A Chorus of Detectives (5 page)

Rosa's face was all innocence. “Marry you
again
?”

“
Ask
her again. Now go.
Parti
. Scout.”

“Scoot,” Gerry corrected.

Rosa heaved a big sigh and headed for the door. “I don't know why you bother. You know she's just going to say no.” She left.

“Are you?” Scotti asked. “Going to say no?”

“Of course I am,” Gerry said. “I've had enough of marriage, Toto.”

“You do not have any marriage with
me
,” he said indignantly. “Do not judge me by that, that
actor
you marry with!”

She leaned over and gave him a kiss. “I wouldn't dream of comparing you, Toto,” she said, secretly doing just that—to Scotti's advantage, if he'd only known. The attack of nerves that had pestered her all day was gone; just being in familiar surroundings and preparing to do something she loved doing was enough to restore her equanimity.

But when Gerry and Scotti went downstairs to the stage level, they ran into a tension that had nothing to do with pre-curtain jitters. It was a toss-up as to who was more on edge, the choristers or the backstage workers who'd been threatened with mass unemployment if even one more accident occurred. “Cross your fingers,” Gerry said to Scotti. “This isn't going to be an easy one tonight.”

“It is better once the music starts,” he said reassuringly. “When they see
you
are not affected by what happens, they grow calm again.”

“You're right. It's up to me to set an example … oh God, there's Emmy.”

Emmy Destinn sailed toward them like a battleship at top speed. Before the war she'd come to Gerry's performances of
Carmen
simply because she liked them; now she came because she knew it annoyed Gerry. “You must wear this tonight,” she said without preamble, holding out a chain with a pendant dangling from it.

Gerry took the chain. The pendant was a cross, ornately decorated in the Czechoslovakian manner. “It's beautiful, Emmy—but I don't think it goes with a Spanish costume.”

“It is a good-luck charm. The chain is long—the cross will hang down inside your dress. But you must wear it.”

Surprised and rather touched, Gerry slipped the chain over her head. She had no faith in charms and talismans and such, but this was the first friendly gesture the other soprano had made since her return. “Thank you, Emmy.”

Emmy nodded curtly. “I want this accident nonsense settled and everything back to normal. Before I sing again.” She sailed away without another word.

“I should have known,” Gerry said wryly. “Toto—is that Pasquale?”

Scotti glanced over to the other side of the stage where he caught a glimpse of Pasquale Amato making his way cautiously through the wings. “Pasquale and Rico and I,” Scotti explained, “we watch from backstage tonight.”

“Why?” she asked suspiciously.

The baritone was saved from explaining further by the arrival of the man who would conduct that evening's performance. Quaglia looked angry, his boxer's body twitching in annoyance.

“Maestro Quaglia,” Gerry smiled brightly, artificially. “I do hope you haven't come with any last-minute changes.”

“No, dear lady, not tonight.” Quaglia matched her artificial smile. “I have one or two things—but they must wait until we have full chorus again. Do you know three of the choristers quit today?”

“No!”

“Yes. Setti brings one elderly chorister out of retirement to help fill in for the time being … but if there is another accident, more will quit.” Quaglia suddenly gave vent to the anger he'd been suppressing. “They think they are soloists, these chorus singers! I must adjust to
them!
I never have so much trouble with a chorus before in my life!”

Scotti started to say that wasn't precisely true but then decided that wouldn't be too diplomatic. “You can not blame them for worrying,” he said instead. “They are afraid.”

“Pah!” Quaglia exclaimed, his face turning red. “Spineless nobodies!
I
am not afraid!”

“
You
do not sing in the chorus,” Scotti said gently.

“Why do they think they are singled out for such special attention? Some of them are claiming these accidents are no accidents—they say everything that's happened is deliberate.”

“
Ridicolo
.”

“Of course it's ridiculous.” Quaglia made a visible effort to calm down. “I've told Mr. Gatti, either Setti whips that chorus into line immediately or I will delete the chorus numbers from all the operas I conduct the rest of the season.”

