Death in the Fifth Position

CHAPTER SEVEN

1

I doubt whether I will ever forget that evening I spent with Louis; we did New York from the Village to Harlem in something under nine hours, from eleven-thirty that night to eight-thirty the next morning when I crawled off to bed.

We met at the Algonquin. From there we went to a bar in the Village … Hermione’s I think it’s called.

I thought I knew a great deal about our feathered friends, the shy, sensitive dancers and so on that I’ve met these last few years in New York, but that night with Louis was an eye-opener … it was like those last chapters in Proust when everybody around starts turning into boy-lovers until there isn’t a womanizer left on deck.

“You’ll like this bar,” said Louis with a happy grin as he marched me into a long blue-lit tunnel, an upholstered sewer, with a number of tables in back and a bar in front. Heads turned to look at us; there was a hiss of recognition when they saw Louis. He’s hot stuff in these circles.

We pushed our way to the back of the bar and a mincing youth, a waiter, found us a table right by the stage, a wooden platform about four feet square with a microphone in front of it and a piano beside it. The stage was empty. A tired little man sat at the piano, banging away.

“They have a swell show here,” said my guide.

“What will it be, big boy?” said Mae West, behind me; I turned and saw that it wasn’t Miss West … only our waiter who despite his debutante slouch managed to give a vivid impersonation of that great American lady.

Louis ordered gin and I ordered a coke, to Louis’ horror but I was firm … I had no intention of getting tanked tonight, for a number of reasons, all good.

The pianist, getting a look at Louis, played a hopped-up version of Swan Lake in his honor and a more godawful noise I’ve never heard. He was rewarded with a big smile from the French Nijinski.

“Nice, isn’t it? They know me here even though I only get down this way maybe once twice a season.”

“Tell me, Louis, how does it feel to be famous?” And believe it or not he told me; it was the last time I ever tried irony on that boy … on any dancer because, for some reason or another, they are the most literal-minded crew in the world.

When he had finished telling me what it was like at the end of a ballet when the applause was coming up out of the darkened house (“like waves”), our waiter eased by with the drinks as I watched, fascinated. Most queens walk in a rather trotting manner with necks and shoulders rigid, like women, and the lower anatomy swiveling a bit; not our waiter, though … he was like Theda Bara moving in for a couple of million at the box office, in the days when a dollar was a dollar.

“Here’s your poison,” he said in that slow Mae Western manner of his.

“That’s a boy,” said Louis and he swallowed a shot of gin which he immediately chased with a mouthful of water. He grimaced. “Lighter fluid,” he said.

“What did you expect, lover, ambrosia?” Obviously a literary belle, our waiter … and what a joy it was to hear her say “ambrosia”!

“Just a little old-fashioned gin.”

“You want some more?”

“The real stuff.”

The belle looked at him beneath sleepy lids which even in the dim light I could see had been heavily mascaraed. “Are you that dancer?”

“That’s me.” And Louis flashed the ivory smile.

“That’s what Mary said when you came in but I said, no, this one’s too old.”

One for the belle, I said to myself, as Louis’ smile vanished. “Get the gin,” he said, suddenly rough and surly.

“I didn’t mean any offense,” said the belle, with a smile of triumph; she ambled off swaying like some tall flower in a summer breeze.

“Bitch,” said Louis, in a bad temper. But then two admirers came over, college boy types, very young and drunk.

“Hey, you Louis Giraud aren’t you?” asked one of them, a crewcut number, short and stocky. The other was a gentle-looking blond.

“Yes,” said Louis, obviously taking no chances after his experience with the waiter.

“See, what did I say?” said the short one to the tall one.

“He’s kidding you,” said the blond.

“No, he’s not,” I said, just to be helpful; Louis was beginning to look very tough indeed.

“Giraud’s right calf is about half an inch thicker than his left,” said the blond.

I could tell by the gleam in his eye that he was a balletomane.

“Please show us,” said the short one. “I got a bet.…”

Louis, exhibitionist to the last, pulled up his trouser legs to reveal those massive legs, like blue marble in this light; sure enough one calf was bigger than the other. They both touched him very carefully, like children in a museum. “I win,” said the short one and he pulled the taller one away, with some difficulty now that Louis’ identity had been established.

“Nice boys,” said Louis, with his old good humor. “Like little pussycats, fuzzy and nice.”

“They don’t look much like pussycats to me,” I said austerely.

“Why don’t you come off it, Baby? Stop all this girl-business.”

“I can’t help it, Louis. I got a weak character.”

“I could teach you a lot,” said Louis with a speculative look; before he could start the first lesson, however, the belle returned with another shot of gin.

“Compliments of the management, Miss Pavlova,” said the belle insolently.

“Why don’t you go stuff …”

“That’s no way to talk to a lady,” said the belle, with a faraway Blanche Dubois smile.

