Naked Cruelty (15 page)

“How can a little boy from the stews of Argyle Avenue come to like M.M.'s daughter?” Delia asked. “Especially given her personality? In time she'll lose some of the hauteur, the unconscious exclusivity, but it must be very hard for Nick in particular to stomach. He's had to work so hard to get what he sees as falling into her undeserving lap.”

“I know, Delia, I know.”

The Brothers Warburton announced their advent before they actually appeared; the County Services parking attendant buzzed to say that this pair of spooky twins refused to leave their car on the street; until their Bentley was safely garaged, they were not getting out of it. The attendant was told to let them park, and shortly thereafter the Warburton twins materialized in Carmine's office looking insufferably smug.

They were exquisitely dressed for a chilly fall day. Both wore what were probably Hong Kong copies of Savile Row suits: Robert's was a navy three-piece pinstripe with a striped Turnbull & Asser shirt and a Stanford tie; Gordon's was a pearl-grey silk with a white silk shirt and a self-embroidered white silk ascot. They wafted a hugely expensive cologne, and bore shaves so close the skin gleamed like satin. Even their eyebrows were thinned and brushed, Carmine suspected. A pair of sartorial dazzlers.

“What color's your Bentley?” he asked, curious.

“Pewter,” said Robert, “with white leather interior.”

Having introduced Delia, Carmine escorted the twins to the largest of the interrogation rooms, sat himself and his papers down opposite the Warburtons, and put on a pair of reading half glasses that gave him a professorial air. Their diary was full-page size, one day to a page, and its cover was a hairy faux zebra skin; the year, 1968, was emblazoned in gold numbers an inch high.

I am fed up with all this light and dark nonsense already, thought Carmine, conscious of a burning desire to cause mayhem. Fire a twelve-pounder shot at this catamaran, hole both hulls!

“I should inform you,” he said, “that I have a very old and dear friend in L.A.—Myron Mendel Mandelbaum.”

The effect of this projectile was extraordinary. Both the brothers assumed an identical look of mingled awe, astonishment, delight and—speculation? The skinned-green-grape eyes had somehow acquired the kind of stars Carmine had last seen in the eyes of a glass teddy bear. Now I know, he thought, what the phrase “stars in their eyes” truly means.

“Mr. Mandelbaum assures me that you are indeed—er—‘hot property' in Hollywood. Apparently it's far cheaper to pay real actors a high salary than incur the costs of blue screen doubling the same actor through many scenes. Also, two real actors give additional flexibility, Mr. Mandelbaum says. I've also talked to your agent, who assures me that you've arrived at a point where you can choose your film roles. TV commercials as well.”

They proved what superb actors they were by managing to look simultaneously proud yet humble, worthy yet unworthy.

“How divine to be vindicated by luminaries like the great and powerful Myron Mendel Mandelbaum,” said Robert, winking at tears. “A Zeus, he dwells atop Mulholland Drive, unattainable, a thousand titans as his lackeys, his world spread out before him in a myriad million lights!”

“Obliterated by smog, more like,” said Carmine. “Okay, let's can the crap. March 3 this year—where were you?”

Gordon flipped the pages, Robert read the entries.

“In Holloman,” said Robert.

“Both of you?”

They looked identically appalled. “We are
never
apart!”

“May l3?”

“Holloman. In between, we were in L.A. filming our greatest screen triumph,
Waltz of the Vampire Twins
.”

“But B-grade. June 25?”

“Holloman.”

“July 12?”

“In the air from L.A.”

“August 3?”

“On vacation in Yosemite National Park.”

“Can you produce proof? Receipts, for instance?”

“Of course.”

“August 31?”

“Alaska, filming a TV commercial for an after-shave.”

“Why Alaska?”

“Coo-oo-ool,” Robert drawled.

“September 24?”

“Holloman.”

“Have you left Holloman during September?”

“Not after we returned from Alaska on Labor Day. We decided to stay in Connecticut for the fall colors.”

“In Connecticut, try October for those.”

“We are now aware of that, thank you.”

“Why Yosemite? You don't look outdoorsy, sirs.”

“You can't tell a book by its cover,” Gordie piped up.

Robert glared at him.

“Do you like books?” Delia asked.

“Easy come, easy go,” said Robert.

“Novels?”

“If there's a film of the book in the offing,” Robert said.

“If you saw a wall of shelves containing a thousand books of all sorts, sirs,” Delia persisted, “what would you look for?”

“A
thousand
books? That's a library. There'd be indicators. I'd go straight to movies.”

“That rapist in Carew is heavily into books,” Carmine said.

The inevitable As One reaction: horror mingled with terror.

“Captain, you cannot possibly think of us as rapists!” cried Robert, gasping in perfect unison with his twin.

“Seriously, sirs, no, I don't. What I do want to know is how much of the simultaneous everythings is real. You may be as homozygous as homozygous gets, but you're not inside the exact-same skin.” Carmine's voice became menacing. “There must be all kinds of differences between you, but you've turned eliminating them into an art form. You're actors by trade, and actors by nature. I'll grant you some invisible connections, even a minor ability to read each other's minds, but you are
not
the same person. How about dropping the identical role for a moment and letting me see the quintessential Robert versus the quintessential Gordon? I can tell you this much—Robert is the one thinks before he speaks, and Gordon is the one speaks before he thinks.”

They smirked—identically.

“Captain Delmonico! Is that a valid observation?” Robert asked. “Perhaps the speak-think is a function of our clothing? Perhaps the one in pale clothing, no matter whether it be Robbie or Gordie, is the twin speaks before he thinks? Colors have such strong vibes, you must know
that
!
Who knows what the City of Holloman did when it forbade us to balance the exterior of our house between the forces of Dark and Light?”

