Murder on the Cliff (18 page)

The theatre was located at the rear of the casino complex, next to the royal tennis court. The exterior was of the same unassuming shingle style as the rest of the building, but, as she discovered when she entered, the theatre itself was an ornate, if somewhat run-down, gem. Spalding had told her it was one of Stanford White’s favorite designs. Charlotte was something of a connoisseur of theatres, having worked over the years in most of Broadway’s most well-known houses as well as an untold number of obscure ones around the country. She could appreciate this one despite its cracked plaster and peeling paint. She had seen many a Broadway landmark in worse condition. On the stage, artists were busy putting the finishing touches on the backdrop, which was a reproduction of a Japanese landscape depicting a temple perched on a mountainside. It reminded her of the Temple of Great Repose. Leaving the empty theatre, she made her way down a corridor to the backstage area, which was humming with activity. People were adjusting lights, fiddling with the sound controls, dressing models, taking pictures. At the center of it all was Marianne, who was fluttering around as nervously as a playwright on opening night: pinning a hem, fussing with a model’s makeup, and giving orders right and left.

Seeing Charlotte, she disengaged herself and clattered across the stage in her
gete
. “You’re here!” she said. She was wearing a white kimono made of a light, airy fabric and dotted with enormous parti-colored polka dots. “We start at one. First, the fashion show. Then the geishas. Then the puppet play. Did Spalding give you any script?”

Charlotte nodded. “Paul sent it over this morning.”

“Paul.” She repeated the name with a grimace. “Ordinarily I can’t stand the mention of that man’s name. But we’ll make an exception for Okichi Day. Let me see.” She grabbed the script out of Charlotte’s hand and looked it over. “Looks okay to me,” she said, passing it back. “He may be a bastard, but he’s an efficient one. As I found out in court. Do you have any questions?”

A reporter interrupted their conversation.

“This is a reporter for Jordan Marsh,” Marianne explained. “They’re sponsoring the show. She’s doing some sort of publicity thing for the store. What did you want to know?” she asked.

“Can you tell us a little about the collection?” asked the reporter as an assistant with a video camera filmed Marianne’s reply.

“The big news in this collection is the return of loose, unrestricted shapes. We’ve reached the end of the line when it comes to a certain kind of design: skirts couldn’t get any shorter, or tighter. The time has come for a shift to a looser, more
dégagé
silhouette. These styles are all based on the kimono design: very light and modern, very colorful, very exciting.”

“Isn’t this a radical departure from your recent collections?” the reporter asked. “You were the designer most responsible for popularizing the miniskirt in the sixties, and for reviving it in the eighties.”

“The point of creating is to change, to go elsewhere. I decided I wanted to create a mixture of Occidental and Oriental. The Occidental clothing tradition has become too tight. I wanted to make things that were free, both mentally and physically. But I wanted to avoid the drab Japanese colors. The eighties were the decade of black; the nineties will be the decade of color.”

At a signal from the reporter, the cameraman set down his camera. “Thank you,” the reporter said, and moved on.

“An excellent performance,” said Charlotte.

“I’m an old pro,” Marianne replied. “Now we have to get you dressed. You’re going to wear one of the designs from my collection. Do you want something way-out or something tame?”

Charlotte looked at Marianne’s outfit. It was stunning: original, dramatic, playful, but it wasn’t Charlotte. “Something tame please.”

“That’s fine. I know my more colorful designs aren’t for everybody. The Princess of Wales, the First Lady of the United States, the Queen of Jordan. But not for everybody. I’m only kidding. We have something that will be perfect for you—just your style.” She called to a handsome young man who was fitting a model in one of Marianne’s smashing kimono designs.

“Just a minute,” said Charlotte.

Marianne swiveled her head around in surprise.

“Before you call him over, there’s something I want to talk with you about—in private. Is there a place where we can talk?”

“Sure,” Marianne replied. “But I can’t talk for long. I have a show to put on.” Signaling the young man to stay where he was, she led Charlotte toward a bank of office cublicles against the back wall. “Would you like a cigarette?” she asked as they sat down on two folding chairs. She removed a packet from the voluminous sleeve of her kimono, and offered it to Charlotte.

