Baby Doll Games Page 20

  “Actually it was Mr Delgado I wanted to see,” Sigrid said coolly, "but he doesn’t seem to be around.”

  “He’s taken a part-time job at Bloomingdale’s. Pre- Christmas sales. Only fifty-two more shopping days, you know.” Helen twisted the ends of her corded belt and her eyes were wary. “What did you mean to ask Cliff?”

  “Part of the routine in many homicide cases consists of running the names of the people involved through our computers,” Sigrid said. “When I got to the office this morning, I found that your husband’s name had popped out. Assault and battery against a female dancer four years ago. I believe he drew a fine and a suspended sentence?”

  “One isolated act,” snapped Helen. “She was an irritating little no-talent who had the hots for Cliff and when he turned her down, she tried to become the prime ballerina with him. Unfortunately, she had lead in her shoes and about the fifth time she made him mess up, he slapped her.”

  “The report said something about stitches over her eye,” Sigrid said. “It must have been a rather hard slap.”

  “That part was an accident. Cliff was wearing one of those tacky junk rings-I think he was supposed to be dancing the part of a prince or something-and it caught her on the bony edge of her brow. Half an inch either way and he wouldn’t have marked her. Honest.”

  Helen dropped the ends of her belt and her voice deepened with intensity. “Cliff has a temper-I don’t deny it. But in the six years we’ve been married that’s the only time he’s used his hand on someone instead of his mouth.” Unnoticed by either woman, Nate Richmond had reappeared in the doorway. His face was still drawn and gray “Teas ready if you people are,” he said wearily.

  Chapter 24

  Despite her refusals, Nate Richmond brought Sigrid a cup of boiling-hot tea anyway. “No lemon,” he apologized, as he set it on the desk in front of her, “and our milk’s gone sour-no one thought to buy fresh-but I brought you some packets of sugar. Or would you prefer some of Wins wild honey?”

  “This is fine, thanks,” said Sigrid, “but you really needn’t have bothered.”

  “No bother.” He hesitated by her desk, absently fingering the thin gold ring in his ear. His gnome-like face was solicitous. “Unless you’re not allowed to?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Not allowed to eat or drink anything with the suspects’ families? Is that still one of the police rules?”

  “I don’t think anyone would object to a cup of tea,” Sigrid said.

  “Anyhow, Helen and I will be in the green room if you need anything.”

  Left alone again, Sigrid absently stirred the sugar into her cup and considered Nate Richmond’s words. She hadn’t thought of it before, but yes, she supposed the troupe did form the equivalent of a family-the way they ran in and out of one another’s rooms, borrowed without asking, defended, scolded, argued, cosseted. Helen Delgado was like the company’s mother, nurturing and earthy; Cliff the unruly bad-boy; Eric Kee the responsible older brother; Wingate West the idle dreamer; while Ginger Judson could be the bratty youngest daughter and Ulrike Innes the sensitive older sister who loyally guards the secrets of the younger ones from parental judgment.

  But what role for Nate Richmond? The household’s ageless brownie? Spirit of the hearth, or bachelor uncle who creeps down to his basement workbench in carpet slippers?

  And who was Emmy Mion?

  The father, Sigrid decided, sipping the steaming tea. An easygoing tolerant paterfamilias so long as everyone acted responsibly, but also a moralist who would have been at home in a pulpit, according to Helen Delgado. The decision-maker and maker of rules, the drawer of lines. This far and no further, my children, or Papa will spank.

  Where had Emmy found Amanda Gillespie’s missing hair ribbon and what thoughts had gone through her mind at that moment? She must not have been sure it was Amanda’s, though, for she had called Amanda’s mother to verify its identity.

  They said she was distracted that morning. That she had fought or not fought with both Eric and Ginger, depending upon whose version one believed. Yet she had sensed no danger from her “family.” She must have recognized her killer the moment he stepped upon the stage for, according to Ginger at least, she had laughed at the jack-o’-lantern’s movements (even though, again according to Ginger, he had done nothing funny at that point) and she had trusted him to hold her safely at the soaring climax of their dance.

  If Tillie were here, he would probably have drawn up one of his incredibly detailed timetables with every person’s movements carefully charted.

  So, okay, Sigrid told herself as she spread her notes on the desktop. Let’s do a Tillie on Emmy Mion and see where it gets us.

