Blackbird 10 - A Little Night Murder (14 page)

Ox was a short man—barely my height, I guessed—but he sat with the body language of a powerful person accustomed to commanding money and prestige: upright posture, shoulders square, head high, one hand resting on the table at all times. As befitting a Broadway impresario, he wore flashy rings on his pudgy fingers. Otherwise, he had a round face and a bald head with a neatly trimmed white fringe around his prominent ears. Put him in a red sleigh and a false beard, and he’d make a pretty good Santa Claus.

I said, “I suppose finding Boom Boom’s daughter dead was very upsetting for everyone connected with the show.”

Libby sighed again. “Such a gruesome subject!”

Ox patted her hand. “The show is my livelihood, Elizabeth.”

She smiled fetchingly. “The show must go on, Oxy?”

“I hope so,” he replied, gazing deeply into her eyes.

I cleared my throat before they started canoodling right in front of me. “There’s something I have to ask you, Mr. Oxenfeld. Have you noticed anything strange about Boom Boom?”

“You mean her color?”

“Exactly. I’ve seen earlier pictures, and she wasn’t always blue. What happened?”

Ox said, “She was taking some dietary supplements that caused the coloration. She’s hoping it will fade, but . . .”

Libby said, “I ate too many carrots on a carrot diet once, and my palms turned orange.” She held up her perfectly normal palms. “That was just one of many reasons for me to condemn dieting forever.”

To Ox, I said, “When did it happen?”

“Let me see. About two years ago, I guess. It started gradually. Then suddenly she was blue, and—well, now she has a nurse to help keep her medications straight.”

I swallowed a comment about closing the barn door after the horse was gone and instead said, “I’ve been invited to Monday’s preview. Boom Boom said I should bring cameras. What’s the purpose of the preview? Can you tell me about it?”

He swung around to me again, unable to conceal his surprise. “I wasn’t expecting any media coverage. I’m not sure it’s the best— Well, if Boom Boom feels strongly about it, I can hardly protest, can I? The purpose? I’ve invited some influential people to attend. We’re still hoping to find backers. And—well, everybody
connected with the show seemed to think a preview might be a nice send-off for Jenny. Boom Boom vetoed a funeral, you see. The cast is rehearsing tonight in the theater’s rehearsal space. The main thing is making sure they can do the show without Jenny. Her loss will be a great hurdle to overcome.”

“Why?” Libby asked. “What did she have to do with anything?”

I said, “Jenny was a vital part of rehearsals, wasn’t she, Ox?”

“Yes. She had— She rewrote some of the lyrics that didn’t work, made a few adjustments to the music.” Ox seemed torn between keeping information from me and impressing my sister. “That happens a lot during the creation of any show when the composer is present, you understand, but without Toodles around—well, Jenny was extraordinary at interpreting the spirit of her father’s intent.”

I said, “Might she have contributed to the songwriting back when Toodles wrote the show?”

Ox struggled with an answer and finally said, “As far as I know, she did not.
Bluebird of Happiness
is one hundred percent from Toodles. Jenny was a big help, though. Without her, we’ll unfortunately have to rely on Fred Fusby now.”

“Doesn’t Fred have the talent to pull the show together?”

“I fervently hope so. But he’s only the music director—the one who conducts the musicians and coaches the singers. We still need a stage director, too—and a whole team of theater pros: lighting designers, a costume staff, that kind of thing. Unfortunately, we can’t afford anyone else just yet.”

I said, “You’re waiting for the big investor to bring more money to the production.”

“Uh, yes. Boom Boom has promised he’s on his way, but—well, we need the money soon or the production will fold. Which is why we’re hoping to encourage other investors at the preview.”

Libby frowned. “I thought you were the producer, Oxy. You
said you wear a tuxedo and go to lovely restaurants with famous actors and—”

“I am the managing producer.” He regained his expansive demeanor. “But I’d be a fool to sink all my capital into one basket. I must save my eggs for expenses that are more important to me personally.”

He smiled into her eyes, and she leaned close and glowed.

I interrupted the tunnel-of-love moment by asking, “Ox, do you know who Boom Boom’s big investor is?”

