The Sea Star (29 page)

     
“I was
afraid
to mention it,” she said, but she blamed herself more for her cowardice than she did him. “Can you imagine that, Jay? A wife afraid to confide in her husband?”

     
The question surprised him. “I don’t see that I’ve ever given you cause to fear confiding in me.”

     
“The fear,” she retorted, “was that you’d say no.”

     
He gave her a puzzled look, reached automatically into his coat pocket for his cigarette case, then swore softly when he remembered it was gone.

     
“There’s a packet of cigarettes in the bedroom,” Susanna said testily. “After you fetch them, I’d like to know what you think about owning a house.”

     
“Susanna,” he said, thoroughly baffled, “you’ve lived in a hotel all your life. It was my understanding that it suited you to do so.”

     
“That was before, Jay. We’re married now. We have a child. You can’t expect us to live like transients.”

     
“Transients?” he laughed and gestured at the opulent surroundings. “Look around you, Susanna. Any transient in the world would give his right arm to be able to call this place home.”

     
“It’s not a home!” she cried. “It’s a hotel suite. Jay, why can’t we have a house? You have plenty of money.”

     
In an attempt to avert a quarrel, he reached into his trouser pocket and brought out some crumpled bills. “At the moment,” he joked,” I have less than five dollars to my name.”

     
“And how much do you have in your bank accounts?”

     
“Not nearly enough to buy the kind of house I’d want for you and Courtney. Good Lord, Susanna, have you forgotten the expenses that go hand-in-hand with hotel profits?”

     
“Jay, don’t treat me like a child. The money you spent on that diamond comb could have purchased two fine houses, maybe three. The money you gave
Dallas
could have bought another.”

     
Now Jay was angry. “Would you rather I had let Charley Smith break your brother’s legs? Believe me, that was my first preference when you asked me to give
Dallas
the money.”

     
Susanna could have bitten her tongue. How idiotic of her to have brought up the money Jay gave
Dallas
. If they’d been dueling on a field of honor, she might just as well have loaded her weapon, marched off the ten paces, then raised the pistol to her own temple and pulled the trigger.

     
“You never liked
Dallas
!” she blazed in frustration. “I knew it from the beginning, when you bilked him out of his half of the Sea Star.”

     
“By heaven!” Jay exploded. “I didn’t bilk him. I paid off his markers and gave him fifteen thousand dollars for that dilapidated pile of shingles you love so much.”

     
“You didn’t!” she cried, torn between believing him and smarting with insult at his slur against the Sea Star. “Dallas would have told me if you did.”

     
“Are you calling me a liar?” His face was hard with anger and with another emotion Susanna didn’t try to discern.

     
“If you persist in saying you gave him the money when you didn’t, yes.”

     
“Damn you!” he said fiercely. “Damn you, your profligate brother, your harridan of a mother, and that treacherous stepfather of yours. I wish I’d never set eyes on the lot of you. And you, you’re the worst. I’ve had nothing but ill luck since the first day I met you.”

     
“And I’ve had nothing but heartache since I met you!”

     
“Good. Fine. We’re agreed, then,” he said hotly. “I had my doubts about marrying you, and my instinct proved true. I’m packing my things, taking Courtney, and leaving Atlantic City once and for all.”

     
“You’ll take Courtney over my dead body.”

     
“Don’t tempt me, woman.” His voice shook with fury. “If I put my hands on you, I won’t let go of you until the last breath leaves your body.”

     
Susanna had never seen him like this—his face white, his eyes dark with rage. Was he capable of murder? At this moment, she thought he was.

     
But still she defied him, though her heart pounded violently. “Save your threats, Jay. You may have cheated me out of the Sea Star, but you’ll never take my son.”

     
Jay did leave Atlantic City, but he didn’t take Courtney. The next morning, after having stormed out of the suite the night before, he returned and said to Susanna, “I’m going away for a month or so. While I’m gone, you’d better think about whether or not you wish to continue this marriage.”

     
“Of course I do!” she said at once, her voice raspy from a tortured, sleepless night.

     
Jay’s heavily shadowed eyes betrayed a sleepless night of his own, but he had never looked more attractive to Susanna, more desirable, nor more hopelessly unattainable.

     
“That’s not the impression I got last night, Susanna.”

     
“We quarreled,” she said, aching to make peace, but too proud, too confused to do so. “That doesn’t mean we should get a divorce.”

     
“We did more than quarrel,” he contradicted her. “It became clear to me last night that the marriage—that
I
—am a disappointment to you.”

     
“That’s not true,” she said. “You’re the one who said you had doubts about marrying me. I never had any doubts, never!”

     
“Oh, no? Did you never have doubts about marrying the man who had ‘bilked’ your brother?”

     
“Jay, I—”

     
“Did you never have doubts about marrying the man who ‘cheated’ you out of the Sea Star?”

