Some Like It Hot-Buttered Page 9

  Alas, there was no clue, no piece of evidence, no neon sign reading “Break Glass to Exonerate Anthony” in the room. But it had been worth looking.

  Danton gave me directions to Dr. Bender’s office. I thanked him for his help, and within ten minutes was carrying my bike up the stairs (fool me once, shame on you . . . ) of Murray Hall, a very old brick building on the Rutgers quad.

  The good doctor’s office was on the second floor, thank goodness, and he was in when I knocked. I brought the bike in with me, which made the room a tight fit, but doable.

  Bender was about ten years older than I am, with a gray ponytail that showed how anti-Establishment he was and a beard that showed what he had eaten for lunch. Looked for all the world like a piece of turkey salad.

  He shook my hand. “So you’re the man trying to keep comedy alive in Central Jersey,” he said in a hearty voice that had probably seen formal training. The man could have narrated audiobooks by Faulkner or Hemingway. “Anthony talks about you incessantly.” I love academics.

  “He’s a nice kid,” I told Bender. “That’s why I’m so concerned about him.”

  He nodded with what Woody Allen once described as “heaviosity.” “Yes,” Bender said, “it’s very distressing that Anthony is implicated in this piracy business.”

  “You haven’t seen him since Tuesday?” I asked.

  “In class Tuesday, yes,” Bender replied. “From what I understand, no one has seen him. I’m quite worried. He’s been acting strangely lately, secretive. He should have checked in on his thesis yesterday, and it’s extremely uncharacteristic of him to miss a meeting. He’s completely immersed in his research.”

  “You haven’t heard from him at all?”

  He shook his head. “As I told the police, there’s been no contact with me since Tuesday morning. He was in class at ten a.m., and I haven’t heard from him since.”

  “Well, if you do, would you be so kind as to let me know?” I handed him a Comedy Tonight business card.

  “Certainly,” Bender said. “Whatever I can do to help, but I doubt he’ll contact me first. Surely he’ll call his parents, or his employer.” He eyed me carefully.

  “I hope so,” I said. “But knowing Anthony, he may be more concerned about his thesis than his own safety.” I stood to leave. “By the way, what is the topic of Anthony’s thesis? ” I hoisted my transportation over my shoulder, to better facilitate leaving without knocking over piles of papers.

  “A classic film by Vittorio De Sica,” Bender said.

  “Not . . .”

  “Yes. The Bicycle Thief.”

  It figured.

  Since I’d have to assume Anthony’s duties as well as my own for tonight’s—and all foreseeable nights’—show, I got back to the theatre around four. I’d called Sophie’s cell phone, and although her parents were divided on whether it was a good idea, she would be back at work tonight, which meant I didn’t have to do everything for everyone. I got the distinct impression that Sophie had acted aggressively obnoxious enough to ensure that her parents would want her out of the house as much as possible. That’s my Sophie.

  I unlocked the theatre door and went in without turning on the marquee lights just yet. There was a good deal of preparation to be done, especially since the theatre hadn’t been open in days.

  First, I vacuumed the rug in the lobby. I didn’t want the carpet to smell musty, so I sprinkled some cleaning powder over it and then sucked it up again. It made me feel like I was running one of those vacuum cleaner demonstrations you see in Red Skelton comedies from the 1950s, where a bag of dirt is thrown on the rug and then nothing works right. Luckily for me, Red was nowhere to be seen, and the vacuum worked just fine.

  I stocked the snack bar with candy, but didn’t start the popcorn machine yet. It was too early, and you want the smell to be fresh when people arrive. I’m not much for popcorn myself, but I do like the smell. And people buy more when it doesn’t smell like foam rubber with butter on it.

  We use a real old-fashioned popcorn popper, not content to work with the pre-popped stuff that comes in enormous bags. If you’re going to re-create the real theatre experience pre-megaplex, you have to do it right. Within a budget.