“Oh, piss off! Get out of here!” Carmine said, tried beyond endurance. “You may not be the Dodo, but you're sure cuckoo.”

Amanda returned to the Glass Teddy Bear limping a little from a sore hip, but basically unharmed. She had insisted on driving herself in and had Frankie and Winston with her; Hank was waiting at her named parking place to help her out, make a fuss of the animals, and bring her upstairs.

“Luckily I have another Björn Wiinblad original in stock—not a bowl, but a vase,” she said, pointing to a stack of big cardboard cartons against the back wall of her office. “If you can get it for me and unpack it, I'd be grateful.”

So by the time Hank left Amanda had settled down, the new original was in place, she had adjusted the Kosta Boda pussycat to her satisfaction, and the dog and cat were ensconced in the window. Hank had put the partition up that prevented any customer reaching in to pat them and disappeared through the front door with a wave. He was bringing Chinese over for dinner in her apartment, and she didn't expect to see him until it was time to go. Why couldn't she learn to love him? Marcia was right, he was ideal for a lonely woman. Yet she couldn't seem to love him as more than a friend, and wished there was some way she could at least demonstrate that much to him.

The morning passed fairly quietly; she sold several lots of wine glasses to customers with very different ideas—one was after the impossibly thin blown crystal of utter plainness, the other after Waterford hobnail, and a third after Murano edged in gold. Wonderful, how tastes varied.

When her stomach rumbled she realized that she hadn't brought any lunch with her—well, she hadn't had the energy yet to shop. Never mind, it wouldn't hurt her figure to skip lunch.

At which moment the door gave its glassy tune; she looked up in time to see a tall, very beautiful young woman clad in a business pantsuit of burgundy gaberdine erupt into the shop with both hands full.

“Is there a space on the counter?” she demanded, steering a skillful path around pedestals and tables.

“Yes,” said Amanda, startled.

“Good,” said the young woman, whose striking mass of apricot hair seemed likely to snap her slender neck off, it looked so heavy. Down went brown paper bags and a thermos. “I suppose there's a place in the Mall where I could have gotten us lunch, but not knowing, I brought everything in from Malvolio's, including coffee. Have you any plates, or do I have to pirate some glass ones, wash them, and use them?”

By this Amanda didn't know whether to laugh or back away in horror, but the pets decided for her by effortlessly leaping the partition and crowding around the visitor begging for attention.

“I'm Helen MacIntosh from Holloman Detectives, and I'm here to grill you. I hope you like hot roast beef sandwiches.”

“Indeed I do, and I'm hungry, and I forgot to pack lunch.” Amanda got up from her chair. “I'll get plates, mugs, and whatever you recommend in cutlery.”

The lunch was delicious, Helen MacIntosh such good company that Amanda hated the thought that, as soon as she had answered some questions, this feminine sun would vanish to shine elsewhere.

But it was a very leisurely interrogation that lasted for several hours and through a dozen customers, during which intervals Helen pretended to be a staff member.

“I have a message from Captain Delmonico,” Helen said after the lunch things were cleared away and the shop deserted.

“He's very different from Sergeant Jones,” Amanda said.

“Try comparing Veuve Clicquot to rubbing alcohol. Anyway, he said to tell you that your nephews, Robert and Gordon, have been living in Carew for over eight months.”

She was shocked: “I don't believe it!”

“True.”

“Why haven't they told me? Visited me?”

“The Captain thinks it's the way they're made—pranksters. Every day you live in ignorance of their proximity, they have a giggle at your expense. It's no more malignant than that, he says. They're not the Vandal—the wrong kind of prank.”

“Have you their number?”

“Sure. I'll give it to you before I leave.” Helen gazed around. “This is the most gorgeous shop, I love it. It's solved all my Christmas shopping problems. That glorious massive urn over there with the peacock feathers actually incorporated in the glass—it's so hard to get glass to assume those iridescent, metallic colors. My father will adore it, he's got a vacant pedestal in his office.”

Amanda went pink. “Um—it's very expensive, Helen—a one-off Antonio Glauber,” she said in a small voice; here was a blossoming friendship going west before it really got started.

“What's expensive?” Helen asked.

“Fifteen thousand dollars.”

“Oh, is
that
all? I thought you were going to say a hundred thousand. Put a red sticker on it.”

Amanda's eyes had gone as round as the glass teddy bear's. “I—are you—can you honestly afford it, Helen?”

“The income from my trust fund is a million dollars a year,” she said, as if it meant little. “I don't spend wildly, but it's so hard finding things for parents who can also afford to buy whatever they fancy, price no consideration. And that urn is really a beautiful piece—Dad will love it.”

“It's for sale, of course, but I never expected to see it go,” Amanda said huskily. “One gets so attached to the original pieces. Still, I've done so well since being in Busquash Mall that I'll have to take a buying trip next summer.”

“I can understand why there's a NOT FOR SALE notice beside the glass teddy bear. It's a museum piece.”

“Yes. I'd never sell him.”

“No one could afford it. What have you got it insured for?”

“A quarter-million.”

Helen's vivid blue eyes glazed. “Uh—that's crazy! You must know what it's really worth.”

“He's worth whatever value I care to put on him, Helen. If I insured him for more than that, he'd have to go into a vault and never be seen. That's not why Lorenzo made him. Lorenzo made him for me, my own one-off, never for sale.”

There was iron in the voice; Helen desisted, choosing to sit on the floor and play with the dog and cat. She had begun her work, but it was far from over. Here was her best source about the twins. Twice a week, lunch. That should do it. And what a change, to find she really liked the person under the detective's microscope.