Stars (The Butterfly Trilogy) (74 page)

T
HE DAY THAT
B
EVERLY
B
URGESS HAD BEEN DREADING
arrived at last: Otis Quinn, the author of
Butterfly Exposed
, was due to arrive at Star's.

     It was time, she decided, to stop kidding herself. He had to be coming here because he suspected she was the Beverly Highland who had destroyed Danny Mackay; there could be no other reason. She saw the scenario already: he would accuse her of being Highland, then challenge her to prove that she wasn't. Either way, he would win. He would sell his story to the tabloids and she would have no defense. Look what had happened to Mr. Smith.

     After all those years, nearly her entire life, spent in taking revenge on Danny Mackay, her careful planning, her patience, the complex traps she laid for him—orchestrating her own death and getting her reward in the end when Danny hanged himself in jail—all threatened to be exposed, sensationalized, possibly also trivialized. Her life's work about to be brought down to supermarket tabloid level.

     She turned away from the window and looked at Simon Jung. He had asked her a question and was awaiting the answer. What a wonderful man, she thought. So polished and refined, yet sensitive and kind, without a trace of arrogance. Why couldn't she have met him years ago, in another, safer lifetime? Beverly had sometimes dared to let herself hope that, as time went on, perhaps she and Simon could have an intimate relationship. She longed to be in love again—and loved.

     But Otis Quinn was going to put an end to that dream; she could feel it, she sensed the storm that was coming. He had come up on the morning tram and had been taken to his cottage. That was why Simon was here in Beverly's office—he had brought the latest list of newly arrived guests. There was the Philippa Roberts party from Australia, who had taken the bungalow left vacant when the Nobel Prize-winning author, Ricardo Cadiz, had canceled; then there was the usual collection of famous Hollywood names; and finally, Otis Quin, freelance journalist. It was only a matter of time now before he would be pressing her for an interview.

     How much did he already know about her past? No doubt everything: Hazel's whorehouse in San Antonio, where Beverly had worked when she was fourteen; the abortion Danny Mackay had forced her to undergo when she was sixteen; the pornographic magazines she had tricked the Reverend Danny Mackay into owning, as well as the ladies' bordello on Rodeo Drive. Even if Beverly didn't confirm any of this, or even if she denied it all, Quinn would no doubt sell the story anyway.

     And she would lose her chances with Simon forever.

     "Are you all right, Beverly?" he asked quietly, coming up to her so that she caught the faint scent of Bijan cologne. "Is there anything wrong?"

     She sensed that Simon felt the same way about her as she did about him, but now she would never know. Perhaps if she had told him the truth when they first met two and a half years ago, they might have had a chance. But now it was too late.

     Before she could reply, her secretary came in and said, "Miss Burgess, Andrea Bachman is asking to see you. She doesn't have an appointment."

     "That's all right, Marie," she said, reaching for her sunglasses, thinking that they were probably no longer going to be necessary after tonight.
After Quinn exposed to the world who she really was. "Please show her in."

     "I'll be in the ballroom if you need me," Jung said, pausing for an instant, as if about to say something else. But he turned and left. Andrea passed him in the doorway.

     "Hello, Miss Bachman," Beverly said, turning around just as she was putting on her sunglasses. "I've been expecting you."

     "Yes, of course," Andrea said, "you knew I would figure out that Marion was still alive."

     "I thought you might. What gave it away?"

     "The way the diary is written. It doesn't read as if the events described in it were written shortly after they took place, but rather years later, with the hindsight of age, perhaps."

     "Very astute," Beverly said, smiling. "But then, you are a writer, aren't you?"

     "Where is Marion now? And what happened to her daughter?"

     "She's here. Waiting to meet you."

     "Which one, Marion or Lavinia?"

     "She'll tell you herself."

     Andrea knew exactly what to expect: an eighty-six-year-old woman living in the past, like Norma Desmond, wearing flapper dresses with tarnished sequins, surrounded by mementoes and faded scrapbooks, with heavy velvet drapes drawn closed over the sunshine, while she waited for Cecil B. deMille to direct her comeback.