  It was well after five when it occurred to me that since this was the first night of the show, the film itself would still have to be spliced to the trailers we were showing (complete with vintage drive-in movie plugs for the snack bar and the number of minutes until showtime, but decidedly without the annoying TV commercials blown up to full-screen size for projection in a theatre that modern movie houses have adopted). Anthony usually did that, then threaded the first reel up on the projector. I knew how to do it, in theory, but he was a magician. I went up early to the projection booth, assuming it would take me a while to remember the procedure and get everything ready in time.

  I unlocked the door to the booth (you can’t be too careful; since the movies are only rented, not owned by the theatre, they’re our most valuable assets—not that my precautions had apparently deterred the movie pirates) and turned on the lights. I stood there for a long time, staring ahead with what must have been a really puzzled expression on my face.

  The projector was threaded with the first reel of the Marx Brothers’ 1932 classic Horse Feathers, which had been spliced to our pre-show reel of trailers. Everything was perfectly set up for my flick of one switch to set the show in motion. It had been done expertly, and the rest of the reels were threaded in order and ready to roll.

  Anthony was in the house.

  13

  After a thorough search of the premises, beginning with the basement and moving up through the lobby, the office, the auditorium, the closets, and even the balcony, I convinced myself that Anthony was no longer in the theatre, although I had to concede to myself (since I was the only one in the conversation) that there were plenty of places to hide, and a one-man search of the building left open the possibility of his moving from hiding place to hiding place without a huge amount of effort.

  Still, the effect of that threaded projector was just a little spooky.

  By the time Sophie arrived at six, I had gotten the place into a semblance of order and replaced last week’s two-sheets with this week’s in the outside displays and the lobby. Sophie began by getting the snack bar together (which meant moving everything I thought I had gotten in order, but hey, she ran it on a daily basis), all the while looking at me from under hooded lids, silently accusing me of messing with her stuff. Some people are so territorial.

  Suddenly, it occurred to me to take a shot. “You haven’t heard from Anthony, have you?” I asked Sophie.

  “Anthony?” Either she was trying to remember who Anthony was, or she thought my question was idiotic. I was betting on the latter, but with the “well, duh” inflection Sophie puts on every sentence, sometimes it’s hard to know.

  “Yeah, Anthony. Tall, thin? Used to run the projector until he vanished?”

  “I know who Anthony is. I just can’t imagine why you’d think I heard from him, Elliot.”

  That wasn’t much of a surprise; the three-year difference in their ages is a wider gap than it would be for someone as ancient as, say, me.

  I focused a lot more attention on the carpet sweeper I was using. There was nothing to sweep, as I’d already vacuumed, but it made a good prop. “I don’t know; you guys work in the same theatre, I thought maybe you were friends.”

  “Friends are impediments.” She must have learned that at the Goth Girl meetings. I wondered if they had a secret handshake, but maybe hands were impediments, too.

  “I heard you two talking the day Anthony . . . left,” I told her quietly. “I heard something about not telling your parents.”

  She stared at me.

  “I’m not your father, Sophie, but if you know something about this that you’re not telling the police . . .”

  Sophie stared at me some more. This time, I believed, with genuine confusion in her eyes.

  �
��So I guess not, then.” Clearly, I was such an enormous fool that I was not worthy of a response, but I decided to take one last stab. “Anthony never taught you how to run the projector, did he?”

  “The one upstairs?” No, the projector I carry around in my back pocket. I nodded. “Why would he do that?”

  Sometimes, talking to a person is less informative than not talking to them. It doesn’t make sense, but it is true.

  We opened the doors at seven, although the show wouldn’t start for forty-five minutes. Sophie had the popcorn machine going, so the lobby smelled wonderful, and with all the lights on and the marquee illuminated, it really did present at least a glimpse of the image I was trying to project. With another few years of restoration, and a whole lot of money, maybe I’d be able to complete the vision.

  A few people were already starting to wander in before seven fifteen, so I went upstairs to recheck the projector (still not entirely comfortable with its being so well prepared by an unseen hand). Then I put up the velvet ropes at the entrances to the balcony, since Anthony usually watched those stairs before starting the projector, and I couldn’t be in more than one place at a time. I’d have to be ripping tickets at the auditorium doors before the show started.

