Suspicion of Madness (21 page)

"I don't know why Teri loves me. I don't know, but I'm grateful, as I'm grateful for the sunshine. Lois gets the resort when I'm gone, but Teri will have enough to live very well and to take care of whatever Billy might require. I don't expect to go tomorrow, but I tread very lightly. I know the odds.

"My beautiful wife. Teri wants another child, can you imagine that? She's young enough, but I put her off. She has enough on her hands with Billy. Wouldn't that be a rotten joke to pull on her? Give her a child and then keel over? I want her to be able to find someone else when I'm gone. I think that's the best gift I can give her. She loves me, but it would be a tragedy if she loved me too much."

Gail felt a knot in her throat. This was so sad. Martin was afraid to tell his wife he was sick because she was young and beautiful and she might stop loving him. Teri was afraid he would see how unworthy she was. Teresa Flores, a Cuban refugee, a maid, a nobody. Her first husband had beat her, and her younger son was dead. If only she had been home instead of working, she might have saved him. She wasn't good enough for Martin Greenwald, so she created an illusion for him, the perfect wife. They were miles apart. Martin would never know who she was or how desperately she loved him. Each of them, an island.

When Anthony finally came back, Gail was so mired in gloom that he had stolen a sip of her beer and was talking to Martin before she realized he was there.

She gathered that Martin had asked him if he'd had any luck.

Anthony was saying, "There were two men on duty that night. Neither of them remembers what time Billy left. They can't even remember if they saw him."

"What do you do now?"

"Now we talk to Joan Sinclair and we cross our fingers."

12

At the fence dividing the properties, the cart left the landscaped grounds of The Buttonwood Inn and entered the woods on the other side. The headlights made a circle of light that bounced over the rutted path. Shadows swirled in the trees. Gail sat in the front with Billy Fadden, leaving the rear seat to Anthony. They came to a clearing. The sky brightened and dimmed as clouds drifted across the moon.

Billy looked tense and unhappy, and Gail saw him wincing when they lurched out of a hole. He had not volunteered to play chauffeur. He said Joan Sinclair had asked him to. She wanted to see with her own eyes if he was still alive, or if she had cut him down off the beam for nothing.

The cart reached a smoother patch of ground. Gail asked, "Do you visit Joan often?"

"Not really." Billy added, "Not like I used to."

"Why?"

"I've heard it all."

"All of what?"

"Her stories. What Hollywood was like thirty or forty years ago."

"That could be interesting."

"Well, it's not. We used to talk about how movies were made. She made me watch
Citizen Kane
about ten times in a row, and she took it apart. But she's changed." Billy steered the cart around a fallen log. "You keep waiting for the director to say 'action.' "

"With your interest in movies," Gail said, "why don't you go into filmmaking?"

"Yeah, right."

"I'm serious."

He shook his head. "There's a million people who want to get into it. You have to know somebody."

"You know Joan."

"Like that's going to help."

Gail wondered if all conversations with Billy dropped into a black hole. She said, "Could you let me borrow one of her movies?"

"Which one do you want? I have them all."

She remembered what the waitress, Emma, had told her this morning at breakfast. "How about
Bride of Nosferatu?"

"Okay, sure," Billy said. "It's not her best, but it's the one that got her noticed in the horror-film genre."

After returning with Anthony from Islamorada, and before dinner arrived on a tray, Gail turned on her computer, hooked it up to the phone line, and searched the Web for Joan Sinclair. She got over fifty links, most of them to very strange home pages. "Eric's House of Goth" contained a photo of a young Joan Sinclair with vampire teeth, an abundance of eyeliner, and a drop of blood on her lips. Someone called "Count Shockula" had a Joan Sinclair fan club page that hadn't been updated in three years. A site called "Women of Darkness" featured two streaming video clips: From
Black Flame,
Joan Sinclair standing outside a dungeon cell, black hair piled on top of her head, breasts straining at the low neckline of a red velvet dress. A terrified, sweating, half-naked man is chained to the stone floor watching her. She smiles.

