Diane Vallere - Style & Error 03 - The Brim Reaper (23 page)

I swept the floor and filled the big gray trash bin with scraps of paper, dental floss, empty battery packages, and packing materials. I nestled the empty cardboard boxes inside of each other. The last box I picked up wasn’t empty.

“What’s in here?” I asked, shaking it. I opened the flaps. A videotape sat inside, half-wrapped in a piece of paper that was rubber-banded to it. As I pulled at the rubber band it broke and snapped my fingers. “Ouch!” I dropped the box.

The paper fell away from the video. Eddie picked up both. The paper was a lobby card from one of the Hedy London movies I had at home. He turned the tape over in his hands. It was unmarked.

“There’s a VCR in Christian’s office,” I said. “I hid behind it.”

“Let’s go.”

We scampered down the stairs. I put out an arm and stopped Eddie from moving forward. As I listened for sounds that we weren’t alone, I heard Dr. Daum’s voice coming from the front of the museum.

“Stay here,” I whispered at Eddie. I jogged back up three stairs and joined the former director.

“Dr. Daum, is there a VCR around here?” I held the black tape up. “Research. Small detail. Eddie and I can’t agree over which movie Hedy London wore the banded beret in. I’d watch it here but I’m afraid we’re going to be at it for a while.”

“Research is important, even with a millinery exhibit. There’s an audio visual cart behind the door of Christian’s office. You can take it upstairs, just please return it before tomorrow.”

“Is Christian there?”

Dr. Daum checked his watch. “No, I believe he’s entertaining out-of-town collectors.”

“Okay, thanks!” I called out. I returned to the hallway where Eddie stood and held my finger up to my mouth.

“Dr. Daum says we can take the audio/visual cart upstairs.”

Eddie looked confused. I dropped my voice to a whisper. “This is our chance. Unlock the door. We have permission to get in there. You get the cart behind the door and make a big production of getting it upstairs. I’ll see if I can find a list of collectors on his desk. Go.” I gave him a push toward the door.

It took Eddie a couple of minutes to figure out the wheels on the cart were in the lock position. When he did, he pushed it out of the office and into the hallway. One of the wheels squeaked out an
eeeeee-eeeeee-eeeeee,
alerting anyone within a five block radius that the equipment cart was on the move.

Christian’s desk was clean. Any piles of paper I’d seen earlier had been filed. His monitor, computer, and printer were all turned off and his chair was tucked under his desk. The only sign that he was planning to return were the construction worker boots along the back wall. The soles had been cleaned, but traces of dirt still clung to the toes.

“Samantha?” Dr. Daum said from the doorway.

I jumped. “Dr. Daum! You scared me.”

“Did you and Eddie find everything okay?”

“I think so. I wasn’t sure if we had all the cords we needed.”

“I’m quite sure everything you needed was on the cart. I must lock up for the night, so if you don’t mind,” he held his hand toward the door, palm-side up. I walked past him to the elevator.

When I caught up with Eddie, he stood in front of the TV with the video in his hand. He popped the tape into the machine and static filled the screen until a black and white of Hedy London replaced it. She rested on the arm of an overstuffed sofa and her smile lit up the screen. She wore a striped boat-neck sweater and sailor pants. One leg dangled while the other supported her. The date stamp on the bottom right corner of the video said December 12, 1998.

“Ms. London, would you like to introduce this footage?” an off-camera voice said.

“Yes, what we are about to see is a series of outtakes from my earlier pictures.”

“And how did this footage become available?”

“Through the generosity of my lover,” she said, smiling at the camera with darkly painted lips. One could only wonder if the cameraman was embarrassed by her admission.

We stood transfixed, as her casual image was replaced with silent footage of her in a pegged skirt and matching fitted jacket. A fox stole was clamped around her neck, and a pillbox hat sat on top of her head. She walked down the street, hips swaying ever so slightly. It was Hedy London, the starlet, the woman who had first captured the attention of moviegoers decades earlier. As much of a fan of old movies that I was, it wasn’t the familiarity of the movie that struck me. It was the familiarity of the hat on her head.

“Recognize anything?” I asked Eddie.

