Murder: The Musical (A Smith and Wetzon Mystery, #5) (8 page)

“We’ve capitalized
Hotshot
at five million, taking into consideration our three-week tryout in Boston ... ah, Twoey.” Mort rolled Twoey’s name around on his tongue, registered it, then tucked it into one of the little compartments in his mind. “Sunny can give you the budget. We have an ensemble company—no stars—so we can keep costs down.”

“No stars?” Smith asked innocently, then moved in for the kill. “How do you expect to pay back your investors?”

Mort looked nonplussed. Had he thought Smith was stupid? Well, surprise, surprise.

“On the strength of the book and music.” It was the first time Sunny had spoken. She’d pulled some papers from a zippered, hand-held Louis Vuitton portfolio and now she efficiently passed a set around to Twoey, Smith, and Wetzon. “The top page is the budget. The second page is a breakdown of our royalty schedule, estimated break-even at the Colonial in Boston and here in New York.”

Mort smiled benevolently at Twoey, who was running his eyes down the budget. “I understand from Leslie that you’re serious about becoming a producer.”

“Mort, old chum.” A tall man in a two-thousand-dollar suit, dark hair showing just the right touch of white at the temples, clasped Mort’s shoulder. They shook hands solemnly. “How’s it going? Terribly sad about Dilla. Such a tragedy.”

“Yes, we’ll miss her,” Mort said, with just the right amount of studied melancholy, “but she would have wanted us to go on.”

Sure, Wetzon thought. The show had to go on, didn’t it?

She recognized the man in the two-thousand-dollar suit. Joel Kidde was the eccentric head of the top talent agency in the world. He had the appetite of a goat. Once at Sardi’s Wetzon had seen him eat a contract.

Kidde glanced at Smith and hung in there until Mort made the introductions. “Well ...” Kidde said, giving Smith an aural caress. “I’ll see you in Boston, Mort.” He moved on to the next table, where he bestowed more greetings.

Smith purred, “What an interesting man.”

What have I done, Wetzon thought.

In the meantime, Mort had resumed his commentary on the budget. “What we didn’t figure on, Twoey, is that we wouldn’t get subscription for the full three weeks in Boston. We’re okay for the first two, which means we could go into the hole in the third week if the reviews are boring, or mixed.”

“How much do you suppose you’ll need?” Twoey asked.

“Safely, a million should cover us and give us a sinking fund.”

Twoey studied the budget figures. “That’s do-able.”

Sunny said, “If there’s anything you don’t understand, please ask.” Her shoulder-length hair was the color of sand with streaks of bottled sun. She wore it pulled back from her slightly horsey face with a black velvet headband.

Twoey grinned at her; she smiled at him. That Sunny liked him was obvious.

Lowering her eyelids halfway, Smith contemplated Twoey, then Sunny and Twoey again. Danger, Wetzon thought. Danger-danger-danger.

“We estimate our break-even—that’s the weekly operating budget—at approximately four hundred ninety-two thousand. Based on gross weekly box office receipts at capacity at a Broadway theatre of six hundred fifty thousand, the weekly operating profit would be one fifty-eight. With full houses it should take us about thirty-one weeks to pay back the investment. And the road is another story. There are built-in costs, higher salaries, travel expenses, and load-in and load-out costs. We never expect to make money on the road, but we don’t want to lose money either.”

“Must you go to Boston?” Smith inquired. “Why not preview in New York? Wouldn’t you save a lot of money?”

Mort shook his head, his smile on the edge of patronizing. “Yes, but I know you can’t fix a show in New York with all the goddam know-it-alls coming in every night and second-guessing you, telling you what you’re doing wrong.”

“Besides,” Sunny said, “we’re committed to the Colonial. They’ve sold subscription in good faith. We have to go.”

“What about the murder?” Twoey was making notes on the budget with a gold Mont Blanc pen.

“It shouldn’t affect us at all,” Sunny said. “Although in a perverse way it may sell tickets to the usual ghouls who love this kind of thing.”

“Dilla was a dear friend,” Mort intoned, “but we have a lot on the line here.”

“The show must go on,” Wetzon murmured.

“Of course, Leslie is absolutely right. She was one of us not so long ago, and as far as we are concerned, she still is.”

“Well, thank you, Mort,” Wetzon said. “I think.” She looked over at Smith, who was being uncharacteristically silent. Smith was smiling like the Cheshire Cat.