  I walked back downstairs and stopped in awe on the third step from the bottom. It was hard to believe my eyes.

  The place was packed. The lobby was full of people, and from what I could tell, the auditorium was already at least half full. I’d never seen so many customers in the theatre at the same time. This had to be at least ten times the usual house. The lines at the snack bar, where Sophie was simultaneously selling tickets and overpriced goodies, were backing up.

  Immediately, I wondered whether I had ordered enough popcorn to accommodate the box office for tonight. We’d never needed nearly this much before.

  I ran to Sophie’s side and started selling tickets, announcing to the crowd that the line just for snacks should shift toward Sophie. She began dealing in food exclusively, looking overwhelmed, but Goth.

  “Where’d they all come from?” I wondered aloud.

  “They’re here because the guy died,” Sophie said, shaking her head at how stupid I am. Of course.

  Things were moving so quickly that I barely looked at the people to whom I was selling tickets. They became hands that handed me money, and to which I handed tickets for the two films being screened tonight, sometimes with change. The hands were young and old, male and female, of various skin tones. The money was all green, except for one wise guy who tried to pay in Susan B. Anthony dollar coins.

  One of the larger, darker hands hesitated a moment when I handed him change, then spoke in a deep, resonant voice. Well, the hand didn’t speak, but you get the idea.

  “Looks like you got quite a turnout tonight,” said Police Chief Barry Dutton.

  “I really wasn’t expecting it,” I told him. “Thanks for coming.”

  “Not at all. I figured I helped close the place down, so I should help reopen it. Hope it wasn’t too much trouble.”

  I looked up into Dutton’s face, which was smiling. “On the contrary; I guess having a man die in the house is good for business,” I told him. “Go figure.”

  “Hopefully, you won’t expect someone to be murdered every night just to keep your business going,” Dutton said. I’m pretty sure he was kidding.

  “I’d prefer to get by without it,” I answered. “It’s nice to see you, Chief, but . . .” I gestured toward the long line behind him.

  “Of course,” Dutton said. He walked toward the auditorium doors, where two tall African-American women, who must have been his wife and daughter, were waiting. With them was a short white man and his very attractive wife and two children, a tallish boy with a slightly gawky look and a girl who was so small she could have been anywhere from five to thirteen. When Dutton joined them, the short man said something that made the chief laugh, and they all went inside.

  I continued to sell tickets until I noticed a striking blond woman a few places back in the line. It took me a moment to recognize her out of uniform, or without a microbrewed beer in her hand.

  Leslie was wearing a skirt, slit up the side to great effect, and a low-cut blouse that completely negated any thought of the police officer who had questioned me the night Ansella died. I blinked a few times, and tried to remember where I should be looking. Tickets. That was it: I was selling tickets. Yes.

  Leslie gave me a quick peck on the cheek when she got to the front of the line. “I was hoping I wouldn’t be the only one in the theatre tonight,” she said. “Guess I didn’t have to worry.”

  The only thing I could think to say was, “You look amazing.”

  “Of course. You’ve never seen me dressed as a girl before, have you?” She stood back and let me take in the view, which was worth taking in.

  “If that’s a disguise, I never want to see the way you really look,” I said.

  “That was a compliment, right?” Leslie asked. I nodded. “Good,” she continued. “I appreciate the thought . . . I think. See you inside?” She tried to hand me a ten-dollar bill.

  “Your ticket is on the house,” I told her.

  She looked annoyed and walked away. Women make no sense.

  When the line began to wind down a little, I gave control of both concessions back to Sophie and walked into the auditorium to assess the crowd.

  It was astonishing. Virtually every seat was taken. If I’d had confidence in the balcony, I could have opened it and come close to filling the seats up there, too. I considered it, then thought about the possibility of 250 Midland Heights residents falling twenty feet to the floor on top of 250 other Midland Heights residents, and made the more prudent, but perhaps less profitable, decision to turn the overflow crowd away. But I thought about it.

