Final Curtain: An Edna Ferber Mystery (Edna Ferber Mysteries) Read online

  “Yes, George?”

  Biggers squinted, uncomfortable. “Tell me what you know about this”—he flipped open his pad again and his finger ran down the sheet—“this Gus Schnelling. The two of them boys being friends with Dakota Roberts. I mean, I know Dakota a long time, yeah, but I guess they all knew each other, it seems and…” He shrugged, helpless.

  “They all knew one another from the Coast,” I told him. “Hollywood. I’m not certain when.”

  “Shoulda stayed there, the lot of them. Well, this Gus is a rabble-rouser, let me tell you. He didn’t like being questioned. In fact, he stood there with his arms crossed and spouted some mumble-jumble nonsense in German. A Nazi, he told me—proud of it. Sickness when folks is proud of being crazy.”

  “Does he have an alibi?”

  Again, the furrowed brow, as though my question startled—the family pet suddenly with an unnatural vocabulary. He hesitated. “What little I got from him is that he was over to Newark with this cold fish named Meaka Snow.” He checked his pad again. “She’s a piece of goods, that one. ‘You don’t gotta say nothing to him, Gus. He’s browbeating you.’ And all I’d said was, ‘Where were you yesterday afternoon?’ A federal offense, they make it. I been hearing that this Gus was none too happy with Evan who’s made fun of this Meaka broad. Christ, I felt like mocking her myself.” His eyes got wide with mischief. “Some folks naturally built to be make fun of.”

  “So she’s his alibi?”

  He let out a phony laugh. “Imagine that. One dirty hand slapping the other.” His gigantic moustache twitched.

  George was watching me closely, the tapping on the table getting louder. He cleared his throat, but I went on. “I don’t have much to tell you, Constable. You did hear that Gus tried to get into Evan’s room right after you left?”

  “Sure thing. It’s a small town. Half the citizens were witness to that.”

  “Well, did you ask him why?”

  “He says Evan owed him money and he was afraid he won’t get it now that his buddy was shot. ‘I ain’t done it,’ he yelled, and then clammed up. Backed off. That Meaka woman grunts and stands in front of him, like she’s a human shield. ‘Hey,’ I said, ‘I ain’t gonna shoot your boyfriend.’ And she spits out, ‘Anything is possible in a time of war.’ A time of war? Jesus Christ! I got away from the two of them. My mother always warned me to step away from the crazies.”

  George grumbled under his breath. “That must be hard for you to do.”

  I shot him a look. “What about Dak?”

  “Yeah, that one’s up to something. You can bet on that. Everyone tells me about his argument with Evan in the lounge at the inn. The two shoving each other around like it’s the Wild West. Punching, swearing. The bartender says Dak was red-faced and blubbering. He hit Evan. Evan, I guess, flirted with”—again he glanced at his pad—“Annika Tuttle.”

  “Do they have alibis for yesterday afternoon? I mean, Dak and…this Annika?”

  Again George glared at me. Tap tap tap. Morse code I had little difficulty translating.

  “Nope. Dak says he was driving around by himself, spent time at the stone bridge in Maplewood Park with his sketchpad. Lord, he said he drove near to DeHart Park, where the body was. He told me that flat out. Like he went by the entrance—but kept going. It turns out he was supposed to be working at the Assembly of God, and Annika went looking for him. He turns up and says he forgot about the time. Said he was here, said he was there. I guess he was everywhere.” A sickly grin. “The Holy Ghost, maybe. Hiding something, that boy. I know him a lifetime, almost. Always an odd boy, mumbling to hisself on the sidewalk. I ran him in a few times when he was a boy. Mischief.”

  I got defensive. “I found him a charming young man. A little brooding, perhaps, and a dreamer…”

  George broke in as the man watched us closely, steel-eyed. “Isn’t he someone you’ve written about, Edna?”

  “George, please. Not now.”

  Constable Biggers frowned at the interruption. “He’s made it clear he was no fan of Evan Street. Lots of different folks told me that. Some rivalry going back some time. I’ll get to the bottom of it—or, maybe, the state trooper will. Murder in Maplewood—it never happens.” He stared off, bewildered. “But it did. You know, right now Dakota Roberts is suspect number one.”