“Thanks,” said Charlotte, taking one.

“What is it?”

“It’s Okichi-
mago
. The police think she was murdered.”

“Murdered!”

Charlotte nodded as Marianne lit her cigarette for her. “They think someone pushed her over the railing after the geisha party. The state medical examiner staged a reconstruction of the fall at the site this morning, with a dummy that was Okichi-
mago
’s height and weight. The dummy landed in exactly the same position as the one in which I found Okichi-
mago
’s body.”

“I thought she committed suicide,” said Marianne. “What about the comb as the symbol of leave-taking, and the mirror as the symbol of the soul? It was so romantic—I hate to think of that beautiful woman being just plain murdered.”

“Someone planted them—to make it look like a suicide. There was also the sake cup that Townsend Harris had given her. Actually, there were two sake cups.” Charlotte explained about the extra sake cup, and about the body being found too far away from the base of the cliff for the death to have been a suicide. She also explained about Lew asking her to look into the murder.

Lester stuck his head in the door. “Is this where you’ve been hiding out?” he asked in an accusing voice. “You’d better hightail it out here, because everybody is looking for you and I’m sure as hell not gonna answer all their questions.” As usual, he was wearing a wide-brimmed felt hat and reptile skin cowboy boots that made him look taller than he really was.

“Come on in,” said Marianne. “Okichi-
mago
’s been murdered.” She gave him a brief recap of the story Charlotte had just told her. “I presume Miss Graham has some questions to ask us about where we were and what we saw.”

Lester entered and sat down on another folding chair. He was a sharp-featured man with a hooked nose and brown eyes that were set too close together. He looked a little like Marianne, in fact. He also looked cranky and preoccupied. “Is there any doubt?” he asked. “What I mean is, could she have committed suicide, or is it definitely murder?”

“I suppose anything’s possible,” Charlotte replied. “But the state medical examiner is convinced that she was pushed.” She explained again about the body being too far out from the base of the cliff. She addressed Marianne: “Where you were and what you saw is exactly what I’d like to know. What did you do after everybody left the party? I know Lester went back for you. Did you end up going home with him?”

Marianne turned to Lester. “You went back for me?”

Lester nodded.

“Isn’t that nice.” Her voice dripped sarcasm. It was clear that all was not well with the Montgomery/Frame relationship. She turned back to Charlotte: “I walked home—on the Cliff Walk. It was a beautiful night: the moon was full and the stars were yellow, as the old song goes. Haven’t walked the Cliff Walk at night since I was a kid.”

“In a kimono, wearing
geta
?”

“I took off the outer kimono and the
geta
. Left them in one of those little closets in the temple. I just wore the under-kimono. I went back yesterday to pick them up.” Looking over at Lester, she licked her lips provocatively. “The nice young policeman who was guarding the place let me in.”

Lester pretended to ignore her.

If the story had come from anyone else, Charlotte would have doubted it, but walking the Cliff Walk alone on a moonlit night wearing nothing but an under-kimono was just the kind of thing Marianne would do. She would probably have done it stark naked. “Did you see anything unusual?”

“Nothing.”

“What about you, Les? Did you see anyone when you went back?”

“Not a soul. I walked out to the temple looking for Marianne. But she wasn’t there, so I left. I don’t know what time it was when she got back. I was asleep by then.”

“How long were you there?”

“Ten minutes, at the outside.”

Charlotte nodded. She turned back to Marianne. “Did you know that Paul was planning to make Okichi-
mago
his heir?”

“He was!” Marianne nearly dropped her cigarette. “His heir—that’s great! Paul is so … so
Gothic
.” She looked at Charlotte. “Let me guess. You think I killed Okichi-
mago
so that Shimoda will go to Dede. Am I right?”

“Let’s say that it’s a possibility.”

“I love it. A suspect in a murder! But forget the motive.” She waved the hand holding the cigarette dismissively. “Contrary to what you may think, I have no objection to sharing Shimoda with Paul.”

“Then why have you been fighting him?”