But then the chief entertainer Molly Malloy came over, a man in his late thirties with small regular features; he was wearing a crimson evening gown and a blond wig like Jean Harlow.

“Hi, there, Louis, long time no see,” said Molly in a husky voice, not precisely female but on the other hand not very male either. He sat down at our table, drawing all eyes toward us. I felt very self-conscious.

“How’re you doing, Molly? I’ve been tied up all season … haven’t been able to get out once.”

“That’s not what I hear. This your new chick?” asked Molly, giving me the eye.

“Yeah,” said Louis, beaming, “Pretty cute piece, huh?”

“Well you always get the best, dear. And I know why.” There was much vulgar laughter and I looked politely away, looked toward the bar where youths and old men of every description were furtively nudging one another, all engaged in the maneuvers of courtship. It was a very interesting thing to watch.

“You still doing the same act, Molly?”

“Haven’t changed it in ten years … my public wouldn’t let me … even if I could. Tell me, dear, about all that excitement you’ve been having uptown: all those dancers murdering each other. Who did it?”

“Damned if I know,” said Louis, and he changed the subject, the way he had with me all night whenever I tried to get the conversation around to the murders, tried to question Louis about one or two things which had to be cleared up before I could get the proof I needed. But Louis wasn’t talking. And I wasn’t giving up … not if I had to get him drunk, a hard job but, under the circumstances, a necessary one since I’d heard he talks a lot when he’s drunk and there’s truth in the grape, as the ancients used to say.

“Well, dear, it’s been a real sensation … let me tell you. And such publicity! If it doesn’t sell tickets my name isn’t Molly Malloy.” I couldn’t help but wonder whether or not his name really was Molly Malloy. “Come here, Miss Priss,” said Molly sternly to our waiter who obeyed with the air of a royal princess dispensing favors, or maybe Saint Theresa scrubbing floors. “Another gin for Louis Giraud the dancer, another coke and a Tom Collins … understand?”

“You don’t have to act like I was deaf,” said the aggrieved, petulantly; another round was brought us and when Louis finished his third shot of gin he was definitely in a joyous mood … just next door to drunkenness and indiscretion. I bided my time.

Then Molly Malloy went into his act, to the delight of the initiates though it was pretty bewildering to me, full of references to people I never heard of, and imitations of celebrated actresses which weren’t remotely like the originals, or anything else for that matter. He finished the act with a torch song and, when that was over, disappeared through a door behind the stage to much applause. Beneath clouds of blue smoke the pianist continued to play; voices sounded louder and the mating at the bar grew more intense and indecorous.

During Molly’s last number, Louis had taken my hand in his and held it like a vise. After a while I stopped trying to pull away; it wouldn’t last forever I knew. That’s what I always tell myself in difficult situations, like the war … fortunately he soon got tired of kneading my palm and let it drop. I sat on my hands for the next half hour.

“Swell place,” said Louis, after Molly left the stage. “Swell,” I said.

“I came here on my first night in New York … maybe ten years ago. I was just a kid from Europe … didn’t know a word of English. But I got by.” He laughed. “Right away a nice old gentleman took me home and since any French boy can make better love than any American, I got me a home real quick; then, later, I go into ballet here … to keep busy. I like work … work, sleep and …” He named his three passions.

“When did you meet Mr. Washburn?” I asked casually.

“When he came backstage at the old ballet company where I was working. I had done one beautiful Bluebird; I guess maybe the best damned Bluebird since Nijinski. Every company in America was after me. Washburn had the most money so I joined him and he made me premier danseur. I like him fine. He treats me like a king.”

“Don’t you ever get tired of those old ballets?”

“I hate all new dancing,” said Louis, diverted momentarily from his usual preoccupation with pussycats and such like.

“Even Jed Wilbur’s?”

Louis shrugged. “He’s the best of that kind, I guess. I don’t get much kick out of dancing in them, though … in Eclipse and now the new one.”

“Where the father kills the girl, isn’t it?”

“I think that’s the story. To tell you the truth I don’t pay much attention. I just do what they tell me. At least he let’s me do things I like to do … tours en l’air, that kind of thing. He keeps me happy.”

“I wonder what the story means?”

“Why don’t you ask Jed? He’ll talk your ear off about it. I just go to sleep when he starts getting arty with me.”

“You sound like Eglanova,”

He snorted. “We got that in common then. I love her. She’s like a mother to me, ever since I’ve known her: Louis, you do this, Louis, you do that … Louis, don’t go out with sailors, Louis, don’t snap your head when you finish pirouette, Louis, don’t take such deep bows after ballet … I never had any mother,” said Louis, and for a minute I thought he was going to have a good cry.

“It’s terrible,” I said, “the way Mr. Washburn tried to get rid of her before Sutton was killed.”