“No, but I trust her,” Ox said, perhaps a shade too quickly. “We’ve known each other a long time. She may be losing a few steps at her age, but she still has relationships with the important people we need. I’m sure she has lined up someone reliable.”

I asked, “Is she really going to play the lead role?”

Ox again grabbed his champagne glass and raised it to his mouth, only to belatedly realize it was empty. As efficient as a geisha, Libby reached for the bottle to replenish his glass. While she poured, he said, “Boom Boom had a lot of talent in her day. But, uh, it’s a very demanding role. It requires a singer-dancer with skill and stamina. And someone who isn’t . . . blue. Out of respect for her past accomplishments, however, we continue to . . . indulge her.”

“I suppose the big investor wants Boom Boom to play the lead?”

“He’s the financial linchpin, but the addition of new backers may change the casting. Everybody comes in with new opinions. It may be a better box office strategy to offer the role to someone with the star power to sell tickets—someone from television or the movies, perhaps.”

Libby swallowed a mouthful of cheesecake and leaned closer, resting one breast on Ox’s arm. “I’d love to meet Neil Patrick Harris. Isn’t he adorable?”

To Ox, I said, “You’re stuck with Boom Boom for the time being.”

Libby sighed irritably. “Boom Boom is a bitch on wheels, from what I heard when I made my deliveries. Everybody hates her. But they’re also terrified of her.”

“That may be overstating things,” Ox said without much conviction.

Libby licked her fork, then speared a raspberry with it. “You told me it’s a wonder she wasn’t the one who died. You said you were actually afraid somebody might kill her.”

Ox’s resolve crumbled. He gave up trying to snow me. “Honestly? She’s more exasperating than any actress I’ve ever known. It’s a miracle somebody didn’t strangle her a long time ago.”

“What about Jenny?” I asked. “Did anyone want to strangle her?”

“Jenny was her mother’s polar opposite. She was very much liked.”

“By everyone?” I pressed.

“Almost,” he said, and couldn’t go on.

I said, “Fred liked her. But Poppy didn’t. And neither did Boom Boom.”

“True,” Ox said unwillingly. “But that doesn’t mean they killed her.”

“Ox, do you know the boy in the photograph? The photo Jenny carried in her pocket?”

“I have no idea who he is.”

“Can you guess?”

Libby said, “Betcha he’s her son. A love child. The result of a wonderful but doomed romantic relationship with—well, I don’t know who. Did Jenny sleep around?”

“Of course not.” Ox began to look unnerved by the way my sister and I were peppering him with questions. “Jenny was a very quiet woman—a woman with a spotless reputation. She was a paragon.”

Libby said, “A paragon? That’s usually a word that means she wasn’t much fun.”

I thought of Jenny hanging around crab shacks listening to the likes of chanteuses like Bridget O’Halloran. Maybe she wasn’t as much of a paragon as people believed.

“If she did have a romantic relationship,” I said, “who might it have been with?”

Ox shook his head firmly. “I can’t imagine Jenny being interested in romance. She seemed single-minded about the music. Where’s the waiter? We should order more cheesecake.”

As he snapped his fingers to call a waiter, it hit me that maybe Ox was trying to gloss over his relationship with Jenny for my sister’s benefit. I wondered if he and Jenny had ever—? Had he used the proverbial casting couch?

Instead of pursuing that idea aloud, I asked, “Did Jenny support your idea that Boom Boom should star in the show? Or did she prefer Poppy Fontanna?”

Still looking around for the waiter, Ox said, “We all agreed Poppy isn’t right for the role, either. Not powerful enough. Not a showstopper.”

I asked, “So who will get the part? Not—Bridget O’Halloran?”

At the mention of Bridget, Ox turned colors all over again. “As much as the delightful Miss O’Halloran would like to be the lead, I’m only the producer, not the director.”

“So Fred will decide?”

Ox considered the question and looked rather surprised by the answer that occurred to him. “Until yesterday, I’d have said that Jenny would have decided. She wasn’t the official director, but she was making the creative choices. And she was the only one who would have eventually stood up to Boom Boom.”

“So,” I said, “if Boom Boom feared her daughter might prevent her from getting the role, what might Boom Boom have done?”

He couldn’t summon the words. By his expression, though, I guessed he believed Boom Boom might have gone to any length to play the lead in
Bluebird of Happiness
.

