Love is Murder

Chapter 25

THE FIRST THING I did after I’d had my morning coffee was phone Nathan Hughes’s office at GBN. His secretary answered.

“Good morning, GBN Publicity.”

“Hi, Gloria, it’s Morgan Tyler.”

“Good morning, Mrs. Tyler. I’m afraid he’s not in yet. May I take a message?”

As always, Gloria’s voice was warm and comforting, which made me think she must have been very good at her former profession, social secretary to the wife of America’s Vice President. It was Harrison’s opinion that Gloria, having experienced the legendary back-stabbing in high-level politics, had the best preparation of any of us to work for a television network.

“I don’t need to talk to him,” I said. “You could help me, if it’s not too much trouble.”

“What is it?”

“Can you fax me the guest list for Mr. Radford’s funeral service?”

“It’s no trouble at all. The list is on my desk. What’s your fax number?”

I gave it to her. “You’re terrific, Gloria. That was all I wanted. You don’t even have to tell Nathan I called, I’m sure he’s busy.”

Within a few minutes my fax machine did its beeping and whirring routine and pages of names came sliding out. I would look at the list, see if anyone seemed out of place. It was four single-spaced pages long, so I put it aside to study later. I had two scripts to edit before my lunch date.

HARRISON LANDERS HAS lived in his stately old building on West Sixty-Fifth Street for twenty years. For most of that time he had an art-filled apartment on the tenth floor, facing Central Park. His housekeeper, Agata, a motherly Italian woman, greeted me warmly when I rang the bell of his new apartment at the rear of the building. Although I had called her once a month to ask about Harrison, I hadn’t seen Agata for almost two years, since Harrison refused to let me visit him. She was a little thinner, and her face had more worry creases, but her personality was as kind as ever. No one could have looked after Harrison with more devotion than Agata. Her smile widened when she saw that I was carrying a flat box from what had been Harrison’s and my favorite neighborhood pizza parlor.

“He will be so glad to have a Poppa Gino’s again,” she said.

“How’s he doing?”

“He has his good days and his bad days.” She lowered her voice to a whisper as she confided, “He’s happier when the lady comes here. She make him feel good.”

“A nurse?”

“No nurse—a lady.”

The way she said it made me think the lady was making Harrison “feel good” by techniques that did not require a medical license. There wasn’t time to ask anything else; Harrison pushed open an interior door and whizzed into the hall in his electric wheelchair. His thick gray hair looked freshly cut, and his face was smooth-shaven. He wore a navy blue wool cardigan over a pale blue cashmere sweater. A navy blue blanket covered his legs.

“I thought I heard your sweet voice, Doll,” he said.

“Don’t try to con me. You smelled the pizza.”

“Guilty, but come here and give me a hug,” he commanded.

“Yes, sir, Major Landers, sir,” I replied, affectionately using the rank he’d had in Vietnam. I handed the pizza box to Agata and leaned over to embrace Harrison. I was surprised at how hard his upper body felt.

“Wow,” I said. “I leave you alone and you turn into Mr. Muscles.”

“Yeah, from the waist up.”

There was an unmistakable note of bitterness in his voice, though he tried to conceal it with humor. “I missed you, Doll,” he said. Then he drew back, adjusted the controls on his motorized chair to make a turn and started rolling down the hall. “Follow me to my lair.”

“Now you’re making the naughty suggestions,” I joked. “You must have worked at NBC.”

This comment made him laugh. It referred to a daytime drama called Another World that had run on NBC for decades until it was cancelled in the late 90s. Harrison had written for it until he was hired away to be head writer on Love. Before Harrison wrote for Another World, the show had a story line that featured a young woman accused of murder, who, when she was acquitted, married her lawyer, a much older man. The girl who played the role, a good actress named Susan Trustman, told Harrison that NBC made her and the actor who played her husband on the show sleep in twin beds—until his character was hit by a car and paralyzed from the waist down. The day he came home from the “hospital” in a wheelchair, the network moved a double bed into their set.

“Don’t let these wheels fool you,” he chuckled.

Glancing around, I recognized most of the comfortable furniture, and his collection of pre-Columbian art. “Your things fit very well in your new place.”

“Everything fits well except me.” He patted the sides of his wheelchair. “I’m a problem wherever I go, which is why I stay here ninety-nine point nine nine nine percent of the time. I’ll only go out to celebrate a national holiday, like Damon Radford’s funeral.” His tone was biting. He tried to smile, to soften the remark, but there was not even a glint of humor in his eyes.

