A Motive For Murder (3 page)

“Sorry,” he said, escorting her into the elevator. He
had no intention of telling Aunt Lil the truth. She pestered him
enough about Lilah as it was. “It’s about this plan of yours to
‘blow the lid off,’ as you put it,” he said. “In this case, I think
discretion really is the better part of valor. You could seriously
harm the Metro with a story like this. I can understand using the
press as a deterrent to head off the vote, but if they’ve already
voted, maybe we would be better off trying to help Fatima find
another role rather than trying to hurt the company.”

Auntie Lil did not reply, and in her silence, he
could sense her stubbornness rising like a beast from the depths.
“Aunt Lil,” he warned, “I am very serious about this. I will take
you to dinner and we will discuss it.”

“Dinner?” she repeated hopefully. Food was the one
sure way to get her attention. “Do I get to pick the place?”

“Of course,” he agreed, knowing that, whether he
liked it or not, she always chose their restaurants—and chose them
well.

“I’ll listen to what you have to say on one
condition,” she decided.

“What?” he asked warily.

“You must accompany me and Herbert to
The
Nutcracker
premiere next month and look properly outraged at
how poorly this child star creature dances. You must complain
loudly about it at both intermissions.”

“Agreed,” T.S. said quickly as they reached the
lobby. The outer doors opened on the spectacular sight of the
Lincoln Center fountain shooting plumes of water high into the sky.
The streams of liquid shimmered like gold against the New York City
skyline. “I’d be glad to come with you and Herbert,” he added,
smiling. T.S. was no fool. Lilah would surely be there, too. With
any luck, he’d wind up as her date.

Auntie Lil may not have alerted the press about
Fatima Jones, but someone else most certainly had. The day before
the Metro Ballet’s premiere of their annual production of
The
Nutcracker,
Margo McGregor’s biweekly column was devoted
entirely to the subject.

Auntie Lil knew she would be blamed for this. Her
remarks at the board meeting almost guaranteed it. Yet she had
followed T.S.’s advice and avoided Margo McGregor’s eventual call
back. She pondered the best way to deal with the situation as she
sat at the dining-room table in T.S.’s apartment high above York
Avenue on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. She had consumed her
customary hearty breakfast and was now in the process of eating her
nephew’s while she waited for him to model his rental tuxedo. It
had been altered for him at the store, but Auntie Lil did not trust
their tailor. She intended to perfect the fit herself and had
lugged over several pounds of supplies in anticipation of
correcting a shoddy job. Now greater problems demanded her
attention.

“Oh dear,” she muttered, absently finishing the plate
of Danish as she scanned the long article. Margo had included
details of audition results that only an insider would have known.
Who had leaked the incident and why?

“What do you think?” T.S. entered the dining nook
looking resplendent in his evening wear.

“I think we’re in for trouble tomorrow night,” she
muttered back, rereading the article anxiously.

“What happened to the sweet rolls?” T.S. asked,
noticing the empty plate.

“You don’t need any sweet rolls,” she said quickly,
hoping to head off his protests. “You are starting to fill out a
bit, I notice.” Much to her chagrin, the tuxedo fit T.S. perfectly.
The tailor had done a good job.

“I am not filling out,” T.S. said, nonetheless
checking his reflection in the glass doors that led to his balcony.
He patted his tummy. He thought he looked rather trim in his
tuxedo. He weighed the same as he had at thirty-five, thanks to
sane eating and regular exercise. It would never have occurred to
him to abuse his body. Everyone knew that the Hubberts were blessed
with stout constitutions—and that they took no chances with their
good luck.

“Stop admiring yourself and come take a look at
this.” Auntie Lil spread the paper out on the dining room
table.

WHO SAYS NO ONE KNOWS WHAT GOES ON BEHIND CLOSED
DOORS?
screamed the headline. Worse yet was the opening
sentence. Auntie Lil read it out loud: “‘Was it old-fashioned
racism or simply a contagious case of Hollywood fever? You be the
judge. Regardless, the behavior of the Metropolitan Ballet board
of directors in the matter of Fatima Jones can only be called
misguided.’” She looked at T.S. from over her reading glasses. “Not
exactly the kind of publicity the board had in mind.”

