Murder at Ford's Theatre (4 page)

FOUR

K
LAYMAN AND
J
OHNSON DROVE
to Dupont Circle, where Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire Avenues intersected, and parked on Eighteenth and N, a few blocks from the circle itself. Klayman knew the area well. When not on duty, he enjoyed browsing the galleries and cafés, especially Kramerbooks & Afterwords, where he would sip strong coffee and eat small but intensely rich pastries while browsing possible selections in the bookstore portion of this funky Washington landmark.

O
NE MORNING,
not long after they’d paired up and while cruising in the Dupont Circle area, Klayman told his partner he’d spent the previous night in that same neighborhood with a friend.

“A buddy?” Johnson asked.

“Uh-huh.”

“What’d you do? Where’d you go?”

“We went to the movies and had dinner.”

They passed a movie theatre catering to gay men. “You go there last night?” Johnson asked, his voice forced-casual, his attention out the window.

“I’m not gay, Mo.”

Johnson turned and faced him. “Hey, man, I wasn’t suggesting you were. It’s just that—”

“Just that
what
?”

“Well, I mean, you’re single and you don’t seem to—I don’t know, don’t seem that interested in women, and this is where
they
hang out and—”

Klayman pulled to the curb and stopped. “Mo,” he said, “I am not gay. But if I were, it wouldn’t be any of your business.”

“No offense, man,” Johnson said, holding up his hands and laughing. “Just clearing the air, that’s all. Wouldn’t mean a damn thing to me if you were—one a’ them. Live and let live, I say.”

“That’s what I say, too,” Klayman said.

“What people do in their bedrooms is their business.”

“Let’s drop it, okay?”

“Okay, my man. It-is-dropped.”

The subject hadn’t been brought up again, although Klayman wondered whether Johnson still harbored those thoughts, and if it would, in fact, matter to him. If Johnson did think Klayman was gay, as well as young, white, and Jewish, it would severely test his partner’s open-mindedness.

Johnson was married—happily it seemed—to Etta, a tall, handsome woman with strong features and a glint in her wide brown eyes, and an edge to her laugh that said she’d seen it all and wasn’t surprised by anything. They had three sons—young adults a year apart, each as big and strong as their father. Klayman had been a guest at a few Johnson family gatherings, backyard barbecues, the funeral when Johnson’s father died, impromptu late dinners when they’d come off a case and Etta had insisted Klayman have something to eat before returning home.

Once, after repeated urging, Klayman brought a young woman he was seeing to a cookout at Mo and Etta’s house. It wasn’t a serious relationship—Klayman and Maryjane had met at Kramerbooks & Afterwords and forged what was basically a platonic relationship based upon mutual love of certain books—although they had made love on occasion; “We’re friends
and
lovers,” Maryjane had liked to say. After they’d left the party, Klayman suffered guilt at why he’d brought her. It was to show his partner that he was quite comfortable around women, thank you, and you needn’t question my sexual orientation.

Klayman and Maryjane stopped seeing each other shortly after that. She started dating a young, black attorney from the Department of Agriculture and told Klayman it was “a physical thing.” He didn’t argue, nor was he hurt. She’d lately been talking about the need to marry and to start a family—the biological clock and all, fulfillment as a woman—which had bothered Klayman. Marriage was not in his current plans.

“T
HIS IS IT,
”
Johnson said, pointing to a three-storey town house on N Street. A tiny patch of English-style garden was neatly tended, bordered by a low, black wrought-iron fence. A keyhole portico covered the front door; the sun brought stained glass in the door to life.

A young, preppy woman, with silver streaked into her blond hair, wearing a pink sweatshirt and tan Bermuda shorts, answered their knock.

“Detectives from the First District,” Klayman said, displaying his badge.

“Has something happened to Mark?” the woman asked.

“I don’t think so, ma’am. It’s about Ms. Zarinski.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I’m afraid she’s dead,” Johnson said, lowering his voice beyond its usual depth. “A murder victim.”

“Oh, my God. This city is—”

“You didn’t know?” Klayman asked. “It’s been on the news.”

“I don’t watch TV during the day. When was she killed?”

“May we come in?” Klayman asked. “This is where she lived, isn’t it?”

“Yes. She rents from Mark and me. I . . .”

Klayman and Johnson waited patiently until she realized she hadn’t responded to their request.