Agata came in just then with small plates and napkins, balanced on the pizza box. Harrison always insisted pizza had to be eaten out of the box, but he conceded on the subject of napkins. She set us up at the game table in the living room, which opened out onto a walled garden. At this time of year, it was all wall and no garden. I decided that the next time I came over, I would bring things that would bloom in October.

“Thank you, Agata,” he said. The housekeeper adjusted a pillow at the small of his back to give him maximum comfort, then she smiled at us and withdrew.

“You look wonderful,” I told him. I meant it.

“Physical therapy turned me into a workout junkie. Now I’ve got a great-looking body, from the waist up. You win some, you lose some.” He reached out and pulled a chair over to the table for me. I sat, lifted a slice out of the box, put it on a plate and handed it to him, then took one for myself.

“Hmmmm. It’s just as good as I remember,” he said. He saw the look of surprise on my face and answered the question before I could ask it. “We used to have pizza together. It was our treat. I didn’t want to have it by myself.”

That touched me, but I knew Harrison didn’t like to—as he called it—“wallow in sentiment,” so I responded with a joke. “So you haven’t been cheating on me by eating pizza with other women?”

“Nope, I’ve been ‘true to you in my fashion,’ Doll. Hand me another slice.”

“I’ve missed you . . .”

“For a long time I missed myself.”

As I separated the biggest piece from the warm pie for him, I asked what I most wanted to know. “With some more therapy, will you be able to walk?”

“Not a chance.” He took a bite and chewed. I thought it was until he could be sure his voice didn’t betray emotion. He swallowed, touched his lips with a napkin and said, “ ’Fraid I won’t be able to run that marathon I never intended to run, or take my dog out for a walk—if I had a dog. I can’t even use a walk-in closet. I’ve got a wheel-in, with all low racks.” He gave me a funny, Groucho Marx, eyebrow-wagging leer. “But you can tell anybody who asks that I’m hell on wheels.”

I laughed, and we ate more pizza. “Have you been watching our show?”

“Never miss it. You’re doing a great job, Doll. I’m proud of you.”

His praise was more satisfying to me than the Emmy on my shelf.

“Do you feel like working?” I asked. “No marathons to run—we sit down to write. What about you and me being the co–head writers?”

That suggestion stopped him with a slice of pizza halfway to his mouth. He put it back down on the plate before he answered.

“That’s a step down for you,” he said softly.

Even though he was keeping his voice resolutely unemotional, I knew him well enough to think he was pleased with the suggestion. I pressed my case. “I wouldn’t have this job if it wasn’t for you. I’d love it if we could work together again.”

“I appreciate what you’re trying to do—”

“I’m trying to help myself by collaborating with the most talented man in the field,” I said.

“Too late, Sweet Face. I’m already working.”

“You are?” That was the last thing I expected to hear. “Where? You returning to daytime is big news, and I didn’t hear—”

“You didn’t hear because it’s a secret. I’m only telling you because of what you were willing to give up for me. I’m helping Serena McCall,” he said.

“You’re writing Trauma Center?” I was stunned.

“Serena and I are writing it together. She gets the credit, we share the money.”

I wondered if Serena was “the lady” Agata referred to. Then I remembered him telling me once, that when he worked he “looked but didn’t touch,” and I had no reason not to believe him. Not only had he always treated me like a colleague, but he didn’t follow up on any of the opportunities Tommy Zenos told me he could have, with actresses on the show.

“That’s wonderful,” I said, “if that’s what you want. I’ll start watching the show. But why keep it a secret?”

He looked at me. A steady look. His rigid face was meant to mask his feelings, but I knew what he was communicating.

“It was Damon’s idea? Is that why he gave her the job, to get you?”

“No, Serena got the job the old-fashioned way, she fucked him for it. Then she came to me for help. She told me Damon was all for my working with her, with certain conditions. One of them was that my involvement be a secret.”

“Doesn’t anyone else know?”

“The producer knows, and whoever cuts the checks. But as far as everybody else connected to the show is concerned, I might as well still be in that coma—or dead.”

“That’s terrible,” I said. “What other conditions are there?”

“Don’t you know?” His voice had grown suddenly cold.

“How could I know?” I asked.

“I assumed you knew about the arrangement because you and Damon were—God, how could you let yourself become his—”

“Harrison! I wasn’t Damon’s anything. What makes you think that?” I felt sick to my stomach suddenly.

“I agreed to see you today because I wanted to get a look. I’m surprised his corruption of you doesn’t show on your face yet.”

“Corruption—?”

“The bastard said you two were going to get married. He left you his money. What the hell am I supposed to think?” His jaw was rigid.

“Who told you I was involved with Damon?” I asked.

