somebody else was running the show. The muscles in his face grew slack and his eyes slipped out of focus. Spittle appeared in the corners of his mouth as fear made him salivate. That look on his face was something I'll remember the rest of my life. I have never known anything more gratifying.

Ian and Leo were standing by the Fiat. “It's over, Odell,” said Ian. “We've got it all on tape.”

“On tape?” Hugh whispered.

I lifted my lapel and showed him the microphone.

Leo tapped him on the shoulder with his metal claw. “Get out.”

They put Hugh between them in the back seat of our rented Chrysler. I was to drive, but I had to lean against the front fender for a minute to pull myself together.

Leo got out of the car and came up to put an arm around me. “You mustn't let yourself listen to him,” he said. “He said some ugly things. But he's warped, Abby. He's twisted himself out of shape. And he says twisted things.”

“I know.”

“You just can't listen to it. Any of it. Put it out of your mind.”

I gave Leo a quick hug and we both got into the car. Ian leaned forward and touched my neck. “Are you all right?”