“The operative word is ‘share.’ My great-aunt’s will says that Shimoda is to be
shared
between my mother and Paul and their descendants. Just because Paul had the place to himself for ten years, he thinks it’s his. In fact, not only do I not have a motive, I have a counter-motive. If I’d known he was going to make Okichi-
mago
his heir, I would have been standing down on the rocks with a safety net.”

Charlotte raised a skeptical eyebrow.

“I don’t mind sharing, but I do mind who I share with,” she explained. “Unless Paul manages to dig up some other obscure relative, he’s going to end up adopting Nadine’s sons and making them his heirs. Actually, they seem like nice boys. Dede seems to have a thing going with the older one. I have nothing against them; it’s their mother I can’t stand.”

“She’s putting it mildly,” said Lester. “She hates her.”

“Okay,” Marianne agreed, “I hate the bitch.”

“Why?”

“She’s a phony, a snob, a social climber. She writes under the name of Nadine de Goncourt. Supposedly it’s her maiden name, but it sounds made-up to me. She says she’s from Paris, but she’s really from some hick town in Quebec. It’s like that. I don’t know who I hate more, him or her. The person who you
should
be investigating is her. Now, there’s a woman with a motive. Have you seen the trees on Bellevue Avenue?”

Charlotte nodded.

“She won’t give up her house on Bellevue Avenue, but she’ll cut down some of the oldest trees in town to save it. Now
that’s
desperation. The only people I know who are more desperate than she is are the ones who turn the whole place into condos and end up living in an apartment in their former house.”

They were interrupted by the handsome young man who informed them that there were only fifteen minutes left until show time.

“I’ve got to go,” said Marianne, jumping up. “So do you. Mark will take care of you. Mark, fit Miss Graham in the gold silk suit. Sorry I wasn’t able to help. If you want to ask me anything else, you know where to find me.”

A few minutes later, Charlotte was delivering the speech that Paul had prepared for her. It described the history of the relationship between Townsend Harris and Okichi, and Paul’s meeting with Okichi-
mago
in Kyoto last year. Finally it described Okichi-
mago
’s tragic death, and ended with a prayer.

Nothing was said about the suspicion that she’d been murdered.

After that came the fashion show. As an announcer from the department store reeled off the names of the designs—“Court Lady,” “Madame Butterfly,” “Samurai Woman”—the tall, thin models paraded down the runway to the accompaniment of electronic New Age Japanese music. Charlotte was amused to see that several of the models wore their hair in the gingko leaf hairstyle.

Although the show had already opened to rave reviews in New York, the fashion press had turned out en masse for the road show. They couldn’t resist the temptation of photographing the Japanese collection against the splendid Newport backdrop. Which was exactly Marianne’s idea.

The show lasted only half an hour: close to a hundred outfits, ending with “Scarlet Empress,” a ball gown of iridescent red. After the show, Marianne strode confidently down the runway in her parti-colored polka-dot kimono to thunderous applause, blowing kisses to the photographers. She had added a huge hat with an abstract Japanese flower arrangement on top.

“The hat is great, but who except Marianne would ever wear anything like that?” commented Connie, who was sitting in the front row next to Charlotte.

Spalding leaned over: “Only another exhibitionist like your daughter.”

Connie smiled.

After the fashion show came the geishas’ exhibition of traditional Japanese song and dance, and then the puppet play, which was titled
The Love Suicides at Sonezaki
. According to Charlotte’s introduction, the playwright was Chikamatzu, who was known as the William Shakespeare of Japan, and the play was considered his first great love suicide play.

The play was short, lasting only half an hour. But it was very moving. The story, which was based on an actual event, involved a young soy-sauce merchant and his geisha lover who kill themselves because they cannot marry, vowing to be “husband and wife for eternity.” The theme was the conflict between
ninjo
and
giri
that Spalding had spoken of.

“No one is there to tell the tale,” the narrator sadly announced as the merchant stabs himself in the throat in the last scene after killing his beloved, “but the wind that blows through Sonezaki Wood transmits it, and high and low alike gather to pray for these lovers who beyond a doubt will in the future attain Nirvana. They have become models of true love.”

Charlotte noticed that the deaths of the amazingly lifelike cloth-and-wood puppets brought tears to the eyes of many in the audience.