“That’s not like you, Pauline. Great artists have to be conceited. Don’t you remember what Huneker said about Rodin? His vast store of conceit kept him going all the years the public neglected him.”
“The public isn’t neglecting Wanda,” returned Pauline. “Not with two press agents working night and day to keep her on every theatrical page in town. And it’s not her conceit I mind; it’s her hypocrisy. She leads the sort of life most suburban housewives would give their eye-teeth to lead; but she flatters them by pretending that they’re the lucky ones and that she’s the martyr to circumstance who deserves everyone’s sympathy. She never sends her picture to the papers without a covering letter to explain that she just hates publicity. She never wears an orchid without telling everyone present that what she really wanted was a simple bunch of violets. You’re never quite sure whether she’s apologizing for being a success or rubbing it in. I suppose it’s her idea of being ‘democratic.’ I prefer honest snobbery.”
“Pauline!” protested Rod. “That isn’t fair.”
“Isn’t it?” Pauline lifted her chin and looked at him. “I believe you’re half in love with her!”
It was the true word spoken in jest. Rod chose to take it lightly. “Don’t be silly!” he cried. “We’re just good friends.”
“You sound like an old, divorced couple!” Pauline shut her notebook with a snap and rose. “Can I give anyone a lift uptown?”
“Yes,” said Rod. “If you’re including me.”
“Of course.” Pauline took a narrow envelope out of her purse and turned to Basil. “Here’s your ticket for tonight. She thrust the envelope into his hand. “Do come if you can! Better dress. Wanda likes her first nights plushy. Good-by!” Pauline slipped away in the crowd. Rodney Tait followed her.
There was a flicker of mild amusement in Leonard Martin’s eyes. In a close-up he looked sickly and underweight; he was gaunt to the point of emaciation. Loose skin sagged in folds and creases on his long face as if he had lost flesh recently. It had a dark tinge, nearer bronze than tan, that contrasted vividly with his pale blue eyes and the fringe of sandy hair above his ears. His high, bald forehead shone waxily in the brightly lighted room. His manner was gentle, almost apologetic. Basil wondered what part such a tired, discouraged, quiet, little man could play in a dashing melodrama like Fedora.
He was speaking now in a voice as mild as his eyes. “I suppose we’ve confirmed your belief that all theater people are crazy?”
“Stimulating is the word I should have used.”
“Wanda is certainly stimulating.” Leonard exhaled a deep sigh. His breath was heavy as if he had been eating overripe fruit. “She’s rather like an X-ray,” he mused. “When you’re first exposed to her, you think there’s no harm done! Her technique is so obvious! Then weeks, or even months later, you may discover you’ve been badly burned.”
“Is that what happened to young Tait?”
“I don’t know. But Wanda ought to leave Rod alone. He’s only a boy and she—well, she wouldn’t like me to say how long she’s been on the stage. . . . I must be off now. Shall I see you this evening?”
“I expect so.” Basil looked down at the ticket envelope in his hand. It was covered with fine print, but two words stood out in larger type: Royalty Theatre. “Have you seen the pictures?” he asked suddenly. “There’s a rather curious animal study over here.”
They squeezed through the crowd to the first row of a group standing in a semi-circle before a small painting in oils. At a little distance it looked like a turquoise matrix. There was a brown plain wide open to a turquoise blue sky mottled with tan clouds. Cunning perspective gave the spectator a feeling of infinite distance, airy and sunlit. In the foreground, drawn on a small scale, there was a row of crumbling Doric columns. A tiny brown ape sat on one of them, cross-legged, holding a yellow bird. He had just pulled off its wing. Three pear-shaped drops of dark red blood were falling toward the ground, high-lighted like rubies.
Leonard looked at the painting, and Basil looked at Leonard. His only response seemed to be the same mild, quizzical amusement he had shown as they discussed Wanda.
“The draughtsmanship is sound, but I’m afraid the subject is a little over my head. Is it supposed to inspire pity or cruelty? My chief feeling is disgust. I suppose that’s because I don’t like monkeys. And I do like canaries!”
Chapter Three. Enter First Murderer
WHEN BASIL set out for the theater the evening was young, and he decided to walk. He turned into 44th Street from Fifth Avenue, the east wind at his back, pushing him along with surprising force. With the reluctance of a busy man, he had obeyed Pauline’s injunction to “dress.” Now the pavement felt hard under the thin soles of patent leather shoes, and white doeskin gloves impeded his efforts to dig loose change from a hip pocket when he stopped at a newsstand for an evening paper. He amused himself with the thought that this unaccustomed splendor was almost as good as a disguise. No one was likely to recognize Dr. Willing, the active member of the District Attorney’s staff, or Dr. Willing, the studious psychiatrist, in this drone’s livery.
As he came to the Royalty Theatre, he stepped back to the curb and looked up with a certain curiosity. It was one of New York’s older theaters. A gloomy façade of plum-colored stone with white trim suggested a wedge of fruit cake with vanilla icing. The marquee blazed with electric bulbs:
Sam Milhau presents WANDA MORLEY
in FEDORA
with RODNEY TAIT and LEONARD MARTIN
Light flooded two great posters at either side of the box-office door—fleeting impressions of Wanda caught on paper with a few slashing brush strokes in sepia and red. Her head was a small, dark ovoid poised on a long, sinuous, white column of neck. Her tilted eyes were half shut in a provocative side glance over a shrugging shoulder. The wide mouth with its thin, scarlet lips curled in a sardonic smile. It might not be art, but it was Wanda. One sketch showed her against a Muscovite skyline of onion-shaped domes; the other, against a summery background of oleander and mimosa. Nothing in either suggested that anyone else appeared in the play. But apparently Wanda was what the public wanted. Already a long queue besieged the box office and an extra traffic policeman was telling a pair of autograph seekers to move on.
Basil glanced at his watch. It was only eight, and the curtain would not rise until eight-forty. He looked about for a place where he could read his evening paper.
To the left of the theater stood a gaudy, Broadway hotel; to the right, one of the low buildings called “taxpayers” because their rentals just cover the landlord’s tax bill. This one housed a row of small shops and restaurants, and the first of these was a cocktail bar.
The moment Basil entered the place he knew it was expensive. There seems to be an unwritten law in New York that the more expensive a drinking place, the dimmer the light; and this place was so dim that he could hardly see across the room. Night gathering in the street outside turned the plate glass window into a huge mirror. Behind the bar, another mirror doubled the reflection of amber bottles with golden highlights. Wherever there wasn’t a window or a mirror, there was a highly polished surface of wood or metal, so the whole place shimmered like a faceted jewel in the half-light. The air was close and spicy with an aroma of mixed drinks. Soft music came from a radio turned low. A solitary bartender mixed his highball and inquired if there were any news about the opening next door in the evening paper?