Murder, Murder, Little Star Read online

  Murder, Murder, Little Star

  Marian Babson

  Walker Books

  104 Fifth Avenue 7th Floor

  New York New York 10011

  USA

  ISBN: 0-8027-5416-3

  CHAPTER I

  There was really, Frances Armitage thought complacently, a lot of nonsense talked about the difficulty of re-entering the employment market. The man across the desk from her was practically pleading with her to accept the job.

  'Are you certain you really want me? There are so many other applicants out there - ' She indicated the reception room outside, which was crowded with younger, and possibly more suitable, women. 'You haven't seen half of them yet - '

  'Oh yes, I have, Mrs Armitage.' Mr Herkimer fixed her with a desperate gaze, obviously determined to break down resistance. 'I've seen all of them a hundred - no, a thousand - times before. You're different.'

  'But I thought you might want someone nearer her own age, someone with the same interests - '

  'Oh, they've got those, all right. That's what's the matter with them. Listen - ' Mr Herkimer leaned forward intently. 'I've been through all this before, remember. Believe me, I know. I hire one of them bints and next thing I know, she's trying to elbow the star right off the screen and grab a piece of the action for herself. They're all alike. That's why I want you. Let's say another five pounds a week, okay?'

  'Well, yes,' Frances Armitage said faintly. 'But I really thought - '

  'Listen.' Mr Herkimer raked her with an assessing glance. 'If you didn't think you'd get this job, why did you want to apply for it in the first place ?'

  Actually, to try to get back into the swing of going for interviews again, but one could hardly admit that. To do so would be to betray the lack of self-confidence that had led her to expect weeks, perhaps months, of hopeless knocking on Personnel Department doors before finding a firm willing to hire her.

  Probably as one of the filing clerks her supercilious daughter-in-law assured her that industry could always use.

  'You're quite right.' She sat straighter and attempted to emulate Mr Herkimer's crispness. 'It's just that I was a bit daunted by the sight of so much competition - ' (All those flawlessly lacquered young girls who so obviously knew their way around this world which was strange to her.)

  'No competition at all.' Mr Herkimer dismissed the bevy of beauties outside with a wave of his hand.

  'You got everything we want.'

  'Well, I hope so - '

  'You got no ties - ' Mr Herkimer ticked off the advantages she offered. 'You understand kids - you've brought up two of your own. You can drive. You're free to travel.' He summed up. 'We're gonna enjoy working together.' He stood up. The interview appeared to be at an end.

  'I certainly hope so, Mr Herkimer.'

  'Call me Herkie. Everybody does.' He escorted her to the door, looking rather surprised at himself.

  'And I'll see you at Heathrow in the morning.'

  Really, she thought as she left, it had all been so simple. With one interview and a minimum of effort, she had landed the first job she had applied for.

  Furthermore, it was a job that would quite fairly be rated in the glamour category, and the salary

  offered had been generous even before Mr Herkimer had raised it. It had all been so beautifully simple.

  If she had been wiser in the ways of the employment world, that alone would have made her

  suspicious.

  CHAPTER II

  After Roger Armitage's sudden death in a laboratory explosion six years ago, Frances had thrown herself into a phase of 'living for the children'. Insurance money and a subsequent ex gratia payment from the laboratory, who denied all responsibility for the accident while admitting to a certain combination of unfortunate circumstances leading up to it, had made it unnecessary for her to go out to work. Apart from which, Simon and Rosemary had been teenagers and it had seemed more important to look after them.

  But children grow up so quickly. Simon had married just over a year ago. (Much too young at twenty-two, but she had been eighteen when she had married, so what could she say?) Then it had been time for Rosemary to start at university, with all the attendant flurry of preparations, planning and shopping.

  It was not until the train actually pulled out, leaving Frances still waving from the platform, that the dismal let-down of anti-climax had swamped her and she had returned home alone and cried.

  So, there it was: crisis time. 'So nice for you to have the house all to yourself,' her friends had said cheerfully. (From the depths of houses crowded with life and action.) 'So lovely to have your time to yourself again.'