  Hotly, protesting, “A little premature, no, officer?” I tried to smile.

  “Ma’am, as I said, I’ve known Dakota since he was a young boy in the town, cared for by his aunt and grandfather. A bundle of trouble, that boy, vandalism and insolence and sassiness and pinching stuff from the Rowe’s Five and Dime. Always angry, a troublemaker…”

  “That doesn’t sound like the sweet boy who sits by himself and draws…”

  “Ma’am, a wild one. You don’t know the half of it. A loner, that one. He runs off to California when he was seventeen or so, and I thought, good riddance to bad rubbish. But then, tail between his legs, he’s back. Ten years back or so his wandering mother—another strange one, a woman preacher—moves back to town after her father died. She marries this Tobias Tyler, the fellow who set her up in this hell-raising tent revival church, the Assembly of God. And nothing in Maplewood’s been the same.”

  “You don’t like her church?”

  “Look, Miss Ferber, I ain’t got nothing against churches that are Methodist or Lutheran. But this holy-roller nuisance brings carloads of whoop-it-up folks, and when they get to going, you can hear ‘Praise be to God’ ten mile away. I like me a nice quiet town. So Clorinda Roberts Tyler is preaching and screaming and hysterical, and people are fainting. Then the buses filled with pilgrims come in and the old ladies wailing to God…Meanwhile Dak is like fourteen years old and running wild. Then he comes back from no good in Hollywood, and Clorinda announces he’s the prodigal son, returned to find the fatted calf, or some such nonsense. Everywhere in town you go you see him arm in arm with this Annika girl. Turning him holy, his mother says. God’s plan. The voice of the turtle, she says. Hallelujah. More like the hounds of hell baying at the moon. Mumbo jumbo.”

  Constable Biggers extracted a large stained handkerchief and wiped his brow.

  “I still don’t see why you suspect Dak of murder.”

  “Ma’am.” He leaned in, and I watched a line of sweat trickle down his chin. “The sons of holier-than-thou preachers are always your killer.”

  “That’s ridiculous.” My voice rose, strident.

  “Edna,” George began, “why are you so angry with the man? You don’t know Dak.”

  “Of course I do.” I paused. “Well, at least I don’t believe a young man like that is capable of such a horrible murder. I’ve observed him, spoken with him for a while—and I trust my instincts. Always. He’s not a murderer. A gunshot to the chest. Brutal, deliberate, vicious. Never!”

  Constable Biggers was talking to himself. “Nothing good ever comes out of these evangelical screamers, hands up in the air, swaying, crying.” Suddenly his eyes caught mine. “Nothing good. And when that Crawford woman opened the Maplewood Theater and put on those live shows, I says to myself here we go again. Folks getting excited, clapping and whooping it up. Cars lined up in front of the train station. All these women in furs—in July, mind you—stepping off the train from Manhattan with their la-di-dah makeup, and wondering where the cocktail lounge is. Theater folks. This used to be a quiet town. Nobody—” he sucked in his breath and snarled—

  I finished for him. “Got murdered?”

  “You said it, sister.”

  When the constable left us, George said nothing but his whole manner suggested disapproval. The long narrow face was stiff, the eyes behind those huge eyeglasses were unblinking, and his lips were drawn into a razor-thin line.

  “What is it, George?”

  “Edna, don’t do this.” He waved his hand toward the street.

  “George!
”

  “You want answers and you don’t trust the town sheriff.”

  “He wants to railroad Dak.”

  “Edna, there’s a murderer is in town. He’s killed someone we knew, if faintly. There is no basis for your trumpeting of this…this poorly named Dak other than he’s one of your underdogs—romantic, doubtless handsome, and woefully flawed. Your nosiness has been annoying in the past, I must admit, but now it could be dangerous.”

  “I’m doing nothing of the sort.”

  He spoke in a small, fierce voice. “I heard it in the way you grilled that bumbling constable. Edna as Spanish Inquisition. Torquemado in pearls. The Chinese water torture, Ferber-style.”

  “George, a little over the top.”

  He sat back and sighed, “All right, I give up, Edna.” A hint of a smile. “Please don’t ask me to speak at your funeral.”