  She found a ruled legal pad and wrote at the top Saturday a.m.-Emmy Mion, drew a heavy line, and began directly underneath with Emmy's arrival at the theater. Right away she ran into problems. Nowhere in her notes could she find a reference to the exact time Emmy had arrived that morning. According to Helen Delgado, she’d slipped on Nate’s jacket, so she was probably one of the first ones to arrive, before the night chill was off the building.

  And why start with Saturday anyhow when there were earlier incidents that might have meaning?

  By the time she’d pulled all the bits and pieces together, Sigrid’s original timetable was scribbled over with circles, arrows, interlineations, and two or three versions of the same story. She tore out the sheet and copied the main points neatly. It took longer to write out than she’d expected and when she’d finished, the chart lacked Tillie’s prolix precision; but at least it helped her spot the points that needed further clarification: Winter-Emmy Mion living w/David Orland.

  February-Amanda Gillespie killed.

  Spring-EM living w/Eric Kee.

  Friday a.m., Oct. 30-David O. runs into EM who says.she’s moving out of Eric K.’s 6- will move in wlGinger J. or into the theater. Seems happy 6- unworried. Saturday, Oct. 31?-EM arrives at theater wlsome of her clothes.

  10- 11 a.m.-Run-through rehearsal.

  11- 11:15 ?-EM checks lighting cues wfNate R., then to Helen D.’s workroom where Helen adjusts EM’s dress & notices EM’s preoccupation; puts it down to performance.

  “sometime around noon”-EM calls Mrs. Gillespie, leaves message referring to “something of Amanda’s “a little before noon”-Ulrike I. calls Nate to lunch, finds EM there who declines to join them as she’s expecting a phone call. Nate says she came for some old pics of Mon. dance class. [NB-Amanda G.’s class? And where are those pics? Was that why EM’s desk ransacked? Or had someone sought the ribbon?] “a little past noon”-Eric K. lunches w/EM in office. Says EM preoccupied, as if working something out in her mind.

  12:45 p.m. + /-Eric i? EM have words. Overheard by Ulrike I. 6- Ginger J. EM joins them in womens dressing rm.

  12:45-1:45/50?-EM in dressing rm. w/Ulrike 6- Ginger. Tells Ginger she will not move in w/her but will live alone. Ginger rushes downstairs-she says to find the jack-o'-lantern head which Eric took; Ulrike thinks because she was hurt 6- angry over EM’s announcement. [NB-Ginger says Eric wore her head on Sat. She left the replacement under her chair but it’d been kicked out under the spiral steps sometime during the afternoon after the murder. Deliberately?] 1:55 p.m.-EM stands at top of wooden stairs as other 5 dancers prepare to go on. Blows a kiss, wishes them luck. No one admits speaking to her after that. 1:55 p.m.-David O. seen entering auditorium.

  2:00 p.m.-performance begins. Ensemble dances approx. 8 minutes.

  2:02 p.m.-David O. leaves auditorium. Tried to make phone call from comer. No verification of precise time.

  2:08 p.m.-Ensemble exits stage left.

  Ginger: says she saw Eric, Win, 6- Ulrike go upstairs, Cliff down the hall, she to her place between curtains. Saw only S. Avril. Saw killer enter from Eric's spot.

  Eric: says Win to men’s dressing rm., he to lavatory^ then to office for his hood, then to his place stage right center as Emmy mounted scaffold. Saw Win’s life-size puppet, no one el
se.

  Win: says he went to dressing rm., then to his place upstage right as Emmy being lifted. Saw no one else. Ulrike: says Eric to lavatory, Win to dressing rm., did not see Cliff. To her dressing rm., then downstairs, Win not in place. Crossed between wall 6- screen to her place upstage left. Saw Ginger sitting as if mesmerized. No one else.

  Cuff: got water, went to john, then immediately to his place downstage right. Saw Ginger seated enthralled directly across, no one else. Angered that killer intruded on EM’s solo, thinks either Eric or someone mimicking Eric.

  2:09 p.m.-EM begins solo.

  2:12?-Killer enters from Eric’s position disguised by jack- o’-lantern head. According to witnesses, probably onstage less than 2 mins.

  2:14 p.m. +/-Killer throws EM onto spiked fence. Death almost instant. Lights doused. Killer exits in dark.