“Of course, please. You’ll have to excuse the mess. Our housekeeper called in sick—she’s been doing that a lot lately, and I really wonder about her—and I haven’t had time to neaten up.”

“Don’t worry about that,” said Johnson as they followed her into a foyer dominated by yellow and blue tile on the floor and walls, and into a living room to their left.

“Ms. Zarinski rented a room from you?” Klayman asked.

“No, not a room. An apartment. Upstairs. The third floor. We have the first and second.”

Klayman turned his head left and right. “She used this same front entrance?”

“No. There’s a staircase outside, at the rear of the house. We had it installed to accommodate a tenant.”

“She’s your only tenant?”

“Yes.” Laura Rosner sat in a tan leather director’s chair and exhaled loudly. “My God, who killed her?”

“When did you last see her, ma’am?”

“Last night, I think.” She screwed up her thin face in deliberate thought. “Yes, it was last night. Mark and I were cooking out in the yard. We asked her to eat with us, but she said she had a date.” A slow shake of her pretty head. “Nadia always seemed to have a date.”

“She saw lots of men?” Klayman asked.

“You met them?” asked Johnson.

“Just one or two.”

“Names?”

“Jim, or John. I don’t know. They were a little weird.”

“Weird?” Johnson repeated.

“Theatrical-type people. You know.”

“Last night,” Klayman said. “Any idea where she was going to meet her date?”

“No. No idea. She worked for Senator Lerner. I wonder.”

The detectives looked quizzically at her.

“There were those rumors. She was very sexy. Sort of liked to flaunt it. She didn’t dress like an intern in a senator’s office.”

“How would that be, ma’am?” Klayman asked.

“Conservative. She didn’t dress conservatively.”

“She pay her rent on time?” Johnson asked. “Was she a good tenant?”

“Her father paid her rent. The check arrived from Florida right on time every month. A good tenant? She was all right, I guess, although Mark and I didn’t appreciate how many times her male friends slept over. Not that we’re prudes or anything. How can you be in this day and age? We just thought it was—well, you know, inappropriate.”

They spent another ten minutes in the living room before asking to see Nadia’s apartment on the third floor, and followed her up the outside staircase. Their initial impression was that Nadia Zarinski wasn’t into neatness, and her landlady mirrored their reaction with a sour expression. A pile of dishes with baked-on food sat in the sink. The white tile floor had spots where food or liquid had fallen and hadn’t been wiped up. Johnson opened the refrigerator. There was little in it: milk with an expired sell-by date, two slices of pizza in Baggies, lemons and limes on their last legs, half a loaf of bread, and a bottle of vodka with enough left in it for two, maybe three, short drinks.

Clothing was strewn everywhere, over the back of a chair in the kitchen, on a couch and chair in the small living room, and on the bed and floor of the bedroom. A peek in dresser drawers showed little regard for folding underwear or sweaters. The top of the dresser was covered with outdated fashion magazines and issues of
People, Cosmopolitan,
and
Washingtonian.

Klayman sat at a desk in a corner of the bedroom and moved papers around, glancing at each before going on to the next. He opened a drawer. In it were Playbills from Ford’s Theatre; bills from department and smaller clothing stores; pens, pencils, and scraps of paper with what appeared to be phone numbers on them, but no names. A search of other drawers failed to come up with the address book he was looking for. At the bottom and to the rear of the last drawer was a jewelry box covered in powder-blue satin. Johnson stood over Klayman as he opened it.

“My, my,” Johnson said as an array of expensive-looking jewelry was displayed. Klayman pulled a jewel-encrusted ladies’ Rolex from the box and held it up for Johnson and Mrs. Rosner to see. She ignored it and leaned closer to see the other jewelry in the box: rings, bracelets, and necklaces, their stones gleaming in the light from the desk lamp.

“Nice collection of trinkets,” said Johnson. “You ever see her wear any of this stuff?” he asked Laura Rosner.

She shook her head. “Never,” she said.

Klayman replaced the box in the drawer, and they moved to the bathroom, the most orderly room in the apartment.

“She sure loved perfume and soap,” Johnson muttered, surveying a row of at least fifteen bottles of perfume, and a large wicker basket filled with wrapped bars of scented soaps. He touched a towel hanging from a bar inside the shower. “Dry,” he said. To Mrs. Rosner: “You see her this morning?”

“No. I’m sorry about the mess in here. If I’d known you were coming I’d—”

“Glad you didn’t,” said Klayman.

