Star Light, Star Bright Read online

  I gave the lady a warm hello; she gave me a distinctly cool hello. With a choice of asking why the coolness or checking out the cards, I checked out the cards. Quist was to be at the head of the table. To his right, in order, were to be Sharon, Calderon, Maggie herself, Scott Rountree, and Araujo. To Quist’s left would be Holly Lee, Kightlinger, Lou Hoffman, Belle Rountree, and Milano.

  Mute Maggie suddenly found her tongue. “When you were having your little dialogue with Sharon, did you say something about me?”

  “No. Why?”

  “Because she just acted pretty damn strange. She came into my room and said to put you next to Belle at dinner. Then—no warmup, just a quick pitch—she said she had asked you to take her with you to New York when you left, and you had told her you wouldn’t.”

  “Oh, Jesus,” I said, “the confidentiality kids,” and Maggie retorted, “Never mind that. You know Sharon and I don’t have any secrets between us. What concerns me is what came next. She said, ‘Of course, if you were the one, he’d jump at the chance, wouldn’t he?’ And then just walked out and left icicles forming on the ceiling.”

  “She did ask me if I liked you. I answered truthfully that I liked you. That is as far as it went.”

  “I’m not so sure, Milano. I realize it should be an ego trip for any woman to have Sharon Bauer regard her as a rival, but it does my position here no good at all. If for your own devious reasons you did suggest to her—”

  “I didn’t. Anyhow, isn’t a foundation grant coming along in a month or so to take you to Europe for a long stretch? That makes your position here very temporary, I’d say.”

  “It’ll be even more temporary if Sharon decides I’m an undesirable element. And that grant money isn’t in my hands yet.”

  “A big healthy grant, I trust.”

  “Big enough. Fifty thousand.”

  “I’m afraid I couldn’t match that. Still, if you do get it, and on your way to Europe find you can spend time in New York—or even postpone Europe awhile—”

  “No.”

  “I’ll settle right now for a maybe.”

  Maggie said angrily, “You are so goddamn obvious, Milano. No matter how you really feel about Sharon, you’re going to punish her every possible chance, aren’t you? All right, that’s your business. But don’t try to set me up as make-believe competition just to help along in the project.”

  I said amicably, “Whatever you want,” and when she said with distrust, “That’s it?” I said, “Sure. I take it Daskalos doesn’t play hermit out there in his cottage. He does show up at the barracks here now and then.”

  “Now and then. He visits Sharon when he’s in the mood. And he uses the library.”

  I asked, “Is there a phone in that cottage? I didn’t see any number listed for one.”

  “His request. But he does have a phone there. And, yes, he uses it quite a bit. Incoming calls from the Coast mostly. Believers who have a problem they want him to help with.”

  “But he does make calls himself when he’s in the mood.”

  “Yes. Now, if you’d kindly explain why you’re so—”

  “Company’s coming,” I warned. Because, in fact, company, led by Quist in his wheelchair, was on its way through the door.

  Caviar and champagne may have been laid on for the Christmastime guests here, but what Araujo’s temporary staff came up with for dinner was a sort of Cuban festival of foods, featuring a rice, black bean, and meat stew, backed up by pitchers of watery sangría. The service was uncertain, confused, and sometimes downright dangerous. None of this did anything to relieve the atmosphere around the table, which was considerably thicker than the gravy that came with the stew.

  Quist, taking this in with a mordant eye from his wheelchair at the head of the table, now and then stirred up general conversation which at best was fitful. At one point he did it at my expense, reminding me that I owed him a dollar for my defeat in the water Olympics in the morning. After I had passed the bill along the table to him he lectured in high good humor about a legendary Australian swimmer, Murray Rose, whose kickless style had inspired him to his own present necessary technique. And winning ways.

  Belle Rountree, up to then silent as she cautiously picked her way through her viands, searching out proteins from carbohydrates, leaned toward me. “One dollar is cheap. He took Scottie for a hundred at chess. Up to then Scottie thought he was a chess player.”