“He’s a bastard,” said Louis, gloomily licking the edge of his gin glass. “He can’t help it. He was just made that way … all the time doing somebody dirty … not that he isn’t good to me, as long as I’m hot with the audience. The second I have a little trouble, get bad reviews or something awful, good-by Louis, I know him.”

“He’s a businessman.”

“Ballet is art not business,” said Louis making, as far as I knew, his first and last pronouncement on ballet. “But you should’ve seen his face when he came to find out if me and Ella were going to quit the company for sure and go into night clubs. He looked like somebody had just belted him one. ‘Now, Louis, you know we’re old friends …’ that was his line to me; so I strung him along awhile then I told him that Ella was just bluffing him.”

“Do you think she was?”

“At least as far as I was concerned. I didn’t have any intention of leaving the company, even though I’ve thought about it a lot. We had talked a little about it then and just lately Jed has been trying to talk me into doing that big musical of his this fall, but I said no; I mean the money’s very nice except that the government gets it all … then you’re out of a job maybe six months of a year with no money coming in and it isn’t so swell. No, I like to know I got a regular amount coming in every week, ten months a year.” I hadn’t realized before that Louis was quite so money-conscious, so shrewd.

“I wonder why Ella told Washburn that, about your quitting the company together?”

“Just to worry him a little, to raise her price. She knew he couldn’t find another dancer to take her place. As a matter of fact, just between you and me, I think she was planning to leave ballet in a year or so, but alone. I think she wanted to go in musicals and I got a feeling that was why she was so keen on getting Jed to join the company. Oh, she wanted to do a real modern ballet and all that but she wanted to work on him to get her a Broadway job. She had an eye for all the angles.”

“I thought Jed joined the company because of you.”

“You’re pretty fresh, petit gosse,” said Louis with a grin, pinching my thigh until I just about yelled with pain. “I wasn’t talking about why Jed joined us; I was talking about why Ella wanted him to, why she sold Washburn on the idea.” I rubbed my leg until the pain went away. One day I am going to beat the hell out of Louis, if I can; if I can’t I’ll do a lot of damage first.

“Jed’s sure got it bad for you,” I said in an earnest, slightly breathless tone of voice.

“Funny, isn’t it?” said Louis, with a sigh, stretching his arms and controlling a yawn … it was stifling in the bar, a single fan made a racket but did not cool the warm smoke-filled air. “He’s been after me for years. Used to write me crazy letters even before we started working together.”

I waved to the waiter who, without asking, brought us another round; before he left he gave Louis a lightning grope and Louis didn’t like it but, as I pointed out, he was just getting some of his own medicine. He didn’t think that was very funny but after he’d swallowed some more gin he was in a better mood. I tried to get him to talk about Mr. Washburn but he wanted to talk about Jed. “I’m a lone wolf,” he said, wiping his sweaty face with the back of his hand. “Lots of guys get themselves a nice pussycat and settle down but not me … I used to be a pussycat for some older guys, when I was real young, but I didn’t like it much and besides it isn’t dignified for a man like me to be kept by somebody else, and that’s what Jed’s got in mind. He wants me to settle down with him and be his boy while he makes dozens of ballets for me until I’m too old to get around a stage. Even if I liked the idea of going to bed with him, which I don’t and never have, I couldn’t go for that kind of life and, as for his making ballets for me, well, that’s what he’s doing right now with Mr. Washburn paying for them in cash, not me paying for them in tail … I tell him all this a thousand times but he doesn’t listen. He’s made up his mind I’m his big love and there’s nothing I can do about it. You’d think somebody who’d been around dancers as long as he has wouldn’t feel that way, like a little girl, but he’s got a one-track mind. He came to us just because I was in the company … not because Ella wanted him or because Washburn offered him a lot of money. Believe me it’s been hell dodging him, too. I can’t take my clothes off but what he isn’t in the dressing room wrestling around. I finally convinced him that Ella, who was making eyes at me this season, and me were having a hot affair and I suppose he fell for it since I’ve been known to play the other side, too. I let Ella in on the secret and so we pretended we were having an affair which was fine until I found out she expected to have a real one … you could’ve knocked me over with a feather when she suggested the idea one afternoon, right after the season opened. I said no and from that time on till she died we were having trouble and I mean trouble. She used to do everything she could to break me up on stage and off. I hate to admit it but I was kind of relieved when that cable broke.”

So were a lot of people, I thought, sipping my third coke … I was getting more and more wide awake and, perhaps as a result of the caffein I was drinking, more and more keyed up.

Molly, in black satin and a dark wig, joined us. “Going to make a real night of it, dear?” he asked.

“First real bender this season,” said Louis, looking happy.

“Well, I must say you couldn’t pick a better place, and in better company,” said Molly giving me the eye. “You a dancer, honey?”

I said that I was, in the corps de ballet.

