Sondgard hurried to the doorway, and called, “Mike! Get over to the theater, and tell Mary Ann to come back here. You know she’s over there alone?”
“Son of a bitch!” Mike stormed away, his boots booming heavy across the porch and down the stoop.
Sondgard remained in the doorway, waiting, half fearful that Mike would come back alone, to tell him his blundering had ended in another death. But when the front door opened again, Mike came in with Mary Ann, and Sondgard smiled with relief. “Down here, Mary Ann,” he called. “You too, Mike.”
They both came down the hallway toward him. Sondgard said, “Just sit down at the table there, Mary Ann. Mike, go on over to the Lounge, see if Tom Burns is there. If he is, send him back here, tell him to come straight in to see me. And you stick around, find out has he been there steadily all afternoon. Get his movements particularly between three-thirty and four-thirty.”
“Right.”
Sondgard went back to the table, sat down, and started the recorder again. The first five-inch reel was full by now, and they were halfway through side one of the second reel. Joyce Ravenfield could type up an extract of the important parts tonight. She needn’t copy the whole thing, at least not right away.
Sondgard had very few questions to ask the girl. She simply substantiated Mel Daniels’ story, confirmed the fact that neither Perry Kent nor Arnie Kapow had left the theater by the front door, and verified Bob Haldemann’s statement that he had come right back to the theater at four-thirty, after leaving Daniels at the house.
She did have one additional piece of information: “When I brought Mel Daniels up from town, Cissie was in the box office. She asked me to take over for her for a while. She had tight loafers on, and they were bothering her; she wanted to go change into sneakers.”
“This was at three-forty.”
“I guess so. Right around there. Just when I got here with Mel Daniels.”
“So she left the theater at three-forty, to go over to the house. Did she meet anybody outside, or say anything about planning to meet anybody?”
“She didn’t say anything, no. Just that she wanted to change her shoes. And I didn’t see anybody out in front of the theater at all.”
“Didn’t you get a little worried when she didn’t come back for so long?”
She fidgeted, and looked embarrassed. “We shouldn’t speak unkindly of the dead,” she said, somewhat prim. “But Cissie didn’t seem very... reliable. It honestly didn’t surprise me that she left me there for nearly an hour.”
“All right. Thanks, Mary Ann. I’d like you to wait awhile, if you can. You can phone your mother if you want. Just wait in the rehearsal room with the others.”
“Somebody has to be in the box office, to answer the phone.”
“Have Bob do it. Or he can send one of the men I’ve already talked to. Not one of the girls.”
“Oh. Yes, I see. All right.”
As she was leaving the kitchen, Tom Burns came in. In his late thirties, he was about five foot nine and somewhat gone to seed, with a pronounced paunch and sagging shoulders. His face had an unhealthy red complexion, and his hair was a dry and sandy brown, thinning on top.
He was, of course, drunk. No more drunk than usual, and no less. Drunkenness in Tom showed only in the slow care of his walk and movements and speech, and a slight fuzziness in his eyes as though he couldn’t focus as well as most people. He came in now, saying, “Summertime! It is now officially summertime, our official has arrived. It’s good to see you, Eric.”
“The official is here on official business, Tom. Didn’t Mike tell you?”
“Michael Tompkins never tells me anything. One time, if memory serves, Michael Tompkins said to me, and I quote, quote, I wish I had you in my outfit, Burns, for just one week, I’d make a man of you, unquote. Prior to that threat, and also post to that threat, Michael Tompkins has never said anything to me at all. May I sit down?”
“I wish you would.”
Burns sat down at the table, as carefully as though sitting on eggs. “He did, howsomever, tell me just now to come over here and look for you in the kitchen. I did, and I found you.”
“Were you over at the Lounge all afternoon, Tom?”
“What’s that, a tape recorder?”
“Yes. Were you?”
Burns frowned, his mobile face going into contortions to achieve the expression. He said, “Serious, Eric? Is this really something serious?”
“A girl was murdered here this afternoon, Tom.”
“Murdered? For God’s sake, Eric! One of our girls? Who?”
“Her name was Cissie Walker.”
“Walker. Cissie Walker.” Burns twisted his face around some more, this time to show concentration. His face worked like faces in silent comedies, exaggerating all expressions into parodies of themselves. He had a small but bushy mustache, the same dry sandy brown as his hair, which added to the effect.
“Cissie Walker,” he repeated. “Now, which one is that? We’ve only been together since yesterday, you know, there’s three new ones. Wait a minute. The buxom blonde?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never seen her.”
“Cissie... Sure, that’s which one. Fantastic, Eric, absolutely fantastic. A Rubens nude. Stacked, overflowing, an abundance of riches. A rump like a mare, Eric. Pearl-white boobies like great big pillows.”
“I said she was killed, Tom.”
“Oh!” His eyes widened, and his hands went to his mouth, as though to block it before he could say anything more. “I didn’t even think. Oh my God, Eric, what a way to talk! Eric, on my honor, I wasn’t even thinking, I was just shooting off my mouth, you know the way I am.”
“All right, Tom.”
“Murdered, for God’s sake. Who can accept a thing like that, right off the bat? You talk about a girl — I just saw her this morning at breakfast. She was really killed, Eric?”
“She really was.”
“Christ, what a shame. I mean that, Eric, you know I do. A young girl like that, what a shame. What a waste. Gahhh, there I go again!”
Burns really did seem more shaken and disoriented than Sondgard had ever seen him before, but Sondgard could understand why. Whatever it was about the world that troubled Burns, he had years ago chosen drink as the antidote. He kept himself anesthetized with liquor, so he would never have to take anything seriously. But this, the murder of a young girl, was so strong and violent a fact that even Tom Burns couldn’t drown it or blur its outlines. It was impinging on him with all its reality, and it had been too many years since Burns had had anything to do with uncushioned reality.
As much to help Burns get back on an even keel as to go on with the interview, Sondgard repeated his original question again: “Were you at the Lounge all afternoon, Tom?”
“Well, sure. You know me. I’ve been hanging around over there since breakfast time. Watched the sailboats for a while. Got acquainted again with Henry, the bartender over there.”
“And you don’t have any ideas about this murder? No one who acted sore at the girl, or acted, uh...”
“Hot for her? Eric, anybody who saw that girl would be hot for her. I didn’t see anybody drooling down his chin, if that’s what you mean.”
“I guess that’s what I mean.”
“It was somebody here? Is that what it is, Eric?”
“I don’t know yet. It could be.”
“What a shame, Eric. What a crying shame.”
Sondgard switched the recorder off again. He had nothing more to ask Tom Burns. He said, “Will you wait with the others in the rehearsal room for a while? And send in...” He checked the list Bob Haldemann had made. “Send in Ken Forrest.”