  Constructing a workable timetable wasn’t quite as productive as completing a diagramless crossword puzzle, Sigrid decided. Disconsolately, she stared at it but no orderly pattern revealed itself. Nothing to suggest why that morning of all mornings Emmy Mion should suddenly stumble across Amanda Gillespie’s ribbon. She had arrived at the theater, rehearsed, worked with Nate on the lighting, let Helen alter her dress, and then called Mrs. Gillespie. Did that mean she’d found the ribbon in Nate’s workshop? In Helen’s?

  But she hadn’t been sure, so even though she’d called Mrs. Gillespie, she’d also gone back to Nate’s for pictures, pictures that probably contained a view of Amanda’s hair ribbons.

  The Pennewelf children had been in the theater that morning and must have seen Emmy with Amanda’s picture. “Emmy yelled about her,” the little girl had said.

  Yelled at whom?

  Someone she trusted? Someone who told her, “No, that can’t be Mandy’s ribbon. You know me, Emmy. You know I wouldn’t hurt a child”?

  And because she trusted, or maybe because they were both due to go onstage so soon and she could not risk the performance, she had let him allay her doubts enough to keep silent until she could prove it one way or the other.

  But he had known that once she was sure, she would not keep quiet. That strict sense of right and wrong of which everyone spoke would have had her dialing 911 the instant she confirmed it.

  No one had seen David Orland in the theater that day until minutes before the performance began so it seemed unlikely that Emmy could have confronted him with the ribbon.

  Eric Kee, Cliff Delgado, Wingate West. It had to be one of those three.

  A little girl had died. A little girl who liked to cuddle and touch and be hugged, but whose mother swore she knew the difference between affection and molestation and would have told if she’d been sexually fondled.

  Assume she had, thought Sigrid, her pen doodling question marks around Amanda’s name. Assume shed been frightened by the betrayal of trust and had run from the theater, only to be caught just steps from the safety of her apartment building.

  Eric Kee. Cliff Delgado. Wingate West.

  If the answer lay in her timetable, Sigrid couldn’t see it. Maybe she needed Tillie’s mountains of extraneous detail after all And yet… Something did glimmer there among the entries. A niggling little point or two which clumped around an alternate theory that was totally illogical. And yet… Sigrid lifted the cup to her lips and discovered that her tea was completely cold.

  How convenient, she thought. Returning her notes and papers to her briefcase, she picked up the cup and walked down to the green room.

  Helen Delgado was alone there and she looked up guiltily from a thick wedge of German chocolate cake as Sigrid opened the door.

  “Caught me,” she said. “I tell everyone it’s glands or genes, but it’s really just plain old gluttony. I love to eat Freud could probably tell you why.”

  “Do you think he actually knew?”

  “Vot do vomen really vant?” Helen said, savoring a bite of frosting.

  Sigrid knew quite well what Freud thought women wanted but she didn’t intend to enter upon a bawdy conversation with this woman.

  Helen Delgado laughed hugely at the expression on Sigrid’s face. ‘Well, of course all women want that, doll! But Freud’s a jerk if he thought we wanted it permanently attached.”

  “May I have another cup of tea?” Sigrid said austerely, moving toward the stove., “Sure, help yourself,” said the other woman, amused. “Want some cake, too? There’s plenty.”

  “No, thank you.” Sigrid busied herself rinsing out the cup and procuring another tea bag, and as she waited for the kettle to boil, she asked, “I wonder if you could tell me approximately when Emmy Mion got here Saturday morning?” The designer paused with her loaded fork in midair. “About eight-thirty or nine o’clock, I guess. Nine’s when I got here and I don’t think she was much before that. She hadn’t turned on all the lights.” The fork continued its journey to her full lips.

  “And the others?”

  “Everyone was here by nine-thirty, but I couldn’t tell you who came when. Wait a minute! Nate and Rikki didn’t get here till almost ten. He had to wait for the hardware store next door to open. He needed some screws or something. Rikki came on in after we’d finished breakfast and I guess the others had been here at least a half-hour by then.”

  The kettle whistled and Sigrid refilled her cup. “And to the best of your knowledge, Emmy Mion first appeared preoccupied, as you described it, when?”

  “Not during breakfast.” Helen finished the cake and stood heavily, pulling down her purple shirt before moving to the sink with that unexpected gracefulness to wash her plate. “She was laughing and talking, keyed up like everyone else; but when I saw her after the run-through, she was-I don’t know-quiet. Withdrawn. Preoccupied.”