T.S. locked eyes with his aunt grimly. His big night
out with Lilah as his date had just taken a turn for the worse.

The turn for the worse turned out to be more like a
headlong dive off a high cliff. The next evening, as they
approached Lincoln Center in Lilah’s limousine, they could hear
angry shouting from a block away.

“Trouble ahead,” Grady the chauffeur informed them.
“Shall I go on?”

“What in the world?” Lilah murmured. She was dressed
in a simple gown of black that draped in soft folds from a diamond
clip pinned over one of her shoulders. Her upswept silver hair
complemented her healthy complexion. Her face gave off the
well-weathered glow of a woman who spent a lot of time with her
horses. T.S. thought her stunning and much preferred her naturally
aged beauty to the artificial youth of many of the women in her
moneyed circle.

Auntie Lil slouched down in guilt, gathering her
purple chiffon concoction over her knees. She tugged the voluminous
folds of her gown around her ever-present matching trousers. Auntie
Lil wore the world’s most elegant pantsuits but seldom touched a
dress—unless she was creating it, of course.

T.S. averted his eyes from Lilah and stared out the
window. He had a good idea of what might lie ahead. Margo
McGregor’s column could only have stirred up trouble; he was sure
the angry voices were about Fatima.

Only Herbert Wong—as oblivious as Lilah to the
article published the day before—addressed himself to the problem.
He rolled down his window and stuck his head out for a better look.
“There is a large gathering of some sort at the entrance to the
theater,” he announced. “I am reminded of the 1968 Democratic
Convention.”

“Slow down, Grady,” Lilah requested. “We’ll walk from
here.” Unsure of the protesters’ politics, Lilah was wise enough to
know that emerging from a limousine into an angry crowd would be as
foolhardy as walking into a herd of migrating wildebeests.

They approached Lincoln Center on foot, surrounded by
the usual chaos of the cultural center near curtain time: cabs
honked impatiently; buses roared by; frantic musicians clutching
strangely shaped instrument cases dashed past, looking stricken;
and well-dressed people laughed in groups, cheerful from their
pretheater drinks and giddy with the anticipation of beauty. This
well-choreographed chaos took place against a backdrop of
headlights streaming past and the twinkling lights of the Center’s
well-lit atrium.

The noise was even more cacophonous than usual thanks
to a parade of fifty protesters marching in a large circle in front
of the entrance to the State Theater. They jostled placards and
shouted slogans as if they had been beamed down into New York City
from another, more political era. Elegantly dressed patrons huddled
in their minks and scurried fearfully on their way to the Metro’s
premiere through the chanters. News cameras were being hastily set
up to one side, triggering a flurry of related activity. As Auntie
Lil and her entourage drew near it became obvious that the
protesters were being led by a beefy black man in a snug blue suit
whose white hair stood straight up from his head as if he had stuck
his finger in a light socket.

“Ben Hampton,” Auntie Lil whispered to T.S. “And
they’re going to blame me for it.”

The Reverend Ben Hampton was rapidly becoming as
familiar a fixture in New York City as the Statue of Liberty. And,
to some New Yorkers, he represented many of the same ideals. Using
media savvy and a dubious diploma from a third-rate law school as
his credentials, Ben Hampton had earned a colorful reputation as
the leader of numerous (and not always wisely chosen) protests
against social injustice. He did not always check his facts first
and had been embarrassed in the past by staged scandals. But he
weighed in often enough on the side of the angels—and uttered so
many good sound bites—that many of New York’s poorer residents saw
him as their champion, as a man they could go to when the system
turned against them. In the past few years Hampton had organized
successful protests against the closing of a swimming pool in
Harlem and several parks in the Bronx; unequal funding of
neighborhood schools; a handful of alleged incidents of police
brutality; and one spectacular case of statutory rape against a
city-council member that turned out to be false and nearly cost him
a lawsuit for libel. He was a fixture on the local news and a
frequent guest on national television programs. Whether he was
truly a reverend or had merely adopted the title was a matter of
lively debate. The walls of his small office were papered in
certificates from numerous organizations and a handful of churches,
but few people had ever heard of any of them. Some politicians made
the mistake of thinking he was harmless; others made the even
bigger mistake of combating him in the press. No one could deflect
a charge and turn it against an opponent better than the Reverend
Ben Hampton. His emotional and thunderous countercharges seldom
made sense, but they sure sounded good—and that’s what counted when
you had all of fifteen seconds to capture the attention of the
public.

