Manhattan Mayhem (34 page)

“Amazingly, the social-work lady believed her. She kept inventing whatever stories she needed to keep from getting caught and sent home. No way could she ever go back to Myrtle. Daddy would kill her. Ray didn’t love her anymore. Maybe he never had.

“She knocked around, earned a few bucks, and found people here and there who were willing to put her up. She discovered all kinds of things in garbage cans and on the street: discarded food, gloves, even a thick green wool sweater with a puffy snowman on the front. It was ridiculous but warm. She imagined her friends laughing their heads off when they saw her in it, but she quickly marched the thought out of her head. They didn’t exist anymore. Neither did home.

“A week after Christmas, she wandered into a noisy bar one night to escape the cold. People were drinking and laughing, coupling up. In the shadows at the rear, a scrawny, bearded guy in a work shirt was playing a beat-up spinet. After
Stardust,
he segued into her mama’s favorite song.
Moon River, wider than a mile …

“Bitsy drifted toward the piano. So much was running through her head: loneliness, longing, the stifling weight of her shattered dreams. She didn’t realize she was singing aloud until the manager came over, a wiry man whose name badge read C
HAS
. She feared he’d kick her out, maybe call the police. Instead, he said he liked her voice. Was she looking for a gig? His regular singer hadn’t shown up, and he could use her. How she grinned at that memory. ‘Heaven, right?’

“After that, things changed quickly. Bitsy had the look, and she was a quick study. She shed the drawl, learned how to move and play to the audience. Once, I coaxed her to demonstrate. Sam erupted in a baby belly laugh when she assumed the sultry look and smoky voice.

“She developed a following. After a while, she was able to ditch the roommates and rent a place of her own. One thing led to another, and by the time she reached her early twenties, she was singing at the Plaza and at private parties for the rich and fancy. She had entrée to amazing events, a closetful of gorgeous gowns, and suitors galore. Bitsy could hardly believe what had happened to her life, much less make sense
of it. She felt like Cinderella, certain the fantasy would shatter at the stroke of midnight. She was dazed by her good fortune but convinced it couldn’t last.”

“And then,
poof,
” said Jeffers, launching an imaginary bird.

L. C. mimicked the gesture. “Poof.” But tragically, the reporter failed to disappear.

Jeffers scowled. “Jeez, L. C. The lady is trying to tell her story. Go on, Colleen. What happened next?”

“Bitsy met Harold Grainger at a private film screening. There was an instant attraction, but she was reluctant to get involved. He was decades older, widowed, with a grown son and a daughter. Since Ray, she’d had trouble trusting anyone. She worried about the age difference and the baggage both of them had. But above all, she worried about the giant gulf between their worlds. Bitsy had told Harold where and what she’d come from, but he didn’t seem to take it seriously. Someday he was bound to realize that she was, as advertised, a head-shy hayseed, and move on.

“Harold pursued her. They became friends and, eventually, more. By the time I met Bitsy, they’d been married for three years. They’d had a fairytale wedding at the Carlyle and honeymooned on a private motor yacht off the Dalmatian Coast. As a wedding gift, Harold had bought the townhouse on Sutton Place and hired a top designer to furnish it. Bitsy described all this with the bewildered delight of a child who’d gotten the actual pony on Christmas morning.

“I so enjoyed our time together. But as things happen, we went our separate ways. Sam outgrew his colic and began napping like an angel twice a day. I wrote while he slept, and miracle of miracles, I started getting encouraging notes from editors instead of the form rejection slips. Those were followed by my first acceptance, a short story in
Ellery Queen.

“James’s mentor at the hospital accepted the job as Department Chief at UCLA. He let us sublet his sunny two-bedroom in Turtle Bay for a pittance. I still kept an eye out for Bitsy when I took Sam out in his stroller, but we rarely connected. When I did run into her, we’d say
a quick hello. We’d talk about getting together, but it never happened.

“Months later, I found an engraved invitation under our door. Tucked in the envelope was a note in Bitsy’s flowery handwriting. Neighbors were hosting a party in Harold’s honor, and she wanted us to come. The Broughtons lived in the largest private home on Sutton Place, a four-story brick Georgian that had been built for J. P. Morgan’s daughter Anne.

