Murder in the Air (15 page)

“What are you doing here?” asked Heda, unable to hide the surprise in her voice.

“Keeping an eye on you,” he said, swirling around and glaring at Gerald. “My mother and I would like some privacy.”

“Of course, Mr. Bloom. I'll go sit in the hall.”

“That goes for you, too, Chambers,” snarled Alfred, jerking his head toward the door.

“Alf!” said Heda. “Where are your manners?”

George held up his hand. “It's fine, Heda. I've got a script to study and I should probably get to it.” As he stood he turned to face the younger man. “You look pretty hot under the collar, son.”

“If I am, it's none of your damn business.”

He shrugged. “Maybe you're right, but Heda is an old
friend of mine. And old friends are often protective of each other.”

“I hardly think she needs protection from me.”

“Take my word on this, Alf. Family can hurt you worse than anyone.” Picking up his sack, he walked over to the door. “Maybe we could have dinner tonight, Heda. What do you say? We've got a lot to catch up on.”

“I'd love it.”

“Good. I'll call you later. Nice to see you, Alfred. I'm sure we'll run into each other again.”

Alfred waited until the door closed. When they were finally alone, he crossed his arms menacingly over his chest and returned his attention to his mother. “What are you up to?”

“What do you mean? George and I are old friends.”

“I'm not talking about George.”

She tapped a napkin to her lips. “I thought we agreed that you would fly back home yesterday afternoon.”

“That was your idea. Never mine.”

“But… your meeting. Didn't you say you had something important scheduled for today?”

“The meeting was canceled. I canceled it.”

She touched the pearls at her neck. “Oh.”

“Is that all you've got to say? Oh!”

“Well—” She placed the napkin next to her plate and attempted a smile. “A few more days of rest will be good for you. I'm … glad you're still here.”

“No, you're not.”

“Alfred, why would you say something like that?”

“Do you need a list?” He ticked the points off on the fingers of his right hand. “First, you push the WTWN acquisition through behind my back. Did I get the chance to voice any opposition? No. Second, you arranged the financing through Tri State Bank. We haven't used Tri State in years. Sam Nielson isn't the kind of man I do business with.”

“He's an old friend and he's as honest as the day is long. I trust him implicitly.”

Alfred ignored her. “Third, I didn't even know you'd left
Palm Beach until one of the junior vice presidents mentioned it to me. You've kept me completely in the dark on this, Mom. Now I know why.”

She gripped her canes and got up. “I've done nothing your father wouldn't have done. The station came on the market. I was informed about it, and I made the decision.”

“Without informing me?”

“I don't answer to you, Alfred. I'm still the head of Bloom Enterprises.”

“Right. I'm just the CEO. Trivial baggage in your estimation.”

“If we hadn't acted quickly, we would have lost out. You were busy with the new station in Tucson, so I didn't bother you with it.”

“Oh, please,” he said indignantly.

“Look, I've wanted to buy a station up here for years.”

“I don't doubt that,” he snorted. “Not after what I heard last night.”

She moved over to the windows, where Dorothy had set up an easel. Turning her back to her son, she opened the blinds, allowing the morning sunlight to flood into the room. After a nasty hip-replacement surgery last year, she'd taken up oil painting as a way of staying active. She was currently working on the downtown St. Paul skyline. “I don't appreciate all this negativity,” she said, sitting down on the stool.

“Oh, cut the act, Mom.” He sank down on a brown mohair club chair next to the couch. “What's going on? I think I deserve some sort of explanation.”

“I assure you, Alfred, the station is as solid as a rock.”

“I've got meetings alLweek to make sure that's the case. And I'm having one of our analysts go over the numbers, so, forgive me if I say it remains to be seen. But that's not what I'm talking about.”

She looked down at her box of paints. “No, I suppose not.”

“Tell me about the broadcast, Mom.
Dallas Lane, Private Eye.”

“Does that mean you listened last night?”

