The Fourth Wall (7 page)

“Excuse me, Sergeant, was it carbolic acid?”

His eyes narrowed. “I don't believe we've released that information.”

“Does that mean yes? Because if it was carbolic, there might be some connection with what happened to Loren Keith.”

“Loren Keith? Who's he?”

Like most people, I don't know much about police procedure. I had simply assumed the New York police knew about Loren's blinding. But there was no reason they should be aware of one particular incident that took place on the other side of the country. Briefly, I told the Sergeant what had happened.

Sergeant Piperson told me to wait and left the office. He returned ten minutes later with a Telex in his hand. “How did you know about this?”

I explained about Jay Berringer and his friend who was acting in the movie Loren had been working on.

“It could be coincidence,” said the Sergeant. “But carbolic's not all that easy to get hold of—you can't buy it over the counter. Did Sylvia Markey and Loren Keith know each other?”

“Yes, they were both with the Manhattan Repertory Company several years ago. And I think Loren designed one of her later plays as well.”

“Is he like Sylvia Markey? Snubbing people, putting them down?”

“No, just the opposite. Loren is very likable. Pleasant to work with, a real good-guy type.”

Sergeant Piperson looked disappointed and after a few more questions told me I could go.

Snow, ice, and sludge had descended on New York while I was in Pittsburgh. I sloshed my way through three short blocks before I could get a cab, which proceeded to give me a thrill ride all the way to St. Luke's Hospital. I told the driver to wait. Sylvia Markey was off the critical list, but the receptionist said no visitors were being admitted. I got back in the cab and held on for dear life.

Safe at home again, I called Jake Steiner: no answer. After that I just sat and stared at the wall, not wanting to read, think, or even snarl at the television.

The one-acts in Pittsburgh had gone as well as could be expected, I suppose. I'd exchanged a few noncommittal words with Brian Simpson's assistant from San Francisco; Simpson himself hadn't made the trip after all. Jay Berringer had just about driven me nuts, gibbering endlessly about Sylvia and obviously enjoying all the excitement. I'd been right about him the first time; he fed on other people's bad luck. Claudia Knight had been quietly sympathetic, for which I was grateful.

When I first got back I had taken calls from seven different periodicals asking me to write profiles of Sylvia Markey. Scandal mongering, pure and simple. I told them no as politely as I could and switched my phone over to the answering service. My downstairs neighbors told me a couple of reporters had been by looking for me.

Shortly before curtain I went to the Martin Beck. Vivian Frank had performed in
Foxfire
three times since Sylvia's “accident,” and I wanted to see what kind of job she was doing.

The theater was packed. The ghouls were out in force to see the play Sylvia Markey had been acting in when she lost half her face. I stood in the back and watched Vivian Frank do a good workmanlike job; she hadn't hit her stride yet, of course. The rest of the cast was down,
way
down. Understandable. The humanoids in the audience kept waiting for something terrible to happen; nothing did. I didn't go backstage during intermission, and I didn't much want to go back after it was over, either. But I'd have to put in an appearance sooner or later, so it might as well be now.

The first person I saw backstage was a total stranger, a huge man bending over the prop table. Wild-haired and wearing Coke-bottle glasses, he was over six feet tall and must have weighed at least three hundred pounds. He wore a beard and a flowered shirt and he should have worn a bra. I stopped Carla Banner, the assistant stage manager. “Who,” I asked her, “is
that
?”

“Oh, that's our new props manager,” said Carla. “His name is—”

“Wait—let me guess. Tiny?”

“Yeah, that's right. Howja know?”

“What happened to Jerry?” I asked.

“He quit. Right after Ms Markey, uh.”

I remembered how jumpy Jerry had been even after the cat episode. “Any other defectors?”

There weren't. The wardrobe mistress had called in sick the day after Sylvia had been rushed to the hospital, but she'd got her courage back and returned.