“Serena,” he said, his voice flat. “She brought me champagne to celebrate. She said she was relieved she didn’t have to be in his bed anymore because you were there now.”

“But I wasn’t!”

“One of you is lying.”

I was so angry at Serena that if she had come into the room, I would have slugged her. “Do you really think I’m the one who’s lying?” I asked, incredulous.

Harrison answered my question with silence. He pushed the half-eaten pizza away from him. The gesture signaled he was pushing me away, too. “I don’t see why Serena would lie,” he said. “And Damon’s will speaks for itself.”

I stood up.

Now I was as angry at Harrison as I was at Serena.

“I thought you knew me,” I said. My tone was so sharp it startled him and he looked up. “We spent so much time together, you should know what kind of person I am.”

“People change.” He turned away and gazed out into his garden, where nothing was blooming. “When you think about it,” he said, “maybe you’ll realize you broke my heart. Now I’d like you to go.”

I started to leave.

I had my hand on the doorknob. I loved Harrison like a father, and I was devastated. I had just lost him for the second time. But then I stopped and turned around. Harrison was still staring out into his gray stone garden. His back was to me.

“No,” I said firmly.

He turned his head just enough so that I saw his face in profile.

“What do you mean—‘no’?”

“I mean no-I’m-not-leaving.” I raised my voice, made it a little singsong, almost childish. “And you can’t make me,” I said.

He spun his chair around to look at me. “I don’t believe this.”

“Believe it, Harrison. You’re stuck in that chair.” I began dancing around the room in quick little steps, as though I was dodging him. “But I can run around your furniture, duck into your closets, climb over your sofas.” I was smiling as I said this. He looked confused. He hadn’t expected this reaction and didn’t know how to respond to it.

“I’ll call the police,” he said, rolling toward the telephone.

I was faster; I sprinted to the phone table and held the instrument high over my head. “I can rip the plug out of the wall before you can call,” I said.

“What’s wrong with you?”

“You’re not going to end our friendship because I’m not going to allow it. You mean too much to me, Harrison. So, I’ve decided to stay right here in your apartment until I convince you I wasn’t involved with Damon. I’ll call Tommy and tell him to send my work over here. I’ll call my friend Nancy and have her bring me some clothes. If Agata won’t cook for me, I’ll order in on my cell phone. And I’m going to follow you from room to room and keep talking until I make you believe me.”

“That’s your plan, is it?”

“That’s my plan,” I said as I put his telephone back on the table.

He rolled closer to me. He wasn’t smiling.

“Come here,” he said. Before I knew what was happening, his left hand shot out and he grabbed my right arm in a powerful grip. He pulled me down close to him so that my face was inches away from his. Just for a second I thought he was going to hit me. But then he kissed me. On the cheek.

His voice was soft. “You’re crazy, you know that?”

“Of course I am, or why would I want to be here with you?”

“I love you, Doll . . .” Gently, he put his hand in my hair and gave a hunk of it an affectionate tug. “I’m sorry I believed Serena,” he said. “The thought of you with that . . . slime . . . it made me a little nuts.” He let go of my hair and put his hands in his lap.

I touched the back of his head lightly, just for a moment.

“I’m going to force myself to take a charitable attitude about Serena,” I said. “Otherwise I might give in to my primitive instincts, and I’m already suspected of one murder. Maybe she was in love with Damon and he used her, then dumped her. It wouldn’t be the first time he—hey, how did you know Damon left me money?”

“Serena told me.”

“How did she know?”

“You’ll have to ask her. Now forget about Serena,” Harrison said. “Are we all right again?”

“Of course we are. We always will be.” I hugged him, then I stood up and uttered a line that used to be one of our running jokes, “You’re my second-favorite man.”

He blew a kiss at me. “Yeah, yeah, always the runner-up. Call me ‘Mr. Congeniality.’ Now go make somebody else’s life a living hell before I forget that you’re too old for me,” he joked.

Out on the street I smiled at the bumper-to-bumper New York City weekday traffic. I even smiled at strangers who passed me on the sidewalk.

I had my treasured friend Harrison back.

WALKING UP CENTRAL Park West, I turned a new mystery over in my mind. How had Serena McCall known what was in Damon’s will? She hadn’t been at the reading, and it was yet to be made public. I thought about this puzzle, as I would a plot point for one of my story lines. If Serena was a character on Love of My Life, how would I be able to explain the fact that she knew the contents of a will when she shouldn’t have . . .

How . . . how . . . ? Then an idea occurred to me.

I took out my cell phone and had the operator connect me with Leo Seligman’s office. When he came on the line, I got right to the point.