The Woman Who Fell From Grace (16 page)

“The one next door?”

“Why, yes. How did you know?”

“Wild guess.”

A uniformed black woman brought us our lunch. Veal marsala, boiled new potatoes, string beans. It was excellent. Sancerre wasn’t terrible either.

I pulled Fern’s love letters out of my pocket while we ate, placed them on the table before him.

Edward frowned, dabbed at his mouth with his napkin, and reached for them. It took him a moment to recognize them. He turned bright red when he did. “Lord, these are dreadful. I was all of eighteen at the time — the last of the great romantics.” He laughed to himself sadly. Then his eyes began to fill with tears. “I can’t believe Fernie saved them all these years. Dear, dear Fernie.”

“Mind telling me about it?”

“Not at all — there really isn’t that much to tell, Hoagy. We read poetry together in the tall grass and dreamt of running off to Greenwich Village and becoming great, starving writers. It was all so …
romantic
. And terribly tragic.”

“Why so tragic?”

“Mother didn’t approve of Fern,” he replied. “Thought she was too common for her young college man. After all, Fern’s father worked on our
car
. So Fernie and I overdramatized it, as we did everything. It was playacting. Kid stuff.” He smiled faintly and sipped his wine. “Besides, Fern already had a serious beau, Frankie Neene. Frankie was a blustering, cocky kid then, a football player. Used to take her for rides in his car and make love to her. She told me all the lurid details. Told me he promised to marry her, too. He never intended to, though. He married a proper Mary Baldwin girl. Broke Fern’s heart.”

“I understand he committed suicide.”

Edward’s face darkened. “Yes. He was a broken man. Terrible business.” He shook his head. “When I was your age, Hoagy, I wanted to lead three or four lives. Now that I’ve been around nearly seventy years, and seen what life does to people, I’ve come to realize that once is plenty.”

“In her diary, your mother mentions that you got to be somewhat friendly with Sterling Sloan during the filming.”

“As much as anyone could,” he acknowledged. “Sterling was a strange, lost soul, a man who lived only for truth and beauty — the two things in shortest supply in this world. He was the saddest man I’ve ever known, and one of the most fascinating. Please stop me if I start to bore you. … ”

“You won’t.”

“It rained the night before they were all due to arrive from Hollywood,” he recalled. “The convoy of trucks, the specially chartered train, the hundreds and hundreds of production people — an invasion. In the middle of the night the doorbell woke me. Someone at the door. I heard our caretaker answering it. Heard voices. Then the doorbell started ringing again. I got up and went downstairs to see what was going on. No one else stirred — I was the light sleeper of the family. The caretaker said it was someone who claimed to be with the movie. He’d told the fellow to come back in the morning with everyone else, but he refused to go. I opened the door to find this thoroughly bedraggled-looking vagabond in a moth-eaten black cape seated out there in the rain on top of an ancient steamer trunk. He was soaking wet and unshaven and smelled more than a little of cow manure. He apologized for the late hour, explained as how he’d hitchhiked his way on a farmer’s truck to be with the movie, and alas, had nowhere to stay and no money. He was unusually polite and well-spoken. ‘What do you do?’ I asked him. ‘I drink,’ he replied. ‘I mean,’ I said, ‘who are you?’ ‘Oh, I am not any sort of person at all,’ he replied. ‘I am an actor.’ A down-and-out one hoping for a bit role, I supposed. Still, he was shivering from the wet and had nowhere to go, so I let him in. It wasn’t until he’d removed his hat and cape that I realized who he was. ‘Why, you’re Sterling Sloan!’ I exclaimed. ‘Someone has to be,’ he replied in that cryptic, disembodied way he had. ‘Unfortunately, I am that one.’ I told him the cast would be staying at the Hotel Woodrow Wilson in town, and that I’d be happy to drive him there. But he was so pale and chilled I offered him a brandy first. His hand shook so badly half of it dribbled right down his chin. He hadn’t eaten for days. I made him a sandwich, and he devoured it and drank several more brandies. He began to get some color in his cheeks. He told me I was a rare and kind young soul. Then he stretched out on the sofa in the parlor and fell instantly asleep. From then on, he attached himself to me. He seemed to like being around me. I have no idea why. Naturally, I was thrilled and pestered him for advice about acting. He told me to get proper classical training in Britain, learn to carry a spear, and play toothless old men and blushing young girls. He was quite generous — he even offered to write me letters of introduction to several theater companies over there. He was very offhanded about his fame. Had no use for the trappings of stardom, no star presence at all off camera, not like Miss Barrett or Flynn. You
knew
they were stars. Not Sterling. He came to life only when he was in front of the camera. The rest of the time, he almost wasn’t there. He was so very quiet and remote. He spent long hours just stretched out on the daybed in his trailer, reading. And sometimes he really
wasn’t
there. By that I mean he seemed disoriented, not totally sure where he was or what role he was playing. … He and his wife weren’t at all close. He’d arrived from London, she from Hollywood. I felt he was a deeply lonely man. And then those headaches of his kept him in great pain for hours at a time.”