“No, and I thought I saw all of her movies.”

“I’m not talking about the movie, I’m talking about the hat. You know that hat. It’s Cat’s hat, the one she was mugged for.”

29

“But Cat said her hat wasn’t in any Hedy London movies. The only way someone would recognize Cat’s hat as a Hedy hat was to watch this video.”

“I think we should go back to the exhibit and take a closer look at that hat.”

We went back to the gallery. Eddie reached past the dental floss and picked up Cat’s hat. He flipped it over and together we stared at the label. It was a small rectangular tag, frayed on one edge from the passage of time. The hat maker’s logo was on a diagonal, stitched on in red thread. One corner had become unattached and curled up, making it hard to read the decorative font.

I picked up another hat from the grouping of fedoras and looked at the label. This one was in much better condition. We compared the two. It seemed as though they were by the same maker. After checking an additional three of the hats, we concluded one thing: Cat’s hat had seen more action than the others. Maybe that’s what happens when a hat finds its way onto the black market.

“Who do you think the video was meant for?” Eddie asked.

“I’ve been wondering about that. Seems to me it was intended for someone in charge of the exhibit, and that leaves a couple of people.”

“Two, right? Dirk Engle and Christian Jhanes.”

“Don’t forget Vera Sarlow. She was the original curator of this exhibit. She said she wished she’d been more involved, but it wasn’t meant to be. Nobody’s talking about the fact that she had access to the entire exhibit, that she has a connection to Milo Delaney, that she is a little bitter about not being here anymore. You know what? I think I need to know more about that.”

“What are you going to do, march into her store and ask her why she was fired?”

“No, not exactly. I have a better idea.”

I drove Eddie to his apartment. Sooner or later he was going to remember he paid rent, and I wanted to reacquaint him with the concept of our own independent lives. He got out of the car and leaned over the passenger-side door before shutting it.

“You headed home?”

“No, I’m heading to Nick’s showroom.”

“Dude, there are these things called phones. You can talk to people who aren’t in the room. They’re very high tech. Some of them don’t even have cords. They’re especially useful for people who look like you look right now.”

I glared at Eddie. “You’re no spring daisy yourself.”

He slammed the door and left.

I pulled around the block and headed back toward the highway. Before I hit the entrance ramp I pulled off into a parking lot and called Nick. I wasn’t sure if I was calling him in the role of girlfriend or showroom manager. No matter which role I chose, I was only marginally performing the duties.

The phone rang three times before he answered. “Nick Taylor,” he said.

“Samantha Kidd,” I replied. It was the same way we’d answered the phone back when he was one of my vendors, on the off-limits list of men to consider dating, though years of not acting on the attraction had somehow allowed the flirtation to filter into the way we said our names. For the first time since I’d taken the job with him, I felt like it was old times.

“Samantha Kidd,” Nick repeated. “It’s been a long time since I heard you answer the phone like that.”

“Nick.” I hesitated. When I dialed his number, I wasn’t sure what I was going to say, but now there was only one way I could see the conversation going. “This isn’t working out like I’d hoped.”

“Are you breaking up with me?”

“I’m talking about the job. Only I’m not talking about the job.”

“Then what are you talking about?”

I sighed. “I think maybe we should see each other, talk about this in person.”

“This sounds serious.”

“Can you meet me at J&D Pizza on Penn Avenue in half an hour?”

“J&D Pizza? Not Brothers?”

“I’m branching out.”

“Half an hour. I’ll see you there.”

I looked in the rear view mirror and realized how right Eddie had been about my appearance. Circles from a lack of sleep colored my under-eye area, and my hair had flattened from being pulled up in a ponytail. I’d chewed my lipstick off somewhere during the hours at the museum and had little other than a ring of red around the outside of my lips.

Half an hour wasn’t enough time to go home to freshen up or change. It was barely enough time to stop at the mall, pick out a new outfit, change in a fitting room, spritz myself with a tester from cosmetics, and brush on a sweep of blush to my cheeks, which is what I did. I pulled my hair into a low ponytail and secured it with a multicolored scarf I kept in the trunk for accessorizing emergencies.