Libby slid her hand over Ox’s. She leaned close to his ear and whispered, “Let’s not talk about murder anymore. We have much more exciting things to consider.”

When Libby set her sights on a man, he was usually a goner. As she stroked his hand, Ox seemed to lose his ability to concentrate before my eyes. Any minute, he was going to start thinking about all those hotel rooms within close proximity. And I wondered if Libby was thinking about her unmet need for intimacy. Or—as Emma had suggested—her need for financial help paying college tuition for Rawlins.

I couldn’t stand to watch anymore. Abruptly, I thanked them for the champagne I hadn’t even sipped and stood up to excuse myself.

Libby cried, “You’re going already?”

Ox rose to shake my hand. The light of the chandelier gleamed on his bald head, highlighting the age spots. He had twinkly Santa eyes, which were discernible through his saggy eyelids. For an old guy, he was courtly.

To me, he said, “Those are very attractive shoes you’re wearing.”

“Oh. Thank you.”

Libby jumped up from the banquette. “I’ll walk you to a cab, Nora. Ox, order us more desserts, and I’ll be right back.”

She wobbled on her new strappy sandals as we crossed the lobby. Outside, Libby gasped and leaned against the hand railing. “Nora, please slow down. I think I’m going to explode.”

“What’s wrong? The new shoes?”

“Not just the shoes.” She clutched her stomach as if she’d been stabbed. “I bought some new Spanx. The Spanish Inquisition could have used this thing! It’s killing me. And how are Spanx any
different from that girdle Grandmama took to wearing, I’d like to know? I was seduced by the naughty name. Now all my internal organs are getting squished!”

She did look a bit as if she’d been poured into her outfit like sausage into its casing. I said, “That couldn’t have anything to do with the cheesecake.”

“What’s wrong with you?” Libby blinked, looking as wounded as a fawn.

“Seeing you practically sitting in Ox’s lap is—is—honestly? I can’t stand it.” I spun on her. “One day you’re delivering his lunch, and now he’s suddenly buying you sexy shoes!”

“You asked me to talk to him!”

“Talking is different from . . . from throwing yourself at the man. What are you thinking? Do you even
like
him? You’re acting like he’s some kind of meal ticket!”

“I’ll have you know he told me more than he told you. You didn’t ask him who got Jenny hooked on energy drinks. Well, it was him! He was totally addicted himself, and he encouraged Jenny to try them, too. But he started getting heart palpitations, so his doctor ordered him to stop. Meanwhile, he got Jenny hooked on caffeine!”

“Then what in the world are you doing with him? He might have killed her!”

“Not on purpose!”

“How do you know that?”

“I just do, that’s all. He’s too nice a man to hurt anyone, let alone a lady.”

“You’re blinded by love, is that it?”

Her spine stiffened at my sarcastic tone. “He’s an attractive man who could use an attentive woman in his life. Why not me?”

“Why not? For one thing, he must be twenty-five years older than you are!”

Two bright spots of color appeared on her cheekbones. “That just means he’s worldly and smart and—”

“You’ve got him wondering how fast he can get his hands on a Viagra prescription.” I could hear myself getting angrier by the second, but I couldn’t stop myself. “And what about that spiritual fulfillment you’re always babbling about? That goes out the window when you see dollar signs?”

Libby snapped to attention and quivered with affronted pride. “Out of the goodness of my heart, I came out here to warn you not to exhaust yourself with worrying about Jenny Tuttle’s death. But I can see your hormones are completely out of control—”

“The only thing that’s out of control around here is you. You’ve sunk to seducing a man to get to his money!”

Libby sucked in a breath and raised her head high. “I think you’ve said enough, Nora. If you’ll excuse me, I have to find a ladies’ room and take off these Spanx before I rupture an ovary. Which I might need if I decide to marry Ox Oxenfeld! Good-bye.”

She stormed back into the hotel, leaving me standing there in openmouthed astonishment.

Had I heard correctly? She was actually thinking of marrying Ox Oxenfeld?