“It’s that man with the strange hair again,” Lilah
said, echoing the sentiments of most of New York’s wealthy about
the Reverend Ben Hampton. He mostly perplexed them: they could not
understand his pulpit histrionics and they rather wished he would
just go away.

Herbert was beginning to catch on that Auntie Lil
might have had something to do with the commotion. He gazed back
and forth between the protesters and Auntie Lil, trying to puzzle
out the connection. He was a patient man, however, and held his
tongue. He knew Lillian would tell him when she was ready.

Auntie Lil eyed the protesters nervously, though it
was not outsiders she feared. She was sure Lane Rogers would come
charging around the corner at any moment and accuse her of having
leaked the vote details to the press.

“Let’s all just get inside,” T.S. suggested. He and
Herbert flanked their companions and waded through the crowd,
ignoring the shouts of “Justice for Fatima!” that rang in their
ears. As they neared the entrance doors they could hear applause
behind them. They turned and watched as Ben Hampton hoisted his
plump frame onto the ledge surrounding Lincoln Center’s magnificent
fountain. It was a well-chosen pose. Sparkling lights thrown off
the water plumes blazed behind him like a biblical endorsement,
framing him in reflected glory. Flashbulbs popped and news cameras
rolled as he held aloft a large photograph of Fatima Jones posed
en pointe
and looking ethereal as she held a classic
arabesque pose, one long leg extended out behind her.

“She had a dream!” Ben Hampton thundered, shaking her
photograph at the crowd. “Yes, she had a dream and she worked
toward that dream. But they have destroyed her dream!” He pointed
to the Metro’s theater with an accusatory finger. Hundreds of
gathered protesters and curious onlookers joined the crews of four
local television stations in simultaneously turning to where he was
pointing.

 His timing was impeccable. Auntie Lil and her
companions were pinned in the glare of television lights right in
the middle of the main doors to the theater. The next day a
photograph of them would appear on the bottom of page one of two
local tabloids, three of them caught with their mouths agape and
incredibly guilty expressions plastered across their faces. Only
Herbert Wong would emerge looking dignified, his calm expression in
the line of fire making him appear like a particularly dapper
modern Buddha.

“What is going on?” Lilah asked in horror as a
security guard appeared belatedly and escorted them inside to the
lobby.

“The press found out about Fatima Jones,” Auntie Lil
explained miserably.

“You didn’t... did you?” Lilah asked, knowing Auntie
Lil.

“No, I did not,” she promised emphatically.

The mob scene inside the theater rivaled the one
outside. The long walk to their seats involved wading through an
overexcited crowd and a huge sea of noise. They were seated in the
third row and had to battle their way to the front. As usual,
Auntie Lil had insisted they obtain seats as close as possible to
the stage. She had even declined the offer extended to all board
members to observe opening night from backstage. She enjoyed seeing
the dancers sweat, she had explained. It made their talent that
much more amazing to behold. T.S.—who had wiped strange
perspiration off his face from far too many talented dancers at far
too many performances—had protested in vain. If he leaned forward,
T.S. reflected, he risked being poked in the eye by the conductor’s
baton.

Once seated, they turned for a better look at the
noisy crowd behind them. The audience was in a state of
pandemonium, not because of the protest but because it consisted
chiefly of adolescent girls and their overwrought mothers.

“Tickets were a hundred dollars apiece for the
premiere,” Auntie Lil said. “How can these young people afford
it?”

“They didn’t pay,” Lilah pointed out. “Their parents
did.”

Someone had paid, that was for sure. Beyond the first
twenty center rows—which were largely occupied by Metro patrons and
their guests—the opulent auditorium was a sea of raging female
hormones. Girls whispered, squealed, wiggled, and elbowed each
other as they waited in breathless anticipation for the emergence
of Mikey Morgan. Chewing gum popped anony–mously all around them in
a maddeningly uneven rhythm. T.S. felt like he was trapped in a
giant bag of popping corn.