I heard someone having a sneezing fit. When I realized who it must be, I rushed over to Hugh Odell's dressing room. “Hugh! You're not having an asthma attack, are you?”

“No, no,” he snuffled. “Just got some dust up my nose. It's okay.”

I looked around the dressing room. “Where's Rosemary?”

“Home. Something on TV she wanted to watch.”

John Reddick was in Vivian Frank's dressing room, formerly Sylvia's. He'd taken notes during the performance and was still coaching the new leading lady, trying to help her over the rough spots. Even with his tremendous energy, John looked tired. He was due to begin rehearsals for a new play next week, yet he still had Vivian to worry about
and
he had to find a new understudy.

The three of us talked for a while and John suggested we adjourn for a beer.

“Just let me finish changing,” said Vivian. “I'll only be a minute.”

While we were waiting for her, I decided to introduce myself to Tiny. He was locking up the prop room when I found him. “Tiny? I'm Abigail James. How—”

“Oh, yes,” said Tiny, his face lighting up. “You mumble mumble a long time mumphle the play gringeshockle for years mumble sniff.”

I thought this over and then said, “Thank you.”

He grinned and nodded, so that was all right. I tried again. “Are you managing all right? Any trouble with the props?”

“Oh, no,” he shook his shaggy head. “They don't mumphmumble on the skrammel except for the glomb.”

“That's good,” I nodded knowingly. “Well, I'm glad you're with us, Tiny.”

“Mh.”

I rejoined John, who was grinning broadly. “How did your conversation with Tiny go?”

“Why didn't you warn me?”

“More fun this way.”

Vivian checked out with the doorkeeper and the three of us betook ourselves (I like that word,
betook)
to P. J. Clarke's. Two mugs of beer were placed before us; Vivian had asked for grapefruit juice with “just a drop” of vodka in it.

“Have you talked to Jake Steiner lately?” I asked John. “I've tried to get him on the phone, but no luck.”

“I think he's pretty much camped out at the hospital. I was there yesterday but couldn't get in to see anybody. You know they have a police guard outside Sylvia's room?”

I nodded.

“Are you going to be here for Christmas?” John asked me.

“No, I'm off to Boston.”

“You don't say
Boston
like a Bostonian,” Vivian remarked.

“I've never lived there. But I have an aunt who maintains open house every Christmas where the scattered members of my family like to congregate. We brag about our lives and feel superior to one another and go off with our batteries recharged for another year.”

“Sounds like my grandfather's house,” said Vivian. “What about you, John? You'll be here during Christmas, won't you?” Vivian herself would be; the play was now sold out through February.

“I'll probably end up going back to Cincinnati for a couple of days,” John said glumly. “Every year I ask my parents to come here, but no—I'm supposed to go ‘home' for Christmas. When I insist, they get on the phone and complain in these frail, hurt voices about how they never complain and all they want is for their boy to be with them on Christmas.”

Vivian and I laughed. We all knew the shtick.

We were interrupted by a couple of autograph hunters. When Vivian had signed and they'd gone away, I said, “Tell us about
Androcles in Church
.”

Androcles in Church
was the play John was to start rehearsing next week. It had been written by a young British playwright named Anthony Gordon, whose work I didn't know. The play had had a brief run in London, where John had seen it and immediately coveted it.

“Gordon calls it a ‘counter-Shavian' play,” said John, “but that's not quite accurate. The opinions it offers are counter to Shaw's, but the rest of it—the wit, the debating, the verbal style—they're all pure Shaw.”

“Love imitative plays,” sighed Vivian.

“It's a young man's play. Gordon's still feeling his way, trying out different styles. Ten years from now he'll probably disavow it. But
Androcles in Church
is funny, the characters are good—not one flat part in it. It's an actor's dream.”

“But it didn't have a long run in London, did it?”

“No, but I think that was the fault of the directing more than the play itself. The directing was so understated it almost wasn't there at all. I think I can do better.” John talked on about the play with that intensity that's so characteristic of him whenever he's caught up in a new enthusiasm. As soon as I'd finished my second beer, he startled me by saying, “Abby, feeling a little mellow?”