Edward’s cook came in and cleared the table. She left us a pot of coffee and a plate of cookies. Edward poured the coffee.

“Would you happen to know if he used morphine?”

“Not that I ever saw,” Edward replied, nibbling on a cookie.

“Was there a doctor on the set?”

“There was. He arrived with the production team from Hollywood. Dr. Toriello. An older fellow with dirty fingernails and hair growing out of his ears. He spent a lot of time with Miss Darnell. I was told she suffered from severe menstrual cramps and refused to work when she had them.”

“Sounds like a Dr. Feelgood,” I suggested.

He frowned. “A what?”

“The studios always kept some borderline quack around to make the little green men go away. They still do. Did he spend time around Sloan?”

“Yes, he often looked in on him for his headaches.” Edward’s eyes widened. “Why, do you think he was … ?”

“I’m afraid so.”

Edward shook his head sadly. “Morphine. It’s for pain, isn’t it?”

“It is.”

“It was her, Laurel Barrett. She was so angelic, so delicately beautiful. Yet she was the dirtiest, rottenest tramp imaginable, Hoagy. God, how she tortured him. It was as if she took delight in punishing him for his love. She and Flynn — the two of them would go into his trailer in the middle of the day to have sex. Everyone knew. It was disgraceful.” He lowered his voice. “She even made a play for me.”

“Did you … ?”

“I was tempted. Lord, was I tempted. She was one of the most gorgeous women in the world. But Sterling was my friend.” He sighed longingly. “I must confess I still wonder sometimes when I’m lying in my bed alone at night. I wonder what I missed out on.” Abruptly, he reached for his coffee. “Drugs? Who could blame the poor man?”

“The night before she died, Fern told me she believed he was murdered.”

“And you believe she was murdered, as well. Yes, I know all about your theory. Mavis phoned me first thing this morning. I was shocked, truly. It’s been so many years since she’d phoned. I almost didn’t recognize her voice.”

“And my theory?”

“I’m skeptical, frankly.”

“So is Polk Four,” I admitted.

“Yes, I know. I spoke with him as soon as I got off the phone with Mave. I wanted to have the facts of the case. Lawyers, by nature, have an aversion to surprises.” He sipped his coffee. “I’ve been curious about Mother’s diary myself. Why those pages were torn out. Why Fern screamed.”

“Did Fern ever say anything to you about it?”

“Not a word. The entire incident came as news to me.”

“Do you have any idea who was there in Vangie’s room with Sloan?”

“None.”

“You said his wife was sleeping around on him.”

“Gleefully.”

“Was he doing the same?”

“There weren’t any whispers,” he replied. “As I mentioned, Sterling kept to himself most of the time. He certainly said nothing to me about anyone.” Edward got up and went over to the French doors. “One thing you should bear in mind about Fern, Hoagy, is that she was always inclined to exaggerate. The fact is Sterling died of a ruptured aneurysm. The warning signs were all there. He had been complaining of blinding headaches. He acted strangely, he was frequently drowsy. The medical experts later agreed that these symptoms indicated the leakage in his brain had already begun. He looked particularly pale and drawn that last day of filming. He was so weak he was barely able to finish. That very night he was stricken in his suite at the Woodrow Wilson.”

“Who else was there?”

“She was — Laurel. And Dr. Toriello arrived almost immediately. He was staying in the hotel. He sent for an ambulance at once, but Sterling died before it arrived.”

“Did any other doctor besides Toriello see him?”

“I imagine so. Someone local had to sign the death certificate. Toriello was licensed out of state.”

“Were the police called?”

“Of course. The sheriff got there right away.”

“Not the Staunton city police?”

