Marcia Talley - Dead Man Dancing

With my blood beginning to gel in my veins, I agreed that it wasn’t.

‘I don’t want you to think that I don’t want to know where Jay picked up the poison, Hannah. Until we find out, other people could be in danger, too. Remember the Tylenol poisonings back in the eighties? Somebody filled Tylenol capsules with cyanide and put them back on the store shelves.’

I stopped breathing. Really, I did. Was Kay a copycat killer? Had she papered Walgreens and CVS with adulterated drugs that she later fed to Jay in order to set up her alibi?

Then I remembered the last box of SinusTabs I’d bought and began to breathe again. A legacy of the Tylenol scare – the year we lost our innocence – was tamper-proof packaging so secure that I had to use a pair of scissors, an ice pick and some extremely bad language in order to extricate the capsule from its container.

‘It’s after the fact now, anyway,’ Kay continued, ‘and it’s not going to bring Jay back, is it?’

Again, I agreed.

At that moment, Lorraine reappeared looking very Betty Crocker in a floral apron and carrying a tray with the wherewithal for tea. ‘Will you join me in the living room?’

I left the dining room and its accusing photos, followed Lorraine into the living room where I sat on the sofa and gratefully accepted a hot cup of Earl Gray. I needed reviving.

‘Cookie?’ Lorraine asked, offering the plate up in my direction.

I selected a chocolate bourbon crème and bit in. From an armchair opposite me, Kay refused a cookie, but sipped her tea. I hoped it was just my imagination, but she seemed to be staring at me suspiciously.

I’d been to Catholic funerals before, and if Jay’s ran true to form, one of two things was going to happen. Shirley would attend the funeral with her daughter Tessa, and Lorraine would see Tessa, recognize the resemblance, and suspect, as I had back there in the dining room, that Tessa could be Jay’s daughter. Everyone else in the congregation might notice it, too.

But, Lorraine had brought the photo album from Texas with her, and Kay had been busy, so there was a slight chance that Kay hadn’t seen the early photographs, and wasn’t aware of the resemblance between Tessa and the young Lorraine. But she’d seen Jay dancing in diapers, so Mom had most likely showed her the photo album, too.

Had Kay suspected all along that Tessa was Jay’s daughter, or had she just found out and killed him for it?

Any way I turned it around and looked at it, I figured that all hell was about to break loose.

After a restless night, with Paul insisting that my imagination was running away with me when I knew darn well that it wasn’t, I showed up early at Hutch and Ruth’s to ask Hutch for advice.

Ten minutes before the police.

Ruth and I were having coffee in the sun room at the back of the house, and I’d barely said, ‘Hi,’ when the doorbell rang.

Hutch went to answer it. ‘Come in and sit down, officers,’ I heard Hutch say. ‘We’re just having coffee. Would you care for some?’

‘Yes. Thanks. It’s a long drive from Baltimore,’ the older of two detectives said as he followed my future brother-in-law into the room.

While Hutch got everyone settled on the chintz-covered furniture he’d inherited from his grandmother, I gracefully fetched the coffee.

When I returned to the sun room from the kitchen and introductions and mugs were passed all around, the older detective fixed his attention on Hutch and said, ‘We understand you were at the Hippodrome at the time Mr Giannotti collapsed, is that correct?’

‘Yes it is. My partner and I were auditioning for the Shall We Dance? TV show. Jay and his wife, Kay, are our teachers. They had been invited to dance an exhibition…’ Hutch paused. ‘But you’re probably well aware of that.’

The young detective had taken a notebook out of his breast pocket and flipped it open but so far, he hadn’t written anything down, so I figured they already knew what Hutch had just told them.

‘Yes, sir.’ The detective set his mug down and continued, ‘When you were at the theater, did you share a dressing room with Mr Giannotti?’

Hutch looked thoughtful. ‘Not a dressing room, exactly. They had several generous spaces cordoned off in the rehearsal area backstage – one for the men, one for the women – where contestants could change, put on their make-up and so on. Jay and I shared that space with a lot of other guys.’

With a glance from his superior, the younger officer finally spoke up. ‘Did Mr Giannotti have anything with him, like a clothing bag, or a suitcase, or a duffel?’

‘Yes, he did. He’d brought his costume in a plastic garment bag, but when he changed, he stuffed his jeans and toiletries into a gym bag.’ Hutch got up from his chair, walked to the window, then turned around to face the officers again. ‘I presume from your questions that you’ve interviewed the staff at the Hippodrome, and that you’re aware that I took the bag away from the Hippodrome after Jay was taken ill. But you’ll have to ask Jay’s widow about the bag. It’s been returned to her.’

From my seat by the window, I began to squirm. I’d completely forgotten about Jay’s bag. Bright red, with a blue International Dance Sport logo, it was still in the trunk of my LeBaron. With Hutch’s and my fingerprints all over it.

‘Uh, Hutch?’

‘Not now, Hannah.’

‘Can I see you in the kitchen for a minute?’

Hutch fixed me in a steely glare, guessing (correctly) why I wanted to speak to him. ‘Jesus Christ, Hannah! You didn’t return the bag to Kay?’

‘I’m sorry, no. I put the bag in the trunk of my car, then Paul took the car in for an oil change. With all that’s happened, I simply forgot.’

Suddenly I became the unwelcome center of attention.

‘Do you still have the bag, ma’am?’

I glanced quickly from the detective to Hutch, and when Hutch nodded, I said, ‘I think it’s still in my trunk. Shall I get it for you?’

‘Please.’

‘It’s got our fingerprints on it,’ I added helpfully.

‘That’s to be expected,’ the detective said. ‘Look, none of you are under suspicion at this time. We appreciate your cooperation with our investigation.’

Across the room, Ruth let out an audible sigh of relief.

When I returned with Jay’s bag and handed it over to the senior detective, he thanked me and said, ‘We’ve been asking everyone if they knew anyone who had a reason to want Mr Giannotti dead.’

I do, I thought, but decided for the moment to keep it to myself.

After yesterday afternoon, I was deeply suspicious of Kay, but somewhere in the middle of the night, Paul had convinced me that an old photograph constituted the flimsiest of evidence, everyone is supposed to have a doppelgänger, and that if the proverbial jury wasn’t still out, it sure as hell ought to be.

After Kay, Tom and Laurie’s fear of exposure sprang immediately to my devious mind, but no way was I going to out them unless I had to.

Then there was Shirley, but I hadn’t worked out exactly why. I disliked the woman intensely, so it was probably just wishful thinking on my part.

Were there thugs in the dance franchise business, I wondered? According to Google, Saddam Hussein had favored thallium to rid himself of potential rivals. Maybe a rival studio head had taken Jay out.

Suddenly I realized that everyone had stopped talking and were once again staring at me. Hutch’s elbow shot into my ribs. ‘Your turn, Hannah.’

‘Everyone loved and respected Jay,’ I added helpfully. I felt my face grow hot. ‘Except for his killer, of course.’

‘Yes, ma’am.’ The detective and his sidekick rose to go. ‘Thank you for coming forward with the bag, Mrs Ives.’