“Will this be a crime scene, with yellow tape and all?” she asked. “I wouldn’t want the neighbors to be upset.”

“No, ma’am. No crime’s been committed here, but we will want to spend more time going through her things. No one’s to come in here except police. All right?”

“Yes.”

Klayman placed a call to headquarters requesting uniformed officers to secure the apartment until they’d had a chance to thoroughly examine it. “We’ll be back,” Klayman told Mrs. Rosner. “Some other detectives will probably swing by, too, in the next hour. Some evidence techs. Where’s your husband?”

“Mark is at work. He’s with the Treasury Department. He should be home soon.”

“Did he, uh . . . did he have much contact with your tenant?”

“With Nadia? They talked when they saw each other, just in passing. Why do you ask?” The answer dawned on her. “You don’t think—?”

They descended the exterior stairs from the apartment and walked to the front of the house. A patrol car pulled to the curb, and Klayman told the two officers to go around back and make sure no one entered the third-floor apartment until he cleared it.

“Thanks for your time, Mrs. Rosner,” Klayman said as he and Johnson went to their car. She stood at the edge of the front garden, arms folded across her chest, brow furrowed. Johnson turned, took a few steps back in her direction, and asked, “Was your husband home last night?”

“Yes, he was. All night.” Her cooperative tone had turned to ice.

“Thank you,” Johnson said, climbing in the car with Klayman, who drove away.

“What do you think?” Johnson asked.

“I see her—the deceased—as being like half the young women in D.C., looking for action, playing the bar scene, searching for love.”

“Uh-huh,” Johnson confirmed. “Lots a’ dates, lots a’ boyfriends, all of them dorks.”

“Why do you say that?” Klayman asked, laughing.

“Ah, girls like this Ms. Zarinski are always more mature than the guys they go out with. You know that. Not you, Rick. You’re very mature.”

“Thanks. Rich dorks.”

“Huh?”

“Unless she bought all that jewelry and that watch out of an intern’s pay, the guys she went out with were very rich. And generous.”

Johnson laughed.

“What’s funny?”

“Some cops—and you know who I mean—would be tempted to find one a’ those pieces in their pocket. Where we heading?”

“Where this Bancroft lives. Maybe he’s home now.”

“‘To be or not to be,’” Johnson said loudly, placing his hand over his heart.

Klayman didn’t respond. His thoughts were of Nadia Zarinski. He saw her battered face and wondered what could have made anyone so angry that they would beat her to death. Had it been one of her boyfriends, or a stranger? The location of her murder ruled out the latter. There was no reason to be in Baptist Alley alone at that hour of the night. Unless, of course, she was at the theatre for some official reason and went outside for a cigarette or fresh air. They’d asked people at Ford’s Theatre whether anyone had been in it overnight, and had received unanimous denials that that was possible. The park rangers on overnight duty claimed no one had entered the theatre after eight o’clock. It had to have been someone she knew, probably knew well.

She hadn’t been wearing a watch; at least it wasn’t on her wrist when Dr. Ong had stripped her down. No purse, either. A set of keys, tissues, two folded blank checks, an American Express card in her name, a pocket comb, breath mints, some loose change, and sixty-six dollars in folding money in her jeans and white sleeveless cotton vest she wore over her blouse.

“What are you thinking, man?” Johnson asked.

“Huh? Oh, sorry. Daydreaming. I was thinking I’d like to know where she got all that jewelry.”

“Maybe her daddy in Florida.”

“You don’t get rich teaching agriculture in college, Mo.”

“Hell, he paid her rent.”

“Yeah, he did.”

“Daddy’s little girl.”

“Daddy’s little
dead
girl.”

“Maybe Senator Lerner was a daddy, too. A sugar daddy.”

They fell silent, their thoughts the same. Solving a murder was tough enough without having a powerful U.S. senator in the middle of it.

FIVE

“C
LARISE?
It’s Mac Smith.”

“Hello, Mac. I’m sure you’ve heard.”

“Yes. Quite a shock. I thought Annabel might be there with you.”

“She is.”

His wife came on the line. “I was just about to leave,” she said.

“Glad I caught you. Still want me to come by?”

“No. I’ll meet you at home.”

“Is Clarise coming for dinner?”

“As far as I know.” He heard Annabel ask Clarise the question. “She’ll be there. Drinks at six okay?”

“Perfect. Hurry home.”

