Death Wears a Beauty Mask and Other Stories (2 page)

“You mean my sister arrived in New York three days ago and you haven't heard from her?” Janice demanded.

Emma shook her head. “She was due in from that Beauty Mask trip Monday evening. When that Wilson fellow called, he said that they all arrived on the chartered plane but separated at the airport. He told me Miss Alexandra was supposed to be driven home by the owner of the charter airline. He hasn't seen her since. Nobody has. Not that that's so unusual. Sometimes when Miss Alexandra has had enough of all the fuss, she takes off and gets a rest. One time it was to Cape Cod, another time to Maine. Then she shows up like it was yesterday she took off. A little inconsiderate when she's doing all this decorating.”

Mike stopped the flow of words. “Is it possible Miss Saunders went on another job?”

Emma shook her head. “That Beauty Mask thing was all she was
doing these past couple of months. Lots of pictures for magazines and them commercials.”

“Has she been reported missing?” Mike asked.

Emma shook her head vehemently. “Course not.”

“What are you trying to say?” Janice demanded.

“Nothing. I'm trying to say nothing. Please don't go 'round reporting Miss Alexandra missing. Like I said, she sometimes ups and takes off and no explanations given or asked. . . . She don't like anyone messing around her with questions.”

Janice turned to Mike. Her eyes seemed even larger when they were frightened. “Mike, what should we do?”

“First, get the messages from the answering service. See who's been calling.”

The answering service at first refused to give any information about Alexandra's phone messages. “Even though you are her sister,” the authoritative voice of an operator said, “we always give the messages directly to her. She has told us never to give them to anyone else who claims to be calling in her name.”

Mike took the phone from Janice's hand. “This is Alexandra Saunders's brother-in-law. She has not been heard from for three days and her family is terribly worried. Answer this, has she phoned in for her messages in these past three days?”

There was a pause. “I really don't know if we should share that information—”

Mike interrupted. “If you don't share it and if you don't give me what messages she received, I am an attorney and I will get a court order to get them. Miss Saunders is missing. Can you understand that? She is missing! I am calling from her phone. You can call me back to verify that I am in her apartment.”

There was a notepad and pen by the phone. Less than a minute later he was jotting down names and phone numbers.

When he put down the phone, he said, “Grant Wilson called
on average three times a day. So did a Larry Thompson—about the same. And several calls from a Mark Ambrose. Most of the others seem to be invitations to charity dinners, salon appointments, etc.”

Emma knew who the men were. “Grant Wilson. He's the owner of the Wilson Modeling Agency that books Miss Alexandra. Larry Thompson, he's the guy who does all those photo shoots and the commercials. Marcus Ambrose, he owns the charter plane service that took them over and flew them around in Europe.”

“We'll start with Wilson,” Mike decided.

“Don't worry about your bags,” Emma said. “I'll put them in the guest room.”

“I don't know what salary arrangements you had with Alexandra, but I want to make sure—”

“Don't worry,” Emma interrupted, “I'm paid through the end of the month.”

•  •  •

Twenty minutes later they were at the General Motors Building on Fifth Avenue. As they stood at the entrance, Mike looked at it appreciatively. “They were just building this when I was in law school.”

Janice smiled forlornly. “When I was here six years ago, Alexandra took me to lunch at The Plaza.” She stared at the impressive old hotel across the street. “It was such fun; celebrities kept coming up to our table.”

Grant Wilson sat behind the massive desk in his corner office. The windows commanded a breathtaking panoramic view of Central Park. The office was furnished like a living room: deep blue carpeting, sofa and chairs covered in the same expensive brocade as the draperies; good paintings, a well-equipped bar, bookcases. It was the kind of office that signified top-of-the-ladder success in the Madison Avenue world. Grant had been successful. He'd come to New York twelve years before when he was twenty-eight. In those years he'd
worked himself up to executive vice president in one of the most important modeling agencies in New York. Three years ago he'd opened his own agency.

