Julie Hayes: A Death In The Life Part 25

On the Forum bulletin board. "Yeah. I hung it myself."

"I am not uninterested in the theater, Mrs. Hayes. So I have numerous informants."

"That figures," Julie said.

"I had in mind a luncheon afterwards-something at which his friends could gather and drink a toast. Would Sardi's be appropriate?"

"I don't think his friends would mind," Julie said.

"Then you will arrange it and I will give you a check to cover. I prefer anonymity where it can be managed. Please, where would you like to sit?" He swept the room with an open palm.

"Opposite that old man." Julie said and pointed to the Vuillard.

As he moved among his sculptures, Romano laid a caressing hand on a figure reclining on a couch. Julie looked at her watch. He had kept her waiting for more than an hour, a deliberate ploy, she thought, to gain a psychological advantage. It was as much to establish some kind of leverage as the import of the call itself that she said, "Mr. Romano, could I make a phone call? I'm going to be late for an appointment and I ought to phone."

"I'm so sorry," he said, and indicated the chair. He brought a phone to her and jacked it into a floor connection. "I shall wait in the next room."

"It's all right," Julie said.

He went out nevertheless while she dialed and, opening the door, gave her a brief glimpse of a library in leather.

Doctor Callahan answered before her service could pick up the call.

"1 may not be able to keep my appointment, Doctor. I didn't know in time or I'd have called you."

"Are you all right?"

"I'm fine. Only it's important."

"Do you want me to call the police?"

"No. It's all right... I think. It is all right. Only crazy."

"Naturally."

"Could I call you later today?"

"Call me at two."

When Romano returned he said blithely, "A psychiatrist."

"Yes."

"And a woman." He had listened in and did not mind Julie's knowing it. "If you didn't want me to hear you, you would not have said I could stay, now would you? Is she capable?"

"For some people."

Romano smiled puckishly. "Or is it that you wouldn't recommend me as a patient."

"Well, Mr. Romano, that isn't how it goes generally."

"I suppose not. I was joking. I am much too well adjusted to take the chance of upsetting the balance." He maneuvered a chair closer to Julie's and sat down. "I do sometimes think that the greatest charitable contribution I might make would be to give myself to science."

"You can," Julie said.

"I meant while I am still alive. Do you know"-and he examined his hands while he spoke-"these hands have not touched another human being in twenty years?"

Julie could think of nothing to say except, "How interesting."

He tucked them into his sleeves again. "I am the ultimate voyeur."

This time Julie didn't say anything.

"Will your doctor call the police?"

"No."

She's very sensitive to your voice. Or was there a signal in what you said?"

"She's very sensitive."

"It would be a needless gesture. I have only the best of motives. And the police are helpless. In this case, entirely inadequate."

"You mean in Pete's death?"

He nodded.

"They're trying," Julie said.

"Are they? No one has come to see me."

"Do you know who killed him?"

"Oh, yes. I'm quite certain of it."

"Then why don't you go to them?"

"As you said about recommending me to your doctor, Mrs. Hayes, that isn't how it goes."

"Were you and Pete friends, Mr. Romano?"

"You might say I was his silent patron."

"Would you mind talking to me about him?"

"My dear girl, isn't that why you are here? I've been expecting you ever since your visit to The Guardian Angel."

"You certainly keep well informed," Julie said.

"It is one more of the little luxuries I can afford. I could play you a tape of your conversation with that young clown Rudy. The Little King... that did amuse me."

"What about the rest of the things Rudy said?"

"Equally amusing, but more out of his style than mine."

Julie thought about it. "I don't follow."

"Couldn't you tell that he was in love with Peter?"

"I guess it crossed my mind," Julie said. "Who was Pete in love with?"

Her host smiled, the saddest smile in the world. "Laura Gibson. But then, so was I."

That was the stunner. Romano sat back and watched her. Recovery came slowly and she had no way of disguising her surprise. "I guess I've been on the wrong track," she said quietly.

"When you get over the shock, you will want to know who Laura Gibson was in love with, and I can only say it was not me. So I have spent half a lifetime in adoration and vicarious pursuit I backed every play she was ever in and I even followed her around the streets of New York."

Oh, boy. "Was she worth it?" The question was out before Julie weighed it. "I mean from certain impressions I've gotten, I don't think I'd have liked her much."

"Yes, for me it was worth it. I have become a connoisseur of the unattainable." He was staring at-or through-the Vuillard.

"It seems to me you've attained a lot," Julie said.

"Of the otherwise unattainable," he amended.

"You mean Miss Gibson," Julie said, not at all sure he did mean her at the moment.

"It's hard to understand, isn't it?"

"She's hard to understand. I mean living at the Algonquin, then at the Willoughby. All the old ladies there adored her. It's a seedy place, really."

"When all this could have been hers?" Mr. Romano chortled.

"All right."

"She didn't want it. She would have turned to stone. She wanted exactly the life she lived, and where she lived it. And so, by the way, did our young friend Mallory."

"That I understand," Julie said. "Did Pete know about you, I mean the way you felt about Miss Gibson? What was the whip business that Rudy told me about?"

"That disgusting young man missed the point entirely: That gesture was ritualistic-out of ancient Sicily, in fact. It was Mallory's ultimatum to me, keep out, and if I am right, it made him her lover before the night was over. At least, that is the way I have lived it."

"Okay," Julie said.

"I don't know what is okay and what is not. Something else this Rudy missed was the significance in that scene of John Maccarello, one of my bodyguards, at the time. I suppose you know him as Mack the pimp."

"Let's talk about him," Julie said.

"He's not worth it, but if you wish. He has not been in my service for many months now. It was all too much." He made a gesture of distaste.

"He liked Pete-is that how it goes?"

Romano nodded.

"When I began to put things together," Julie said, "maybe the wrong things in the right places, one of the big scenes was at St. Jude's Hospital... where they seem to think of you as Mr. Big."

"They should. I would have bought that hospital to see that Laura's last days were the best possible. I came out myself in order to make sure. I was afraid Mallory wouldn't have sufficient... ah..."

Julie provided the word, "Clout."

"Exactly."

"But he paid the bill."

"Oh, yes. Neither of them would have it any other way. So I created a project. Instant money."

"Pete made a p.o.r.n film for you."

"If you say so."

"Three days of shooting in Boston. The two of them wrote the script or whatever."

"You are informed."

"Why Boston, Mr. Romano?"

"I prefer not to be seen in any of the local-let's use the word studios."

"I see," Julie said, but she didn't actually.

"What puzzles you? That I was present?"

"Maybe. But what I really don't dig was what Pete could do. I mean Pete used photography a lot in his stage design, but a p.o.r.n film-that's a different art form. It has to be."

"Oh, yes, and you are quite right, it is an art form. Mallory was on camera throughout, the male lead. My identification was with him, not Laura."

"Okay," Julie said. The ultimate voyeur. Yeah.

"You are nave," he said solicitously.

"I guess I am."

"Now. What did you want to ask me about Maccarello?"

"The big question, Mr. Romano: did he kill Pete?"

"Do you think so?"

"Yes, but I couldn't prove it."