The Straw Hat Theater Mysteries - Final Curtain

Written by William Shepard, Published on 10/26/2009, Re-published on 7/30/2010

The last performance of “Murder by Design,” a classic 1930's Broadway thriller that had once been a vehicle for Tallulah Bankhead, was going smoothly. In the last act, the Detective, played with sinister smoothness by Straw Hat Theater leading man Sam Watson, was slowly revealing that he was the actual murderer of two victims. Now to the gradual realization and horror of leading lady Stella Marlowe, it looked like she would soon be added to the list.

Just in time, police officers, bothered by inconsistencies in the Detective’s story, had arrived to check things out and confronted him. At this point, stage directions called for Watson to take a dive through the window at rear stage right, a suicidal move for the character, for the setting, a shorefront mansion, backed onto a cliff with grand, sweeping views of the ocean far below. Then would come the final curtain.

Watson fired the gun wildly as he backed towards the window. In every other production, the Detective’s dive through the window ended the play. Then, disbelief would be suspended a few moments later, when the curtain rose with all of the actors gradually coming onstage for their bows, to the tumultuous applause of the appreciative audience. Except this time, the actors looked stricken. And Stella Marlowe was still on the sofa where she had been when the play ended. Not in the script was the neat bullet hole on her left side with its ever- widening circle of dark blood staining her dress, as it emerged from what had been her heart.

Pandemonium struck the audience. Even though I am Police Chief of this Vermont town, I had never before seen an actual murder. Whoops, I mean killing. I shouldn't use the M word until that was proved, you see. Anyway, I took charge, let the audience go, and after a call to my two deputies, started to take statements from anyone who might possibly have had anything to do with that gun.

For it wasn't the usual prop gun, you see. It was a real gun, roughly the same size and weight, which had been placed on the props table by Linda Eberlie, the Straw Hat Theater’s prop master. And it had been loaded. A six- shooter, it had contained just the one bullet that had done the job when Sam Watson pulled the trigger. I suppose that meant that whoever had made the gun switch hadn't wanted to leave many clues behind and extra bullets might have been evidence of some sort. All the time that I've been Police Chief here and I still don't understand the way that a criminal’s mind works.

There was a back- story, of course. There always is, behind what people tell you at first. For what you hear then is what they have carefully constructed, to make themselves look good, or to deflect suspicion, or perhaps, if they are really nasty, to put suspicion onto someone else. The people I tend to believe are those who do not do that, I mean, the witnesses who tell you just what they saw and don't embroider. There aren't too many of them, believe me.

Anyway, what I heard was about the victim. It turns out that Stella Marlowe was very difficult to work with, given to perfectionism and temper tantrums. She had often engaged in shouting matches with Director Arthur Glendon, who was even heard to say during one tiff, “I'd like to wring your neck!” He wished now that he could have retracted those words. In fact, he was soon at work writing a memorial talk on what a fine actress she had been, which he intended to give at her funeral service.

It also turned out that she had another enemy, a former boyfriend, none other than leading man Sam Watson. She had just broken up with him, impulsive as usual, when her previous (and very rich) boyfriend, Josh Whitehead, had driven up from New York to see the play. Of course, it was pretty clear from my talk with Whitehead that he had had no idea whatsoever that until he showed up, he was considered history! And when he was readmitted to grace and favor from Ms. Marlowe, his mood wasn't improved when he caught her and Sam Watson an hour later in a torrid embrace.

“It was her way of saying goodbye,” Watson sort of explained. One surely needed an emotional traffic cop to sort out when her goodbye meant that and not “Hello!”

Later on, I saw the dressing rooms, which were cordoned off by one of my deputies. In Sam Watson’s dressing room, there was the usual setup of makeup and mirror, plus lots of reading material. He wasn't a very sociable guy, it seemed. When he wasn't on stage acting or rehearsing, he'd rather just stay in his dressing room with a good book or a magazine. He seemed to favor thriller novels and for magazines, the latest from Hollywood and those catering to hunters or fishermen. Therefore, Watson was probably a gun enthusiast.