Grant had a high-bridged nose, light brown eyes, the trim build of a man who works out frequently at the Athletic Club and a head of graying but abundant hair.

Right now he was badly frightened. He'd been at lunch at the Four Seasons. His meal had consisted of salmon with a salad and two gin martinis. The martinis were to calm his nerves. When he got back to his office, his secretary gave him several messages. The first was that Alexandra's sister and her husband were on the way to see him. What did that mean? He'd forgotten Alexandra had said her sister was married. He had thought she was some college kid. What kind of questions would she ask about Alexandra? How should he answer them? He'd tell her he couldn't understand how the hell anyone as familiar as Alexandra could just disappear. He'd say that you couldn't open a magazine without seeing her face. And all those guest appearances on Johnny Carson and Merv Griffin. Surely somebody would notice her somewhere. But she might as well have fallen through a crack in the earth.

There were other messages. Ken Fowler from Fowler Cosmetics, the company that owned Beauty Mask, had phoned three times. He still hadn't paid the last invoices they'd submitted. If they didn't immediately reshoot that last commercial in Venice, he would refuse to pay any of the outstanding invoices.

The intercom on his phone buzzed. It was the receptionist. “Mr.  and Mrs. Broad to see you. Mrs. Broad is Alexandra Saunders's sister.”

“I know who she is,” Grant snapped. “Bring them in immediately.” He slammed the phone down, rubbed his hands together to dry them and waited.

When his secretary came in with his visitors, Grant stood up, every inch the welcoming, gracious executive. He took both of Janice's
hands in his. “My dear, I'd have known you anywhere. You're the image of your sister.” Then he shook Mike's hand warmly.

He was, as a matter of fact, thrown off base by the appearance of the young couple. God knows what he'd expected—a pair of lunatic college kids with shaggy haircuts, flowers on their toes and granny glasses. But this Mike Broad was no lightweight kid. And as for the sister, he studied her carefully. What a knockout; not that ethereal look of Alexandra . . . more of a healthy kind of beauty. A bit taller . . . probably five or six pounds heavier but it looked good. He'd been warning Alexandra that you could overdo the stringbean look.

Janice was protesting. “Oh, I'm nothing like Alexandra. Well, there's just no comparison.” Next to Alexandra's chiseled beauty she had always felt like a peasant. “Do you know where my sister is?” she demanded.

As she finished the question, she realized that simultaneously Grant Wilson had been asking one of her. He'd said, “I hope you're bringing news of Alexandra.”

Grant studied the narrowing of Michael Broad's eyes, the crushing disappointment in the girl's face. He felt the muscles in his own throat constrict.

“Let's all sit down.” He waved his hand toward the sofa. They sank into it and he decided to jump right into the subject they'd come to discuss.

“I'm not going to pull any punches,” he said. “I'm worried about Alexandra. I wasn't at first . . . for reasons I'll explain. Quite frankly I thought it was just possible that she'd made arrangements to join you, my dear.” He nodded to Janice.

Mike leaned forward. “Mr. Wilson, when was the last time you saw Alexandra?”

For an instant Grant had the feeling he was on a witness stand. There was something professional about the way the question came. He looked directly at Mike.

“Three days ago, on Monday evening, a group of us returned from Venice on a chartered plane. We had gone to Europe to do television commercials and photography for a very important new campaign featuring Alexandra. As you may know, Fowler is one of the largest cosmetic companies in the world, on the level of Elizabeth Arden and Helena Rubenstein. Beauty Mask is a new product of the company. Very simply, it's probably the most exciting new product in the cosmetic industry . . . which I might add is a multibillion-dollar business.”

He nodded to Janice. “As this young lady will probably verify, some days a girl just doesn't look her best. She may have circles under her eyes from being out half the night or studying late, or she may have tension lines in her face. There are any number of creams on the market to hide those lines and shadows. Beauty Mask is different. It simply eliminates them. Facial masks are usually messy to put on and have to stay on for half an hour at least to be effective. Beauty Mask comes in a jar. You rub it on your face, as you would cold cream, and it hardens in seconds. Leave it on while showering, wash it off with warm water and a cloth, and your face will look as though you've spent a week at Maine Chance. I can't be sufficiently enthusiastic.”