I
left Libby to do whatever the hell she wanted with her life, and I tried to calm myself by walking several blocks toward the Chinatown section of the city. Although still furious with my sister, I told myself I needed time to process what I had learned from Ox Oxenfeld. But my thoughts were so muddled by anger at my sister, I ended up thinking that the only person without a motive to kill Jenny Tuttle was me.

I passed the best Peking duck restaurant in Philadelphia and a few more tiny shops before stepping through a doorway beside a former Chinese laundry that was now the take-out window of the Fu Manchu restaurant.

I took the long flight of narrow steps to the second floor. Halfway up, I encountered an old woman gripping the banister and carefully making her way down the stairs. With a start, I remembered her. Dorothea Mitt Scanlon. In her day, she had been a very famous Philadelphia socialite and a friend of my grandmother’s. Now at least ninety, she attended only a handful of high-society
social events a year—those with ticket prices of five thousand dollars and up, and which required the haute-est of haute couture. She was still stick thin and as tanned as cordovan leather, but her cosmetic procedures could no longer fight gravity. Her face was tight at the edges, and filler had puffed her mouth into duck lips, but everything between had gone slack. It was a shame, because she’d probably have aged very gracefully if not for surgical intervention. We said hellos but kept going our separate directions. The light was so dim and her eyesight was so poor, I was sure she didn’t recognize me—certainly not in my current round shape.

At the top of the stairs, I knocked, and Krissie Wong opened the door to her modest apartment.

“Hi, Nora. Thanks for coming. Wow! Is that a real Pucci?”

“Inherited from my grandmother.” When I had closed the door behind myself, I said in a stage whisper, “I just met Mrs. Scanlon on the stairs. Can you tell me what she’s wearing to the hospital ball?”

Krissie put one finger to her lips. “She’d be humiliated if it got out, but she’s recycling old dresses.”

“Hey, that’s the story of my life,” I said with a smile.

“But not hers. Poor thing, she lost all her money. Lexie Paine stole it.”

“Lexie didn’t steal anything,” I immediately objected. “It was her partner who did all that.”

“But her partner’s dead, and Lexie’s still alive, so that’s who people blame. I feel sorry for Mrs. Scanlon. She doesn’t have any children, and her husband is long gone. Her friends are paying for her ticket to the gala to cheer her up. She must sell her house and downsize.”

I felt sorry for Mrs. Scanlon, too. At her age, she was probably afraid of ending up destitute. But it was unfair of people to blame Lexie for her partner’s terrible crime. I kept my objections to
myself, though. It was hard to defend someone who was living in the lap of luxury—even if that luxury was borrowed.

Krissie’s tiny apartment was jammed with clothing that hung on hangers and racks and lay folded over the furniture. Some of the items I recognized right away—elaborate silken costumes from the opera company’s coming production of
Carmen
, obviously sent to Krissie for alterations. The other pieces ranged from prom dresses to business suits and beautiful beaded gowns I’d no doubt see in the coming months at formal functions around the city. Despite her modest atelier, Krissie did quality work for quality clients.

Her furniture consisted of folding chairs, several old sewing machines and a well-used ironing board, all crowded together so that there was little room to move except for a small cleared space in front of a three-way mirror. The room smelled faintly of machine oil as well as the cooking fragrances that floated up from Fu Manchu.

From the half-open kitchen door waved Krissie’s tiny, smiling grandmother. The former proprietor of the long-gone laundry business downstairs, she was now a diminutive, wrinkled lady who always seemed to sit in Krissie’s cluttered kitchen reading a Chinese newspaper. Her gnarled fingers ran lightly across the printed symbols.

Judging by the bare-bones nature of her apartment, I suspected Krissie sent money to support many relatives abroad.

Krissie didn’t notice the mess around her and cheerfully asked, “How about some tea?”

The idea of drinking hot tea in the hot apartment didn’t appeal, so I thanked her and declined. “How are my dresses coming?”

“I wanted you to try on the St. Laurent one more time. I’m still not sure we have it right.”

I slipped into the bathroom that served as the dressing room and
pulled over my head a voluminous chiffon dress. When I came out, Krissie fastened the gown at the back and led me to the mirror. Together, we studied the mint green Yves St. Laurent design with critical eyes. I had inherited it from an actress who had battled her weight, so the dress had been intended for a larger woman. Its long, sweeping lines and wealth of fabric were intended to camouflage figure flaws. The elegant neckline was a simple silver ring that exposed my pale shoulders. The chiffon flowed over my belly in a graceful cascade of mint green and touched the floor at my feet. Krissie had lightly basted her alterations so that the dress fit my figure
.