     
“Jay, listen to me, please.”

     
“I listened last night.” His voice vibrated with injury. “I listened very carefully to what you said and the way you said it. I thought you were joking about buying a house, until you started hurling accusations at me. Do you recall a conversation we once had? Do you remember my asking you if you didn’t want more out of life than being married to a confirmed workhorse like me? I was so afraid of depriving you of all the things you women hold dear—a social life, balls, teas, galas. So I asked you, I made a point of it. And do you remember what you said, Susanna? You said, ‘All I want is you.’”

     
“That hasn’t changed,” she insisted. “I still want you, Jay. But having Courtney has made me see that our lives have to change now. We’re a family. We must have a home to call our own.”

     
“Susanna, you say you want a home because our situation has changed. I say you seek change itself because the marriage hasn’t turned out to your satisfaction.”

     
“That’s just not true, Jay. Why won’t you believe me?”

     
“The way you believed me when I told you about the fifteen thousand dollars?”

     
“You’re not being fair,” she said miserably.

     
“Whenever did you think I was fair, Susanna?”

     
Without waiting for an answer, he walked out of the suite. Stunned and torn with confusion, Susanna didn’t follow him.

     
As soon as Jay left
Atlantic City
, Susanna took her son and moved back to the Sea Star, as if the place of her birth could afford her the sense of security that had vanished with her husband. Grace Pascal and Nina Watkins, the nursemaid, accompanied her, but Nina, the young, pretty daughter of the Sea Star’s concierge, had little to do. Thanks to Colin Baxter’s efficiency, the Sea Star was managing very well without Susanna’s help. Thus, she spent most of her days caring for Courtney, bathing him, dressing him, feeding him, and walking him on the Boardwalk in his regal perambulator.

     
He was such a dear little baby. Every morning when Susanna bent over his cradle, he would be wide awake, waiting patiently for her to lift him in her arms. She would tickle his button nose with a lock of her hair. A toothless smile would greet her, and a gurgle of enjoyment. Courtney’s eyes, bluish green, would crinkle with delight. He would raise his chubby arms, as if saying, “Hold me, Mama, hold me.” Susanna would sweep him up and kiss his dimpled neck, while he crowed with pleasure and nuzzled closer in her embrace.

     
But the joy of having Jay’s son was marred by Jay’s absence and by the chasm of alienation that now yawned between them. How could Susanna be completely happy with her child when his father was absent? Moreover, Jay hadn’t told her where he was going, and Susanna had been too proud to ask him.

     
As his absence lengthened, Susanna alternately missed him and was angry with him. She was heart-sore, she was indignant. There were days when she was determined to begin divorce proceedings, but that resolve would peter out the instant she picked up his son. Divorce this darling’s father? Never! It was unthinkable. Then she would spend the rest of the day missing Jay so much that she could barely utter a word without wanting to burst into tears.

     
As if she didn’t have enough to contend with, Dallas started borrowing money again. It wasn’t much at first, twenty or thirty dollars, but by the end of the summer, he was asking her for hundreds. Her bank balance, which had grown to a respectable amount when Teddy was managing the Sea Star, was fast being depleted.

     
“Dallas, what are you doing with your money?” she asked him in September. “You’re not still stealing from Charley?”

     
“I don’t like that word, Sunny,” he said airily. “I
borrowed
from Charley. I always replaced the money.”

     
“You mean Jay replaced it.
Dallas
, you promised you’d stop what you were doing. Have you gone back on your word?”

     
“Let me alone!” he snapped. And Susanna noticed that his fingernails, always so fastidiously maintained, were bitten to the quick. “You’re not my mother, you know.”

     
“I’m not your pot of gold either,
Dallas
. My bank balance is close to zero. What will you do when the money runs out?”

     
“I don’t know.” He was perspiring. “You’ll have to speak to Jay again, I suppose.”

     
“I can’t ask him for more money,” she said hotly. “I told you how matters stand between us now. I haven’t even heard from him since he left. For all I know, he’s making plans to dissolve our marriage.”

     
“It might be better if he did,”
Dallas
said in an ominous voice. “It might be better, in fact, if he were permanently out of the way.”

     
“Don’t you dare say such a thing!” Susanna blazed in a rage. But a sudden premonition of disaster was even greater than her anger.

Nineteen

     
Disaster did strike—sooner than Susanna expected. On the morning of October first, she was listlessly going over the books in her office at the Sea Star, when Colin Baxter burst into the room, clutching a copy of the
Daily Union
in his hand.

     
“Susanna! Have you seen this?”

     
He thrust the newspaper into her hands. The headline read: “Jay Grainger, Owner of the Excelsior, Being Held for Questioning on Suspicion of Murder.”

     
Susanna gasped, then quickly scanned the article, hardly making sense of the content as her eyes rushed over the words.