Mort settled his glasses back on his nose and fondled his baldness. “Look, if you’re interested, Twoey, I’d be willing to take you on as associate producer and teach you what I know. Sunny here is my numbers cruncher so she can sit down with you and—”

At this point Smith pounced. “The Smith and Wetzon pension fund,” she pronounced cheerily, “will invest fifty thousand dollars in
Hotshot.”

“I can’t believe you did that!” Wetzon had worked herself into such a fury that it was propelling her several paces ahead of Smith. “And with our pension money.” She ended up having to wait, steaming, on the corner of Forty-ninth and Lexington until Smith caught up.

“You know, there’s no pleasing you, Wetzon. Did you or did you not tell me that this musical Mort Hornberg and Your Gay Person are working on was going to make theatre history?”

Smith had stopped referring to Carlos as the Degenerate after he became a celebrity choreographer. “Your Gay Person” was his new designation. And never to be outdone, Carlos loathed Smith. He blamed Smith for luring Wetzon from the Theatre and for trying to impose her values on Wetzon. That his darling Birdie should be partners with someone so bigoted and greedy was a constant source of irritation. Carlos and Smith fought out their battle, around and through Wetzon, usually leaving her quivering in the middle.

This was one of those times. “‘My Gay Person’ has a name, Smith. Read my lips. Carlos Prince.” She found herself stamping her foot on the sidewalk to punctuate her words, to the great entertainment of a multilayered bag lady whose top layer was a moth-eaten mouton coat.

The woman cackled and seemed about to join in the fray when Smith snarled at her. “On your way, or I’ll have you put in a shelter.”

The woman froze. Her face showed abject terror, as if Smith had condemned her to death.

“I mean it.” Smith shook a leather-clad finger at her.

“You are an evil person!” the bag lady shouted. “I put a curse on you.” She pointed two fingers at Smith, spitting at them, then, muttering under her breath, grabbed her shopping cart loaded with bursting plastic garbage bags and a dilapidated broom, whiskered ends up, and pushed off up Lexington.

“Oh, my God.” Smith clutched Wetzon’s arm. “Did you hear her? She put a
curse
on me.” Her face had a yellowish tinge.

“Don’t be ridiculous. She’s disturbed, and you shouldn’t have gotten into it with her. It didn’t mean anything.”

Smith looked slightly relieved, but still seemed to be rattled. She shuddered. “Let’s get out of here.”

Wetzon locked arms with her. “You’ve been hanging around with these psychics too long. Come on, she was just blathering.” Wetzon would have loved to recapture her anger, but, alas, most of it had dissipated. “Of course, I did see a broom in her shopping cart....”

“No!” Smith turned miserable eyes back to look for the bag lady, but she had disappeared up the avenue.

Wetzon groaned. “I was kidding!”

“You were?”

“Cross my heart.” She made the motion. “Can we get back to
Hotshot?”

“You are the limit,” Smith said, recovering. “Well, did you or did you not say this would be a landmark musical?”

“I did, but—” Wetzon shoved her gloved hands into her pockets and grouched all the way to Third Avenue.

“Well, then.” Smith had entirely retrieved her equilibrium. “It was a business decision. Last year was the best year we’ve ever had. We have to diversify where we put our money.”

“But fifty thousand? Jesus, Smith, no one makes money investing in the Theatre anymore.”

‘We
will. The Tarot says turmoil, then buckets of money, and the Tarot never lies.”

“I might have guessed.” Wetzon stretched the
s’s
out into a hiss.

“Trust me.”

Wetzon would have felt a shade better if Smith had not said those last two words. Years earlier a broker had warned Wetzon that
trust me
is code for
fuck you.
“Oh, hell,” she muttered.

“Angels!” Smith said with relish. “We’re angels. Isn’t that wonderful?”

The question was rhetorical. Smith had never before expressed any interest in the Theatre, only went to mega hit shows like
Miss Saigon
and
Phantom
because one did, and the last thing she would ever have done was invest money in it. And she would have been right. Investment in the Theatre was notoriously risky. Wetzon came to a stop in front of Steve Sondheim’s house.

“What are you doing?”

“Paying homage.” She tipped her beret to Sondheim and then did the same to Kate Hepburn, whose house was next door, and who had, it was said, complained vigorously about the noise from the legendary composer’s piano. “You should join me now that you’re going through the blood rite of investing in a musical.”

