Suspicious Circumstances (10 page)

‘Mother…!’ I croaked.

But no one seemed to notice me for, without any warning at all, Sylvia La Mann cocked her lovely head and fluttered a pretty look from Inspector Robinson to Ronnie and to Gloria.

‘Ronnie, deah, I think it’s all
right
, don’t you? I mean, I think this may be a
beautiful
moment and after all
deah
Gloria is such a bosom friend — positively bosom — and this
nice
Inspector Robinson has been
so
sympathetic.’

Ronnie said something but it was quite unintelligible. Sylvia La Mann arranged her veil then with tapering black-gloved fingers and Gloria got the full pretty look.

‘Gloria, deah, it’s not
just
for the picture’s sake. It’s much, much more than that. It’s for Norma. It’s because Ronnie and I are
convinced
that it was what
Norma
would have wanted. And that’s by
far
the most important factor.’ The pretty look embraced even Delight and me as if, as a tiny fraction of her public, we too were entitled to thrill to her news. ‘So there it is, Gloria, deah. It makes it a
tiny
bit difficult for me, of course, having to disappoint so many
deah
friends who had other plans for me, but I’m going to do it. I’m
going
to play Ninon. Oh, I know I’d
never
do it as well as Norma,
never
in a
thousand
years, but I’m going to try to be
worthy
of her
memory
.’

Completely split apart as I was, I could still realize that Mother was being wonderful. She had retreated behind her ‘nothing' look and was registering absolute negation.

Gloria, looking as if it was more than she could endure to find herself stranded in a cemetery where there were no telephones to plunge to, said, ‘You confirm that, Ronnie? I can print it?’

Ronnie, from somewhere, managed to produce the most seasick smile since Jonah’s trip in the whale.

‘Yes, Gloria. That is correct. Sylvia has very kindly consented to play Ninon de Lenclos.’

Gloria, who knew a scoop when she saw one, instantly swept Sylvia off with her towards her own special limousine, which was probably equipped with radar and two-way television and thumbscrews. For what seemed like the full extent of eternity the rest of us just stood. Then dimly I heard the Inspector’s voice.

‘Well, Miss Rood, I’ll wish you good day.’

He was holding out his hand. Mother was shaking it and then Ronnie was shaking it and then Delight was shaking it. When he came to me, the Inspector threw a benevolent arm around my shoulder and drew me off with him.

When we reached the grave of a woman improbably called Eliza M. Bunthorne which had a peanut-butter jar of pansies on it, he gave with the crinkles.

‘Listen, son, you didn’t tell your mother about that letter, did you?’

‘No,’ I gulped.

‘Fine,’ he said. ‘Just fine. It’d have been a shame worrying her — a big, successful star like that.’ The benevolent arm was still on my shoulder. It felt as heavy as the Empire State Building. ‘Know something, son?’

I was supposed to react. I knew it. So I managed, ‘Know what?’

‘I’ll let you in on a police secret. Maybe you’ll find it useful one day if ever you’ve got to handle the cops. This afternoon I guess I seemed pretty casual and friendly like with you, but, to tell the truth, I wasn’t brushing off that anonymous letter, no sir. Of course, there wasn’t anything exactly about Miss Delanay’s death that didn’t fit with an accident. Bottle of booze hidden in her room, all that. But a cop, you know, has to keep an open mind. A woman falling downstairs and breaking her neck? It does happen, sure, but it doesn’t happen every day. And then, actresses — you never know with actresses, do you, son? So this morning when that letter came, I figured: Well, what d’you know? Maybe we’re on to something here. Now if I was to open my Los Angeles Times one morning and read that Anny Rood was going to play Ninon de Lenclos…’

The Empire State Building came off my shoulder and thumped me on the back.

‘Yep, son. That’s how I was thinking. I’m here to tell you. Now you know. Never trust a friendly cop. Remember that. Might come in handy.’ He gave a sigh. ‘So Sylvia La Mann gets to play Ninon de Lenclos and that slams the file shut on Norma Delanay. Too bad, isn’t it, son? Think of the splash it would have made.
INSPECTOR ROBINSON UNMASKS ANNY ROOD AS MURDERESS OF NORMA DELANAY.
Well, you can’t win, can you?’

He laughed waggishly. He was being Old Mr Hilarity again. The eyes crinkled for the last time and he went away through the graves.