“My, they’re much more butch than they used to be,” said Molly, turning to Louis. “What’s happened to the mad girls who used to be in your company?”

“Flew away,” giggled Louis. “Spread their wings and flew away.… psst! like that, all gone.”

“Well, it’s a new look,” said Molly, giving me a tender smile. We had a great deal more to drink and then we left Hermione’s. I was wide awake and a little jittery while Louis was roaring drunk, throwing passes almost as fast as I could catch them and throw them back.

At four in the morning we ended up in a Turkish Bath in Harlem. I was very innocent; I figured that if Louis tried to give me a rough time I’d be safe in the baths since they were, after all, a public place with a management which would come to my help if he got too horny. I was mistaken.

We undressed in separate lockers, like a beach house, then we went upstairs to the baths: a big swimming pool, then steam rooms and hot rooms and, beyond these, a dark dormitory with maybe a hundred beds in it where you’re supposed to lie down and take a nap after your pores have been opened by the heat. Only nobody takes a nap.

Standing by the pool in a strong light, I was very embarrassed not only by what was going on but by Louis who was staring at me, taking inventory. “Where’d you get those muscles, Baby?” he asked, in a low husky voice.

“Beating up dancers,” I said evenly. But I wasn’t too sure of myself. Louis looked like one of those Greek gods with his clothes off, all muscle and perfect proportions, including the bone head. Our presence caused even more of a stir than it had in the different bars. Fat old gentlemen came strolling by; one old fellow could hardly walk he was so old … he wheezed and puffed and he looked like a banker, very respectable, very ancient yet here he was, operating like mad, or wanting to.

“Let’s go in the steam room,” said Louis and, ignoring the pinches and the pawing, we got through the old gentlemen to the steam room where a number of youths, black and white and tan, were carrying on, dim shapes in the steam which hid everything over a foot away. All around the steam room was a concrete ledge or shelf on which the various combinations disported themselves, doing a lot of things I never thought possible. It was like being in hell: the one electric bulb in the steam room was pink and gave a fiery glow to the proceedings. For the first time that night I was tempted to give up, to run away, to let the whole damned murder case take care of itself. Only the thought of Jane kept me in that steam room.

We climbed up on the ledge out of the way. Louis stretched out beside me while I sat straight up, legs crossed, and he made love noises. It was pretty terrible. Fortunately, he was drunk and not as quick as usual and I was able to keep his hands off me. For several hours I had been trying to clear something up but I couldn’t. He was either on to me or else he was too drunk to make sense.

“Come on, Baby, lie down,” he mumbled through the steam as dark shadows moved by us, shadows which would abruptly become curious faces; then, seeing us together, seeing my furious scowl, would recede into the ruddy mist.

“I told you one million times, Louis, I don’t like it,” I said in a low voice.

He sat up, his face so close to mine that I could make out the little red veins which edged the bright blue irises of his eyes. “You don’t think I don’t know all about you,” he said. “You think I don’t know about Jane?”

“What about Jane?”

“You know as well as I do. Everybody in the company knows … no use your trying to bluff.”

“What’re you talking about?”

“About Jane and Ella.”

“What about them?”

“Stop looking so dumb … Ella had a big thing with Jane, didn’t you know that? Just last year. Everybody knew. Ella was crazy for Jane. As long as I knew Ella, Jane was the only person she ever got excited over, except maybe me and that was just because I wouldn’t have anything to do with her.”

“I don’t believe it.”

“Then go ask Jane … she’ll tell you. Maybe she’ll tell you about the fight they had … if she doesn’t, the police will.”

2

The sun was shining when I got back to the apartment. I was staggering with fatigue and I was aware of nothing as I fell into bed beside Jane who did not wake up.

Two hours’ sleep is not as good as eight but it’s better than none. At least I didn’t feel that my head was full of feathers when Jane woke me at ten o’clock.

“What happened to you?” She was already dressed.

I groaned as I sat up, shaking the sleep from my eyes. “Hunting a killer.”

“Did you find one?”

I nodded grimly, wide awake. “In spite of the fact, nobody’s been very co-operative … including you.”

“Here’s some coffee,” she said, handing me a cup from the table by the bed. Then: “What do you mean?”

“You and Ella,” I said, looking straight at her. “I didn’t know you went in for that sort of thing.”

She turned very pale. “Oh my God,” she breathed and sat down with a thump on the bed. “How did you find out about that?”

“Then it’s true?”

“No, not really.”

“It either is or it isn’t.”

“Well, it’s not. I’ve been so scared somebody would rake all that business up … the police don’t know, do they? Gleason didn’t tell you, did he?”

“No, I found out from one of the dancers last night. I gather everyone knew about it except me.”

“It’s not one of the things I most enjoy talking about,” she said with some of her usual spirit.

“I can see why not.”