     So she was surprised to be shown into a delightfully sunny living room done in cheerful spring colors. And the elderly woman walking with the aid of a cane, dressed in a basic but perfectly tailored wool dress with a scarf pinned with a brooch at her shoulder, was no aging jazz baby trying to hold onto a long-gone past, but what Andrea thought of as a grande dame, walking as erectly as her age allowed, her pure white hair drawn back with tortoiseshell combs. When they shook hands, Andrea felt cool, smooth skin with arthritic knobs underneath.

     "I've been looking forward to meeting you," the woman said. "I am Marion Star."

     Andrea was momentarily speechless. To have spent the last four days reading this woman's diary, the private and intimate details of her life—what
did one say? "I've seen you in the lobby, Miss Star!" she said in amazement. "You always sit in that curious chair at the foot of the staircase."

     Marion laughed and escorted her visitors to the hearth, where a silver tea service had been set on a brass steamer trunk that served as a coffee table. Sunlight from the tall windows spilled over the setting, giving it, Andrea thought, a summer feel. "Yes, that chair!" Marion said. "It was from my movie
Robin Hood.
The sheriff of Nottingham dispensed his evil justice from it! I like to sit in the main hall and watch the guests in my house. I like doing it anonymously, and no one notices an old woman." Her eyes twinkled. "But you did, clever girl. Please, sit down. I hope you like herb tea. My doctor has forbidden me caffeine."

     Andrea was spellbound as she watched Marion effortlessly pour from the silver teapot; her hands, though only four years from ninety, appeared strong enough, and capable. "And that staircase," Marion added as she handed cups to Andrea and Beverly, "I'll never forget the night John Barrymore got drunk and decided to slide down that enormous banister. He landed in my lap at the foot of the stairs and we both went sprawling!"

     She turned dark and lively eyes to Andrea. "So you've read my book. And you guessed that I didn't write it back in 1932."

     Sitting next to her on the sofa, and in such healthy daylight, Andrea saw that Marion wore very little makeup. There wasn't much resemblance to the sultry vamp in the photographs hanging in the main hall downstairs, but Marion's eyes were still sensual.

     Andrea looked around the room and was surprised to find absolutely no trace of that era in evidence. The antique armoire displayed country crockery and wooden folk art. The walls were decorated with framed silhouettes and twig wreaths. There were vases of fresh flowers on nearly every available surface; a small willow table supported a collection of antique toy soldiers. But there were no photographs of Marion herself, or of Ramsey, or anyone from that era; no movie posters for
Her Wicked Ways
, no memorabilia from
Queen of the Nile.

     "I'm not what you expected, am I?" Marion said with an amused smile. "Perhaps you're even asking yourself if I really am Marion Star?"

     It hadn't occurred to Andrea, but now that she thought about it, what proof was there?

     "My real name is Gertrude Winkler," Marion said, "which was what it was before I met Ramsey. He gave me that ridiculous Star name. Nearly all of us changed our names in those days. Theda Bara was really Theodosia Goodman. And poor Rudy, his full name was Rodolfo Alfonzo Raffaele Guglielmi. Quite a mouthful. How I adored that man." She added wistfully, "But I adored Dexter Bryant Ramsey more."

     Marion offered a plate of tiny buttered sandwiches to Beverly and Andrea. "Yes, I was Marion Star," she continued. "And I do have proof, should anyone ever care to challenge me. But who would? And besides, I have no desire to go public, as they say these days. I'm content to be Gertrude Winkler, and to allow this house to remain as a monument to a vanished woman." She smiled at Andrea and settled back with her tea. "Now, I imagine you have a thousand questions to ask me, Miss Bachman!"

     "I hardly know where to begin."

