The Role Players (18 page)

He looked puzzled, then surprised. “A .38?” he asked.

Aha!
I thought.

“Jonathan didn't know what kind it was,” I said.

He shook his head. “My god, the police asked me if we kept a gun on the theater premises, and I told them no! I was so shaken by Rod's death I wasn't thinking straight. I'd completely forgotten there was one in the box office! I haven't seen it in years. I bought it when I first took over the Whitman, as a protection against robbery, and over time completely forgot about it. I should lock it up in the safe right away.”

“Uh, that might not be a good idea right now,” I said. “Did you know Rod was killed with a .38?”

“No! I had no idea! Surely you don't think…”

“It's highly unlikely,” I said, “but the deeper I get into this thing, the more strongly I'm inclined to believe that your intuition might have been right.
If
the box office gun was involved, I think it should be left where it is for now.”

“But we just can't leave a possible murder weapon lying around. What if whoever used it decided to use it again?”

“I don't think that's likely,” I said. “If someone from the Whitman killed Rod, they had a specific reason for doing so. I don't think anyone else is in danger. If someone did use it, he may not know how many other people were aware of it. He probably thought that by putting it back, no one would think to connect it with the killing. Otherwise, he could have just disposed of it after the shooting. Moving it now could cause more problems than just leaving it there.”

I sighed. “Of course I'm just blowing smoke on this whole thing until we can eliminate the possibility of
this
gun being
the
gun.”

“I'd imagine only the police could do that,” he said. “But do you think it would be wise to turn it over to them at this point?”

“Frankly, no,” I replied. “If it turned out it wasn't the murder weapon, we'd be wasting their time and calling unnecessary attention to the Whitman. You said they never told you the caliber of the murder weapon. As far as I know they never told anyone else, either. And if it
was
the gun that killed Rod, the police would be swarming all over the place, which I'm sure you do not need in the middle of a production.”

He shook his head firmly. “Definitely not. But there is another reason, one I'd not mentioned previously, why I really want to get this resolved one way or another,” he said.

“What might that be?”

Heaving a deep sigh, he said, “I trust you to keep this between us, but Gene and I think there might be a possibility of taking
Impartial Observer
to Broadway after its run at the Whitman. It's much too early to know for sure right now, but we both feel strongly it has the potential. With some good reviews and a solid box-office, and Gene's reputation as a playwright, it may well be feasible.”

“How long have you been considering this, if I may ask?”

“From the time I first read the script,” Tait said.

Well,
I thought,
there went Gene Morrison as a potential suspect! He wouldn't risk sabotaging his own show by killing the lead, even if Rod weren't his lover.

I pulled myself back to the moment. “Did Gene—or you—ever think about just opening it on Broadway to begin with?”

Tait shook his head. “No. That wouldn't have been practical. The costs of staging a show on Broadway are staggering. You need investors. We wanted to be sure of its feasibility first. And though Gene wrote it for Rod, not even he knew for sure that Rod could come through. Staging it at the Whitman is roughly the equivalent of out-of-town trials without the expense of moving it around from town to town. It gives us a chance to correct any problems. The play is strong on its own, and so even if Rod—or any other member of the cast, for that matter—wasn't strong enough in the part, he could be replaced by a bigger name for the Broadway run.”

I admit I was more than a little surprised. “And Gene agreed to that…the possibility of replacing Rod?”

Reenter Gene Morrison as suspect #1.

Tait smiled. “The
possibility
of replacing
any
actor, yes. Casts come and go. It's the play that lasts, if it's good. Writing
Impartial Observer
for Rod was an act of love, but Gene is also an eminently practical man.” He paused, looking at me. “So all these conjectures, speculations, ifs, and maybes aside, what do you suggest we do now?”

“I've got five more days in town, counting tomorrow,” I said. “Let me follow up on some angles I'm working on and see where they lead. Again, this may all still end up as just a wild goose chase. And if I haven't found out anything more by the time I leave and you are still considering taking the show to Broadway, I'd suggest you go to the police.”

Tait sighed. “Very well.”

We sat in silence for a moment until I broke it to ask, “So you're not aware of anyone else who might know the gun was there?”

Tait pursed his lips in thought. “Nobody, as far as I know,” he said. “When I bought it the box office staff knew about it, obviously, but none of those same people are still with us. Even though I'd forgotten about it completely, if anyone had mentioned seeing it in the interim, I'd have remembered and gotten rid of it then.”

“So nobody still with the company?” I persisted.

Tait thought another moment. “No,” he said, then reversed himself. “Oh, wait. Gene. He's the one who convinced me we should have one, and he went with me to buy it, since I didn't and don't know a cap pistol from a machine gun. I'm sure he's forgotten about it, too.”

Gene Morrison again, eh?
I thought.

“Okay,” I said, “so let's just leave it right where it is for now. I'd strongly suggest you don't even mention it to
anyone
. We don't want to risk calling any attention to the fact we even know that it's there. I'd suggest that you don't go near it, and definitely don't touch it. We don't want any more fingerprints on it than are already there, assuming whoever might have used it didn't wipe it clean before putting it back in the drawer.”

Boy, you're really reaching, aren't you, Hardesty?
my mind asked. I ignored it.

I then asked Tait about Gavin Sturgess and why he might have said the things he did, and pretending I didn't already know, I asked who Gavin was referring to as an ‘ex-criminal.'

“Gavin despises me,” he said. “Gavin despises just about everyone. It's just who he is. After he won the Tony he became insufferable. As the years passed without another hit, his ego is the only thing that keeps him going. And the best way to raise himself up in his own eyes is to put everybody else down.