  I laughed politely. “Any other ways he hustles his guests?”

  “Bridge. There could be a table set up after supper. He and Maggie Riley against all comers. Beware.”

  “She play a good game?”

  “Fair. But he’s master level, I’d say. Squeezes blood out of a hand. And talking about blood, how are you making out pinning the tail on the donkey?”

  “So-so.”

  “But you think it is somebody right here at this table?”

  “Could be.”

  “Could be. You’re a regular little chatterbox, aren’t you?” She looked at me inquiringly. “Or is it possible you’ve got me down on your list and find the subject a mite uncomfortable?”

  I said, “Your name’s down there all right. And, no, I don’t find the subject uncomfortable at all.”

  Belle carefully laid her fork on her plate. Kightlinger; further down our side of the table, and Calderon, directly across from him, were warming up to an argument about cinematography. Something about West Coast cameramen not knowing how to handle the South Florida sunlight. Kightlinger said they didn’t, Calderon said they did, their voices rising with each exchange.

  Belle suddenly said to me, “What the hell makes you think there’s even a remote chance I’m the one?”

  “Motive. And opportunity.”

  “What motive?”

  I said, “You don’t like what’s happening to your husband’s movie script. That script is being butchered by Daskalos’ orders. Maybe more than that, you don’t like what’s happening to your husband. He seems to be buying Daskalos’ bill of goods. Falling under the influence.”

  “And that’s your dimwitted idea of a motive?”

  “It is. How much of a motive I don’t know, because I don’t know you that well. Or your husband. However, I take it you’re proud of his work. He’s no hack. Right?”

  “You couldn’t be righter. He’s dealt with very respectfully in literary circles. Real literary circles. And a hack doesn’t take years of sweat to write a novel. In thirteen years he’s written five of them, working full time.”

  “And a movie script.”

  “He put everything into it, just the way he does with his novels. He couldn’t be a hack if he tried.”

  “And that’s how you want it?”

  “That is damn well how I want it. When The New York Review of Books defines him as an authentic talent and gives him two full pages—”

  I cut in, “All the same, when Daskalos said to either cut the heart out of that script or no movie deal, your husband went right along with it. Isn’t that what they call hacking it out?”

  “No,” Belle said in a light voice. “Pride.”

  “Pride?”

  Belle said, “Five books. Great reviews, damn few sales. I’m the breadwinner of the family. Scottie brings home a small piece of cake now and then. That’s not easy for him to live with. If this picture is made, it means he’ll put real money in the bank for the first time in his life.”

  “I thought he was already paid for the job.”

  “Option money. Ten percent. The other ninety comes when principal photography commences.”

  “But the way things are you’d rather not have it commence.”

  “That is—was—one beautiful script before it went on the operating table. And I know, because my job is evaluating literary properties. I work for Wyeth and Wyeth. Ever hear of them?”

  “No.”

  “Literary agents. Old-line. Still think quality writing is the name of the game, not packaging. It was Scottie’s luck that th
ey’re the ones he mailed his first manuscript to. And I was the one who picked it out of the slush pile. Want the rest? He came to New York from Des Moines with a cardboard suitcase and a portable typewriter, and I worked with him on the book until it was ready for the publishers, and eventually we got married. And, as you can see, we’re still married. End of story.”

  Lou Hoffman, on Belle’s other side, had been drawn into the argument about cameramen. He was plaintively explaining that, as director, he had already contacted Pruitt on the Coast, and Pruitt didn’t need lessons in handling any sunlight. After all, he had been on the camera for Mike’s last picture, which was shot in Texas. What about the sunlight there?

  Kightlinger said, “Oh, for chrissake,” and reached for the pitcher of sangría. The too-helpful waiter behind him grabbed for it simultaneously, and wine spilled on the table. The look Araujo gave his hired hand was a dotted line with daggers on it.

