Chapter Fourteen
A fifteen-minute break the next morning found Spraggue back in the Huntington Avenue phone booth. Someone had added fresh graffiti with a runny can of orange spray paint, but the phone still worked.
Aunt Mary answered on the second ring.
“Find out anything from Jamie Blakeley?” he asked.
“You again?”
“Sorry,” Spraggue said hastily. “I know I’m supposed to say hello and how are you and all that, but I just haven’t got the time.”
“I knew I’d raised you better than—”
“Come on, Aunt Mary.”
“Darling, I haven’t gotten a thing from him yet. I’m meeting him for lunch at the Cafe Plaza. He’s just the type to fall for Caroline Ambrose—”
“He wouldn’t cough up the information over the phone?”
“Not a word, but don’t worry. A bottle of claret with lunch and Blakeley will tell me more than I ever wanted to know about Arthur Darien’s financial setup. I only hope I can keep him from telling me about his divorce again.”
“You are a great lady.”
“I know. And I do happen to have some fascinating information about your actors.”
“Yeah?”
“Such as: Deirdre Marten is really Dinah Martowski.”
“You get that from Equity?”
“No. They’re remarkably closemouthed. One of the theater companies she worked for in Canada.”
“Aunt Mary, would you call Fred Hurley at Police Records and give him Deirdre’s real name?”
“Fred? You’ve got him working on this, too?”
“Yeah. And tell him he’d better hurry up.”
“I refuse to browbeat him. Now listen. Does it interest you to know that your Greg Hudson is an expert in stage fighting? Taught a course in it at Carnegie-Mellon and choreographs fights when he can’t get work acting.”
“Intriguing avocation.”
“So if he takes a swing at you, duck.”
“Anything else?”
“Lots of things. Your young Renfield, for instance. He neglected to put several major credits on his résumé. He’s actually done a New York Hamlet! Shakespeare-in-the-Park.”
“Eddie Lafferty?”
“So his agent says.”
“New York agent?”
“Right. Vacationing in Paris. My phone bill may bankrupt you.”
“Did Lafferty happen to play Macbeth, too?”
“No. Why?”
“That’s what I want to start focusing on. Find me any connection to Macbeth.”
“I trust you have a reason. Macbeth is a fairly popular play.”
“Macbeth was Samuel Phelps’s last production in the Fens Theater. And our joker sends messages from” Macbeth.”
“Phelps,” said Mary thoughtfully. “I tried to trace the family. Find out if they still had any interest in the Fens.”
“And?”
“Hard going. The wife died soon after Samuel. Two sons: George and Thomas. George attempted to make a go of the theater, but failed. He tried to sell it, wound up practically giving it to Boston State. They wanted it for a school. Then their enrollment dropped and it went back on the market. It belongs to some holding company now. You know, Michael, Acme or Bonded or Universal something-or-other. I’m trying to check the title now.”
“Keep after it. What about Phelps’s grandchildren?”
“A blank.”
“How about the résumé photos I asked for?”
“Time, Michael. It takes time. Maybe tomorrow—”
“I’ve got to run. Look, if I invite you to Darien’s backers’ gala tonight, will you come?”
“What’s tonight?”
“Monday.”
“Odd night for a party.”
“You’re telling me. Monday’s ‘dark night’ in Boston. All the theaters are closed. That’s probably why old Phelps held his soirees on Mondays. If Phelps did it, Darien can do it.”
“I’d be delighted to come.”
“Jamie Blakeley will be there,” Spraggue warned.
“Ah. But so will John Langford.” Aunt Mary sighed deeply.
“I’ve got to get back to rehearsal.”
“Michael, I’ve got papers that need your signature.”
“Financial drivel?”
“What else?”
“How about forgery?” Spraggue said. “I should just give you power of attorney.”
“Nonsense. That’s what the old and feeble give the young, not the other way around.”
“I’ll sign whatever you want, as soon as I get a minute.”
“There’s a report from your California vineyard. Not a half-bad investment.”
“Praise from the master is praise—”
“Even though I suspect you went into it more for the sake of a lady than a dollar. There is a letter from your co-owner, Kate.”
“Don’t open it. It’s probably obscene.”
“Michael!”
“’Bye, Aunt Mary. See you tonight.” He hung up and headed back toward the theater.
Had he forgotten anything? The Macbeth connection: Caroline had played Lady Macbeth. Langford had played Macbeth. The photos: one of the lesser-known actors could be using someone else’s résumé, substituting his own photograph. Stage names … Hudson, an expert in stage fighting … Jamie Blakeley: Mary would take care of him. She’d turn him nicely inside out, inspect the stuffing, and return him to his original shape.
Spraggue took the long cool corridor to the steps, descended to the dressing rooms. Just time to scan Karen’s book on Boston theater, check the index for references to Phelps, senior or junior.
Two sons: George and Thomas. Children when father Samuel had taken his life? Georgie and Tommy. No. Spraggue remembered the photograph, the white-haired gentleman with the massive beard. Must have been in his sixties when he died. Grown-up children. What was there about that photograph? Samuel Borgmann Phelps. Georgie Phelps. Tommy Phelps.
Georgie Phelps. Georgina Phelps. Georgina Phillips!
Spraggue found Karen’s book wedged into a crack on the shelf over his makeup table. He thumbed through it as he strode down the hall toward Georgina’s dressing room. Her door was closed.
Spraggue knocked. No answer. He opened the door.
The photograph was there in plain sight. Slightly younger, the beard trimmer, darker, the beady eyes unmistakable: Samuel Borgmann Phelps.
Spraggue shook his head in disbelief.