Death by Hitchcock (13 page)

Chapter 32
 

Mary Buttery knocked on the door of Chaz Winner’s apartment. It was Saturday afternoon, and Chaz was hungover. He stood unsteadily in the marble foyer of his apartment, unshaven.

“Mary?” he said, clearly uncomfortable. “Come in.”

“I’m awfully sorry to bother you,” Mary said.  “I hope you don’t mind me barging in like this.”

“It’s just that I’ve been packing up Bunny’s things,” she continued.  “Her parents are coming tomorrow to pick them up. Would it be all right if I collected a few of her things from here?”

Chaz looked at her uncomprehendingly through the haze of a pounding headache, until her meaning became clear.

“Of course, of course,” he said, his parched lips sticking together. “It’s very thoughtful of you, Mary.”

“I’m not feeling terribly well,” he continued. “Would you mind finding your way around the apartment on your own? I’m just going to lie down on the sofa.”

As Chaz shuffled toward the living room, Mary headed for the master bathroom. She searched through bottles, jars, and tubes in the medicine cabinet, but did not find what she was looking for. Next she tried the bedroom, sorting through dressers, nightstands, and the vanity table as quietly as she could. She removed Bunny’s clothes from the closet, and folded them into one of the bags she had brought with her. 

Mary made her way quietly into the kitchen. She surveyed the landscape of gleaming granite countertops and stainless steel appliances. There, on a small tray near the sink, were Bunny’s vitamins and homeopathic remedies. Mary found what she was looking for: a bag of Honeysuckle’s raspberry leaf tea, a container of headache tablets, and a bottle of Honeysuckle’s homemade ‘Crampaway,’ made with angelica root, fennel fruit, cinnamon bark, and a few other special ingredients.

Mary made one last tour around the apartment, and collected Bunny’s jewelry, along with a few more personal items. She headed toward the front door.

“Thanks, Chaz,” she called out toward the living room. “I’ll let myself out!”

Chapter 33

After a relaxing lunch with Louis and Hannah Edwards at their small apartment in town, Milo and Louis went for a stroll along the river. It was a beautiful, crisp Saturday afternoon. 

Milo was all wrapped up, trying to convey the importance of Edweard Muybridge’s contribution to the development of moving pictures, and as a result, did not notice Mary leaving Chaz’s apartment building. But Louis did. He recognized Mary from a picture of her Milo had shown him, as she walked briskly away carrying two full shopping bags. Louis wondered if he should mention it to Milo, and decided not to. 

After Milo had gone home later that afternoon, Louis discussed the matter with his wife, Hannah. A walkie-talkie monitor stood on the kitchen table, emitting a soft buzz and the occasional gurgle from the napping baby. 

“What purpose would it serve to tell Milo you saw that girl leaving that apartment building?” Hannah asked, loading the dishwasher.

“I don’t know,” Louis said. “What was she doing there? Seeing another man? Milo told me she lives in one of those apartments over Crackenthorpe’s, so she must’ve been visiting somebody. What if it was a man? Shouldn’t I let Milo know? He’s so crazy about her
––I don’t want him getting hurt.”

“But we have no way of knowing what Mary was doing there,” Hannah replied. “I know you’re only trying to help, Louis, but I think it’s probably better left alone. Too much speculation is never a good thing.”

“Yeah,” Louis said, gathering up baby toys. 

“You’re probably right,” he continued. “But you know something? I think I’ll stop by the police department on Monday and let them know about it. It
might have something to do with the murder investigation. I mean, you never know.”

“You think this girl you saw might have something to do with all of that?” Hannah said.

“You never know,” Louis replied.  “I just don’t want Milo getting hurt.”

Louis arrived at the New Guilford Police Station at nine o’clock Monday morning, and asked to speak to someone about the Bunny Baldwin murder. The woman at reception buzzed Will’s office to see if he was in, yet. 

He was. He had been there since seven-thirty, combing through evidence.

“What can I do for you?” Will said, offering Louis a chair.

“I realize this might be a whole bunch of nothing,” Louis began, “but a friend and I were taking a walk on Saturday, and I happened to see someone running out of an apartment building, carrying two big bags full of stuff. It seemed a little strange to me.”

“You mean, like a robbery?”

“No, not exactly,” Louis replied.

Will’s mind was elsewhere, and he was feeling impatient. He tried again.

“The front desk said you wanted to speak to me about the Baldwin murder investigation,” Will said. 

“Right,” Louis replied. “See, that’s the thing. The girl I saw running from the building was the roommate of the girl who got killed.”

“Mary Buttery?” Will asked.

“Yes, that’s right,” Louis said. “My friend that I was walking with the day I saw Mary, is also a student in the Film Department. As a matter of fact, he has kind of a crush on Mary.”

Now Louis had Will’s undivided attention.

“Would this friend of yours be Milo Marcus?” Will asked.

“Yeah, how did you know?” Louis replied.