  Time. Endless time to sit and contemplate the wasteland surrounding her. Time to take stock - and to realize just how much time she had.

  At forty-two, she was far too young and energetic to be able to close up her life and occupy herself with a house and a garden. Nor could she see herself settling down to a future of cooing over grandchildren - even had Amanda shown signs of being willing to provide any within the next decade, or of being the sort of mother who might allow a grandmother within doting distance oftener than Christmas and Easter.

  There was always charity work, but that somehow seemed rather unsatisfactory. There were too many professionals available these days who could do the job more competently and might (shades of Amanda) treat amateur volunteers with thinly-veiled impatience and contempt. Also, and perhaps more importantly, there were Amanda's insinuations that one was paid what one was worth - and that people who took jobs for which they did not receive payment had found their correct level and should, therefore, be left at that level.

  However, another point on which she was determined was that she was not going to devolve into the sort of woman who made a career out of warring with her daughter-in-law. Simon must work out his own problems - although, to be fair, he seemed quite happy in his marriage. All the more reason for his mother not to turn into an interfering in-law.

  Obviously, the answer was to find a job. Or to 'reenter the employment market', as Amanda's sociology textbooks phrased it. Her self-assurance was not strengthened by the realization that she could hardly have been deemed to have ever 'entered' it in the first place.

  However, the advertisement in that morning's Times had seemed as good a place to start as any; perhaps better than most since it called for a telephoned response which would save her the difficult

  task of drafting a letter of application.

  She had been somewhat taken aback by the cordial invitation to come for an interview that afternoon.

  And now, amazingly, the job was hers. It had all happened so fast that she had not had time to sort out her feelings properly yet.

  On the whole, she was pleased. Even though Simon and Amanda were coming over for dinner tonight to say goodbye to Rosemary, who was going off in the morning for a month's working holiday with friends in France, and her own long afternoon in town meant that the menu she had originally planned would have to be abandoned. Tonight, she would be the one serving frozen food with fulsomely false apologies.

  That didn't displease her, either.

  'I'm sorry about that, darling,' Frances said, as she saw Simon stab at a limp prawn with an expression of dismayed incredulity. (He had been trained into acceptance of this state of things from his wife, but he expected better from his mother.)

  'It doesn't matter,' Simon said despondently. Rosemary still appeared to be in a state of mild shock; she had never had to accustom herself to family meals like this, particularly for a farewell dinner.

  'Of course it doesn't.' Amanda alone was telling the truth, seeing nothing untoward about the meal, and anxious to finish it and get back to her
work. (It was unthinkable that she should face a boring evening with her in-laws without bringing along a bulwark of work. And market research, it seemed, required a constant stream of reports interpreting what the public actually meant when it answered designated questions.)

  'I knew you'd understand.' Frances beamed a totally insincere smile at her daughter-in-law. 'We working women must stick together, mustn't we?'

  'Working?' Amanda's head snapped up abruptly.

  'I start in the morning,' Frances said complacently. 'So I'm afraid that's why things have been rather rushed tonight.'

  'Mother - what?' Simon stared at her.

  'Mother - when ?' Rosemary looked blank.

  'Mother - how?' One could always depend on Amanda for the tactless, if not the downright insulting.

  'I answered an advertisement in The Times this morning,' Frances said. 'I went for the interview this afternoon, and I start work in the morning.'

  'But you're not qualified for anything,' Amanda gasped.

  'They seemed to feel I had all the qualifications they needed.' Frances smiled at Simon and Rosemary, then frowned as a new thought occurred to her.

  'I'm afraid, Rosemary,' she said, 'you'll have to get a taxi to the station in the morning. I'll need the car to get to Heathrow by nine.'

  'You're not leaving the country?' Having assimilated the basic fact, Simon now appeared ready to

  believe anything.

  'No, dear, but I have to link up with the Unit.

  They're arriving on the first flight.'

  'What Unit?' Amanda asked suspiciously, something in her mother-in-law's attitude alerting her to the fact that she was not going to relish the answer.