But Krissie frowned at my reflection and finally shook her head. “It fits, and the color’s great on you, Nora, but it still overwhelms you, doesn’t it?”

I sighed. “I look as if I’m swimming in key lime pie.”

“I hate to suggest this, but what if we cut it short? If it were cocktail length, it wouldn’t be a St. Laurent anymore, exactly, but it would suit you better. And it would be more multipurpose.”

It felt like a sin against fashion to change the spirit of the original St. Laurent design. On the other hand, I really needed something nice to wear during the next two months.

Seeing my indecision, she said, “Let me pin it up, and we’ll look at it again.”

While she worked, I stood still and let my gaze rove over some of the costumes hanging around the room. There were many saucy peasant dresses and bright military uniforms with plenty of braid. “Looks as if you have
Carmen
under control.”

She laughed around the pins in her mouth. “I think so. I didn’t make the costumes, you know—I’m just altering pieces from the opera company’s costume shop. They send me work when their staff gets overwhelmed.”

“Do you work on other kinds of shows? Musicals, for instance?”

“Just alterations, never original designs. I have a rush job on my hands at the moment.”

“
Carmen
? Or for a preview of
Bluebird of Happiness
, by any chance?”

She blinked up at me. “
Bluebird
. How did you know that?”

“I’ve been invited to see the preview on Monday night.”

“I thought that preview was supposed to be top secret. Here, look again. What do you think?”

The hem was bulky with extra fabric, but I could see what Krissie had in mind. With high heels, the dress might be flattering, and a little bit sexy, too.

I said, “May God and Coco Chanel forgive me. Let’s hem it.”

Krissie laughed, and I went back to the bathroom.

Next up was an off-white Galanos gown that I’d been saving for years. It had been my grandmother’s when she was expecting my mother. Not for that reason alone did I hold the dress in special esteem. The designer had been born in Philadelphia, and my grandmother had known him well. Although she never said so, I had heard an aunt whisper that she had been one of the great designer’s muses.

I slipped on the dress and caught my breath at my reflection. It was simple, elegant, very chic, with a slim silhouette that might have suited Claudette Colbert in an old movie. A pregnant Claudette, that is. The fabric was a creamy silk with satin ribbon that was embellished with tiny crystals. The shape of my belly was clearly visible, but was not an ungainly bulge. The designer had taken pains to minimize my grandmother’s pregnancy, and his extraordinary skills were clear. The neckline was demure, the bias cut feminine. The best part was that the very low-cut back of the dress featured an exquisite oval of rose-shaped satin cutouts that made a
feature of my otherwise naked back. As if they had been cut out of the fabric, appliqued roses fluttered down the back of the dress into the slight train. The total effect was . . . romantic.

I hadn’t planned on wearing white to the judge’s chamber, but the cream-colored Galanos masterpiece was the kind of dress in which a woman could start a new life, a new family. I looked at myself in the mirror and felt myself tear up. My dear grandmother might well have been standing at my shoulder, smiling at me. She had been the woman who most shaped my life, and I felt as if I honored her memory by wearing her beautiful dress to my wedding.

Filled with happiness, I soon felt guilty for having yelled at Libby. Who was I to judge her situation? Maybe she saw something in Ox I hadn’t observed yet. I needed to apologize to my sister.

“You need help in there?” Krissie asked from the other side of the closed door.

“I’m fine. Just a sec.” I found my handkerchief and dabbed my eyes. Maybe my hormones were more out of control than I thought.

“This is more like it!” Krissie said when I emerged from the bathroom. “Let me adjust the hem. And maybe I’ll tweak the fit of the bodice. This dress demands perfection.”

Down on her knees, she began pinning the silk. “Since you’re going to the preview on Monday night, I wondered if there’s any chance you knew Jenny Tuttle?”

Her question surprised me. “I knew her slightly. I was in her house just after her body was found.”