A
NNABEL HANDED THE PHONE
back to Clarise and resumed her seat across the desk from the theatre’s producing director.

Like her husband, Mackensie, Annabel had also been an attorney, a divorce lawyer. And like him, she’d packed up her practice one day to pursue a lifelong love of art, particularly pre-Columbian art. With Mac’s unbridled support, she opened a pre-Columbian gallery in Georgetown, an aesthetic success from the start to be sure, but only marginally profitable. But that wasn’t the point. The Smiths were financially comfortable from their lucrative former law practices, and were blissfully free to pursue more altruistic pursuits: the gallery; for Annabel, being part of D.C.’s arts community; and for Mac, teaching law and lending his vast legal experience to nonprofit activities.

Although Annabel’s friendship with Clarise Emerson was not of long duration, it was close, having become more so over the past few years. As often happens, they’d met through a mutual friend—in this case, a friend in very high places, Dorothy Maloney, America’s first female vice president.

The veep and Annabel had become friendly when Maloney was a four-term congresswoman from Los Angeles, and the House’s most vocal proponent of the arts and government funding for them. Dorothy’s husband seldom ventured to Washington, preferring to remain in Los Angeles to manage a successful real estate business, and the congresswoman had become part of the Smiths’ social circle.

Once the Nash administration was up and running, its lovely vice president took the lead in lobbying Congress for arts funding—as well as lobbying the president for Clarise Emerson to head the NEA. They’d been friends since college in their native Los Angeles; Clarise had produced Dorothy’s campaign TV spots, and the congresswoman had pushed through legislation benefiting Clarise’s favorite California nonprofit arts organizations. That this quintessential quid pro quo friendship moved to Washington—America’s leading city of mutual back-scratching—when Clarise took over the leadership of Ford’s Theatre seemed only appropriate, although there was more to their relationship than advancing careers. They happened to like each other, too.

When Clarise moved to Washington, two of the first people Congresswoman Maloney introduced her to were Mac and Annabel Smith. “This handsome couple knows D.C. intimately,” Maloney told Clarise, “but they haven’t been corrupted by it.”

“I
STILL CAN
’
T BELIEVE IT,
”
Clarise said to Annabel as they sat in her office in the three-storey building attached to the theatre. “I know murders happen in this city, but here? Good Lord! And
her
?”

“Anything from the police?” Annabel asked.

“Not that I’m aware of. I told them everything I could, which wasn’t much. I never even knew she spent time here at Ford’s. Not that I should be expected to know. Interns come and go, volunteers, dozens of them. They work at night, helping out on productions, or in the office sometimes.”

“Your office?” Annabel asked.

“At times, but not her. I assure you, if I had known she was even within a hundred feet of the theatre I’d have sent her packing.” She leaned back in her chair, closed her eyes, and slowly shook her head. Annabel didn’t intrude on whatever thoughts were dominating her friend. When Clarise opened her eyes, she said, “This whole business with Bruce is so distasteful.”

Annabel was aware, of course, of the rumors linking Lerner to some sort of sexual relationship with Nadia Zarinski, but dismissed them as being nothing more than the result of one of Washington’s favorite avocations: generating scandal. The rumor’s genesis hadn’t had much substance to back it up. A former aide to Lerner, who’d been fired, made the claim that the senator and Nadia had enjoyed a number of sexual episodes late at night in the office. That was it. That was enough. The seed germinated and blossomed into a full-grown “item” at bars and restaurants: “Not hard to believe,” many said. “Lerner’s love of the ladies isn’t exactly news.” “Hell, he’s single. So what if he has a fling with a sexy intern?” “It’s not like it’s anything new in this town.” And so on. Lerner, who successfully ignored the rumor until press mentions gave it legs, eventually dismissed it as nothing more than the petty grumbling of a former staffer, end of story. Nadia, too, when confronted by a reporter, said it was a filthy lie.

Some of Lerner’s advisers urged him to get rid of Nadia to avoid even the appearance of impropriety, but he refused. A young woman’s life, he told them, wasn’t going to be ruined because of cheap innuendo and a malicious lie. And so she stayed—and was paid, which raised a few easily elevated eyebrows—until that morning in Baptist Alley, in back of Ford’s Theatre.

“The police brought up the rumor about Bruce and Nadia,” Clarise said. “They actually had the nerve to ask
me
about it, dumb questions, like whether I ever confronted her, or what I was feeling about her murder.”

