Murder Can Ruin Your Looks by Selma Eichler Read Free Book Online Page B

it makes this place look like the Shubert.’’ His voice grew animated as he warmed to his subject. ‘‘It was really like amateur night there, too. The actors tried hard, but most of them were very young, and they just weren’t up to their parts. All except Merry.’’
    Shields looked down at his hands then. I looked, too. He
    was slowly, almost rhythmically, clenching and unclenching his fists. Without stopping, he said quietly, ‘‘I’d give any
    thing for five minutes alone with the bastard who did this. Five minutes with him, that’s all I’d need.’’ A moment later, he very deliberately folded his hands in his lap, lifted his head, and told me sheepishly, ‘‘Sorry. I guess I got carried away.’’ Unexpectedly, he forced a grin. And, forced or not, for an instant his ordinary face wasn’t so ordinary after all.
    ‘‘Don’t apologize. Please. This must be very difficult for you.’’
    ‘‘It’s hell,’’ he replied simply.
    ‘‘You said you first saw Meredith in Show Boat, ’’ I prodded.
    ‘‘Right. She was playing Julie, the second female lead. Merry’s voice wasn’t great, but she really knew how to read a lyric. Mostly, though, I was impressed with the way she delivered her lines—her speaking lines. She even had the dialect down pat; you’d never know she’d been living in England most of her life. In fact, she was so good that I went to see the show again just before it closed.’’
    ‘‘So you and Meredith met in September?’’
    ‘‘No. We didn’t even meet that second time—which was at the beginning of November. After the performance, I was on my way backstage when I ran into an old friend, and by the time I broke away, Merry had left the theater. I was disappointed, but I decided it was probably just as well; I was seeing someone else at the time, and I had a feeling Merry could complicate things for me.’’
    ‘‘And then?’’
    ‘‘And then, less than a week after that, I went to a cock
    tail party. And there was Merry. I broke off with the other woman a couple of days later.’’
    ‘‘This other woman—would you mind telling me who
    she was?’’
    Shields hesitated. ‘‘Lucille Collins,’’ he muttered, flushing.
    Somehow, I wasn’t at all surprised. Well, it now seemed
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    that Ms. Collins had a couple of reasons for not being overly fond of Meredith Foster. I said as much to Shields.
    ‘‘You’re wrong. Lucille isn’t like that. Besides, by the time I met Merry, things had already started to cool be
    tween us.’’
    ‘‘On your part or hers?’’
    The flush deepened. ‘‘Both. We probably would have
    split up soon even if Merry hadn’t come into the picture.’’
    I wondered, briefly, if that was true. But I realized it was something I’d never know. And, for that matter, Shields and Collins probably wouldn’t, either. Right now, though, it was time for me to wrestle with that question again. It was not easy spitting it out. ‘‘Did you ever notice . . . uh, I mean, does she—Meredith . . . uh, Merry—have any distinguishing marks on her body?’’ (Believe me, practice does not always make perfect.)
    ‘‘The police asked me the same thing. They asked if I remembered seeing a small mole right next to her navel. But if Merry was the one they spotted that mole on, it must have been very small, because I never noticed it.’’
    Then his voice broke as he added huskily, ‘‘God, I wish there was something. At least I’d know .’’
    I shook my head, commiserating. Larry Shields truly ap
    peared to be suffering, just as Peter was. I reminded myself he was a suspect. In fact, as far as I was concerned, every
    one was a suspect—at least for the time being. My client excepted, of course.
    ‘‘They won’t even let me into the hospital room,’’ Shields fumed. ‘‘I keep trying to change their minds, but a lot of good it does talking to those assholes.’’ Suddenly he stood up. ‘‘I’d