Gerry half-gasped, half-laughed. “Surely you're not serious! You can't just eliminate the chorus from opera!”

“I am thoroughly convinced that I can.” The conductor pulled out a handkerchief and patted his forehead. “Ah, it is time.” He grasped Gerry's hand, gave it a perfunctory kiss, and hurried away to take his place in the orchestra pit.

The soprano watched him go. “Sometimes I believe that man thinks he's Toscanini.”

Scotti nodded solemly. “All of the temperament, but …”

“But little of the artistry,” she finished. The sound of polite applause from the auditorium told them Quaglia was making his way to the podium. Scotti gave her an encouraging squeeze of the hand and slipped away.

The opera started.

Gerry listened carefully to the chorus; their attack was ragged and one or two voices stood out over the others. Not good. The tempo was too fast, for one thing, faster than what they'd rehearsed. She put the chorus out of her mind and concentrated on her own role. Enter …
now
.

“
Quand je vous aimérai?
” She sang her first line with all the authority she could muster.
When will I love you?
Who knows. She deliberately slowed down the tempo of the
Habanera
and ignored Quaglia's attempts to get her to pick up the speed. The first half of the aria was ruined by a conflict of the two tempi; but when Quaglia saw she wasn't going to follow his beat, he glowered at her and slowed the orchestra to match the pace she was setting. She rewarded him with a smile, all the while thinking that Toscanini would never have allowed her to get away with
that
.

She finished the
Habanera
to enthusiastic applause—and to the sound of a few voices chanting
Ger-ee, Ger-ee!
from the back of the auditorium.
Not yet, girls
, Gerry thought as she sashayed off the stage;
mustn't cheer yourselves out before the final curtain
. Every year new gerryflappers appeared in the audience, fresh-faced young girls eager to join the army of females who worshipped the ground Geraldine Farrar walked on. The ones who'd been around a while knew just when to start the chanting—not too early, not too late.

Gerry's maid was waiting offstage with a towel and make-up so she wouldn't have to run up the stairs to her dressing room and right back down again; she had to go back on again as soon as the tenor finished singing his duet with the
second
lady of the opera. Gerry took the towel and started patting dry the light film of perspiration on her face.

“I hold the mirror, yes?” a familiar voice asked.

“What are you doing, Rico?” Gerry asked, powdering down. “You and Toto and Pasquale—what are you up to?”

“We watch,” he said importantly. “We watch and make certain no more accidents bedevil us.”

“Hold it a little lower—there. How can watching stop an accident?”

“Oh, we are very busy,” Caruso announced. “We check stage ropes and props and scenery—hey,
scugnizz
',” he broke off, “what do you do here?”

Rosa Ponselle came over for a hug from her favorite tenor. “Everybody else was staying backstage—I didn't want to miss anything. Gerry, that was a great
half
a
Habanera
.”

“Mm, yes, it took Quaglia a while to catch on. Hold the mirror still, Rico.”

“I think Mr. Gatti and Ziegler are both on the verge of nervous breakdowns,” Rosa remarked. “They're both fussing around like old mother hens.”

“We all check,” Caruso explained. “We make sure no more accidents.”

“I've got to go on,” Gerry said, patting her hair. “Everybody go away.”

They left her alone and once again she directed all her concentration toward her role. In the next scene she got into a fight with one of the chorus women. She'd always liked that part.

Yelling and screaming—all musical, all rehearsed. Women pouring on to the stage, filling the stage, taking over the stage. Geraldine Farrar in the middle of it all, pulling free from the soldier who was trying to restrain her, turning to strike at the chorus woman …

… who wasn't there.

Without hesitating, Gerry lashed out at a different woman of the chorus—who looked shocked at first but then caught on and played out the incident. It wasn't art, but it got done.

Eventually everyone left the stage except Gerry and the tenor, the seduction of whom she was to complete in exactly one aria. Halfway through the
Seguidilla
, she became aware of raised voices backstage. Angry, she started singing louder, causing Maestro Quaglia to raise an eyebrow at her. But the backstage voices didn't stop, and she could even hear someone running. The
idiots
—creating a disturbance while a performance was in progress!