“What did they think
you
would know?” Annabel asked.

“Oh, maybe that Bruce”—she laughed—“or Nadia confided in me one dark and gloomy night to clear their consciences—who knows? It was so embarrassing, Annabel. How dare they?”

“Well, at least you have that behind you, Clarise. Being questioned by the police. I heard that there’s someone who claims to have seen the murder.”

Clarise guffawed. “An old drunk sleeping it off in the alley. I’m sure the only thing he sees is snakes and bugs crawling over him.”

Ford’s Theatre’s controller appeared in the open doorway. “Sorry to interrupt,” Bernard Crowley said.

“Come in,” Clarise said. “You know Annabel Smith.”

“Of course,” Crowley said, offering his hand tentatively in the event it was bad manners for a man to do so first. He wasn’t sure. Annabel accepted it and said, “We were just talking about what happened this morning.”

“There’s nothing else to talk about,” he said, leaning against file cabinets. “Or think about. That’s all I’ve been doing.” He shifted his oversized body against the cabinets and flicked a drop of perspiration from the side of his nose with a finger. “I must tell you, Clarise, that I knew she was working here.”

“You knew, and didn’t tell me?”

“I didn’t want to hurt you, Clarise. She helped me out a few times on some of the large fund-raising mailings we’ve been doing lately. She seemed like a really nice girl, willing to pitch in, not like some of the others who hang around here. All they want is the creative end of the theatre. Don’t even mention the business side. But she was always willing to give me a hand when I got backed up. You know, add columns of figures, get fund-raising letters ready to go out, things like that.” Tears formed in his eyes and he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket. “I’m sorry. I’ve never been close to a murder before. And somebody I know.”

“You knew who she was, Bernard?” Clarise asked, incredulous.

“Not at first. When someone mentioned to me that she was the girl who—well, you know, was rumored to have had some sort of relationship with Senator Lerner, I told her to leave. I told her that it was insensitive and even foolish to come here to Ford’s Theatre, knowing you were in charge. I’m afraid I was pretty harsh with her.”

“Well,” said Clarise, “at least you did the right thing. The gall, the arrogance of her, wanting to work here. It’s inconceivable, but judging from what I read about her, it shouldn’t be a surprise.”

The phone, which had rung almost continuously while Annabel was with Clarise, was picked up by someone else in the small building. That someone else came up the stairs and handed Clarise a sheaf of phone message slips. She perused them and said, “Just about all from media wanting interviews. The ghouls are on the prowl. I’d opt for a secluded, sunny island right about now.”

“I can’t offer that,” said Annabel, “but sunsets from our terrace are pretty nice. How about getting out of here early? Like now, for instance?”

“Good idea,” Clarise said.

Crowley said, “Sunny islands don’t appeal to me, not with my fair skin. I’ve already had a dozen skin cancers burned or cut off. For me, I’d like a quiet, dark bar where they pour big drinks.”

“I can offer that, too,” Annabel said brightly. “You’ll have to put up with a big dog—we have Rufus, a blue Great Dane—but he doesn’t drink much.”

Crowley laughed.

“I mean it,” said Annabel. “Clarise is coming for dinner, and you should, too.”

“I wouldn’t want to—”

“You work for me, Bernard,” Clarise said, “and I say you join me at the Smiths’ for dinner. That’s an order.”

“Yes, ma’am. Give me five minutes to close up my office.”

“Oh, and take these,” Clarise said, handing him a dozen checks she’d signed while talking with Annabel.

“He’s been a godsend,” Clarise said once Crowley was out of earshot. “Finances were in disarray when I got here. He arrived and quickly put everything in order. He’s like a human computer. Every cent accounted for, bottom line solid for the first time in ages.”

“How did you find him?”

“A search firm. He was controller for a string of movie theatres in the Midwest. He took a pay cut to come here, which concerned me. But he said he wanted to work in a place where things mattered, where money was put to good use, like this theatre. I suppose being single helped in his decision. Less overhead and obligations. He seems to spend his life here, sometimes all night, and weekends. At any rate, Annabel, having him here has certainly made my life easier. Whoever replaces me will inherit a top-notch controller.”

“Once you’re confirmed to head NEA.”

“
If
I’m confirmed. Come on, we’ll pick up Bernard on our way downstairs. An inspiring sunset and a stiff drink are precisely what I need.”