“James and I debated about whether we should go. We’d be ducks out of water among Harold’s millionaire friends. We had nothing reasonable to wear around people swaddled in haute couture and Harry Winston. But in the end, we decided to accept. After all, Bitsy had embraced me as a friend. She’d been so kind to me and little Sam. How could we turn her down?

“My sister Maureen and her husband, Frank, had made a killing in commercial real estate. She insisted I borrow her favorite dress, a full-skirted floral by Oscar de la Renta. Maureen lent me matching shoes and a Judith Leiber minaudière in the shape of a red rose. I felt like a princess. And James was my prince, dashing in his rented tux.

“The evening was unusually warm for early April, with a light lilac-scented breeze. Waiters in white coats served champagne and canapés in the garden overlooking the East River. Huge tug-drawn barges lumbered by amid darting powerboats. The low wrought-iron railing around the periphery was laced with tiny lights. A string quartet played the loveliest music: Brahms’s
Double Concerto,
Pachelbel’s
Canon,
and Haydn’s
Emperor.
Amazing how the details stick with me. Bitsy’s disappearance cast the evening in amber.

“Harold’s children were there. Trey was a harsher, brasher version of his father. On his arm was a gum-cracking blonde in a gold lamé mini-dress and sparkling stiletto heels. Harold’s daughter Marissa showed up solo in jeans, a sloppy white shirt, and cowboy boots. Both acted icy and contemptuous: a study in filial resentment.

“I was taking in the alien habitat and exotic species when I spotted Bitsy in the shadow of a towering oak, staring toward the river. I hesitated, thinking she might want a moment alone, but something
drew me to her.

“When I asked if she was all right, she turned and fixed me with those moonstone eyes. ‘You’re so lucky to be a writer, Colleen,’ she said. ‘You get to decide where your stories will go.’

“I told her that wasn’t entirely true. Sure, I got to imagine and test possibilities. But stories have to make sense. There has to be consistency, believability, and internal logic. A writer can’t simply wander as she pleases, not if she wants to produce something publishable that readers will accept. And sometimes, I get stumped. I have no idea what comes next, can’t even envision how to tie things up. Until I do.”

Jeffers chuckled. “Nothing like a fat check at the end of the rainbow to get those juices flowing, right, Colleen?”

L. C. silenced him with a poison eye dart.

“Soon after that, we were invited in for dinner. Bitsy hugged me, which had never been her way. And she whispered in my ear. ‘Bless you, my friend. Bless you and your darling little Sam.’ Then she went off to find Harold. James and I made our way inside together.

“As we took our seats, we had a frantic call from Rachel, Sam’s babysitter. She’d turned her back for an instant, and the baby had taken a spill. I could hear his pained screams in the background. James and I raced home and rushed him to the ER at Lenox Hill. They checked him thoroughly, closed the cut on his forehead with Krazy Glue, and sent us home. Everything was fine. Or so we thought.

“Late the next day, Harold called, frantic. Had I heard from Bitsy? Did I have any idea where she might be? He hadn’t seen her since the party. After dinner, the men had gone to the library for cognac and cigars. After a while, Bitsy had poked her head in to say goodbye. She was tired. She was going to bed.

“When Harold got home about an hour later, their bedroom door was closed. He didn’t want to disturb Bitsy, so he slept in the guest room. By the time he awoke the next morning she was gone. Their room looked exactly as they’d left it after dressing for the party. Wrappings and tags from her red chiffon Halston gown lay crumpled on the velvet settee. Pots of makeup, brushes, and crystal perfume atomizers
with tasseled caps were strewn on the vanity. No one had slept in the bed.

“I tried to reassure him. Maybe she’d gone for a walk and lost track of the time. Bitsy loved to wander. But deep down, I knew something was wrong.

“Three days later, the story broke in front page headlines: “Millionaire’s Bride Missing.” The picture plastered underneath was from their wedding: Bitsy’s radiant face, moonstone eyes fixed on the boundless future. A massive investigation followed. Flyers were posted everywhere:
Have You Seen This Woman
? Harold offered a $100,000 reward for information leading to her safe return.

“Her disappearance sparked endless speculation. Maybe she’d been murdered, her body tossed in the East River and dragged by the vicious currents out to sea.