  Belle said to me, “Anyhow, if you think everything was hunky-dory with this picture until Kalos showed up, you’re way off. I’ll grant Sid Kightlinger one thing, he started off with good intentions. But he didn’t have the guts to follow through.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning that as soon as he was told he might get backing if he signed on Mike Calderon, he jumped at the chance. He knew Mike is all wrong for the part—he’s at least ten years too old for it—and he also knew that Mike grabs control of any picture he’s in. Which is how Lou got picked as director, which is how Holly Lee got picked for a lead. And she is worse than all wrong.”

  “And Mrs. Quist?”

  Belle said grimly, “Sheer denial on Sid’s part. There’s a couple of bedroom scenes in the script. Very essential, very explicit.” She motioned with her chin toward the head of the table, where Quist was being entertained by the cameraman argument. “Our Mr. Quist made it plain from the start he intends to be right there on the set any time his wife is in action. I ask you to consider the consequences.”

  I considered them. “Interesting,” I admitted. “Do you think Daskalos might have put Quist up to playing chaperon?”

  “Kalos? He wouldn’t have to. Why?”

  “Because at breakfast you suggested I check out why Calderon was so hot to play in this picture, and why he’d like to see Daskalos dead. The hot part, according to my sources, is that Calderon has a dire need to crawl into bed with Mrs. Quist without her husband or a cameraman present. Is that right?”

  “Dire is the word for it.”

  I said, “And since Daskalos stands against such immorality—”

  “That’s about the size of it. You don’t know Mike. He is not one to live with frustration. And if scaring off Daskalos—”

  I cut in: “You didn’t say anything at breakfast about scaring him off. You said you believed a murder impended.”

  Belle looked unhappy. “Well, if you’d gotten an eyeful of that poor mutt laying there. And that blood—”

  I said, “Murder was the word you used. And Calderon was the one you pointed at.”

  “All right, then I withdraw the nomination. I never meant Mike was a killer. A general all-around son of a bitch, yes. Not a killer.”

  “Are you sure of that?”

  Belle said in exasperation, “Ah, come on, Sam Spade.”

  “Do you know anything about Calderon’s marriage? His family?”

  “Know what? He’s got a wife and kid somewhere. You want to see pictures of the kid, ask him. He carries a string of them around.”

  “And that’s all you know about him?”

  “If I knew more, I’d be happy to run a seminar on it for you!”

  Her timing was bad. Kightlinger, loudly upholding his end of the argument about cameramen, caught Quist watching him with amusement and stopped short in midsentence. Belle’s words came out clearly audible in the sudden silence. Every head turned toward us.

  Belle said brightly to the company, “I was responding to a third degree by Mr. Milano. He’s been making like a detective.”

  “That’s what he’s here for,” said Quist just as brightly.

  There was bridge after dinner in a sort of game room furnished with a few card tables, a bar, big-game trophies, mostly carnivorous, and a lineup of Pachinko pinball machines. Cigars and brandy were offered as a preliminary. The cigar Araujo lit for me was good. The brandy I sampled wasn’t in the class of Quist’s private stock.

  Hoffman and Kightlinger lingered briefly over drinks, then departed to look over the day’s work on the script, Holly Lee trailing after them. Quist and Maggie made a bridge partnership against the Rountrees. Sharon and Calderon paired off in armchairs which Calderon had dragged into knee-to-knee position. At the bridge table Belle Rountree said, “Tenth of a cent a point is still my speed,” and Rountree grumbled something at her.

  There was a bowl of brass slugs on a table near the Pachinko machines. Araujo watched me drop a slug into a machine and test the plunger. He said in an undertone, “Do me a favor. Instruct me to place a man on twenty-four-hour duty at the front door here.”

  I glanced at him and saw he wasn’t joking. I said, “Sure. You do that.” I released a ball and it tinkled musically against nailheads. “Now tell me why I’m doing you this favor.”

  “Because Mrs. Quist hates to have security people placed where she can see them. They make her nervous. It’s why she can’t stand the apartment in town: the security is very conspicuous there. But since she has such faith in your judgment about these things—”

  “Isn’t it up to Mr. Quist?”

  “Not when she gets emotional about it.”