  “Who likes the children more than they should?” Sigrid asked abruptly.

  “What?”

  “I said-”

  “I heard what you said, Lieutenant Harald! I just don’t know what the hell you mean!”

  “Don’t you?” Sigrid stood placidly, stirring sugar into her steaming cup, as she waited for the other to reply. Helen banged the dishes into the sink, then out into the drain rack before answering. "That’s a hell of a thing to accuse a children’s theater of. We all like kids or we wouldn’t be in this end of show business, would we? That doesn’t make us pedophiles.”

  She slammed down the dish towel. “Do you think we’d stand for something like that?”

  "No,” Sigrid said calmly. “Not collectively. But if someone among you kept it secret and hidden-•”

  “No! No! No! How long do you think something like that could be hidden? We live in each other’s pockets.” They faced each other across the length of the table and Sigrid said, “Emmy Mion found the Gillespie child’s missing hair ribbon.”

  It took a moment for the import of Sigrid’s statement to sink in, then Helen Delgado’s plump face was drained of all natural color, leaving behind mauve eyelids and lips that were now a ghastly shade of plum against the whiteness of her face.

  “Oh, my God,” she whispered and held onto the table for support.

  Sigrid hurried to slide a chair beneath her. “I’d prefer you didn’t mention this to any of the others yet.”

  “Of course, of course,” Helen murmured brokenly. Sigrid brought her a glass of water and was relieved to see the color begin to creep back into the woman’s face.

  “So that’s why Emmy was killed,” she said. “I was so. afraid that Cliff-” She clutched at Sigrid’s hand. “You know about Cliff’s temper, but I swear to you he’d never hurt a child. Or touch one in that way. It takes a sexy woman to turn him on. Always has. Before I got so fat-before he started catting around-which came first?” she asked bitterly. “The tomcat or the pig?”

  Sigrid freed her hand. “What about Eric Kee or Wingate West, then?”

  “Win is like a child himself when he plays with them. He’s so gentle and sweet. And Eric? No, not Eric. Emmy must have been mistaken.”

  “Emmy’s dead,” Si
grid reminded her, but Helen Delgado could not be budged from her position.

  Suddenly remembering that she had a spy in Canaan, Sigrid let it go. “There’s another point of confusion, Mrs. Delgado. The jack-o’-lantern heads. Ginger Judson insists that Eric Kee wore hers on Saturday, but Ulrike Innes said they were identical.”

  “Rikki’s right. They are. Ginger always goes off halfcocked,” said Delgado. She sipped more water and smoothed her glossy black hair. “I heard she was accusing someone of hiding it on her, under the spiral steps. As if anyone would sabotage the production like that. She probably left it by her chair and in all the confusion, it got kicked aside. Like my paint mask.”

  “Ah, yes, that paint mask,” said Sigrid. “Did you ever find the missing strap?”

  “Yes, Roman Tramegra turned it up in the john down the hall.”

  “You thought your husband took it?”

  Helen Delgado looked at her warily. “So?”

  “No reason. I was just curious as to why he would have. What was he painting?”

  Helen managed a shadow of her usually raucous laughter. “Not painting, doll. Clowning. Cliff could turn a crucifix into a phallic symbol if he put his mind to it. My mask is almost the same size and shape as a medieval codpiece. Use your imagination and see where it takes you.”

  “I see,” said Sigrid. She glanced at her watch and saw that it was almost six. The Pennewelf children! She impressed on Helen Delgado the need to remain silent about Emmy Mion’s hypothetical suspicions concerning the Gillespie child and hurried from the theater.

  But once again, she found herself peering futilely into a locked and darkened hardware store.

  Chapter 25

  Personal notes of Dr. Christa Ferrell, re: Corrie Makaroff [Tuesday, 3 November-Success! Anne Harald called to say the first pix look good & that she’ll probably definitely use the Makaroff case to illustrate the Social Services part of her series. I can't push Corrie too hard, but I didn’t think it would hurt to speed things along. Accordingly, I called Mrs. Berkowitz this morning; told her I thought we ought to intensify & that I’d fit Corrie in for an extra session this afternoon.] When Corrie returned today, Mrs. Berkowitz was very distressed. “She seems to be backsliding, Dr. Ferrell. She wet the bed last night. She hasn’t clone that since school began. And she wouldn’t talk to Tanya last night or this morning.”