“What apartment building was this, where you saw Mary leaving?”

“The new condos by the River Walk. The white building with big windows,” Louis said.

“And when was this, that you saw her?”

“Let me see,” Louis paused. “It was after lunch, probably about two-thirty on Saturday, I’d say.”

“If you could, Mr. Edwards, can you tell me a little more about the nature of the relationship between Milo and Mary?”

The talkative Louis left Will’s office an hour later, elated by having been of assistance in a real murder investigation. He felt like Robert Mitchum or Dick Powell or Dana Andrews in one of the
noir
mysteries he loved so much. Will thanked Louis for coming in, and gave him his card, along with an open invitation to contact him at any time.

Will got in touch with Rita Clovis, the secretary in the Film Department, and procured Mary and Milo’s class schedules. He had to time this right, and it would mean proceeding without a search warrant. Of course, Mary might have disposed of the articles in question, but if not, it would be worth the chance of getting caught.

The hallway outside Mary’s apartment was quiet. Will proceeded to pick open the lock and enter, quietly and swiftly. He closed the door behind him, and removed his shoes.

The first bedroom in the apartment looked as if it had been ransacked. Shoes and clothing covered the floor––there were piles of sweaters, blouses, pants, coats, dresses, skirts. As Will studied the scene more closely, he saw there was a method to the madness, that the clothing was, in fact, organized by type into distinct categories. It looked like a spring-cleaning. Will searched the room thoroughly, and came up empty-handed. 

The second bedroom was cluttered, but neat. The bed was made with a patchwork quilt and a menagerie of forlorn
-looking stuffed animals leaning against the pillows. On the walls were movie posters of Audrey Hepburn in
Funny Face,
Wendy Hiller in
Pygmalion
, and Bette Davis in
Now, Voyager.
Grouped atop a chest-of-drawers there were bottles of lotions, potions, and scents. Postcards and ticket stubs crowded the bulletin board. Will gave the room a thorough going-over.   

He discovered the items in question on the floor of Mary’s closet, and sifted through the shopping bags carefully, trying not to disturb the rest of the contents in any noticeable way. He secreted the desired objects in his pocket, and quietly left the apartment as he had found it.

Chapter 34 

Milo was notified he was to be interviewed by a Detective Tenney at Hexley Hall at twelve noon. Will knew this would not conflict with Milo’s class schedule, and that Milo had no excuse to cancel the meeting. 

“I’ve had an interesting time tracking you down, Mr. Marcus,” Will said.

“Oh? I didn’t realize. Forgive me if I proved elusive,” Milo replied. “I’m no Pimpernel, you know.”

Will regarded Milo with a cool expression.

“Sir Percy Blakeney,” Milo elaborated. “‘They seek him here, they seek him there,’––Leslie Howard, 1934.
The Scarlet Pimpernel
. If he didn’t want you to find him, you never would.”

Will and Milo sat opposite one another in the cavernous reception area of Hexley Hall. The concrete expanse was minimally decorated with a few pieces of neutral
-colored furnishings. Rita Clovis sat well out of earshot behind a sleek workstation on the far side of the hall.

“If you don’t mind, I’d like to ask you a few questions regarding the murder of Bunny Baldwin,” Will said.

“By all means,” Milo replied.

“I take it you knew her?” Will said.

“Yes, indeed,” Milo replied, gazing evenly at Will.

“What did you think of her?”

“What did I think of her,” Milo repeated, not as a question but a statement.

“I’m sorry to say I didn’t think very much of her,” Milo said, betraying no emotion. “In a nutshell, Bunny Baldwin was a spoiled brat who used sexual wiles and her parents’ money to manipulate people.”

Milo’s dark eyes glistened behind heavy glasses, and a faint smile on his face suggested an attitude of condescension.
Did Milo see himself as the dashing nobleman, Percy Blakeney
, Will wondered? Above the fray? This haughty affect struck Will as vaguely absurd, given the reality of the rotund, rumpled college kid who sat before him.

“That is a very bitter assessment, Mr. Marcus,” Will said.

“I’m simply being honest,” Milo replied.

“Can you think of anyone who had reason to harm Bunny?”

Milo chuckled.

“For starters,” he replied, “if I believed in taking such extreme measures, myself,
I
might have killed her. I considered her a waste of space, true enough. Worse than Bunny’s total lack of consideration for others were her stark ambition and film illiteracy. She knew nothing at all about movies, and she was an insult to the program here at Cushing. Admittedly, I’m a zealot on the subject of movies, but Bunny really had no business being here.”

Milo’s smooth patter almost sounded rehearsed, Will thought.

“Surely, that’s no reason to wish someone dead?” Will said.

“As you say,” Milo replied.

“Besides yourself, does anyone else come to mind who had issues with Bunny?” Will said. “Did she have enemies?”