  “I see. So if she does get emotional this time, you lay the problem on me.”

  Araujo said, “You do agree that a man should be on duty at that door, don’t you?”

  “I do. All the time. And wide awake.”

  He went off to attend to this. I played a couple of games, scoring badly. Then I moved over to the bridge table and took up a position at Belle’s shoulder. She hadn’t underestimated Quist’s skill, but he had easy pickings here. Belle herself handled her cards competently, but Rountree was one of those pugnacious types who had to take the bid and play the hand no matter what. That was fatal against a team like Quist and Maggie who would guilefully ease him into overbidding, then double him and set the hand, piling up the points. Each time this happened he would blast his wife for her bidding, and Belle took this graciously, nodding her head in acknowledgment of the sins she hadn’t committed.

  Her husband’s style of play gave her plenty of chance to be dummy hand, and she finally seized one such opportunity—after laying out the hand and getting the predictable calling down—to rise from the table and move a safe distance from it. En passant she said to me, “Got a cigarette you can spare?”

  I followed her across the room and lit the cigarette for her. She sat on the arm of a couch, puffing away. Finally she said, “You never do see Scottie at his best, do you?”

  “In my line of work you don’t often see people at their best.”

  “I know. Like a gynecologist.” She waved aside smoke. “Is he on your list of suspects, too?”

  “Yes.”

  “So he thought. And it’s one of the things upsetting him. You must know the idea is ridiculous.”

  I said, “If he’s not our joker, he doesn’t have anything to worry about.”

  Belle crushed out the cigarette in an ashtray. “You really ought to come up with some shiny new clichés. And, for that matter, a plausible suspect. Otherwise, somebody here is having a good silent laugh at you right now.”

  “Maybe not. After all, nobody’s been eliminated from the list yet.”

  Belle said sweetly, “Not even Holly Lee?”

  “No.”

  “You have to be kidding. That baby bitch rates as one of the prophet’s truly dedicated ass-kissers.”

  I said, “She’s an actress. A pro. Do people like that stop acting when they’re offscreen? Can they?”

  Belle said, �
��Well, I might debate that under other conditions. Right now I’m all for it. Stick it to her, Sam.”

  She rose to go back to the table. I blocked her way and said, “This morning you described the notes to Daskalos as Biblical. Is that because you recognized some Biblical lines in them?”

  “Do you remember every little thing you hear, Sam?”

  “I remember that because a line in the first note’s been bothering me. It sounds familiar but I can’t place it. ‘I am in Hell.’ Is that from the Bible?”

  Belle said, “Not that I know of. It’s just that the tone of those things is Biblical. Grim prophecy. Jeremiah on the loose. Damn scary too. At least for a civilian like me.”

  “You’re a judge of writing. Would you say they’re well written?”

  “Very well written in their gruesome, simplistic way. Almost as if—” She stopped short there, and when I encouragingly said, “Yes?” she said, “Go do your own homework. I’ve got a cold deck of cards to warm up.”

  The game ended after two rubbers, the Quist-Maggie team splitting eight dollars in winnings. Good nights were said, Sharon switching on all the sapphire power in those eyes as she said it to me. Maggie lingered to turn out lights, and I lingered with her. Throughout the game she had managed to suggest that I wasn’t visible to her. Now, her finger on the light button, she had to take notice of me. “After you, Mr. Milano.”

  I said, “You know, there’s something really funny about all this. About us. You’ve cooked up a juicy scenario where I’m Sharon’s betrayed and vengeful lover. You don’t like me in that role, which is understandable. At the same time, you won’t let me explain that I’m being wildly miscast.”

  “I don’t see why my opinions should matter to you, Mr. Milano.”

  “But they do, Miss Riley. Now, may I revise that scenario?”

  “If you’ll kindly—”

  “Just listen. For one thing, I have no intention of taking Quist’s money and getting into bed with his wife simultaneously. I admit that three years ago it would have been different. But contrary to what you said earlier this evening, three years can be a very long time. And a very instructive time.”