Then it hit her. There'd been another accident.

Her fears were confirmed when she glanced off into the wings and saw Scotti standing there watching her worriedly. When next she happened to look off the other side of the stage, there stood Caruso, wringing his hands, anxiety written all over his face. The tenor she was singing the scene with missed a cue, also aware that something was wrong.

Gerry finished the
Seguidilla
on automatic and rushed off the stage toward Scotti, who immediately wrapped both arms around her and started making comforting noises. “Don't
soothe
me, Toto,” she ordered, “tell me what's happened. There's been another accident, hasn't there? How many this time? And how serious? Who is it?”

“Only one, but it is as serious as it can be. She is dead.”

She knew it, she knew it!
“Who, Toto?”

“The chorus woman you are supposed to fight with,” Scotti said. “She is not onstage tonight because she is lying dead behind one of the roller curtains.”

“My God.” Gerry was silent for a moment, shaken. “What kind of accident was it this time? Did the roller curtain fall on her?”

“No.” Scotti's face was full of pain. “This time is no accident. Someone stabs her, Gerry! There is long knife in her heart. This time it is murder.”

Gerry drew in a deep breath.
Murder
.

“And,” Scotti finished anxiously, “this time we are supposed to know it is murder. The killer, he wants us to know—he wants us to know he is here.”

3

In 1918, the city of New York had done away with the corrupt and inefficient coroner's office that had been the scandal of city government for so long. And now, two years later, the Metropolitan Opera was seeing the new medical examiner's office in action. Pathologists and technicians descended on the opera house along with the police; they examined the body and estimated the time of death to be between four and seven o'clock, since rigor mortis was just beginning to set in.

The murdered woman's name was Teresa Leone. She was a mezzo-soprano from Baltimore who'd been singing in the Metropolitan Opera chorus for four years. Teresa had shared rooms on Bleecker Street with another chorister, who hadn't seen her roommate since noon. It seemed that Teresa always had voice lessons scheduled for late Thursday afternoons; so instead of making the trip downtown to her rooms and back up again, she was in the habit of going straight from her voice teacher's studio to the opera house. Pending the voice teacher's confirmation of the time Teresa had left the studio, the police then set the time of death at around six o'clock.

Teresa Leone had been engaged to marry a publisher of catalogues and Bibles, a prosperous man who'd been in Cleveland for the past three days on business. She had no obvious enemies among the other choristers; Giulio Setti told the police she was one of the least contentious singers in the chorus. Teresa's roommate said nothing had been troubling her lately; Teresa was, in fact, happily looking forward to meeting the rest of her fiancé's family at Christmastime.

Every member of the chorus volunteered the information that Teresa's death was simply the most recent of a series of malevolent acts directed against the chorus; Gatti-Casazza volunteered the opinion that the choristers were understandably upset and were jumping to conclusions. The body had been found by Edward Ziegler, during his ongoing accident-prevention patrol. The two or three choristers who'd missed Teresa while they were getting into costume and makeup, including her roommate, had simply assumed Teresa had dressed early and was waiting in the greenroom. There was precedent for such an assumption.

The police were faced with the problem of finding out whether Teresa Leone's murder was connected to the earlier ‘accidents' or whether it was an isolated event. Also, the ostensible suicide of the man found hanging in the chorus dressing room would have to be looked into more closely. There was much to be considered.

Sixteen more choristers resigned.

“
Una maledizione
,” Caruso croaked. “I say so—do I not say so, Pasquale?”

“Yes, Rico, you say so.” Amato sighed tiredly. “It is still foolishness what you say.”

“Not so foolish. I say something more happens, and I am right.”

They had gathered the next day in Geraldine Farrar's apartment on West Seventy-fourth Street—Caruso, Amato, Scotti, and Gatti-Casazza. Emmy Destinn had arrived shortly thereafter, demanding her good-luck pendant back from Gerry. “I sing before you do again,” she explained. “We will take turns wearing it.”