     "Surely the first thing you want to know is if I killed Dexter as the police said. Yes, I did. I murdered my beloved Dexter. I found him in bed that night with another woman. In
our
bed, with our baby in the next room. Do you know how he reacted when I caught them? He laughed. Right in my face. I kept a gun in my night table, for security. When I brought it out, the girl, whoever she was, ran out of the room. But Dexter kept laughing, daring me to pull the trigger. He was always such a showman. He actually got out of bed and walked away from me. I remember his last words: 'You don't mind if I take a pee before you kill me?' So I followed him into the bathroom and I shot him."

     She paused. Then added, "You should have seen the surprised look on his face."

     Andrea glanced at Beverly, then back at Marion. She tried to think how to word the next question, but Marion anticipated her again. "You want to know about the castration, I didn't do that. When I saw what I had done, that I had killed Dexter, I dropped the gun, ran into the nursery, bundled up Lavinia, and ran out into the night. Somehow, I got into one of the cars—I don't know whose—and drove down the mountain. I don't remember doing it or driving straight through to Fresno, to my sister's. I learned much later, of course, that the gun had disappeared and that someone had taken a knife
to Dexter, but I had nothing to do with that. Maybe someone thought they were protecting me by taking the gun. And maybe someone else decided to take their own form of revenge on him when they found the body. Dexter had many enemies. I suppose that whatever occurred in that bathroom after I ran out will always remain a mystery."

     "What happened after you got to your sister's?"

     "I went insane—literally. My sister took care of me and of my baby. She got rid of the car, and when the police came by to ask if she'd seen me or heard from me, she said she had no idea where I was. But I was very ill, and eventually I became too much for her to handle. Apparently I raved a lot, not making much sense. I tried on two occasions to kill myself, and it terrified her. So she decided to put me into an institution. I was committed under a false name and spent the next several years in two living hells—the one in which I had nightmares of killing Dexter over and over, the other in which I was brutalized by the inmates and staff, raped many times, and subjected to months of insulin shock treatment that almost killed me. When my sister found out what was happening, she took me out and brought me home, hiring a strong nurse to take care of me."

     Marion paused to drink her tea. When she put the cup down, it rattled slightly in its saucer.

     "One morning I woke up," she said quietly, her gaze focused on the silver sugar bowl, "and I saw a sparrow sitting on a branch outside my window. Spring sunshine filled the room and I was very hungry—for waffles, I recall. I had been ill for eight years, there was a war on in Europe, and the world had forgotten Marion Star. But I was healed."

     "What happened to Lavinia?"

     "She died in 1943, of polio. She was a beautiful child."

     "And afterward?"

     "It took me a while to regain my strength, but while I was convalescing I made several important decisions. The first was to let Marion Star remain vanished. The second was never to return to Hollywood. The movies had changed anyway; everything had changed. The third decision was to leave this house as it was, intact. I didn't know if I would come back and claim it someday. Legally, my sister had inherited it, so she had someone come and
close it up; we had it watched, to make sure there was no vandalism. And finally, my fourth decision was to go into business.

     "When I was making my millions in the movies, I had sent money regularly to my sister, who banked every penny. When I was well again, we had enough capital to go into business— real estate mostly. And as time went on and my emotional wounds healed, Gertrude Winkler became quite successful, and rich. My sister died several years ago on a golf course in Florida. She had had sex the night before with a man half her age."

     "And that was when you put Star's Haven up for sale?"

     "Yes, I decided it was time to let it go. But I wouldn't sell it to just anyone. Miss Burgess and I had many long talks before we agreed on the sale." She smiled at Beverly. "Now then," Marion said, livening up. "Tell me about this Japanese fellow who is so mad for me and wants to invest in a film about me."

     As Andrea told Marion about Mr. Yamato, who was due to arrive tomorrow, an idea began to form in her mind that was suddenly so exciting she could barely sit still. She was going to write
two
screenplays. The one for Yamato would be about the young screen goddess Marion Star, but the second one would open with her flight from the house the night of the murder, and it would chronicle her battle with insanity and her eventual recovery and ultimate victory over years of abuse and exploitation.

     Both were going to be sensational films, and Andrea couldn't wait to get started.