“And not for the reason you think. It all started about two years ago when Ella needed an understudy in one of the lousy new ballets we were doing then … this was before she was such a star: so I was given the job and she offered to teach me the part … something which is pretty rare with any dancer but unheard of with someone like Ella. It took me about five minutes to figure it out. From then on, for the next few months, it was something like you and Louis, only worse since I had to work with her. I turned her down a dozen times; then, finally, after being as nice as I could be under the circumstances, I lost my temper and we had a knockdown fight which did the trick: she never bothered me again … never spoke to me again as a matter of fact, off stage anyway.”

“Then why does everybody think you were carrying on with her?”

“Because she told them we were, because she got everybody in the company to believe that I was the one who had gone after her and that she had been the one who finally threw me out.”

“Jesus!”

“That’s what I say. Well, even though everybody knew what an awful person Ella was, they tended to believe her since after all, she had so many affairs with men, too, and I wasn’t at all promiscuous,” she added primly.

“This may make it kind of tough,” I said, putting on my shirt.

“I don’t see why they have to bring all that old stuff up now. What does it have to do with Ella’s being killed?”

“Well, they’re pretty thorough in these matters, the police are … they’ll probably trot out every scandal they can find in the company, if only to make the headlines.”

“I had a premonition about this,” said Jane, gloomily packing her rehearsal bag.

“I wish you’d told me sooner.”

“I was afraid you wouldn’t believe me … you do believe me, don’t you?” I gave her a big kiss and we both felt better after that.

“Of course I do. Only a complete hayseed like you could manage to do so many things wrong.”

She shut the rehearsal bag with a snap. “I almost forgot … somebody searched the apartment yesterday.”

“Take anything?”

“Not as far as I could tell.”

“The police … probably just a routine checkup.”

“I’ll be glad when they make their damned arrest and stop bothering us.”

“That’s just because you want to dance Eglanova’s roles.”

She smiled wanly. “I’ve been wondering, though, who they will get for the rest of the season.”

We took a taxi acrosstown to the studio; we were followed, I noticed, by two plain-clothes men in another cab. I said nothing to Jane about this.

Mr. Washburn was at the studio and he greeted me as cordially as ever, as if the unpleasant exchange of the night before had never taken place. “I hear you were out late,” he said, when I joined him in the reception room, near Madame Aloin’s desk. Dancers in tights, detectives, tiny tots, and mothers all milled about. None of the company, though, was in sight.

“How did you know?”

“I saw Louis this morning. He was here for the nine o’clock class.”

“How on earth does he do it? I didn’t get to sleep until eight and he was still going strong when I left him.”

“Where were you?”

“In Harlem.”

“Then I suppose he came straight to the class instead of going to bed … he often does that when he’s been drinking, to sober up.”

“Iron man,” I said, with real admiration. “Is he still here?”

“He’s rehearsing with the rest of the company. How is Jane?”

“She doesn’t suspect anything.”

“Well, try and keep the papers away from her today. One of them says right out that she’s guilty, for personal as well as professional motives.”

“They don’t mention her name, do they?”

“No, but they make it clear.”

“I suppose somebody tipped them off about Jane and Ella.”

Mr. Washburn looked solemn but I could see he was pleased. “So you’ve found out about that.”

“Yes … have the police?”

“Of course. I didn’t want to be the one to tell you.”

“Very thoughtful.”

“Yes, I think it was thoughtful of me. There was no use in upsetting you with gossip like that. Now that you know, however, I may as well tell you that we’re going to have a hard time keeping it out of the trial … the state will build its case on that affair, so Bush tells me.”

“When are they going to arrest her?”

“Today, I think; Gleason is in that classroom having a conference. I’ve told our lawyer to stand by. He’s at the office now, waiting. It’s terrible, I know, but there’s nothing left for us to do but live through it.”

“Have you found someone to take Jane’s place in Eclipse?”

“No,” said Mr. Washburn emphatically; I knew he was lying.

“Well, don’t hire anybody yet … don’t even write one of those letters of yours.”

He winced slightly at this reference. “Why not?”

“Because I know who really did the murder.”

He looked like one of those heifers which Alma Shellabarger’s old man used to hit over the head with a mallet in the Chicago stockyards. “How … I mean what makes you think you know?”

“Because I have proof.”

“Be very careful,” said Mr. Washburn harshly. “You can get into serious trouble if you start making accusations you can’t back up.”

“Don’t worry,” I said, more coolly than I felt. “I’ll be back in an hour.” I was gone before he could stop me.

At the office I ran into Elmer Bush who had somehow got his signals mixed and had expected to meet Mr. Washburn here. “See the old rag this morning?” he asked brightly, referring to that newspaper which had once given me a berth.

“Too busy,” I said, pushing by him into my office; he followed me.

“Happen to have a copy of it right here,” he said. “I say in it that there will be an arrest by noon today.”