  'The Film Unit.' The line was so sensational one could afford to throw it away. 'More rice?' she enquired innocently.

  'Films ?' Rosemary perked up, foreseeing unexpected status about to be conferred by having a mother in the media.

  'What sort of films?' Amanda managed to convey the impression that anyone so ill-equipped to cope with the world as her mother-in-law would unfailingly find that she had become involved in blue movies and they would all wind up in the Sunday Sensationals to the immediate destruction of their reputations and burgeoning careers.

  'Oh, quite respectable, I assure you.' Frances allowed a moment for the suspense to build. (Perhaps Mr Herkimer had been wrong about her, perhaps she had unsuspected dramatic longings.) 'Herkimer-Torrington Productions, in fact.'

  'Herkimer-Torrington!' Even Amanda couldn't try to pretend that she had never heard of them. 'But they're a major studio. They're important.'

  'So I understand.'

  'You don't think Mother would settle for anything less than the best!' Rosemary said loyally, making it sound as though Frances had had a choice of any studio she would deign to work for.

  Simon just whistled.

  'But - ' Amanda still struggled for comprehension -'what are you going to do for them? I mean, what can you do? In films?' She spoke as though she still cherished a forlorn hope that the answer might be

  'Tea lady'.

  'Well, they tell me -' She wasn't feigning modesty, it was just that the incredulous feeling that had been coming and going all afternoon swept over her again. 'They say I'll be chaperone and sort of secretary to the star.'

  'But you can't even type!' Amanda wailed. 'Let alone take shorthand.'

  'Oh, I shouldn't think she'll be dictating many letters,' Frances said. 'She's only ten years old. It's Twinkle, you know.'

  'Twinkle!' Amanda knew. In a series of films about lovable children, Twinkle had made her mark on the Great British Public quite as indelibly as she had on the Great American Public. People who had not been to any film in years that wasn't pretentious foreign soft-porn had heard of Twinkle.

  'It's just glorified child-minding, I expect,' Frances tried to comfort the stricken Amanda. 'Her mother has been ill recently, I gather, and they want a sort of substitute to help with the long tedious hours at

  the Studio.'

  'Studio?' Amanda rallied, becoming more like her old self. 'I certainly think you might have found something closer to home - something more suitable.' She even found a grievance. 'If I'd known you were serious about working, I could have got you something in market research.'

  'Oh, yes?' That was too much. It was the first time such an offer had ever been made, although Frances had 'seriously' mentioned going to work on several occasions. 'Do tell us about your latest project, dear.

  Something to do with housewives and fish fingers, isn't it?'

  Routed, Amanda declared an early evening due to pressure of work and departed with Simon a good hour and a half earlier than Frances had dared hope.

  CHAPTER III

  Heathrow, by dawn's early light, was a futuristic city peopled by ghosts obviously regretting their past fives, especially the one they had led last night. Frances parked the car and marched purposefully past grey-faced automatons who were carrying, wheeling or just slumped over pieces of luggage. Other uniformed automatons drifted dreamlike along shining corridors or shuffled aimlessly through stacks of paper at desks. An occasional bright-faced, alert specimen seemed to act only as a focus for resentment; Frances was aware of vague emanations of hostility from underwater groups as she passed them.

  'Over here!' Mr Herkimer hailed her and waved her onwards. 'We want Gate 12 - that's where our Red-eye Flight comes in.'

  'Red-eye?' It couldn't be a new airline, could it? Perhaps something to do with American Redskins.

  'Wait'll you see them. Then you'll know why we call it that. Up all night, what do you expect? Who can sleep ? Except Morris, that is ?'

  Racing across the terminal with Air Herkimer, already slightly out of breath, Frances became aware of an unnerving swishing sound following after them. She turned to see two uniformed attendants scurrying behind them, pushing empty wheelchairs. They increased their speed when Mr Herkimer increased his speed, swerved when he swerved, slowed when he slowed. There was no escaping them; they were definitely with Mr Herkimer. For the first time, Frances was conscious of a feeling of foreboding.

  'Mr Herkimer -' she said breathlessly, 'Mr Herkimer, what are those - ?'