"You called me evil. Am I? Do you think so? Well, my darling, you're about to find out what evil is. Hendrik! Open the door!" From
Dawn of the Undead,
a blond Joan Sinclair in a diaphanous white gown, moonlight revealing every curve. She puts a hand to her ear. "Listen. Do you hear the music? It's the voices of the dead, singing to us.
La-la-la-laaaa."

There were many insignificant references contained in longer articles. Joan Sinclair's name listed in the cast of a movie. Mentioned in articles about Vincent Price, Christopher Lee, Roger Corman. Joan Sinclair as scream queen and campy comedienne. Joan Sinclair as typical of, example of, or betrayal of, feminist ideals. The most comprehensive biographical data came from the online
Guide to American Film:

Sinclair,
Joan (born Joan Lindeman, Key Largo, FL, 1940?), a virtual unknown, was given the coveted role of ill-fated mob girl Carlotta Sands in
The Edge of Midnight
(MGM, John Huston, 1963), which earned Sinclair an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She appeared in three other major pictures (most notably Paddy Chayefsky's
Network)
but became best known for her work in horror films (
Bride of Nosferatu, The Scourge, Hell House, Black Flame, Moon of the Vampires,
and others). TV appearances include the occult drama
Dark Shadows; Star Trek;
and the suburban witch mother in the short-lived 1980 sitcom
Skeleton in the Closet.
Sinclair had become a cult figure and subject of parody by the time she guest-hosted
Saturday Night Live
in 1981. Her career suffered due to disputes with directors and other actors, a failed lawsuit against her agent, and arrests for drug possession. Married four (?) times, including actor Sam Jakes and British rock guitarist John Everts.

Los Angeles Times
movie critic Art Hammersmith (1987): "Even in a string of low-budget bombs, Sinclair's approach was slyly comedic and self-consciously aware, forcing the viewer to go along for the ride."

Though Joan Sinclair sank into B-movie obscurity, she has a quirky and possibly underrated place in American film history. She lives in seclusion somewhere in the Florida Keys.

Such a weak bulb burned in the porch lamp that they had to feel their way up the steps. Only a sliver of light shone through a crack in the curtains. Billy lifted a hand to knock on the door but stopped when a woman's angry voice came from behind it.

"—tired of arguing with you. Why shouldn't I, if I want to? Why must you always—" The voice grew too faint to make out, as though the woman had turned in another direction.
 

Then another voice, too muffled to indicate its gender.
 

Billy banged on the screen, which rattled on its hinges. The voices went quiet.

"Joan? It's me, Billy."

From inside: "They're here, would you
leave?
Get out.
Go!
"
 

There were footsteps fading away. Then a door slammed somewhere deeper in the house.

Half a minute later the click of high heels came nearer, and a lock was thrown back. The door opened, and the figure of a woman appeared on the other side of the screen. Soft jazz and cigarette smoke drifted out. The glow of an ember rose and brightened and for an instant reflected in her eyes. Bracelets jangled as they slid down her wrist.

Billy said, "Hi. I brought Miss Connor and Mr. Quintana."
 

They murmured their hellos. Joan Sinclair leaned for a moment longer against the frame, then pushed open the screen door and moved aside. "Come on in out of the snow, why don't you?" The words were spoken clearly, slowly, with an undertone of wry amusement.

She shook their hands. Her fingers were arched, the grip quick and light. Long black hair fell past her shoulders, and bangs stopped at the level of her wing-shaped eyebrows. Her nose was strong, and her lips were outlined and filled in with red. Dark blush accented her angular cheeks. She wore a loose, leopard-print sweater with the sleeves pushed up, black Capri pants, and high, backless heels with open toes. A gold silk s was tied around her neck.