“Do you say whether the right person will be arrested or not?”

“No, I leave it up in the air,” said Elmer, chuckling.

“You’ll find Mr. Washburn over at the studio,” I said coldly, going quickly through the heap of mail on my desk.

“I’ve got some advice for you, boy,” said Bush, in a serious voice.

“I’m listening.” I didn’t look at him; I was busy with the mail.

“Keep out of this. That girl of yours is in big trouble. There’re a lot of things you don’t know … just take my word for it. I’ve been around a long time. I’ve had a lot more experience dealing with the police … I know what they’re up to. They never act in a big case like this unless they got all the dope, unless they’re sure they got their suspect signed, sealed and delivered. I like you, Pete; I don’t want to see you get torn apart by these wolves. I know you like the girl but there’s more in all this than meets the eye … more than most people, even real friends like Washburn, are willing to tell you.”

I looked up. “Do you mean to say that I have body odor, Mr. Bush?”

“I was only trying to do you a good turn,” said Elmer Bush, very hurt. He left me alone with my ingratitude.

I looked at my watch; I had less than an hour before the rehearsal broke up, at which time I was fairly sure the arrest would take place. I took out my sheet of paper and went over it carefully: all the mysteries had been solved and the answer to the puzzle was perfectly clear. Short of a confession on the part of the guilty party, however, I was not going to have an easy time proving my case. If worst came to worst, though, I could always announce my theory, get the police to hold up the arrest and then let them do the proving, which they could do, in time … I was sure of that.

I got on the telephone and called an acquaintance of mine at the rival ballet company’s office … he’s been the press agent over there for years. Since we’ve always been friendly, he told me what I wanted to know … it helped a little.

It was not until I was out in the street that I recalled I had not shaved or changed my clothes in two days and that I looked incredibly seedy, according to the plate-glass window in which I caught an unflattering glimpse of myself. I had not been to my own apartment in several days, not since the afternoon when I had packed my clothes and stormed out of Jane’s place.

I let myself in and picked up the suitcase which still lay in the middle of the living-room floor. Then I opened it.

At first I thought someone was playing a joke on me. The bag contained a woman’s nightgown, nylon stockings, brassière, panties … I examined them all with growing bewilderment. It was not until I discovered the sealed envelope that I realized what had happened, that this was Magda’s suitcase.

I had a long talk with Gleason. It lasted for forty minutes and ended just as the rehearsal did, which was good timing for the company was at least able to get through its rehearsal before the killer was arrested.

I purposely held the final bit of evidence back until I had explained, to Gleason’s annoyance, how I had put the puzzle together. I’m afraid I was a little smug in my hour of triumph.

“You see,” I said in the same quiet, somewhat bored tone a professor of English I had had at Harvard was accustomed to use with his students, “we all were led astray by the later deaths; we didn’t concentrate on the first murder enough, on the character of the murdered woman which was, naturally, the key to the whole business.” I paused in the middle of this ponderous and obvious statement to fix the Inspector with my level gaze, as though I expected him to question what I had said. He didn’t. He just looked at me, waiting. His secretary’s pencil was poised above his shorthand pad. After a suitable pause, I continued.

“Curiously enough, what I considered to be your somewhat morbid interest in the shears, The Murder Weapon as they are officially called, turned out to be, finally, the first clue I had to the killer’s identity; in my pocket I have the final evidence. Between the first clue and the last, however, there is an extremely complex story which I am sure that you never suspected, in its entirety at least … I didn’t either, I must admit.” I am not sure but I think that at this point, I put the tips of my fingers together.

“Ella Sutton was an ambitious girl, as we all know, and an excellent artist. Her tragedy began (and I think it has all the elements of a classic tragedy: a beautiful, clever, gifted woman rising to glory only to be struck down because of one fatal flaw in her temperament … greed).” I was having a very good time; I had shifted now from the slightly bored professor of English to the more suitable role of classic moralist, a Sophocles sitting in judgment. “Her tragedy, then, began in 1937 when she joined the North American Ballet Company where she met Jed Wilbur, an eager young choreographer, and Alyosha Rudin who, though he was with the present company, was more active in the whole ballet world in those days than he is now. She made, as I construct the case, two friends at that time: Jed, who was not only her choreographer but her political mentor as well, and Alyosha who fell in love with her and, when the North American Ballet folded, was able to take her into this company. Both men had a great influence on her. With Wilbur, she joined the Communist Party …”

“You realize what you’re saying?”

“Yes, Inspector. They joined the Party and belonged, for a time, to the same cell. Ella, however, was not very much interested in politics, or anything else which didn’t help her to get what she wanted professionally … she was a true artist when it came to her work: she would do anything to get ahead. I believe she became a Communist to impress Jed, who was indifferent to her sexually; and she became Alyosha’s mistress to please him … even taking a Russian name for a while in an attempt to make people believe that she was a White Russian born in Paris. All of this you can find in old interviews.

