EQMM 
AVAILABLE IN DIGITAL FORMAT!

 
John Huston once told me there's no such thing as a perfect murder. He'd said it seated at the bar in the Happy Squirrel, a small drinking establishment on Sunset frequented by screenwriters.

It wasn't that Mr. Huston had practical experience in the crime, but he'd made a picture or two with it as the central theme, and he'd given the matter a writer's consideration.

"Writing should reflect the real world," he'd said, whiskey in one hand, a cigarette in the other. "And in the real world, nothing is perfect. Nothing ever works out the way you want it."

He didn't say any of this to me personally—I was a pup screenwriter, seated at the bar along with five others, all of us soaking up the man's wisdom—but I took it to heart.

That was back in 1948, just after I arrived in Los Angeles. Now, four years later, I had seven rewrites, three additional dialogues, and two original screenplays under my belt. I wasn't exactly a veteran, but the work was steady and I was getting a name in the business beyond the two crime novels I'd written before I came out to the coast.

Therefore, to celebrate the completion of the final draft of my third screenplay—an edgy two-hander about a woman who murders her childhood nemesis—I got religiously intoxicated with the Mexican couple that lived in the apartment above mine.

And why not? I had a boss who liked me, a bank manager who grinned, and Claire Trevor had read an early draft of my script and had asked for the female lead.

I explained all of this to the police officer.

In my merriment with the Mexicans, I had gotten naked, traveled across the city, and at dawn the next morning had punctured the W in the Hollywood sign with three clips of bullets.

The police officer wasn't interested in the machinations of the motion picture industry, but he liked my gun—he carried the same model.

It turned out we had both made sandcastles on Omaha Beach on a certain day in June back in the summer of '44. How about that? He loaned me a blanket, drove me home, and before he left, he made me the strongest pot of black coffee I'd ever met in my life.

ACT TWO

So, at eleven-thirty a.m. on a Wednesday, feeling rather fine despite a hangover patented by Satan, and while sitting at the window in my apartment watching the traffic drive by, I got the strangest phone call I'd ever met in my life.

"Is that Jack Gloucester?"

"Yes."

"This is Miranda."

"I know, Mrs. Taunton. I recognized your voice."

"Can you keep a secret, Mr. Gloucester?"

"Sure."

"I want you to help me commit a murder."

"What kind of murder?"

"A perfect murder."

If my life had been a screenplay, that phone call would have been the beginning of the second act.

Her name was Miranda Taunton. She was an actress. I barely knew her. I did know her name wasn't Miranda—it was something no one could ever remember or spell. She had an accent. She was originally from Prague, or someplace like that. Her husband was Torrance Taunton—the movie producer, and one of the most powerful men in the business. Him I knew well. He was my boss.

Torrance Taunton, or TT, as he liked to be known, was a veritable blimp of a man. Fat and ill-tempered, with a taste for the finest in all things—particularly women. As a movie producer, he was best known as the discoverer of a seemingly endless line of fresh young female talent. Talent he brought to the screen by way of his office at the studio.

There was a joke that went about town; it was perennial and it never made it into the movie magazines or gossip columns, and certainly never into the ears of polite company. It described the two well-worn patches of carpet, side by side, about the size and shape of a knee each, to the left of where Torrance Taunton sat at his desk. The punch line of the joke was: "If you want to get into the movies, you have to know where to pray."

Miranda Taunton invited me over to her house in Pacific Palisades. One p.m. sharp. She told me nothing on the phone other than she wanted to commit a murder and she needed my help in doing it. Would I come? How could I not? And keep it a secret. Yes, ma'am.

Driving up to her house, it occurred to my alcohol-infested brain that maybe it was me she was planning to perfectly murder. After all, for the last eleven months, I had been living under the assumption the woman loathed me.

I pulled into her driveway at one sharp and parked near the front door. The Taunton house was a big sprawling number that boasted, among other things, sixty-two bedrooms, eighteen bathrooms, five kitchens, three bars, a movie theater, an art gallery, and a golf links. I'm not kidding. In the basement was a full-sized three-hole golf course, complete with sand traps, flora and fauna, and a lake. There's money in the motion picture business, in case you hadn't heard.