She held up her cheek to Billy. "Kiss, kiss." With a sigh of embarrassment, he gave her a peck. She turned up her palms though she expected something more. "Aren't you going to say 'thank you'? Or do you want me to mind my own business next time?"

"Thank you, Joan."

Joan gestured toward the bandage on Billy's left hand. "You bled all over my new blouse." She was Billy's height, but his posture was bad, and he seemed smaller. "Billy darling, when I said death was beautiful, I didn't expect you to take it literally." She walked him toward the door. "Now scram. Your lawyer wants to talk to me."

She stood looking out as the hum of an electric cart faded then flicked her cigarette into the yard. She locked the front door when she came in. For her age, she was stunning. The black
hair had to be a wig, but a very good one. Her waist wasn't as small as in the photos from thirty years ago, but she still had the curves.

Gail looked around, getting the layout of the house: Living room ahead, hall and stairs to the right. Old furniture, a scattering of threadbare rugs on wood floors. A hanging light fixture with most of its low-watt bulbs missing. A row of candles flickering on the mantel of the coral-rock fireplace. On the other side of the living room a wide opening to another room, probably the dining room at one time, now empty except for two recliners, a big-screen television, and many posters on the walls. In the semidarkness, the outline of a door, perhaps to the kitchen. Had the other guest gone out that way? Was he—or she—still here?

"Bienvenue chez moi."
Joan Sinclair's cocoa-brown eyes lingered on Anthony before moving to Gail. "Mr. Quintana brought you along as backup? We'll gang up on him if he gets out of line. Have a seat, you two." She motioned toward the camel-backed sofa, which had been draped with a fringed, green brocade throw. Fake fur pillows had been propped in the corners.

At the other end was a pole lamp with three metal shades, and Gail clicked one after another without result. She smiled apologetically at her hostess. "It's dark in here."

Wordlessly the owner of these gloomy environs moved around Anthony to switch on a lamp at the nearer end of the sofa. The wooden base was carved into a vaguely female shape. The scarf draped over the shade allowed a soft pink light to come through. "Better?"

On the coffee table, incense curled upward from a brass burner, masking the smell of cigarettes, mildew, and unwashed laundry. A jazz trumpet was coming through the built-in speakers of a cabinet in the dining room. Gail remembered her mother had owned one of those. She walked a few steps nearer and saw a stack of phonograph albums.

"Do you like Dizzy Gillespie?"

Gail looked around. "Is that who it is? Yes, it's very nice."

"What can I get you to drink?" Joan Sinclair's breath revealed that she herself had already had one or two.

"Do you have white wine?" Gail asked.

"Wine. Wine. I have red wine. Wouldn't you rather have a martini? I make a mean martini, my own secret formula." Her voice was a breathy alto, and each word she spoke seemed to carry the weight of some hidden meaning.

"Just some club soda, then."

"She's being a good girl tonight." Dark eyes shifted to Anthony. "How about it? Want to join me in a martini?"

"All right."

"Sit down, will you? Get comfy."

The bar was on the wall near the dining room, an oak cabinet on claw feet. Over it, an ornate gold mirror tilted from the wall. The striped wallpaper was curling down at the ceiling. Joan Sinclair found a rocks glass and used aluminum tongs to drop in a few ice cubes from a metal refrigerator tray. She bent over to search behind some doors for the club soda. Her Capri pants fit snugly. She had slender legs and a round butt.

Anthony was staring at her. Gail leaned closer and whispered, "You think she's hot."

He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, passing a hand over his hair. His lips barely moved. "I think Billy is in trouble."

"One club soda. Tee martoonis." Joan Sinclair's tilted image in the mirror smiled at them. "I learned to drink martinis when I was in Vegas shooting
The Runner's Club.
I got to know Elvis Presley. He wasn't in the film, but he came by the set to see what was going on. He was a lot of fun, but I'll tell you something. If he sang like he made love, he'd be a frog." She laughed.

Bottles clanked as she searched among them. "Life in the fast lane. I'm not gonna lie to you about it."