  I smiled and sat back. “The white flag of surrender always pleases me.”

  “Just a warning, my dear. There is someone out there with a gun. Now, personally, I know at least a dozen people who’d like to shoot you, but your absence would be…conspicuous. An oxymoron.”

  “I’m a big girl.”

  “I’m going to be watching from the wings, Edna. This bleak tragedy is Elizabethan. In three acts.”

  ***

  When I answered the knock on my door later that afternoon, I was surprised to see Nadine Novack standing there. For a moment she stared at me, as though she’d knocked on the wrong door, but then, breathing in so deeply she made a raspy sound, she tried to say my name, stammered, had to begin again. She shook her head back and forth, angry with herself. “Miss Ferber, I’m sorry. You must think I’m a fool. I rehearsed what I want to tell you and now my mind’s a blank.” Clumsily, she backed off and looked up and down the empty hallway as if she’d lost her sense of direction. I reached out and touched the sleeve of her dress. She was wearing a breezy pale-yellow summer smock, baggy, unattractive, a size too large for her, but I could feel her twig-like forearm under the cloth. My gesture rattled her but she stopped moving. Some of the bright crimson lipstick she wore had smeared a front tooth. It made her look vulnerable.

  “Nadine,” I began, “tell me.” When she said nothing, simply batting her eyes wildly as though I’d shone a bright light into them, I insisted she come in, but she shook her head vigorously: no, no, no. “All right, then, let’s go downstairs. A cup of coffee. The two of us.” She nodded.

  Not speaking, with too much space between us, we walked to the Full Moon Café and found a table at the back, away from the few customers who sat clustered by the front window. Nadine wanted hot coffee, though the room was close and sticky. She drank it black, in tiny squirrel-like sips, staring into the cup as though it held prophetic tea leaves.

  “Tell me,” I said again, this time gripping her hand. The coffee cup rattled when she put it down.

  “Dak Roberts.” Two words, both explosive with feeling.

  A heartbeat. “What about him?”

  She found her voice, even and cool. “They’re gonna arrest him for murdering Evan Street. He told me.” Her face trembled.

  “That seems a little hasty, no?”

  Pleading in her voice, a quiver. “Miss Ferber, he has no alibi. None. Worse, he was there.”

  That stopped me. “Where?”

  “In the park. He keeps changing his story—like he doesn’t know what to say. He confessed to Constable Biggers and the state police that he was driving around and spotted Evan’s car cruise by. Stupidly he followed him to DeHart Park and saw Evan pull up and get out.” A helpless shrug. “Why would he tell them that?”

  I felt my heart racing. “Perhaps because it’s true. The truth counts now, Nadine.” I waited a second. “Was there anyone else there?”

  She shook her head. “Dak says Evan headed off in a hurry, running even, disappearing behind a bank of bushes.”

  “Did Dak stop?”

  “No, he kept going. He thought maybe Evan was meeting some girl…or something.”

  “I know—he told this to Constable Biggers.”

  Nadine smiled thinly. “You got to know Dak, Miss Ferber. He can’t lie to anybody. I mean”—she blushed—“he sometimes avoids saying something he shouldn’t, but he won’t lie outright. He was driving around, sketching.”

  “So Biggers now suspects him.”

  “He confessed to following him—seeing him there. It’s not good. No one goes to that park. I’ve heard it’s deserted most of the time. Dak was foolish. And the constable knows him from years back—his wild days in town. Biggers never liked him. I mean, Dak as a boy then—he did…dumb stuff…but this is murder. He said Biggers told him not to leave town.” She locked eyes with me. “It was like a line from the movies.”

  “But this is not imminent arrest, Nadine.”

  “Dak is convinced. You know that he fought with Evan. More than once. They even came to blows. Dak isn’t a fighter but Evan always made him furious. He hit Evan. He told people how unhappy he was that Evan came here to perform.”

  I waited a second. “Tell me. Did Evan come here because of Dak?”

  That perplexed her. “I can’t imagine why.”

  “What do you want from me, Nadine?” I sipped my iced lemon soda slowly, trying to make sense of this.

  She waited, looked over my shoulder. “Dak trusts you. He says he talked to you, and he thought, well, you trusted him.”