  'Herkie!' he snapped over his shoulder. 'I told you. Call me Herkie. Everybody does.' Putting on a fresh burst of speed, he outdistanced her.

  'Herkie - ' she gasped, catching up. Gate 12 loomed just ahead of them.

  'This way!' He snatched at her elbow and propelled her along. 'We've got permission to go straight through. On accounta them.' He jerked his thumb backwards and when Frances turned around, she saw that several reporters and cameramen had joined the wheelchair men, leaving her uncertain which ones Mr Herkimer was referring to.

  'Mr - Herkie -' She plucked at his sleeve. 'Is there anything wrong?' She had a sudden vision of a heap of crumpled wreckage on a runway. 'Has something happened ?'

  'You mean them?' He shook his head. 'Naw, that's okay. They're just here to take Morris to the

  ambulance.'

  'Ambulance ?'

  'Take it easy, will you?' He slowed a little, going through the gate. 'I told you there's nothing wrong. It's only Morris. Morris Moskva - greatest scriptwriter you ever saw, but he can't stand planes. Morrie hasn't made a vertical flight in twenty years. He figures, if the plane crashes, he don't want to know about it. So we wheel him on at one end and wheel him off at the other. Then we just throw him on a bed in the hotel until he sleeps off the pills. After that, he's ready to work. Greatest scriptwriter you ever saw - when he's conscious, that is.'

  'Yes, but - ' Frances was only partly mollified. 'But does it take two wheelchairs to carry him ?'

  'Oh, yeah, well - ' Up ahead, a group of people who could only be called a motley crew were gathered around an Immigration Desk. Mr Herkimer suddenly seemed less anxious to join them than he had been. 'Well, I'll tell you. Sometimes Laurenda isn't always feeling so good. Twinkle's mother, you know? So the second wheelchair is a sort of back-up operation. Jus
t in case she needs it.'

  'I see,' Frances said. Her uneasiness increased.

  'Well . . .' Mr Herkimer gave a deep sigh. His attention appeared to be centred on a midget in a fur coat and dark glasses. 'We gotta get with it, I suppose.' He put on a fresh burst of speed and reached the Immigration Desk just as the Press converged on it.

  'Here you are - ' The Immigration Officer was just finishing, he extended a slim grey passport to the overdressed midget. 'Welcome to England, Miss Tilling - '

  'What was that name -?' one of the newsmen began.

  'Twinkle!' Mr Herkimer swooped on the midget, enveloping her in an embrace she did not appear to relish. 'This is Twinkle - our ten-year-old star. Twinkle - that's the only name she's got. Twinkle - like in star.'

  Behind him, the Immigration man flipped open the passport again for another look. With a flick of an eyebrow and a grin he didn't bother to conceal, he then passed it to the pallid-faced woman who held her hand out. 'Mrs Tilling,' he murmured.

  Laurenda Tilling - Twinkle's mother - took the passport and her own passport without acknowledging the smile. Her attention seemed concentrated on her daughter - or perhaps on the Press people surrounding Twinkle.

  From the background, a uniformed airline stewardess with an armload of fur coats, airline bags and assorted impedimenta, moved forward slowly. Her regulation smile seemed less plastic than carven granite. Unerringly, she zeroed-in on Frances.

  'You're part of the London end?' she enquired tonelessly.

  'This is our Frances -' Mr Herkimer contrived to kiss Laurenda Tilling on one cheek, introduce Frances, pat Twinkle on the head, wave the stewardess beyond the Immigration barrier and direct one

  wheelchair plus attendant towards the plane - all at the same moment. 'Frances Armitage. I promise you, Laurenda, she's a doll. You won't have a problem in the world while she's around. She'll take care of everything.'

  Laurenda Tilling waved a limp hand in her direction. Twinkle ignored her. The stewardess advanced mechanically and began unloading her burdens into Frances's unresisting arms.

  Flashbulbs were popping off all around them. Blinking through an after-image of coloured flashes, Frances saw Twinkle round on a photographer who had been staring at her.