“Hm. Well, I suppose there’s the obvious one,” Milo said. “Professor Winner’s wife. I’m sure you know all about Professor Winner’s affair with Bunny.”

Milo crossed his chubby arms and regarded Will laconically.

“And then there’s that funny woman who comes to all the Film Society movies,” Milo continued. “She always sits behind Professor Winner and Bunny. She’s kind of a kook. I sometimes see her up here, studying the Film Society bulletin board,” he said, nodding in the direction of a wall-sized notice board covered with flyers and announcements. “You might do well to question her.”

“What about Bunny’s roommate, Mary Buttery?” Will asked.  “Do you know her?”

Will had uttered the magic word. He finally got the visceral reaction he was looking for. Milo’s cool demeanor faltered at the mention of Mary. He blinked rapidly, and shifted uneasily in his chair.

“Yes,” he replied. “I know Mary, but she certainly has nothing to do with Bunny’s death.”

“How can you be so sure, Mr. Marcus?”

“Because, Detective, Mary is an unusually fine person. Beyond reproach. Well bred, genteel, and brilliant. In my opinion, she would not be capable of something like that.”

“I think it’s safe to say we’re all capable of such things,” Will said, hoping to unsettle Milo further. “It’s an established fact that human beings possess every impulse under the sun, even homicidal ones.” 

“That’s where civilization comes in, you see,” Will continued, sensing Milo’s growing discomfort, “to teach us to control our destructive impulses. Have you had an opportunity to study any psychology here at Cushing, Mr. Marcus?”

Milo’s cool affect was steadily unraveling. His voice jumped several notes higher when he next spoke.

“Both my parents are psychoanalysts, Detective. You can disabuse yourself of the idea that I could possibly need any schooling when it comes to human behavior,” Milo huffed. “I’m simply saying, that in my estimation, Mary Buttery couldn’t hurt a fly.”

“Can you think of any reason she would be seen on Saturday, exiting the apartment building where Professor Winner lives?”

Milo opened his mouth, but nothing came out. He furrowed his brow and removed his glasses, slowly wiping the lenses with a tissue he fished from his pocket. Will recognized that Milo was buying himself a little time before answering the question, time needed to get his emotions in check.

“No, I can’t,” he replied.

“Well, she was observed by a reliable source leaving Professor Winner’s building, carrying two large shopping bags.”

Milo said nothing.

“Are you and Miss Buttery romantically involved?” Will asked.

“That depends on what you mean,” Milo replied, struggling to maintain his composure.

“I would say,” he continued, “that there is an understanding between us.”

Will let these ridiculously old-fashioned words hang in the air between them for some moments.

“The possibility has been mentioned to me that Mary wrote the screenplay that ended up getting Bunny a Hollywood agent,” Will said.

“Yes, I believe that may be true,” Milo said. “That was typical of Bunny, taking credit where none was due, and living off other peoples’ accomplishments. She was a real parasite.”

“Mary must have been resentful of Bunny. Couldn’t that have been a motive?” Will pressed, adding, “Maybe Mary was even jealous of Bunny’s relationship with Professor Winner.”

“Detective,” Milo said, forcing a weak laugh, “as I’m sure you realize, it’s a long way from schoolgirl resentment to murder. If we did away with everyone we felt resentful toward, the sidewalks would be littered with corpses.”

“Can you tell me where you were the night of the murder––that is, where were you before you arrived at Hexley Auditoruium for the showing of
Spellbound
?” Will asked.

“That’s easy,” Milo said. “I was at Lattimer’s Pond with Wallace Duncan and Hugo Hitchens, shooting our documentary. They’re both film students.”

“Until what time?” Will asked.

“I would say we left there at about six o’clock,” Milo replied.

“And Wallace Duncan and Hugo Hitchens will verify that?” Will asked.

“Of course,” Milo replied.

“One last question, Mr. Marcus. When I spoke to Aaron Farb he stated that you came into the projection room and instructed him to shut off the movie. Is that correct?”

“Yes,” Milo answered.

“Why was that?”

“Well, it’s pretty obvious, isn’t it, Detective?”

“Not to me.”

“The auditorium was in chaos,” Milo said. “Once that girl started screaming, no one was paying any attention to the film. I wasn’t going to let that happen. Perhaps you have to be a film aficionado to understand.”

“You arrived in the projection room within seconds,” Will said, “before anyone in the auditorium even knew what was happening. That was quick thinking.”

“What are you suggesting?” Milo sighed. “That I had beforehand knowledge that someone was going to scream
––that the whole place was going to erupt in confusion? Not at all, Detective! It’s just that I happened to be sitting close to the projection room, and was able to alert Aaron immediately to shut off the film.”

“I’m sure you would have been every bit as quick-witted, had you been in my position,” Milo continued. “You see, you simply cannot allow the genius of Mr. Hitchcock to play to a distracted house. The moment we all heard the scream, I ran in and told Aaron to stop the film. Simple as that.”