“Oh, puh
-lease”
Smith tugged at her arm. “You’re making a fool of yourself, and of me. What if he came out and saw you?”

“He’d love it.”

“Well, if you don’t mind, I don’t want to be here to find out.” She steered Wetzon across Second Avenue and back to their office.

It was two-thirty. Max had worked his half-day and was gone. Three neat stacks of suspect sheets sat on his desk. Wetzon hung up her coat and collected the stack labeled
Wetzon—Priority.

B.B., who was on the phone, waved. The blinking button indicated someone was on hold. Wetzon went into the office she and Smith shared and set Max’s priorities on her desk next to the four phone messages on pink slips. One was from Laura Lee. And Alton. He’d be home Saturday morning and would call her then. If things went as planned, she would be in Boston on Saturday for Carlos’s opening. She had told Alton weeks ago and he’d forgotten.

Wetzon picked up the phone and released the hold button. “Hi, this is Leslie Wetzon. May I help you?”

“I ... oh ... Leslie? Oh, Birdie?” It was not Carlos but the voice was familiar.

“Yes?” She straightened out her date book and plucked a pen from the pressed-glass spooner she kept pens and pencils in.

“Hi, this is Phil? You know, Phil Terrace? From
Hotshot?”
Everything he said ended with a question. It was disconcerting. “Carlos wanted me to find out if you can meet him at five?”

“Where?” She had told Susan Cohen, or Susan Orkin, as she called herself now, they could meet at six o’clock. That didn’t leave her much time.

“The Polish Tea Room.”

The Polish Tea Room was really the coffee shop of the Edison Hotel on Forty-seventh Street in the Theatre District. It had, over a decade ago, been dubbed the Polish Tea Room because the chef was Polish. “I’ve got a six o’clock, Phil. Do you think he can make it four-thirty? Is he rehearsing?”

“We loaded out this morning. Carlos just wanted a couple of hours with the company and they’re finishing up now. I think four-thirty will be all right. I’ll call back if it’s not.”

“Are you taking over as production stage manager, Phil?”

“Temporarily, at least. I don’t know what Mort’s plans are.” Phil seemed slightly less tentative. He’d stopped ending sentences with questions. “I know the show backward and forward.”

“Well, good luck then, and I’ll see you in Boston. I’m coming up for Friday’s preview and will stay through the opening on Saturday. Unless that’s changed.”

“No. We’re right on schedule. I’ll tell Carlos four-thirty.
Ciao.”
He definitely sounded more confident. Knowing Mort, Phil would become production stage manager, and life, for
Hotshot
, would go on without a ripple.

Wetzon sat down at her desk. Dilla’s death had left her on the verge of melancholy, and she had not even liked Dilla. A frisson of her pain and fear of the previous night intruded. She pushed it away.

“I can’t get over Twoey,” Smith said casually to Wetzon’s back.

Now what was Smith up to? “I give up. Tell me.”

“Well, he just doesn’t seem like the same person.”

Wetzon turned and looked at her partner. “There
is
life after Xenia Smith, you know.”

“Very funny. That’s not what I meant at all.”

“I’m sorry. What did you mean?” Wetzon’s voice dripped with sweetness.

“Humpf.” Smith lowered her lids partway to see if Wetzon was mocking her, but Wetzon gave good cipher. “I just never knew he wanted to be a Broadway producer, or even that he had any interest in the arts.”

“If you weren’t so wrapped up in yourself and the wonderful Richard Hartmann, mouthpiece for the Mob, and money launderer
par excellence,
you might have seen that Mark and Twoey both are interested in the Theatre.” One day soon, Wetzon thought, Smith will get tired of Hartmann and I’ll take what’s sitting in my safe deposit box to the district attorney’s office.

“Oh, spare me one of your goody-two-shoes lectures,” Smith said waspishly.

“Twoey is a love, and you’ve let him slip through your fingers. Did you happen to notice how Sunny Browning was with him?”

“That slut?”

“Smith! You don’t even know her.”

“He would never look at her twice.”

“Whatever.” Wetzon turned away and took the budget material on
Hotshot
out of her purse and dropped it on her desk. Absentmindedly, she flipped over the page to the breakdown on royalties and the weekly costs to run the show.

It is estimated that the gross weekly box office receipts at a theatre with 1500 seats, with an average price ticket of $45 would be $600,000.