“The ‘ex-criminal' he was talking about was—and I trust you not to repeat this—Joe Kenyon. Joe is one of the best lighting and soundmen in the business. He could and should be working on Broadway, but Gavin's gossip mill pretty much assured that no other company would hire him after his release. He's a great asset to the Whitman, and I certainly wasn't going to turn my back on him.”

“I understand,” I said. “Oh, and I'm curious as to who has keys to the theater?”

He thought a moment. “Me, the director, the sound manager, the stage manager, and the prop manager.”

“Does Gene Morrison have one?”

He nodded. “As a close friend and one of the original investors, yes, though I bought him…and the other investors…out some time ago. He uses it occasionally when he's in town.”

*

I asked him a few more minor questions until I saw him glancing over my shoulder. I turned to see Keith standing in the doorway.

“Are we about done here?” Tait asked me.

“I think so,” I said, and Tait nodded to Keith, who disappeared, returning a few moments later with Jonathan. As Jonathan crossed the room to join us, Keith once again left the room.

The three of us talked for a few minutes—well, okay,
Jonathan
talked, about the new orchids and how he envied Tait for having them and admired him for appreciating their beauty—until I looked at my watch and realized it was time for us to go.

Keith reappeared to show us to the door. I thanked Tait for his time and information, and Jonathan thanked Keith profusely for showing him the orchids.

I waited until the elevator doors closed behind us before turning to Jonathan and asking, “So what did you find out?”

Jonathan gave a small shrug. “Not too much, really, except I'm pretty sure Keith is in love with Tait.”

CHAPTER 7

The elevator stopped a few floors down from Tait's apartment and a blue-haired dowager got on with a Lhasa Apso in her arm. It looked very much like a well-groomed dust mop. We exchanged polite smiles and rode the rest of the way down in silence.

“He said so?” I asked Jonathan, picking up the conversation as soon as we left the building and headed for the subway stop.

Jonathan shook his head. “Not in so many words, but he didn't have to. The fact that he was really reluctant to talk about Tait at all was a clue, and when he did, well…” he paused to give me a rather odd glance, as though not quite sure whether he should bring up a still-touchy subject for him. He decided to forge ahead. “While I was hustling I got pretty good at reading people—not only what they said and how they said it, but what they
didn't
say.”

“So what
did
he say?” I asked as we stopped at the corner to wait for the light to change.

“I tried to be cool about it, and not to sound like I was prying,” he said. “But I asked him how long he'd been working for Tait, and he said six years, right after he got out of college. When I asked how he'd come to work for him, he made a goof. ‘I met him at…' he started to say, then changed it to ‘he had an ad in the paper for a personal assistant.' Betcha anything Tait picked him up in a bar.”

The light changed, and we crossed.

“Another time,” Jonathan continued, “I asked him if he had a boyfriend. He blushed and said ‘No. No time. Mr. Duncan keeps me really busy.' His answers were all really short, then he'd change the subject as soon as he could. I finally gave up, because I knew he was uncomfortable.”

I shrugged. “Well, maybe he's just really, really shy.”

Jonathan gave me a raised-eyebrow look. “You believe that?”

“No,” I admitted.

“Me, neither.”

*

We took the subway up to the Port Authority Bus Terminal, and walked over to Times Square. Jonathan was of course excited about seeing another Broadway show.

“Can we see another musical?” he asked. “I can't imagine anything could be better than
Cats,
but then that's the only musical I ever saw.”

We were passing 44th Street when Jonathan stopped me in mid-stride by grabbing my arm and pointing to the Shubert Theater. “
A Chorus Line!
” he said. “I'd love to see that! Wouldn't you?”

I grinned. “Sure, if we can get tickets.”

He propelled me down the street to the box office, which had a surprisingly short line. Well, I remembered, it had already been running for some time. When we reached the ticket window, I said, “Any chance for two tickets for tonight?”

“You're in luck,” the man behind the window said. “We had a group cancellation about ten minutes ago. I've got two of those left. Row 2 of the mezzanine. You want 'em?”

“
Yes!
” Jonathan said, causing the man to look up sharply.

He looked at Jonathan, then at me. “You're together, I assume.”

I nodded, taking out my wallet.

The man grinned, put the tickets in a small envelope, and handed them to me. “Eight o'clock curtain,” he said.

I handed the tickets to Jonathan, who opened the envelope to take the tickets out and examine them closely. “This is great!” he said, carefully replacing the tickets in the envelope, and handed it back to me.

“You can hold onto them,” I said.

A quick look of concern crossed his face. “I don't want to lose them.”

I smiled. “You won't.”

He put the envelope in his shirt pocket, taking great care to push it down to the bottom, then patting it to make sure it wouldn't jump out and get lost.

“What do you want to do now?” I asked.

He moved his hand from his shirt pocket to his stomach. “Lunch?” he asked.

“Good idea. Any preferences?”

He grinned. “Yeah!” he said. He spotted a policeman on the corner and stopped me, holding up his hand. “Just a minute,” he said. Leaving me standing there, he walked over to the cop and said something to him. The cop nodded and pointed somewhere across Broadway. Jonathan smiled, said something else to the cop, then came back to me.

“Come on!” he said.

“Where are we going?” I asked, thoroughly confused.

He grinned again. “You'll see. It's a surprise. Somewhere I've wanted to go since I read about it in
The Weekly Reader
in third grade! Come on!”

He had me. We crossed Broadway, walked to 42nd and turned west. I thought maybe we were going back to Grand Central, but we passed it and kept going to 3rd Avenue.