I’d been lying in bed, awake and staring at the thin beam of moonlight slipping through the cheap curtains when Velvet came in. She tripped, giggled, said, “Sorry,” and giggled again.

  “I have to get up early tomorrow,” I said.

  “Sorry.”

  She undressed without switching on the light, went down the hall to the bathroom, and climbed into bed when she returned. The springs squeaked, the mattress shifted, and my friend sighed heavily. The windows were open to the night air, and the fan on the dresser moved slowly, but the room was still stiflingly hot. I didn’t ask Velvet how her evening had gone. I was afraid that if I did, and she told me it had been wonderful, I’d end up telling her what I knew about Todd. I hadn’t yet decided if I was going to do that.

  “ ’Night,” she said.

  “Harrumph,” I replied.

  The fan whirled softly in the corner.

  * * *

  * * *

  When I got up, I dressed quickly in the dark and did the best I could with my hair and makeup in the bathroom and slipped downstairs. Velvet had rolled over, murmuring softly in her sleep, but she didn’t wake.

  Muffled snores came from behind some of the closed doors, and from others I could hear women getting ready to start their day.

  A band of pale gray was rising over the lake when I headed for the hotel, and birds were calling to one another from high in the trees. A wind had come up, blowing straight off the water toward me, and that boded well for the prospect of a slightly cooler day. Not many lights were on in the guest rooms or cabins, but the kitchens and the laundry rooms and garden and maintenance sheds were ablaze. Work in a hotel starts early.

  I found the head breakfast cook at work in the kitchen, checking a batch of coffee cakes in the oven, and I told him what I needed. He hailed a yawning dishwasher and ordered him to give me a hand. I sent the boy to the storage shed to get trestle tables while I searched for George, head of maintenance, and organized the use of a truck for the day.

  That done, I went to my office to try to get a few hours of work done. I was falling so far behind, I worried I’d never catch up.

  By nine o’clock, I’d made such good progress on the accounts I was able to start plowing through the pile of pink message slips to return calls when I thought people would be in their offices. I’d left my door open, and I’d heard the clerks arriving to start work at eight. Women chatted, chairs were pulled out, covers thrown off typewriters, desk drawers opened, cigarettes lit, coffee made, and phones began to ring.

  “Sorry to bother you, Mrs. Grady,” a head popped around the corner, “but we thought you’d want to know. The police are here. They’re in the kitchen.”

  I threw down my pencil.

  Fortunately this time the police had arrived at mealtime, and the security guard had the sense to direct them to park around the back, so not many guests knew they were here. Also fortunately Chef Leonardo hadn’t arrived yet, so he wasn’t going to throw a tantrum and get himself arrested for threating bodily harm to officers of the law.

  I’d met Detectives Stanford and Flynn of the state police before, and I hadn’t been particularly impressed with their efficiency or professionalism. This morning, they’d been served coffee and were munching on a plate of scrambled eggs and toast when I came in. “Good morning, Detectives,” I said in my cheeriest tone. “What can we do for you today?”

  “We’re here about the guy who died on Monday. Poisoned, the autopsy says.”

  “Yes.”

  Staff dodged around us. Assistant cooks flipped eggs or laid slices of lox on plates or supervised the industrial-size toasters; bakers took breads and cakes out of the oven; waiters called for more juice or demanded to know where their order was; busboys carried in towers of dirty dishes; and dishwashers banged away at pots and pans.

  “We want to talk to the cooks and waiters and other folks who were working that night.” Flynn stuffed eggs into his mouth.

  “Most of them aren’t here yet,” I said. “Our kitchen operates more than eighteen hours a day, so people work in shifts.”

  “Yeah, that’s what he”—a stab of a fork in the direction of the breakfast chef—“said. We’ll come back later, then. Say, around lunchtime. Any more toast there, sweetie?” Flynn called to a passing cook’s helper.

  * * *

  * * *

  At eleven o’clock I sent a truckload of assorted Haggerman’s employees who Aunt Tatiana had rounded up into town to help Lucinda pack up her night’s cooking and baking and take it out to the film shoot, and I drove myself to Sparkling Waters Bungalow Colony.