I’d been impressed with J&D’s Pizza when I stopped here a couple of days ago, not the least of which was because they were directly across the street from Vera Sarlow’s hat store. I drove past the restaurant, parked on a side street, and walked back up Penn Avenue, checking out the front of the store. Like the last time I was here, the sandwich board out front advertised the Milo Delaney public appearance tomorrow. Hey, Nick and I could talk anywhere. Why not talk and conduct surveillance on a suspect at the same time?

Nick was already inside the pizza shop when I entered. He stood from a table by the side wall. “Kidd.”

“Taylor.” I looked around. The table by the front window with the clear view across the street was available. “Can we sit here?”

“I thought this would be a little more private—” he started, but I interrupted.

“The sun’s going to be in one of our eyes if we sit there,” I said. “This one in the front is perfect.”

He carried a bottle of water and two glasses to the front table.

“What’s this about?”

“We should order first.” I hopped up and went to the counter. “Large round.” I twisted around, looked at Nick and then back at the pizza man. “Pepperoni on one half, anchovies on the other. Do
not
let them touch.”

The man tapped a few keys on the register and I handed him a twenty. I stuffed the change into a large mayo container that had “Tips” written on it in red marker and went back to the table.

“Did you get the shoes for the Hedy London exhibit?” I asked.

“Yes. They arrived this morning.”

“And what about Milo? Did he finish with the hats for the exhibit?”

“I imagine so. I haven’t heard otherwise. What’s up, Kidd?”

“Nick, for the rest of this conversation, can we pretend I don’t work for you?”

“I think that should be pretty easy.”

I looked out the front window for a second. “I know we need to talk about all kinds of things, and I’m not avoiding you, but I can’t do it right now.”

“Kidd, you’ve been burning the candle at both ends trying to help me and trying to help Eddie. I don’t like how distant we are right now. It wasn’t fair for me to snap at you like I did.”

Exhaustion kept me from replying. I closed my eyes. I nodded off for a second and then snapped to attention when my chin hit my chest.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

I took a swig of water directly from the bottle and then was immediately embarrassed by my poor table manners. Nick smiled at my faux pas, and the creases around his eyes deepened.

“Kidd, slow down. Here comes the pizza. Have a slice. It’s okay if you want to drink Pellegrino from the bottle. I kind of like that about you.”

For a moment I forgot about the hat store across the street and the exhibit at the museum and the video in my handbag. I forgot about everything but the connection I felt with Nick, the mutual attraction I knew was there underneath the unwanted don’t-get-involved advice and the haven’t-you-learned-anything lectures. The promise of something in the future, and the smell of mozzarella and cheese. I was going to have to stop allowing food to distract me from the important things in life.

We finished off half the pizza before talking. I tore a piece of crust from a remaining slice and looked out the window. Vera Sarlow picked up the wooden tent sign from in front of her shop and carried it inside.

“Did you see what that sign said?” I asked.

“What sign?” Nick looked out the window, and I could almost see the light bulb go off over his head. Uh-oh.

“Is that why you asked me to meet you here? You wanted to check out Vera’s store, didn’t you?”

“I like the pizza here,” I said.

Nick shook his head. “I want to believe you, really, I do. But you’re hiding something, I can tell.”

“After this exhibit is over I won’t have to hide anything.”

Nick stood up and tossed his napkin on the table. “Take the leftovers. Eddie might be hungry. Don’t worry about the showroom tomorrow. I’ll pick you up at five?”

“Do we have plans for tomorrow night?”

“The exhibit? I figured you’d be my date.”

“Oh. Yes. Sure. Right.”

“Then I’ll see you this time tomorrow. And Kidd? I’m looking forward to spending some time away from my showroom manager.” He left.

I ate half a third slice and asked for a box for the rest. I carried it to my car and drove home. Eddie’s VW Bug was in my driveway. I parked next to his car and approached the front door. A cardboard box sat on my doorstep.

I looked up the street. It was way too early for UPS. I looked back at the box. It had a white rectangular mailing label attached over the clear packing tape. My name and address were printed on the label. And on the side of the box was a small red number three.

The return address was Milo Delaney’s showroom.