Stella Marlowe’s dressing room was a shrine to herself. It was probably endearing in its way, with all of those pictures of her in her various stage roles, but now, it just gave me a feeling of sadness and loss. I'd never seen her act before, but I've got to admit, her performance in the first two acts of tonight’s play had been excellent. And I guess she was religious after her fashion. There was a photograph of her, wearing a shawl, at Lourdes in France, and a rosary was on the side table, within easy reach of her dressing table chair.

The next day, ballistics and police reports were in. The gun that was used to kill Stella Marlowe was registered to Arthur Glendon.

*****

“All right, Glendon, what was going on between you and Stella Marlowe?”

“Nothing whatsoever, Chief.”

I persisted. “Do you own a gun?”

“Sure: I own a revolver - want to see it?”

Glendon opened the lower left-hand drawer of his desk and looked for a moment, puzzled and then worried. “It’s not here!”

“When is the last time you saw it, Glendon?”

“I don't know, Chief" he replied. "Maybe a few weeks.”

I went on, although I knew he wouldn't like the question. “Did you keep it loaded?”

“Of course not!” Glendon was indignant.

“Did anybody else know you had a gun?”

“I didn't make a secret of it," Glendon replied. “Come to think of it, in a show earlier this season, Linda Eberlie was in a crunch for props, and she made a general announcement asking for a gun. She needed it for a show, and her props were late arriving from Philadelphia. So I lent her this gun - unloaded of course!”

“And she returned it?”

“Yes," said Glendon. "She returned it to me, in this very room, after the set was struck following the last performance of that show.”

*****

Sam Watson was in a state of shock. I offered him a drink of his own Scotch, and he turned it down. “You don't understand, Chief. Regardless of whose idea this was, I was used to kill Stella Marlowe. It’s horrible.”

“Just a few questions, Watson. You're a hunter, I suppose?”

“No, Chief. Fly-fishing is more my style. Breathing the fresh air while fishing is my idea of heaven. Rainbow trout, now that’s my sport. Excellent eating, too, and its easy to make. Even I couldn't mess up frying trout, and I'm no gourmet chef, believe me!”

He seemed to be feeling a little better.

“Tell me, Watson, I gather it was all over between you and Stella Marlowe?”

“So you found out about that, Chief? Well, I suppose I'm too old for a summer fling, but between you and me, I was just as glad when it ended. Seems her old boyfriend had staked a prior claim, and he had the financial resources to offer her a lifestyle that I never could. So it’s back to Linda, if she'll have me!”

“So you had been dating Linda Eberlie?”

“Sure, Chief. We tried to keep it to ourselves, but that’s not possible in a small theater group.”

“What can you tell me about that last scene?” “Chief, I've been kicking myself ever since, for not making anything of the fact that the gun on the props table was just a bit heavier than the gun I had used at previous performances. I noticed it, but I didn't make anything of it. And then, the firing. Usually I just aim in the air. But this time, the cop running onstage just jostled me enough so that the shot went straight at Stella. It was horrible!”

*****

I interviewed Josh Whitehead at his motel. “What a terrible loss, Inspector, or Chief, whatever you're called. She was a good actress and potentially more than that.”

“Were you jealous of Sam Watson?”

“You bet I was, Chief. And let me tell you this. He is the one I wanted to take out - never Stella. But even if I'd wanted to, this is the first time I've been to Vermont. I wouldn't know where to buy a drink, let alone a gun!”

*****

Linda Eberlie was in a state of near shock herself, so I began in low key fashion.

“I hear that you and Sam Watson will be getting together, Ms. Eberlie.”

She smiled. “Yes. That’s the good news. I don't deny that I was upset with Stella Marlowe for stealing my boyfriend. Maybe she felt a sense of remorse after all. I've been wondering if she hadn't switched the real gun with my prop gun. I suppose you've talked with Arthur Glendon, and know that the gun used was his - everyone knew that he had one and where he kept it.

“My guess, Chief, is that she couldn't stand losing Sam. Having him fire that shot was her way out - and her way of making sure that Sam and I never got together after all. So I'll be skipping that memorial ceremony that Arthur is planning. It just wouldn't seem right.”

*****

I called the cast together and made sure that Josh Whitehead was there too.

“I've never seen a case quite like this before," I said, "and I hope I never do again. But I'm ready to make the arrest right now - we'll call this one, the Final Curtain.”