     
“Detained since last Tuesday by the
Boston
police....Evidence discovered linking him to the death of Theodore Addison....Firmly denies guilt, although he cannot account for his whereabouts at the time of the crime....”

     
“No,” she said. “This isn’t real. It’s a nightmare.”

     
“It’s obviously an appalling mistake,” Colin said. “Jay a murderer? It’s too absurd to even consider.”

     
“Yes,” Susanna said faintly, staring at the article and thinking of her past suspicions. “It’s absurd.” She looked up at him suddenly. “But, Colin, the newspaper says the police have evidence.”

     
“What evidence?” His tone was contemptuous. “If you ask me, something’s not right here. Maybe the city officials have been after the police to solve the case, so they trumped up some evidence. Jay never killed anyone. I defy the
Boston
police to try to prove otherwise.”

     
Colin’s resolute words filled Susanna with courage. Of course Jay wasn’t a murderer. She’d been a fool to feel fearful, even for a moment.

     
“Colin,” she said, rising, “who manages the Fenway?”

     
He thought for a moment. “Preston Stedman,” he said. “He used to be head of security at the Imperial. It’s odd,” he added, “that Jay gave him a managerial position.”

     
“Is he called Pres?” Susanna asked, remembering a tall, dangerous-looking man she’d met when she was Jay’s guest in
New York
. When Colin nodded, she said, “I know him. Colin, do me a service. Find out when the next train for
Boston
leaves. Then telegraph Pres, ask him to have someone pick me up at the station and drive me to where Jay is being held. Ask him to prepare a room for me. I don’t know how long I’ll be staying.”

     
“Susanna, you’re not planning on going alone? Why don’t I come with you? I’m as anxious as you are to get to the bottom of this.”

     
“Thank you, no,” she said gratefully. “I’d rather go alone. The Sea Star needs you, Colin. And Jay...” She paused, then said firmly, “And Jay needs
me
, whether he knows it or not.”

     
She arrived in
Boston
late that evening. She’d had to change trains in
New York
, and the porter had lost her luggage. When it was finally located, she almost missed the train to
Boston
. She spent the entire trip with her heart in her throat. Each mile she traveled seemed a hundred, each hour that passed seemed an endless eternity. All she could think of was her husband in chains, locked up like an animal, wrongly accused of a crime which she now knew he was incapable of committing.

     
How wrong she’d been to ever doubt him on any score. Jay
had
given
Dallas
an additional fifteen thousand dollars, she knew that now for a certainty. As much as she loved her brother, she had to face the fact that he was a thief and no doubt a liar, too. He would say anything to save his skin—and God knew it needed saving—even at the expense of the man who, ironically, had done his best to try to help him.

     
Well, that was all over with now. As Susanna stepped out on the platform at South Station in
Boston
, she made a vow to herself to never again question her husband’s word. Her first loyalty must lie with the man she had married.
Dallas
was her blood and she loved him with all her heart, but he was no longer a boy. He was a man of twenty-three. And it was high time he started behaving like one.

     
“Susanna! Susanna Grainger!”

     
She turned at the sound of her name and caught sight of a tall, well-dressed gentleman with the face of a brigand hurrying toward her. A momentary apprehension gripped her as he bore down on her. But when he reached her with an outstretched hand and his dark face lit up with a smile, she realized she knew him, and she let out a sigh of relief.

     
“Pres,” she said, “I didn’t expect that
you
would come down to meet me. How are you?”

     
“I’m well, thank you. I won’t bother asking how you are. This business with Jay must have come as quite a shock.”

     
“I’m still reeling,” she admitted as he signaled the porter to follow with the baggage. Pres took Susanna’s arm and led her outside to a waiting carriage.

     
“We’re all reeling,” he said, handing her into the carriage. “But you’re not to worry, Susanna. The police are going to look mighty silly once it’s proven they’ve arrested an innocent man.”

     
She was tempted to ask Pres why Jay had come to
Boston
, but then, realizing how that would sound, she said nothing. As the horses started down
Dewey Square
, she said, “Are you taking me to Jay?”

     
“Yes,” he said. “When I got your wire, I telephoned Ian Carmichael. He arranged with the authorities to have you visit Jay tonight. Jay is being held at the county courthouse in two basement rooms. The police claim the jail is overcrowded, but I think they’re giving him preferential treatment because they know the evidence they have isn’t enough to indict him.”

     
“What
is
the evidence?” Susanna asked as the carriage turned down Summer Street in the direction of Tremont.

     
“I don’t know. They’ve released no information to the newspapers, which gives me all the more reason to believe that Jay will be out of there in no time.”

     
Susanna prayed that was true, but as the carriage approached
Pemberton Square
, and the formidable German Renaissance facade of the county courthouse came into view, any optimism she may have felt faded. People were not arrested if the police weren’t almost positive of their charges. Moreover, Jay had been in custody for a week. If the so-called evidence was false, wouldn’t he have been able to disprove it by now?