For a moment I just stood there, leaning against Eliza M. Bunthorne’s monument. There was relief. Of course there was, relief; immense, all-pervading relief. Inspector Robinson was a jerk. He hadn’t noticed the paw-prints. He was just a self-satisfied jerk, crinkling around seeing himself as the Smart Cop handing out tips to the Younger Generation. Okay. We were through with the police. Okay.

But that wasn’t all. Just because the police were dumb, that didn’t keep Norma from having been pushed. And look who was playing Ninon de Lenclos now! I couldn’t begin to understand how it had happened, but there it was. And if Mother had done what — what she just might have done, only to be confronted with…

I was engulfed by a great protective love for Mother. I’d never known I could feel so paternal, so much the man of the house. There she was standing where I had left her with Ronnie and Delight. I ran to her. She was still way, way off somewhere in her 'nothing' reverie. I put my arms around her. I couldn’t help myself. I kissed her on the cheek.

‘Mother,’ I said. ‘Gee, Mother!’

Mother didn’t say anything, but her reverie expression changed slightly and became spiritual as if she were having a vision of Norma’s enthusiastic reception at the Pearly Gates. Ronnie was making peculiar stuttering sounds like an almost frozen tap and then at last managed,

‘Anny … I can explain … please … the car … please’

Very gradually Mother returned from the beautiful reverie. She gave her head the faintest shake, drew my arm from around her and patted it gently.

‘What a charming man that Inspector seems to be, Nickie. How sweet of him to have a little chat with you. Excuse me, Ronnie dear, what did you say?’

‘Anny, for pity’s sake, the car … come …’

‘The car? Ah, oui, c'est tout accompli ici, n'est-ce pas?’ Mother gave me a tender smile and looped her arm through mine. ‘Dear Nickie, you and I will take poor Ronnie home with us and try to cheer him up.’

Ronnie threw an anguished glance from Mother to me. ‘But, Anny, how can I explain when that terrible boy … I mean, when Nickie …? Anny, we’ve got to be alone.’

But Mother converted that into One Of Those Things She Hadn’t Heard. She let the gentle smile shift to Delight. ‘Darling, find Pam and Gino and Uncle Hans. Go first to Ronnie’s in the limousine and then Gino can drive you home in the Mercedes.’

With that, she drew me down the cemetery path and there was nothing Ronnie or I could do. We made, I’m sure, a lovely somber picture as we departed with Mother bowing and nodding to various illustrious friends who, out of respect for Ronnie’s grief, didn’t actually accost us but merely bowed and nodded back.

Since Ronnie had reverted to speechlessness, it was Mother who, with a great deal of charming eyelash batting, instructed the chauffeur to drive to our house rather than to Ronnie's. Then we were all three in the back seat, with me, placed, very deliberately, by Mother, like a buffer, in the center of the group.

There weren’t any mobs outside the gates. Norma’s drawing power didn’t seem to have stretched as far as the cemetery. The limousine purred silently off through gracious palms and eucalyptus which had been planted to make a sort of No Man’s Land between the Dead and the Living.

As we proceeded into a section of perfectly hideous Desirable, Convenient, Lower-Income-Bracket Homes, Ronnie exploded like an over-inflated balloon.

‘Yes, dear.’

‘I couldn’t help it.’

‘Help what?’

‘For pity’s sake, you know what.’

‘Tell us, Ronnie dear — just quietly and simply.’

‘Sylvia,’ he spluttered. ‘I couldn’t help it about Sylvia.’

‘About Sylvia playing Ninon?’ Mother, whose magnificence had seldom soared to so exalted a peak, merely raised and lowered the lashes and gave him a Good Old Friend smile. ‘But, Ronnie dear, why not? That I should do it was only a notion — a casual idea. As the producer, you have every right to change your mind if you feel that a British Ninon…’

‘Oh, God.’ Ronnie clutched both his hands to his head. ‘Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God.’

‘Nickie, dear,’ said Mother. ‘Help Ronnie. Don’t you see he needs help?’

All I could think of to do was to offer him the handkerchief with which Mother had obliterated Sylvia La Mann. He pushed my hand savagely away and moaned, ’Oh, God ,’ again.

Then, whirling around and leaning across me towards Mother, he said, ‘Do you honestly think I want her? Do you think I don’t realize she’ll be as cataclysmic as Norma? It’s just …’

He gave up then. ‘Just — what, dear?’ asked Mother.

‘That monstrous female! With Gloria standing there and that lurking, grinning policeman! What could I do? My hands were tied, bound, shackled, manacled for the Firing Squad.’

When he said ‘monstrous female’, Mother got to look more human and also faintly curious.