  My supervision probably wasn’t necessary, but I wanted to check the activity for myself. Over the phone last night, we’d arranged that Lucinda and her mother would prepare the food and Haggerman’s would provide soda and juice and what was needed in the way of trestle tables to lay it all out on, as well as dishes, cutlery, and glassware. Lucinda couldn’t spare workers from her small restaurant, so I sent some Haggerman’s staff to the diner this morning to help her get it all out to the film shoot, and then serve and clean up.

  When I got to the Haggerman’s staff parking lot, I found Velvet and Olivia waiting impatiently for me by my car.

  “Are you two coming?” I said.

  “I thought I’d enjoy the outing,” Olivia said. She’d wrapped a yellow-and-blue scarf around her hair and tied it under her chin, and put on enormous sunglasses.

  “I saw Olivia heading this way, and asked her where she was going,” Velvet said. “And I decided to come too.”

  “Don’t you have work to do?” I asked, maybe a fraction more harshly than I should have.

  “I got one of the girls whose day off it is to take my morning classes,” she said. “I should be back in time for tennis this afternoon.”

  She looked lovely this morning. Positively glowing with health and happiness. I didn’t ask how her dinner date had gone—I didn’t want to know. I growled at them to get into the car.

  “That’s quite the car over there,” Velvet said, pointing to Luke’s friend’s Styleline. “That’s the staff area. The car must be in the wrong place.”

  “And therein lies a story,” I said.

  * * *

  * * *

  Lucinda didn’t look as though she’d been up all night, although she had. By the time we arrived at the filming location, she had everything well in hand. Most of the food would be served cold—sandwiches and various salads—with pies, cakes, and cookies for dessert, along with juices and soda, tea and coffee.

  I’d lent her what staff Aunt Tatiana and I could grab with little notice and temporarily spare, from Francis, the gardener’s assistant, to a dishwasher I found having a smoke behind the kitchen door after breakfast service was finished, to a dance instructor who’d sprained her ankle. Long tables had been laid across a section of the lawn, and they groaned under the weight of the offerings. Lucinda stood behind them, smiling broadly, her polka-dot apron on and her long dark hair tied behind her head. She gave me a big thumbs-up.

  A couple of cars were pulled to the side of the highway near the entrance to the bungalow colony, and reporters stood together in small groups, watched over by a security guard. The guard recognized me and waved me through.

  Equipment trucks and trailers lined the bumpy road into the bungalow colony, and the movie crew had taken over a section near one of the cabins, positioned so the brown waters of the small lake provided the background. The camp was ill-named: nothing at all sparkled in the waters of that lake. It was more like a pond—shallow and muddy, thick with weeds and rushes.

  Wide-eyed guests hung around the perimeter of the filming area while bathing suit–clad children ran back and forth. Thick cables crisscrossed the weed- and crabgrass-choked lawn, the cameras were set up and ready. Gary sat in pride of place in the director’s chair while Mary-Alice hovered over him, and the makeup artist dabbed at Rebecca’s face with her brushes. Gloria sat next to Gary, her eyes hidden behind huge sunglasses and an enormous straw hat over her hair. Judy Rae was seated beside Gloria.

  Todd, dressed in his perfectly tailored army uniform, stood in the shade of the cabin that would be the center of the scene, smoking. He spotted us picking our way around the network of equipment, threw his cigarette to one side, and bounded toward us.

  Or, I should say, he bounded toward Velvet.

  “You came! Great.” He smiled at her. She smiled back.

  My fingers itched to smack that grin off his face. He tore his attention away from Velvet and bowed to the women with her. “Miss Peters, how nice to see you.” He extended his arm. “May I?”

  Olivia glanced at me and wiggled her eyebrows as she took his arm. “You may.”

  They walked away, making me feel, once again, like chopped liver. He helped Olivia settle into the chair next to Judy, also resplendent in sunglasses and an umbrella-size hat, where she could have an uninterrupted view of the action. Gloria and the singer greeted my mother with cries of welcome.