     
When they entered the impressive great hall of the courthouse, Pres, taking note of Susanna’s pale face, said lightly, “At least Jay is being detained in elegant surroundings.”

     
Susanna’s spirits were at too low an ebb to be lifted. When Pres led her to a stairway at the rear of the building and they descended to a dingy basement, her throat tightened, her heart started pounding, and she had to mentally restrain herself from leaving.

     
At the end of a long corridor, two policemen, looking bored, stood at listless attention before a carved oak door.

     
“Jack, Hal,” Pres greeted them, “a good evening to you. I’ve brought Mrs. Grainger to see her husband.”

     
Both men returned his greeting. The younger one said, “She’ll have to go in alone, Mr. Stedman. Orders, sir.”

     
“I understand. Susanna, I’ll wait for you out here.”

     
Susanna reached for the door handle, but the older policeman stepped in front of her. “If you please, madam, will you remove your ulster so that Jack can look in the pockets? And, begging your pardon, I’d like to see what’s in your purse.”

     
Susanna looked angrily at Pres, but he quietly bade her to comply. Grudgingly, she did. When the policemen were done, she swept past both of them and opened the heavy oak door.

     
She stepped inside and closed the door behind her. The room was large and dim, lit only by a single lamp on the desk pushed against the wall. There were a table and two chairs in the center of the room. In a corner were a tatty easy chair, a side table, and an unlit lamp.

     
The room was empty. Susanna shivered with a prescient fear. Where was he? She put her coat and purse on the table and softly called his name. After a moment, a door which she hadn’t noticed opened and Jay appeared in the doorway. Susanna couldn’t see him clearly. The doorway was in shadow. But she knew it was Jay, she knew the powerful line of his body. She was so happy to see him that she could have wept in relief.

     
“Jay,” she said, and was unable to say more.

     
He walked into the light. His appearance gave her a jolt. He was in shirtsleeves, his hair was tousled, and a day’s growth of beard darkened the hard line of his jaw. But it was his eyes that most shocked her. They were deadly grim, heavily shadowed with fatigue. With a sob she couldn’t suppress, she went to him and embraced him. He returned the embrace briefly but so tightly that if he had held her any longer, he would surely have cracked her ribs.

     
He held her away from him, and his hands bit into her arms. “Why did you come here?” He stared down at her fiercely. In his eyes she saw both shame and impotent rage.

     
“Why did I come?” she echoed. “Because I love you. I’m your wife, I belong by your side.”

     
“Do you think I murdered Teddy?” he demanded.

     
“I
know
you didn’t.” And as she spoke those simple, loyal words, she knew once and for all that he hadn’t.

     
He released her and walked restlessly away from her. “What time is it?” he said. “They’ve taken my watch. Without windows in here, I can’t tell night from day.”

     
She glanced at her lapel watch and watched him worriedly as he paced back and forth. “It’s almost ten—in the evening.”

     
He stopped pacing abruptly and looked at her. “You didn’t bring Courtney, did you?”

     
“No. Should I have? Did you want to see him?”

     
“Of course I do.” He sat down wearily. “But I’m glad you didn’t bring him. My son,” he said bitterly. “I waited so long for an heir, and this is the legacy I bestow on him.”

     
Susanna went to him swiftly, knelt at his feet and wound her arms about his waist. “I’ve been so worried about you. How did this happen? Why did they arrest you?”

     
“Because there’s irrefutable proof that I killed Teddy.”

     
She rose and took the chair opposite him. “What proof?”

     
“The police received an anonymous letter from someone who claimed to have been working at the Fenway at the time of Teddy’s death. The person wrote that he was in Teddy’s quarters on the morning he died and that he discovered a cigarette case in the sitting room, which wasn’t Teddy’s. He didn’t smoke. The writer said further that he was afraid to turn over the cigarette case to the police because he would have to admit he’d been in Teddy’s quarters about the time of the murder, and the police might think he was the guilty party.”

     
“I don’t believe any of this,” Susanna said scornfully.

     
“No intelligent person would,” Jay agreed. “In any case, the man—or woman—in question said that fear eventually drove him to leave the Fenway, but now, after much consideration, he thinks that if the police have the cigarette case, it will lead them to the murderer.”

     
“And the cigarette case is....”

     
“Mine, naturally. That’s how I came to be an honored guest of the city.”

     
“But, Jay,” Susanna said, “how can they detain you on such a superficial basis? Surely they need more than that to convict you of the crime.”

     
“There’s a matter of motive,” he reminded her. “Teddy’s ‘suicide note’ mentioned the embezzlement, so I became the chief suspect. Also, I was in Boston at the time of the murder. Now, with the cigarette case, the police think the case is solved.”