“As you probably know, she quickly lost interest in Alyosha who adored her but cared for the dance more; he refused to push her ahead in the company as fast as she thought she should go. She deserted him finally and married the next most powerful person, from an artistic point of view, Miles Sutton, the conductor. Their marriage was never very happy. She had a bad temper and she was a natural conniver. I suspect much of the trouble she had with the men in her life came from the fact that she was either quite indifferent to sex or else she was, in actual fact, a Lesbian. In any case, she went quickly to the top, and, finally, this season, she got her dearest wish when she prevailed upon Washburn to fire Eglanova. Meanwhile, however, Ella had made a great deal of trouble for herself. She had got involved with Jane Garden in an abortive affair … she was genuinely attracted to Jane who is not, contrary to your recent theory, a Lesbian … that’s one of those things I would know better than you without any evidence. And Ella had decided to shed Miles and marry Louis, partly out of attraction (she seemed always to care only for men and women who would have nothing to do with her) and partly because it would be a glamorous marriage or alliance: the king and the queen of ballet.

“Everything might have worked out perfectly if Louis had ever shown the faintest interest in her, but he didn’t and there were bitter quarrels. Miles, who now no longer lived with Ella, fell in love with Magda and, as you know, got her pregnant. Even in ballet circles that sort of thing presents a problem and he did his best to get Ella to divorce him. She took it all very lightly … it was the sort of thing that amused her and she made it clear that he would have to work his problems out on his own time. I think she was indignant, deep down, that he had preferred another woman to her even though they no longer lived together, even though she despised him … naturally, he could have killed her. But he didn’t. So, by the time Eclipse was to be prèmiered, Ella had infuriated Miles and Magda, Louis, Mr. Washburn by threatening to leave the company and take Louis with her, Eglanova by succeeding her, Alyosha for deserting him and for getting his beloved Eglanova fired, Wilbur for having blackmailed him into joining the company.…

“Now when I had found out all these things, it occurred to me that the person who killed Ella would, naturally, be the one with the most urgent motive or, failing that, the one whose monomania was equal to hers. The most urgent motive was her husband’s and I was just as sure as you were that he killed her. But we were all wrong. That left Eglanova, Alyosha, Louis, Wilbur, Mr. Washburn and Jane. I knew Jane hadn’t done it. Mr. Washburn, despite a rather sinister nature, had no motive, other than exasperation. Eglanova and Alyosha seemed likely candidates, for nearly the same reason. Louis had no apparent motive. Wilbur had an excellent one.

“Ella needed Wilbur for two reasons: she wanted a modern ballet and she wanted to go into musical comedy. They had grown apart over the years and when she first had Washburn approach him the answer was no. He didn’t like the Grand Saint Petersburg Ballet and he had no intention of leaving his own company, or Broadway. Ella then went to see him and told him, in her definite way, that if he didn’t accept Washburn’s offer she would give evidence in Washington that he had been, and for all anybody knew now, was still a member of the Communist Party … and she had proof. She was the sort of girl who never let go of anything which might one day prove useful. Needless to say, Wilbur joined the company. But like everyone else connected with this mess, he had more than one iron in the fire: you see, he had been in love with Louis for years. Which was, as far as he was concerned, the one good thing about his predicament, about his giving in to Ella.

“Everything might still have turned out all right if Ella had not gone too far and if Louis had been a little brighter. The Grand Saint Petersburg doesn’t have much of a reputation for chic but it is a money-maker and Wilbur was allowed a free hand and he did create for Ella what many people think is his best ballet—Eclipse. As for Ella’s going into musical comedy, well, there was nothing wrong in that either. She could have gotten a job with any management in town on her own … so there was no reason why Wilbur shouldn’t sponsor her. The complication arose when Ella became interested in Louis and Louis, who was not at all attracted to Wilbur, used Ella as an excuse for his own coldness, saying that she was the one woman he had ever loved and that they were to be married. Poor Wilbur took this as long as he could. Louis would even pretend to make love to Ella in his dressing room when he knew Wilbur might be within hearing distance.

“This crisis came to a head the afternoon of the day Ella was killed. Wilbur told her he wasn’t going to stay in the company another minute, that he was going to break his contract. She told him if he did she would expose him as a Communist and that would be the end of his career. So, believing that he would lose his career as well as his love to Ella, he cut the cable; then he put the shears in Eglanova’s dressing room since she seemed as likely a suspect as any.”

I stopped, expecting some outcry from the Inspector, but there was none. “Go on,” he said.