  More than a few of the watching women, I noticed, were more excited at seeing Olivia, Gloria, and Judy than the younger actors. A large man in a suit stood next to the row of chairs, feet apart, hands behind his back, staring across the lawn rather than toward the film set. Security, keeping pesky fans at bay.

  Velvet and I found places to stand behind the three women.

  “Places, everyone,” Gary yelled. “Quiet on set.”

  Behind us, parents shifted their feet and shushed children.

  Makeup done, Rebecca took her position on the cabin’s front porch. This place hadn’t been chosen to show the Catskills to its best advantage. The cabin that would be in the movie, like the others packed close together and stretching in a long double line toward the lake, was noticeably in need of some sprucing up. Flecks of paint peeled off the door and window frames, the gutters drooped, the porch railing tilted ominously to one side, and what plants remained in what had once been flower beds were being slowly choked to death by weeds.

  This place had been chosen, I assumed, as an illustration of the class and income differences between Todd’s character, the scion of a family getting rich(er) off the war, and Rebecca’s Lower East Side factory worker.

  It’s customary for guests in the bungalow colonies to share common areas as well as cooking facilities. The scent of boiled cabbage and burnt meat was so strong, it was too bad the camera wouldn’t be able to capture it.

  “Aaaaand action!” Gary shouted. The clapper board clapped and the camera and sound boom moved slowly in on Rebecca. Todd stood just out of range. He gave Velvet a huge grin and a wave and then returned his attention to his job.

  Rebecca was sitting on a porch chair, pretending to read a book. She looked up as though she heard a sound. Her eyes widened and her mouth fell open. She jumped to her feet, gasping and clutching her hands to her chest. The book fell to the ground. The camera moved back, and Rebecca took a step forward. Her eyelashes fluttered, she gasped again, and said, her voice breaking with emotion, “You’ve come.”

  Todd stepped into camera range. “I’ve come,” he announced in that deep, rolling voice, the patrician accent the pride of many a voice coach.

  “Cut!” Gary shouted. He stood up and hurried across the lawn toward the actors. He leaned into Rebecca’s face and screamed, “That has got to be the worst piece of amateur dramatics I’ve seen since my son’s first grade Christmas pageant.”

  All the color drained out of the actress’s lovely face. “I . . . I . . .”

  “No,” Gary screamed, “I’m wrong. It’s the worst piece of acting I’ve ever seen.”

  Todd slipped out of range.

  “I did it like I rehearsed for Mr. Theropodous,” Rebecca said.

  “Oh dear,” Gloria said softly.

  “She is rather . . . stiff,” Olivia said.

  “Yelling at her like that,” I said, “is not going to help.”

  “I’m sure the camera loves her,” Judy said.

  Rebecca was beautiful, but she looked nothing at all—to me anyway—like a factory worker with a name like Esmerelda Sanchez. I glanced at Lucinda, laying out sandwiches and flirting lightly with one of the crew who’d decided to get a head start on lunch. With her perfect olive skin, dark eyes, long black hair, and lush figure, Lucinda would have suited the part better than the skinny, blond Rebecca, who’d have been better cast in a California surfing movie.

  Everyone said Elias had been a perfectionist. Why would he have cast the unsuitable Rebecca for this part?

  Gary continued shouting. “Don’t you cry. Don’t you dare cry. I have no time to waste while you have your makeup fixed.”

  Gloria got to her feet and marched onto the set. “Will you be quiet, Gary. You are not helping.” She put her arms around Rebecca, who was fighting to hold back the tears. “There, there, dear. Never mind him. Some men need to overcompensate when they step into another man’s position. It’s difficult filming in this heat, but there’s a nice breeze today, and that helps, doesn’t it? Can someone bring us a glass of water, please?”

  Gary looked like he was about to argue, but Mary-Alice, who’d moved to stand next to him, caught his eye. He grumbled and stalked back to his chair.

  I ran for the catering table, grabbed a jug of water, poured a glassful, and took it to Rebecca. She accepted it in shaking hands and drank deeply.