“But what has this to do with Alexandra?” Janice demanded.

Grant's tone suggested he was not used to being interrupted. “Very simply this. In an unusual arrangement, my modeling agency was chosen to provide the models and to oversee the implementation of the Beauty Mask introduction. We've prepared a saturation series of magazine ads and television commercials. The client deferred to my suggestion that Alexandra be the model for the entire campaign. In terms of television residuals alone, the booking is worth a fortune to her. However, because of the amount of money Fowler has allocated for this campaign, the Beauty Mask people are incredibly demanding. We've already had to redo several of the commercials at great expense. The one we just completed in Venice was quite difficult.
We had weather problems . . . camera problems . . . and Alexandra just doesn't look that great in it. As a result, Alexandra was very tired and rather uptight when we got off the plane. I was rushing to a dinner engagement. My baggage came out first. I grabbed it and ran. When I heard she was missing, I thought she was someplace like Gurney's in Montauk relaxing for a few days. But I don't believe that anymore.”

“What do you believe?” Mike asked.

Grant Wilson turned the paperweight on his desk. “I don't know. I simply don't know.”

“How did you know she's missing?” Mike persisted.

“She was supposed to be at my office on Tuesday morning with the director of the commercials and the photographer to go over the footage but she never showed up,” Grant replied.

Janice tried to keep her voice steady. “I understand you've left many urgent messages for my sister to phone you. Why?”

Grant's expression became grim. “Because the client has not approved the commercial we did in Venice. Because the great probability is that we'll have to redo it. Alexandra looked fabulous in the three other commercials, but she doesn't look that good in the final one. All the others are a buildup to it. That's why she can't look tired and drawn in it, when it's the climax of the Beauty Mask effect. We've got to reshoot immediately. Fortunately, we have enough Venice background that we can redo it in New York. The campaign is due to break in the August issue of
Vogue
and that will be published in a few weeks. We can't use anyone except Alexandra because she's in all the print ads and in the other three commercials. But the client insists that they okay the Venice one before they pay the final invoices. The progression of the publicity campaign has her photographed in New York, Paris, Rome and finally Venice.”

“What will happen if you don't locate Alexandra in time to reshoot?” Mike asked.

Grant stood up. Unconsciously he was gripping the edges of his desk. “The client is threatening to scrap the entire campaign, to introduce its product for Christmas with a new agency and a new model . . . and in that case would refuse to pay us one cent more.”

Mike stood up too. With one hand under her elbow, he drew Janice to her feet. “I think it's time we called the police,” he said.

“You can't do that!” Grant said violently. “Do you realize what a scandal would do to this campaign? Can you see what Suzy or Rona Barrett would do in their columns with a juicy item like Alexandra Saunders being listed on a missing persons bulletin? As I told you, she has been known to disappear for a few days when she needed a break.”

“If that is the case,” Mike said slowly, “I would say that Alexandra will be showing up very soon. There's no doubt that she wanted to see Janice and was planning to be here to meet us.”

“That remains the single shred of hope,” Grant agreed.

“Then, against my better judgment, we'll wait another twenty-four hours before we call the police,” Mike said, “but no more.”

Janice thrust her hand out. “Good-bye, Mr. Wilson,” she said, turning toward the door as she spoke. She desperately wanted to get out of this office. She wanted to be alone with Mike, to have a chance to think.

“My friends call me Grant.” He attempted a smile. “I am very much in love with Alexandra and have been pressing her for some time to accept an engagement ring from me. She and I are right for each other. She has always said that she wasn't ready to marry. Frankly, I think your marriage might have started her thinking. I asked her again in London and in Venice. But that's another reason why I didn't worry too much when she bolted. I knew she'd want a little time to herself . . . to test her feelings. I honestly think this time she might be ready to say yes.”