“Fortunately for Wilbur, Miles was immediately suspected and, as fortunately, Miles died a natural death before he was arrested. The case would have ended there except that Miles had known all along that Wilbur was the real murderer … Wilbur never knew that Ella, a very efficient woman, had somehow managed to get hold of his membership card in the Party years ago and, with an eye to the future, had kept it. She was a very shrewd woman … the more you study her life the more you have to admire her for the sheer audacity she displayed. If she had been able to identify a bit more with her friends and victims she’d still be alive … might even have ended up being adored by everyone like old Eglanova.”

“Why didn’t Sutton give us this card?”

“He would if you’d tried to arrest him. He was not rational … no man as heavily doped as he was could be. Besides, he must have regarded Wilbur as a benefactor.I do know, though, that he discussed the whole thing with Magda that day he went to Magda’s apartment and he either gave her Wilbur’s membership card then, or else told her where it was in case something should happen to him. If he didn’t give it to her then she could have got it the night she came to his apartment. No matter how she got it, the card was in her possession at the time of her death.”

“Why didn’t she bring it to us?”

“The same problem … why should she? She had nothing against Jed. The death of Ella didn’t disturb her one bit and she realized that now with Miles dead the case was over. And it would really have been over if, for some reason we may never know, Magda hadn’t become suspicious of Jed. She began to think that perhaps Miles had not died naturally. She made a date to talk to him; she told him that she had the Party card and he asked her for it. They were to meet after the rehearsal. I admire the way he went through that rehearsal, not knowing what to expect from Magda who was sitting there with the rest of us on the bench, waiting for him to finish. After the ballet they went into the empty classroom … or rather Wilbur joined Magda there after Jane had left her … a break for him, the room being empty. She told him that she had the card with her; they quarreled. She demanded to know whether Miles had died naturally or not. There was some sort of scuffle and he grabbed the purse and, either accidentally or on a sudden impulse, he pushed her through the window. Then, taking the card out of her purse, he rushed back into the studio.”

“Then he has the card?”

“Yes. Magda, however, the day she died came to Jane’s apartment as you know, intending to move in. Since the apartment is a small one I was forced to move out … which naturally irritated me. So, shortly after Magda arrived, I left … after first shoving my own suitcase under the bed and taking hers with me to my own apartment where it remained unopened until an hour ago.”

“What was in that suitcase?”

With a look of quiet triumph I handed Mr. Gleason the photostatic copy Magda had had made of Jed Wilbur’s membership card in the Communist Party, dated 1937.

4

It was a blissful evening. I had sold the exclusive story of my apprehension of the murderer to the Globe for what is known in the trade as “an undisclosed amount,” meaning a good deal … to the fury of one Elmer Bush whose own story on the arrest of Jane Garden had to be killed at the last minute at great expense, and now Mr. Washburn was entertaining Jane and myself at the Colony Restaurant for dinner.

“You know,” said my erstwhile employer expansively, offering me a cigar, “though it may sound strange, I always suspected Jed. You remember how I repeatedly maintained that no one connected with my company could have done such a thing? Well, in a sense, I was right … it was the newcomer who was responsible, the outsider.”

“Very sound, Mr. Washburn,” I said, glancing at Jane who glowed in coral and black.

“But what made you suspect him … when did you get on to him?”

“The evening I went to see him in his apartment and tried to get him to talk about the murder. At first he wouldn’t, which was suspicious. But then, after much coaxing, he did suggest that perhaps Eglanova had done the murder and then put the shears in her own dressing room to make herself appear victimized. Well, I knew that only three people in the company knew where those shears had been found originally … you, Eglanova and myself. Only the murderer could have known that they had been placed in her wastebasket because it was the murderer who had put them there. Very simple.”

“Isn’t he wonderful?” sighed Jane. I preened myself.

“Now isn’t that remarkable,” said Mr. Washburn with a gentle smile.

“Remarkable?”

“Why, yes. You see I told Wilbur about those shears … or rather I mentioned it to Eglanova in Wilbur’s presence. I felt at that time it would make no difference since the case seemed solved … Miles was dead and the police were satisfied. I must say it was fortunate, all in all, that you were able to locate Wilbur’s Party card. Otherwise he would have said that he’d learned about those shears from me.”

“That may be,” I said evasively, feeling a little sick to my stomach. “Anyway, it’s all over and he’s confessed.”

“And you did a bang-up job,” said Mr. Washburn, riding high on the wind he had knocked from my sails. “Not only did you save this little lady from an unpleasant experience but you have cleared the whole company of these crimes. I am more grateful than I can say.”

To this tribute, I made chivalrous answer.

“We are also fortunate that the arrest didn’t take place earlier because now, I am happy to say, the new ballet is in good enough shape for the Chicago opening. A real bit of luck under the circumstances. It’ll be a sensation … the Murderer’s Ballet … I can see the papers now.”

Reflecting sadly that the Ivan Washburns of this world always win, Jane and I went home to celebrate. A row of Miss Flynn’s asterisks could alone describe our bliss.