‘But what is it, Ronnie darling? How can you expect poor Nickie and me to understand when …’

‘She . . Sylvia ... Sylvia ... In the name of mercy, how can I explain anything when you insisted on lugging Nickie along?’

By then I was so tormented by curiosity that I abandoned any attempt to keep up an illusion of ignorance any longer.

‘If it’s anything to do with Mother being at your house when Norma plunged,’ I said, ‘don’t mind me. I know all about that.’

They both swung on me simultaneously. Ronnie looked green, presumably the shade Pam had described. Mother merely looked firm but indulgent.

‘Nickie dear, what are you talking about?’

‘Pam told me. At least I got it out of Delight and then made Pam tell me the whole thing.’

‘Delight?’ echoed Ronnie. ‘Who conceivably could be called Delight?’

‘Don’t be silly, Ronnie,’ said Mother. ‘You know Delight, the lovely girl who was with us at the funeral, my secretary. She’s perfectly divine.’ She put a butterfly hand on my knee. ‘So you know, Nickie dear. Perhaps it’s just as well.’ She sighed and then turned back to Ronnie. ‘There, dear. You see? There’s nothing to worry about. Now tell us. Sylvia knows — what?’

Ronnie groaned. ‘Sylvia knows you were at the house that night. And not only that. She knows something else, too. It’s incredible. I can’t conceive how. But she does.’

‘But, Ronnie dear,’ said Mother, ‘how could she possibly know?’

‘When I went to the studio to cut off the phones in the house, somebody called. I told you that. Well, it was Sylvia.’

Mother started looking vague again. Ronnie’s face turned a most undebonair shade of pink.

‘Anny, darling, I hadn’t been seeing her. You know it. After you’d saved me from her unspeakable coils. I hadn’t even set eyes on the degenerate, scheming cobra. She just - well, that night she just happened to call. I might have known she would sooner or later. She’d just been biding her time.’

As I watched him with one of Mother’s 'keen' glances, he went on, ‘And you can’t imagine what it was like. She was crying and sobbing and whimpering and moaning. How could I have abandoned her? Didn’t I realize I was the only Real Thing in her life — the only Pure, Honest, Straight Thing she’d ever known. She’d been in agony, absolute agony, and now this was the end. Now she was going to slash her wrists, put her head in a gas oven, take sleeping pills, jump off the Malibu pier.’

Ronnie thought about reaching over me to clutch Mother’s hand but didn’t quite dare. ‘I knew it was phony, of course. That woman is one hundred per cent guaranteed unadulterated phony. But I couldn’t hang up. I mean — think if she really had done it, leaving suicide notes all over the place. So I started to argue. It didn’t do any good. She just went on and on and on. Did I know she had no contract, that no studio would touch her, that she was penniless, that she would be forced to sink back into the gutters of Birmingham from which she’d so valiantly struggled? Then, on top of it all, she got on to you. It was all the fault of that dreadful Anny Rood, who had poisoned my mind against her. If it hadn’t been for that frightful Anny Rood…’

Ronnie paused to find some more breath from somewhere and then plunged on. ‘That’s when I felt myself snapping. Anny, darling Anny, you know how I snap. Something happens inside like the wrong things happening to an elastic band — and I snap. So I snapped and I heard myself yelling into the phone, ‘Okay. End it all. Go ahead. But before you do, I’d like you to know that Anny’s here right now, and all this time, while you’ve been gluing me to this phone for a full twenty minutes, she and Norma have been having a terrific pitched battle. By now one of them’s probably murdered the other, so at least you’ll find a dear old friend waiting for you in the Great Beyond.’ ‘

He broke off, appalled, as well he might be, at the memory of that most unfortunately phrased sentence. But he couldn’t have been more appalled than I because, as I had listened to his tirade, a thought more ominous than any of my thoughts to date had swooped down on me. Until then, there had always been Ronnie. In those unfortunate moments when I knew Norma had been pushed, there had always been Pam’s theory to fall back on. But now — if Ronnie had been telling the truth, if he’d been on the phone with Sylvia all through those crucial twenty minutes — then he was out as a pusher. And Uncle Hans and Gino had been together at the pool house. And Pam and Tray had been running all over the grounds. Who then did that leave definitively, once and for all, as the only possible pusher? Who?

I made myself glance at Mother. No one had ever looked more composed.

‘So later Sylvia came to you, Ronnie dear?’ A faint ripple of distaste furrowed her brow. ‘And she threatened you? Either she played Ninon — or she told the police about me?’