  This was what I had envisioned when I opened Comedy Tonight. It was what I had wanted when I first flashed on that For Sale sign in front of the Rialto and called Virginia Squeo on an impulse. It was, perhaps, what I had been hoping to do all my life.

  The fact that the success had come about because someone had poisoned Vincent Ansella’s popcorn did dampen the feeling a little but, I confess, only a little.

  Time to head back up to the projection booth and get started. On my way out of the auditorium, I almost knocked over a large bucket of buttered popcorn. Behind the bucket was my one and only loyal customer, Leo Munson.

  Leo, in his early sixties, would have been a great “grizzled old Indian fighter” in a Howard Hawks Western, the kind of part generally played by Walter Brennan or Ward Bond. He always had some white stubble on his face, but never grew a beard, thus creating a look perfected in the 1980s by Don Johnson. You almost expected him to be wearing a captain’s hat, but Leo was bald as a cue ball and proud of it. He once told me that “every hair I’ve lost is an experience I wouldn’t give back for anything. They can keep the hair.” I didn’t know who “they” were, but I appreciated the sentiment.

  “I was afraid you might not have a seat for me tonight, Elliot,” he said.

  “Always a seat for you, Leo, even if you have to sit up in the projection booth with me.”

  “You know, I came by both nights you were closed. The ad kept running in the paper.” Leo had come to Comedy Tonight literally every night since I opened the place, laughed the loudest, and, until Vincent Ansella, left the theatre last, discounting the staff.

  “Sorry about that, Leo. I couldn’t change the ad in time, and obviously I didn’t know what was going to happen Tuesday night.”

  Leo thought about that, ate a little popcorn, and then rubbed some of the butter inadvertently on his stubble in thought. “Yeah, that poor fella. Didn’t really seem to be enjoying himself, even before he died.”

  “Yeah, I guess not. Well . . .” I was already turning away when I realized what he’d said, and I practically pulled a muscle in my back twisting to face him. “Leo!” I shouted. “You noticed him?”

  “Sure. You com
e every night to see the same movie, eventually you get to watching the audience at key moments. That guy was sitting there with his girlfriend, watching every move on the screen. The girlfriend just about bust a gut laughing at the ‘walk this way’ gag with Marty Feldman. You’d think they’d never seen it before.”

  I heard myself say, “Actually, it was his favorite movie,” before I regained my senses. “His girlfriend?”

  Leo clearly thought I had lost what precious little there was left of my mind, as the look in his eye indicated a deep desire to dial 911 and ask for a well-padded ambulance. “Yeah. Big blonde. Gave him a peck on the cheek at one point, then left before the first movie was over.”

  “Was he dead by then?”

  “How the hell would I know? I was sitting behind him. I could see her leave, all right, but I couldn’t see his face. For all I know, the guy was dead before the picture and somebody just dropped him in his seat in time for the trailers. ”

  “What scene was it when she got up and left?” I knew he’d remember that. Whenever Leo’s view is obstructed, he remembers.

  “Puttin’ on the Ritz,” he said with great certainty.

  I needed to be sure of something. “You’re sure it was a big blonde? Ansella’s wife was a petite brunette, and about as beautiful as you’ve ever seen.” I took a good look at Leo. “Probably more beautiful than you’ve ever seen.”

  “Don’t assume, Elliot. I wasn’t born this old.”

  But I wasn’t listening. Could Ansella really have been cheating on a wife that gorgeous?

  “If she’s that good-looking, then it sure as hell wasn’t his wife,” Leo continued. “I’ll tell you, Elliot, I couldn’t see the guy’s face, but the woman kept turning to look at him, and I got a good look at her in profile. She sure don’t match your description.”

  “Not a slim, beautiful brunette? A blonde, huh? Was she . . . brassy?” Could Ansella have been cheating with his best friend’s wife?

  Leo shook his head. “Not slim, not brunette, not brassy, and just between you and me, Elliot?” He gestured that I should lean forward, and I did, so he could speak softly.