He bristled. “Of course I listened. It's my job to listen.”

It was clear that she was fighting a losing battle. Since he'd already figured some of it out, she might as well come clean and tell him the truth. “What do you want to know?”

“Is the story about Justin?”

“Yes, dear, it is.”

“But why?”

“It's very simple. I want to set the record straight.”

Heda was thoroughly disgusted by this turn of events. Alfred wasn't supposed to find out about the radio broadcast until after the fact. In six weeks everything would be said and done. The show would vindicate Justin, at least in the eyes of some, and she could go home again, if not a happy woman, then at least content that she'd done what she could to restore her son's good name.

Alfred put his head in his hands. “You don't know what you're doing, Mother. This is a hornet's nest. Controversy is the last thing we need.”

“On the contrary. I welcome it.”

“You always did think you had some special corner on the truth. But you don't. Your oldest son was an evil man. Now that he's dead and buried, why can't you leave it alone?”

“Because I'm his mother! And what was printed about him in the papers wasn't true.”

Alfred shot to his feet. “But we have an eyewitness, a police officer, who swears he saw Justin murder Kay.”

She watched him pace off his frustration. “I have Justin's word, Alfred. That's proof enough for me.”

He whirled around. “You what?” Marching back to the easel, he stared down at her. “What do you mean you have Justin's
word?”

“I've never told anyone this before, but Justin wrote me from Europe for many years. Before he died, he told me the entire story.”

“What entire story?”

“Of how Kay really died.”

Alfred eyed her with deepening suspicion. “You say … you have letters ?”

“I do.”

“Where are they?”

She smoothed her white hair into place. “That's not important.”

“Of course it is. I want to read them.”

“What
is
important, dear, is that, by the end of
Dallas Lane”s
premiere run, the truth will be told.”

Alfred crouched down next to her. “You're going to name names? Mother, you could be sued! We could all be sued.”

“Don't worry.” She patted his hand. “No names. At least, not on our part. If there's conjecture by the media, what can we do about that?”

“But … the scriptwriter? He's putting his neck on the block, too.”

“You're such a catastrophist sometimes, Alfred. Everything's going to be fine. Actually, finding Wish Greveen was an incredible stroke of luck. He's really good, don't you think? Apparently, he wrote for a number of shows in the late Forties and early Fifties. Dorothy found him through an ad she placed in the newspaper. I explained to her that I needed someone who could write me a radio drama, and she did the rest.”

“You fed him all the pertinent details?”

“I did. Dorothy said he was so thrilled by the prospect of returning to radio, he never even batted an eye about having to collaborate with an old bag like me.”

“Mother!”

“Oh, Alfred, don't be so prissy.”

“But… does Greveen know about Justin? That he's telling a real story?”

“Of course not.”

Alfred seemed to consider it for a moment and then shook his head. He kept shaking it as he moved over to the window. “I don't like it.”

“Well, like it or not, it's the way it's going to be.”

“You're … getting bad advice.”

“From whom?”

“Dorothy, for one.”

“Dorothy's completely in the dark about my motives, Alfred. If she's heard about Justin, it wasn't from me.” Heda knew that convincing Alfred would be a struggle. That's why she'd kept her intentions a secret. “Listen, son. I've explained everything to you—what I'm doing and why I'm doing it. Now, you
must
back off. The topic is no longer open for discussion.”

“But, Mother!”

“Presenting Justin's case by using a radio mystery is simply good marketing. It's a perfect way to entertain and at the same time introduce our side of the story. Think about it, son. Radio is the only forum open to me. It's all I know and it's all I need.”

As he stood looking down on the street below, he muttered, “Anybody ever tell you you're a tough old broad?”

“Just your father. Nobody else would dare.”

“Well, he was right.”

She smiled, though at this moment, with her stomach doing nervous flip-flops, she was feeling far from tough. The truth was, not everything was as cut-and-dried as she made it sound. Something was at work here, something she didn't entirely understand.