  “Thank you,” she mumbled.

  “Take your time,” Mary-Alice said. “We’ll try again when you’re ready. Gary’s not the same director Elias was, and he prefers understated to overly dramatic. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” Rebecca mumbled. She handed me the empty glass with a shy smile. I carried it back to the table, and Gloria followed me. I hadn’t seen Matthew and Freemont arrive, but they were now studying the lunch offerings.

  “What’s going on?” Matthew said. “Don’t tell me Gary’s having histrionics already.”

  “He doesn’t care for Rebecca’s acting style,” Gloria said. “A better actor would be able to help her, but not Todd. He’s a hack. Did you know Elias was considering replacing him?”

  “Where’d you hear that?” Freemont said. “Mr. T. figured Mr. Thompson was perfect for the part. He was excited to get him.”

  “Doesn’t matter if he was or not,” Matthew said. “Too late now to replace anyone. This picture is going to be a mess.”

  “Places, everyone,” Gary yelled. “And we’ll give it one more try.”

  Velvet and I stayed for an hour, watching the filming as well as helping Lucinda and the Haggerman’s staff serve the starving moviemakers.

  “Good thing you told me to make a lot,” Lucinda said. “I thought our customers at the diner were big eaters.”

  “Can’t beat free food,” Velvet said, helping herself to a ham sandwich and putting it on a plate next to a scoop of Jell-O salad packed full of canned fruit. “You did a great job with no notice.”

  “Tony helped out,” Lucinda said, referring to her fiancé. “He’s no cook, but even he can put together a sandwich, if I tell him what to use. He did that while Mom and I made the cakes and cookies. He and I packed everything up and then cleaned the kitchen so Mom could go home and get some sleep. The diner was busier than normal yesterday, what with all those reporters in town for the mayor’s press conference, and I’m worried how Mom’s going to manage today, but the money was too much to resist. As my dad always said, Catskills people have all winter to sleep.”

  Gloria and Rebecca didn’t line up at the trestle tables for lunch. Instead, they walked down to the lake and sat close together on a dilapidated bench while gaping holiday families kept a respectful distance. Mary-Alice joined them a short time later, bringing a bottle of Coke for each of the women. Todd wolfed down a handful of sandwiches and, accompanied by a director’s assistant and a security guard, waded into the crowd of onlookers to talk to kids, smile at squealing teenage girls, and sign autographs.

  Velvet and I needed to get back to work, but this movie business was just so interesting.

  Lunch break over, Gary called everyone into position.

  After the berating from the director, Rebecca managed to pull herself together. Her acting still seemed overly dramatic to me, but she did less of the wide eyes and theatrical chest clutching.

  They did three more takes, and then Gary said it would do, “probably.” Rebecca fled into the trailer that served as her dressing room.

  “We’d better go,” I said to Velvet. “We both have work to get back to.”

  “Sadly, yes.”

  “I’ll tell Olivia she’ll have to find a ride home if she wants to stay longer.”

  While crew hands adjusted the porch furniture to make it look as though the next scene was in a different location, Olivia, Gloria, and Judy chatted. They were joined by Nancy Littlejohn, dressed and made up and ready to step in front of the camera.

  “We’re leaving,” I said to Olivia.

  “I’m going to stay a while longer,” she said. “I’ll make my own way home. How did you ladies get here?”

  “We called a cab,” Judy said. “I’m sure we can get one when we’re ready to leave. There must be a telephone around here somewhere. Do you see anything resembling an office in this horrible place, Gloria?”

  “Gary will make arrangements for us.”

  “I’ll see you back at Haggerman’s later, then,” I said to my mother.

  “What’s going to happen in this scene?” Velvet asked Nancy. “Are you in it?”

  “I am. This is my major scene in the entire movie. I play Rebecca’s boss at the factory, and I’ve come to the Catskills to try to convince the young woman to forget about her”—she made quotation marks in the air—“ ‘true love,’ as he can’t be trusted to do the right thing by her. When I don’t convince her, I confront Todd, and that’s what we’re going to shoot next.”