“On two beers?”

“I've got something to tell you.”

I didn't like the sound of that. “What?”

“You know I'm trying to find an understudy for Vivian.”

“Why?” interrupted Vivian. “Why isn't Gene Ramsay taking care of it?”

“He's been in and out of town all week,” John said. “He asked me to see to it. Anyway, I've got to decide this week, because starting Monday I'll be giving all my attention to
Androcles in Church
. That means Griselda Gold is going to have to teach the new understudy her blocking.”

I groaned.

“Griselda Gold?” said Vivian. “Is she the one who …” She thrust out her chin.

“That's the one,” John and I said together.

John went on, “She won't be doing any real directing, Abby. It'll be more like prompting.”

“You think so?” I said. “That girl is just aching to direct—she's not going to let an opportunity like this slip through her fingers. And she's nowhere near ready, John, you know that.”

“Oh, I don't know. She may be better than you think. You're the logical one to do it. But Griselda's my assistant director and for me to tell her now she can't coach the new understudy—well, I just can't pull the rug out from under her.”

Vivian was looking puzzled. “If she's not qualified to rehearse the new understudy, how did she get the job in the first place?”

“Director's choice,” I said grimly. “John and I have locked horns about this before. I say the job of assistant director should go to the most qualified person available. John looks on it as a sort of training ground. So far it's never made any difference because John's been able to handle everything himself. But now—”

“How about this?” said John. “Why don't you sit in on the rehearsals, Abby? To advise Griselda, make suggestions. Would you like that?”

I'd rather face the Steelers' front four. “I don't think that's such a good idea. She's bound to resent it, and I couldn't get anything accomplished under those conditions. I don't like this, John. I don't like anything about it.”

John grinned. “You worry too much. It'll be okay, I promise.”

I turned to Vivian. “
Don't get sick
.”

She grimaced. “When it would cost me ten thousand dollars to miss a single performance? You better believe I'm going to stay healthy.”

John and I exchanged looks. “You signed that contract?” I said. “The same kind Sylvia had?”

Vivian shrugged. “It meant double the salary. How could I pass that up? Even though I know Gene Ramsay would collect if I took time off to go to my own funeral. Besides, it's only half what it's costing Sylvia Markey for missing that matinee.”

“Oh, come on,” I said. “Ramsay isn't going to collect from Sylvia. Surely not. Not now.”

“Yes he is, Abby. Ramsay told me she violated her contract and she was going to have to pay.”

“That bastard,” said John.

None of us was really surprised. Disgusted, but not surprised. Gene Ramsay was like that.

As we were getting ready to leave, I asked' John, “Is Anthony Gordon coming over for
Androcles in Church?
I'd like to meet him.”

“Can't make up his mind,” grinned John. “First he says yes, then he says no. You know how indecisive writers are.”

“Right,” added Vivian. “No firm opinions about anything.”

I had no opinion about that.

7

The next day I had another session with Sergeant Piperson.

This one lasted several hours. The Sergeant had decided that someone connected with
Foxfire
had to know something and he was going to dig it out of us if it killed him. Or us. “Everything,” he said to me. “I want to know everything
you
know about Sylvia Markey, every conversation you ever had with her, every conversation with someone else about her. Everything.”

I was appalled. “Every conversation in the past ten years? That's how long I've known her. You don't really expect me to remember—”

“I expect you to remember one thing at a time. Start with your first meeting.”

“But that will take hours!”

“Then we'd better get started, hadn't we? Why the reluctance, Abby? What's your problem?”

People who say “What's your problem,” for one thing
. I started talking, trying to remember “everything.” Most of it was trade talk, but Piperson was more interested in details of her personal life—most of which I suspected he already knew. All I could tell him was what I had personally seen and heard during rehearsals and performances of my own three plays Sylvia had acted in.