Alfred sat down on the couch and spread his arms across the back cushions. “Well, I'm here for the next week at least, like it or not.”

She couldn't force him to go, and yet she didn't want him to stay. Not only was she concerned for his safety, but she wasn't interested in having someone watch her every move. She wanted to pursue her mission in peace. When all was said and done, she would pack her tent and quietly steal away, leaving the pieces to fall where they may. Dorothy would object to his continued presence, too, but what could she do? The bottom line was, Heda loved both her sons. It pained her deeply to think they would never be friends. “All right, dear. Stay as long as you want. But on one condition.”

“What's that?”

Never being one to beat around the bush, she said, “What happens on
Dallas Lane, Private Eye
is my call. Stay out of my way, Alfred. And keep your mouth shut. That's an order.”

14

“The number is 555-4905, and I'm not making this up, my friends. Some people in this country
would
rather die than live with horrible pain. As far as I'm concerned, it's their right. You wanna fight about it, give me a call. This is
The Bram Baldric Show,
and don't touch that dial. We'll be right back.”

As they went to a commercial break Bram leaned back, pulled off his headphones, and stretched. He'd been broadcasting his show from Studio B for several years now, and yet today the room struck him as unusually claustrophobic. Remembering the maxim
It can't be the hour, it must be the company,
he smiled. That old saying should be laminated and tacked up all over the gray, acoustic foam walls. Someday it might even be his epitaph.

Every weekday afternoon, Bram sat at an ancient scuffed table and talked to the public. In front of the table was a glass booth where his producer and a technician sat amid a tangle of technology. Radio stations were notorious for their lack of ambience. What the public couldn't see didn't matter. Only what they
heard
had any significance.

Bram glanced briefly at today's guest. The man was a doctor and looked like he needed a stiff drink—or a couple of Valium. “You doing okay?”

“Jeez, do these people eat raw meat for dinner or what?”

“We've got about ten minutes left in this segment. After that, you can take off.”

“Good.”

Bram felt sorry for the guy. He usually did a one-on-one interview for the first hour, and then opened up the next two hours for listeners to call in and ask questions or make comments. Maybe it was a full moon or an explosion of sunspots, but whatever the case, most of today's callers had gone into attack mode right from their opening statement. Bram figured it was only fair to let this poor schmuck off the hook, even though he had an hour left to fill.

Through the glass, he could see the producer hold up her hand, counting down the seconds until they would be back on air. He put his earphones back on. “Five, four, three, two—” She pointed at him.

“This is Bram Baldric and you're listening to WTWN, 1630 on your radio dial. Again, we have with us today one of the country's foremost medical ethicists, Dr. Lloyd Berg-stein, professor of medical ethics at the University of Minnesota. The topic? Assisted suicide. Back to the phones. Gary, you're on.” Bram heard nothing in his earphones. He waited a second more and then said, “I guess Gary was disappointed Jack Kevorkian couldn't be with us. Let's move on to line two.” He checked the computer screen in front of him for the name. “Betty, you're on with Dr. Bergstein.”

“Me?” came a weak voice. “Am I on?”

“Talk now or forever hold your opinions.”

“Bram?”

“Yes, Betty?” He tried to be patient. Sometimes it was a struggle.

“My husband and I listened to the new radio mystery theatre show last night. It was the second episode.”

“We're off topic now, Betty. Did you have a question for—”

“The story reminded me of that Kay Collins murder case back in the Fifties. Do you remember it? My husband says I'm crazy, but I'm sure I'm right.”

It had started as a slow trickle on last Friday's program. One caller noted that Heda Bloom had recently bought the
station. The next fellow, a self-professed geezer from Lake Elmo, brought up the subject of her son Justin Bloom. From there, the floodgates had opened. Smelling potential public interest, several local TV stations had picked up the story for their weekend ten o'clock reports. Interest in the topic was beginning to snowball.