“To keep suspicion—particularly your suspicion—away from me. I knew Marilyn had sent for you. I knew who you are—an old friend and lover of Marilyn’s. I knew it would be most difficult for you to believe Marilyn guilty of murder. I made it easier for you. I planted a doubt in your mind.”
“You blinded me,” Fletch said. “I haven’t thought straight since.” Fletch’s hand was on the door knob. “What was true about the story—anything?”
“Did you ask Marilyn about it?”
“Yes.”
“And did she assure you she did not kill Mister Hodes?”
“No. She didn’t.”
“Ah, that Marilyn.” Smiling, Mooney shook his head. “She sure knows how to keep an audience.”
38
It took Fletch longer than he expected to charter a plane to Fort Myers. He finally found a charter service in Miami willing to fly down to Key West to pick them up. It would be a while before the plane arrived.
Going back into the front hall, Fletch saw through the open front door that Geoffrey McKensie was in the street putting his luggage into the small yellow car.
A dozen or so people were watching the house from across the street.
Fletch went out to the sidewalk. He stood quietly a moment. Then he said to McKensie: “I’m sorry everything has worked out so rotten for you.”
A garbage truck went by. Painted on its side was WE CATER WEDDINGS.
His head in the trunk, McKensie said, “Every time us Aussies leave Australia we get used as cannon fodder.”
“History doesn’t say so.”
McKensie slammed the trunk. “You won’t see this lad on these shores again.”
“Sorry you feel that way. You ran up against one cheap crook, a murderer—”
“That’s not all, brother.” McKensie got into the car, closed the door, rolled down the window, started the engine. “I’ve had my experience with the American film industry. My first and my last.”
He drove off.
In the front hall, Edith Howell said, “I’m so sorry, Fletcher. Geoff told us all about the police dragging Moxie away. Not that I blame her for doing in that Steve Peterman. Awful man! I always said so, didn’t I, John?” John Meade had carried luggage down the stairs. Stella and Gerry Littleford were coming down the stairs with luggage, as was Sy Koller. Everyone was carrying luggage except Edith Howell. “We were just hoping she’d have a little more time before she was incarcerated. She’s been working so hard.”
In the street a rubber-neck wagon was going by….
Fletch decided not to trouble anyone with the facts. Let these people go. Getting Frederick Mooney out of the house and to the airport would be much easier without his being encircled by the shock and clucking of these people.
“Where’s Freddy?” Edith asked. “Getting as drunk as he can as fast as he can, I expect.”
“Maybe.”
“Oh, I know my Freddy,” said Edith. “I wouldn’t have that man for all his millions. Scrambled eggs for brains.”
“You’d get employed faster, Edith, as Mrs Frederick Mooney,” Sy Koller said.
All the people carrying luggage were trying to get around the person not carrying luggage. Edith Howell centered herself nicely in the front hall.
“I don’t think Freddy’s the great actor people make him out to be, either,” said Edith. “In
Fletch watched them go through the process of leaving. It was as if they were leaving a hotel. Edith Howell jabbered to John Meade about getting to Miami,
Before getting into the car Gerry Littleford said, “Oh, yeah. Fletch. Someone called. With an English accent. Didn’t catch the name. Talked fast. I didn’t know where you were. He said to tell you Scarlet something-or-other, Pumpernickle? won a twenty-five thousand dollar purse.”
“No foolin’.”
“Didn’t know you were into horse racing.”
“Didn’t know Scarlet Pimple-Nickel was either.”
If he were a doorman, they might have tipped him. As it was, they all drive off in two cars, discouraged for the moment, Fletch believed, but only for the moment, nevertheless sure that on some tomorrow the right material and the right people would come together and they would create an unreality more credible than reality, and be paid, and be applauded.
39
This time after knocking on Frederick Mooney’s bedroom door, Fletch waited to be invited in. There was no response. He knocked again.
He opened the door.
Frederick Mooney was on his back on the bed. On the bedside table were a drinking glass and one of the bottles, three-quarters full.
Fletch closed the door and went to the bedside. “Mister Mooney?”
He shook the man’s arm. “Oh, come on. I don’t need a final act.”
He sniffed the bottle on the bedside table. Cognac
“Come on,” said Fletch. “I’m sure you can also hold your breath and play dead longer than anyone else who’s ever been on the stage.”
On the bed the other side of Mooney was an empty tablet bottle. The cap was off. Fletch reached over Mooney and picked up the bottle. The label was for prescription sleeping tablets.
“Mister Mooney!” Fletch said. “You set the stage nicely. Now let’s go.”
He shook him again. “Jeez,” Fletch said. “Do I believe it?”
He felt for the pulse in Mooney’s wrist. There was none. Frederick Mooney was not breathing at all.
“O.L.!” Fletch dropped Mooney’s hand. “God-damn it, now you’re not acting at all!”
A curtain of wetness slipped down over Fletch’s eyes. The afternoon light from the windows was bright.
On the desk were two envelopes and an open note. Fletch went to the desk. The two envelopes were sealed. One said,
The open note was to him.