Krissie sat back on her heels. “Maybe you can help me with a problem. In addition to the costumes I was altering for the show they’re working on, I have a couple of dresses that belong to Jenny.”

“You do?” I was startled all over again.

“Not like this.” She gave the Galanos a respectful tug. “Dresses she ordered online. She brought them here for alterations. Now that she’s gone, I don’t know who to send them to.” Krissie gestured
at something hanging in a plastic bag from a doorframe. “A little blond lady brought the costumes, and I was thinking I could send Jenny’s dresses back with her, but—”

“A blond lady with a baby voice?”

“Yeah, that’s her. The one who looks like Shirley Temple and talks like she just took a hit of helium.” Nettled, Krissie said, “But she acts like a drill sergeant—giving orders and never saying thank you.”

Poppy Fontanna. “I wouldn’t send Jenny’s dresses back with the drill sergeant. They could go to Jenny’s mother, I suppose. Krissie, did Jenny tell you what the dresses were for?”

“Yeah, she said they were for the opening night of her musical. She couldn’t decide which dress would be best, so she left both of them here.”

Her
musical, I noted. “Could I see the dresses?”

“I guess discretion doesn’t matter anymore.” Krissie had finished crawling around me and clambered to her feet. “Right this way.”

She opened the garment bag and showed me two long gowns on hangers—not couture pieces, but mother-of-the-bride dresses someone might pick up in a department store. They looked a little matronly to me, but elegant. One was black, one silver. Both with beading. They were showier than the clothing I had seen in Jenny’s closet. She had planned on making a splash.

Krissie said, “Jenny thought the black was more slimming, but she was hoping to diet her way into the silver one.”

“When was she going to pick them up?”

“She said she wouldn’t need them for a few more weeks. Come to think of it, that was almost a month ago. When is her opening night going to happen?”

“It’s not a firm date yet. Krissie, did Jenny actually call it ‘her’ show? Or her father’s show?”

Krissie screwed up her face to think. “I’m pretty sure she said it was hers.”

After dressing again, I thanked Krissie profusely for her hard work on my gowns and asked if I could pick them up on Wednesday. She agreed. I waved good-bye to her smiling grandmother and went back down the narrow stairs to the street.

Outside, I almost didn’t hear my phone over the roar of a passing bus. I ducked into the lobby of a tourist hotel to answer.

“Nora Blackbird, hello?”

“Uh, Miss Blackbird? From the newspaper?”

I plugged my other ear so I could hear the soft male voice on the other end of the line. “Yes, that’s me.”

“It’s David Kaminsky. Sorry about playing phone tag. I was at band camp and had to wait until the kids were dismissed for the day.”

Band camp? I made my way to a sofa in the lobby and sank down into its squishy softness. Too late, I realized I might have to flag down a passerby to get my bulky self out of the deep cushions.

My momentary silence prompted my caller to add, “I’m the assistant high school band director this year.” He named a school district in nearby Delaware. “It’s only a few extra bucks, but I love it. Did you play an instrument in high school?”

“The cello,” I said.

“Oh, cool. Actually, my first love is strings. I play them all, give private lessons. Band camp is just something to do in the summer. I’m a music teacher, in case you didn’t guess.”

“Mr. Kaminsky, my editor tells me that you called the newspaper this morning.”

“Yeah, I did. Hey, I’m coming up the expressway, almost to the city. Can I meet you somewhere? For a drink or something? Just to talk, that is. Hey, that sounds like a Match-dot-com hookup, huh? But I’m not trying to pick you up, honest.”

I hadn’t planned on taking any chances, but the voluble David Kaminsky sounded like the kind of callow youth I could be perfectly safe with.

I was about to suggest he meet me in the hotel lobby, but I felt my stomach gurgle and instead asked if we could meet at the Reading Terminal—a kind of indoor food court popular with tourists. I walked a couple of blocks to get there and stood in line for a dish of Bassetts cinnamon ice cream. On such a hot day, the line was full of locals as well as out-of-towners. At a nearby stall, the Amish girls were packing up their leftovers. One of the coffee vendors was already closed for the day and had put a
GONE FISHING
sign on the counter. I passed it and went to the back of the terminal to find a semiquiet table to enjoy my treat, feeling only slightly guilty.