“Maybe she’d been diagnosed with a lethal illness and gone off to die alone. Maybe she’d run off with another man, or gotten embroiled in a criminal enterprise. Some embraced the theory that an obsessed admirer had kidnapped her. Why wouldn’t her looks, talent, and fortuitous marriage be punishable by violent demise? Tongues wagged about a secret addiction, mental breakdown, or suicide. But weeks turned to years, and still no ransom demand, no body, no suicide note, not a single credible lead.

“As time passed, the case was shunted to the back pages and, eventually, ceased to be news. A few years later, a book,
Little Girl Lost,
came out about the disappearance. The author claimed that Bitsy had taken up with a charismatic cult leader and was living off the grid in the Adirondacks. Investigators found no evidence that such a cult existed and nothing to bolster the convoluted theory. Obviously, the writer had hoped to capitalize on a lurid story. Nevertheless, press around the publication stirred everything up again. For a while, Sutton Place was unwilling host to yet another media circus. But thankfully, after the book was discredited, the furor died a natural death.

“I understood Harold’s decision to stay away. For a long time, I avoided the neighborhood, too. Then one morning, while Sam was at nursery school, I forced myself to walk to Sutton Place and take a look
at their townhouse.

“Someone was keeping up the place. Salvia and snapdragons bloomed in the window boxes. The lawn had been mowed; the bushes trimmed. The leaded glass windows sparkled. When I peered inside, I was shocked to find everything unchanged. Through the archway that led to the kitchen, I caught a glimpse of Bitsy’s precious coffeemaker. A china cup perched beneath the spout, as if she were about to brew a cup of her beloved cappuccino. Still, the emptiness was palpable. No one lived there. Not anymore.

“A few weeks later, James finished his residency. He joined an internal medicine practice in Greenwich, Connecticut, and we resettled there. My first novel vanished without a trace, but the second became a surprise best seller. Knopf offered a three-book contract with a bigger advance than I’d ever dared to imagine. We put a down payment on the Lake Avenue house.

“Our family continued to grow. After Sam and our daughter Lillian, we had the twins, Lucy and Patsy, and then Robert came along, our little caboose. Those were busy, crazy times, but also full and fun. I wouldn’t have traded a day of it.

“Once the whole brood was grown and launched, James and I bought the apartment on Riverside Drive. I loved the idea of a pied-à-terre in Manhattan, and we wanted a river view, but any time the broker suggested I look at a listing on the East Side, I refused. I wanted to stay away from Sutton Place.

“And I did—until last fall. I’d agreed to speak at a fund-raiser for Literacy Partners. My publicist had arranged everything. Until I was in the car on the way, I had no idea the event was to be held in a penthouse down the block from where Bitsy used to live.

“We’d left extra time because of the snow, so we arrived a few minutes early. I asked the driver to take a slow loop around the neighborhood. And I was glad I did. Avoidance did not erase reality. Bitsy’s disappearance was a tragic fact. I’d do better to confront it than try to pretend it hadn’t happened. Soon after that, I became preoccupied with the case and realized I needed to write about it.

“I didn’t return to Sutton Place until I was deeply into the story. By then, I’d traveled to London to meet with Harold’s business partner, Richard DeWitt, and to France to see his brother Gregory. Several of Harold’s friends had retired to Florida, so I spent a couple of weeks in Palm Beach and Key Biscayne.

“Harold’s children live in the flats of Beverly Hills. Both of them are over sixty now. Trey is twice divorced, with two adult daughters, engaged to a very young, very beautiful actress. Marissa and her partner, an artist named Eloise, own an art gallery on Rodeo Drive.

“None of them had seen Harold in many years. After Bitsy’s disappearance, he’d settled in Costa Rica. He’d lived a simple life in relative seclusion. A decade ago, he suffered a massive stroke and died instantly. He left everything to a charitable trust dedicated to preserving Caribbean rainforests. Trey and Marissa hired big gun lawyers to challenge the will, but they lost.

“My last stop was Bitsy’s hometown. Myrtle, Mississippi, is tiny. Population five hundred. Everyone knows everybody and everything, and everyone was eager to talk. Bitsy’s father had died years earlier, but I met members of the Baptist congregation where he used to preach. Reverend Yudis had always liked his whiskey, which he took—naturally—for medicinal purposes. He’d started hitting the bottle harder after Bitsy ran away. One night after many too many at Gus’s Tavern, he rammed his pickup head-on into a Kia carrying a family with two little boys. No one survived.