  I interrupted. “I do like him, but there is a murder to be dealt with.”

  At my use of the word murder, her hand rose to her mouth and she closed her eyes. “My God, Dak had nothing to do with that. Of course.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I know Dak.”

  “Tell me, Nadine, how do you know Dak? I’ve sensed something I can’t put my finger on. He seems to be interested in you.”

  She swallowed and whispered. “We know each other from years ago. Briefly. In Hollywood, as a matter of fact. I was a bit player.” She shrugged her shoulders and dipped her finger into the coffee, stirred it mechanically. “It’s not important. That’s over with. When I got the job at the theater, I remembered that he lived here…grew up here. I didn’t know if he still lived here. Really, I didn’t.”

  As she spoke, her tone became hollow, faraway, and I suspected she wasn’t being truthful. Some part of the story was missing. Dak had watched her from the shadows, and now she sought me out on his behalf. A puzzle, this one, and it came with missing pieces.

  I repeated, “What do you want from me?”

  “He wants to talk to you tonight. The two of you. He asked me to ask you. He doesn’t want to come to the inn—get away from…from…”

  I grimaced. “Will Annika be at his side?”

  She shivered. “God, no. But Annika is worried about him. I know that. His parents, too. His mother’s like a brooding mother hen, and Annika copies her. Annika is leery around me. I don’t see him at the theater. He works afternoons, mostly. He avoids me there—purposely. I mean, he knows me from…from Hollywood. I thought we’d…you know…reconnect. But when I learned about Annika, I…backed off. One time she caught us talking and flew into a rage. She went crazy, yelling at me. We were in the middle of the Avenue. She was horrible, calling me a tool of Satan. ‘Leave Dak alone—he’s being used’ and ‘theater people are evil.’ She went on and on. ‘Life on the stage corrupts.’ So we try to avoid each other. But today Dak slipped away and caught me as I left the dressing rooms. He mouthed the two words: Miss Ferber. I said—what? He told me to come here. See you. He hoped to see you alone, but you…you were always with Mr. Kaufman.” She ran her fingers through her hair and smiled. “End of a long monologue. So here I am.”

  “I will meet with Dak.”

  “He’s working with Frank on sets tonight. You’ll find him backstage.”

 
“Nadine, tell me the truth. You came to Maplewood knowing Dak was living here.”

  “Of course not.” But she spoke too quickly, regretting the obvious lie, and retreated. “I mean, I thought we might bump into each other and…” She turned her head away, flushed.

  “Did he know you were coming? Tell me the truth.”

  She shook her head vigorously, and then smiled. “Not really. He was surprised. I’m using my old stage name. Nadine Novack. In Hollywood—my brief moment in one bad movie—I used my real name. Nadine Chappelle. That’s how he knew me. So short a time I knew him”—a wistful moment, teary-eyed—“that sometimes I think I dreamed it all.”

  She started to stand but I reached out to touch her wrist. “One last thing, Nadine.”

  She bit her lip, uncertain. “What?”

  “Did you know Evan Street before you came here?”

  A long silence, painful, but then her face sagged, her eyes dark, heavy. “Yes.”

  “And?”

  A sob in her voice. “I couldn’t believe it when he showed up here. I hoped I’d never see him again. An understudy. I remember thinking—Can God be that cruel to me again?”

  “Again?”

  “Miss Ferber, I hated Evan Street. I hated the sight of him.” She gave out a laugh, a little hysterical. “I am so happy he’s dead.”

  Then she started to cry.

  ***

  Frank Resnick wasn’t happy when I asked to spend a half-hour talking to Dak, though he nodded. “He’s a little frenzied,” he told me. “I’ve come to like the boy, Miss Ferber. He’s running scared, I think. I made him come to work tonight. Last night, when I heard Evan was murdered, I remembered how Evan treated him. Dak’s stories about him. I guess I overreacted. I…” He was ready to blather on, defensively, but I held up my hand.

  “A half-hour at most,” I repeated.

  Frank’s head shifted nervously. “I didn’t sleep last night.” Then a smile I couldn’t interpret. “Dak,” he called out.

  Dak was waiting backstage. “Thank you,” he whispered. He led me down into the theater seats, walking slowly ahead of me up the aisle.