Edward smiled. “Town was a lot smaller then. There was no city police force.”

“I see. Who was the sheriff?”

“Polk Two,” he replied. “Polk Four’s granddad. Fine man. Only just gave up his senate seat in Richmond last year. Represented us there quite proudly for the past forty-five years. His legs are bothering him — he’s eighty-seven, after all. But he’s still sharp as a tack, old Polk Two.”

“How would I get in touch with him?”

“If you wish to be gracious, you go through Polk Four and get his blessing. He’s very protective of the old fellow.”

“And if I don’t?”

Edward stared at me for a moment, then turned and looked out the door at his garden. Stiffly he said, “He’s in the book.”

Polk Two lived on a small farm out off Route 11 on the way to Harrisonburg. The road to it wound back through lush, fragrant farmland and through time. A colony of Mennonites lived there. I passed a couple of their black, horse-drawn carriages clopping slowly along, and a farm where four women in bonnets, long dresses, and sneakers were planting vegetables in a garden. They waved as I passed. I waved back and fleetingly, wished I lived there with them.

A big silver Lincoln Town Car was parked out in front of the white, wood-framed farmhouse, which was badly in need of paint and a new roof. The broad wraparound front porch had a serious case of dry rot. There was a bank barn and grain silo out behind the house, a poultry house, hilly pasturage. All of it looked neglected.

I left the Jag behind the Lincoln and rang the doorbell and waited. And waited some more. Finally, I heard heavy footsteps inside and a cough.

“Sorry to keep you waiting, son,” Polk Two said cheerfully as he opened the door. “It’s my legs — they’ve pure gone to hell on me.”

He was a tall, beefy man and he still had the lawman’s air of authority even if he did have to walk with two canes. His coloring was fair. His full head of white hair was still streaked with blond. His eyes were blue and twinkly behind the heavy, black-framed glasses, his loose, saggy skin so pale as to be almost translucent. I could see the blue veins on the backs of his hands as they clutched the canes, trembling slightly. He wore a white button-down shirt, black knit tie, a heavy gray wool sack suit, and hearing aids in both ears. He smelled like witch hazel and Ben-Gay.

“Come on in, son,” he said. “Come on. Your dog, too, if she wants.”

She didn’t. She likes porches.

He moved slowly, waddling like a large, heavy penguin. Wheezing, he led me into a small parlor that hadn’t been painted or aired out since V.J. Day. The air was heavy with cigarette smoke and dust and heat. Portable electric heaters were going strong in each corner. It must have been ninety in there.

“Too warm for you?” he asked.

“No, it’s fine,” I replied as I felt the perspiration beginning to run down my neck. “Cozy.”

A radio was on, tuned to the police band. He waddled over to it and turned it off. “Can’t get too warm when you get to be my age, you know,” he observed. He chuckled. “I have to turn up the thermostat another degree every birthday. In three more years I’ll be able to bake bread in here.”

A captain’s chair piled with cushions was set before a table. A large-type edition of
Reader’s Digest
lay open on the table along with the phone and a carton of cigarettes.

Polk Two plopped
slooooowly
down in the chair. “Have a seat, son,” he commanded, indicating an easy chair. “That one used to be mine. Most comfortable one in the house. I just can’t get up out of it anymore.”

I took off my cap and sat. “Nice place you have here, Mr. LaFoon.”

He turned up his hearing aids. “Thanks. Been in the family a long time. And make it Polk Two, Mr. Hoag.”

“If you’ll make it Hoagy.”

“As in Carmichael?” he asked, turning them up some more.

“As in the cheese steak.”

He nodded. “Always like his songs. ‘Stardust,’ ‘Georgia on My Mind’ — you could hum ’em. Yessir.” He lit a cigarette and looked around. “It’ll all be Polk Four’s when I pass on, if he wants it. Needs work, of course. Haven’t done much to it since the wife died in ’72. But the land’s good. Twenty-five acres of it. My boy, Polk Three, he’s retired down in Florida with his wife. I’m all alone here. But it suits me, except for this habit I got of not being able to shut up when I trap some poor fellow here like you.” He chuckled. “Polk Four, he looks in on me regular as clockwork. He’s a good boy. I just wish he’d take a drink of whiskey or a dip into a cute little blonde once in a while. A man needs to let off a little steam now and again, or he’ll blow.” He glanced at me sharply. “I phoned him after you called. He said he’d try to make it over.”