Miranda Taunton met me at the door in person. She was dressed like someone's kid sister. I was in my jacket and striped tie. We shook hands and exchanged pleasantries. It was cordial, if somewhat muted. She then led me to "someplace quiet to talk."

Miranda was twenty-nine and looked a treat, both on-screen and off. She was almost as tall as me and had short, dyed blond hair, a slim figure, and a pair of beautiful hazel-colored eyes that had inspired many a man to run ice water in his bathtub.

TT had first noticed Miranda in a magazine advertisement. She was looking youthful and demure and holding a bottle of French perfume. TT's wife had shoved the magazine under his nose and said, "I want some of that." TT agreed with the woman.

He immediately had the girl shipped to California. He gave her a new name and a prominent role in a film about the French Revolution. He personally supervised the scene where she rode the horse naked—they spent a week and a half filming it.

TT was divorced the week the film opened, and he and Miranda were married before shooting began on the sequel.

Since then, Miranda had appeared in ten pictures. Her popularity at the box office was alchemic. Put her in any costume, any role, and people would flock to see her.

It was often said folk would pay money to see her in a movie even if all she did was sit in a chair and read aloud from a list of auto parts. Which would have been just about right, given that Miranda Taunton was an actress who couldn't act. Not to save her life. She was as wooden as a telegraph pole.

Eleven months earlier, I'd made an off-the-cuff remark about her acting abilities. It had been at a swanky post-premiere party. It had been the kind of

snippy aside screenwriters like to make amongst themselves after a skinful. Among other derogatory witticisms, I suggested her specialty as an actress lay solely in walk-offs and crowd scenes . . . with her at the rear.

Unfortunately, the lady had been in earshot. To my surprise, she didn't say a word. She sought out the tongue that offended, stared at me with eyes like daggers, and then walked away with silent dignity.

That taught me a lesson.

I got no sleep that night. I tossed and turned on my conscience. Insulting a woman was not the act of a gentleman. The next day, I drove out to her house to make a formal apology.

She accepted it, coolly, and told me to forget the matter. The door was closed in my face and that had been the end of it. Upon reflection, I was lucky to have still had a job.

That had been my last encounter with Mrs. Taunton, until that phone call.

"Won't the staff talk?" I asked her.

"This is the only room in the house in which I am assured of privacy," Miranda answered me.

The someplace quiet to talk was her bedroom.

Miranda Taunton's bedroom was on the third floor. You could have turned a Greyhound bus around inside it. The décor was pink and soft—that went for the cushions, pillows, rugs, chairs, and the bed. And it was the biggest bed I had seen in my life. You could've strung up a net and played tennis on it.

"Sit down," Miranda said, perching on the edge of the tennis court.

I sat on a chair nearby. "So, you want to commit a murder?"

"Yes."

"There's no such thing as a perfect murder," I sagely advised her.

"You're a screenwriter, Mr. Gloucester. According to my husband, your specialty is crime and mystery."

I nodded. "That's correct. I've never yet worked on a Technicolor picture, and I have no immediate plans to do so."

"My husband says you're very good at what you do. Surely you can think of something?"

"Who's going to die?" I inquired.

She smiled at me coyly. I'd seen the same expression in all of her pictures. It was the only one she did well. It was her I have a naughty secret look.

"Perhaps a young, attractive woman takes a gun and shoots a man to death in the bathroom connected to her bedroom." She glanced at a white door. It was across from the bed. The white door was closed and it presumably led to a bathroom.

"A young, attractive woman, like say, yourself?"

"Perhaps."

"And a man, like say, your husband?"

She nodded. The coy smile blossomed into something vaguely unnerving.

"Why?"

"Maybe because he deserves it."

I didn't need to ask for any further clarification.

I stared at the white door. The idea of a bathroom appealed. The pot of black coffee had made its way to the departure lounge in my bladder and was pacing about agitatedly.

"It must be a perfect murder," she added. "I want the woman to get away with it."

I glanced at her. And then back at the white door—such a plain and simple door. I couldn't help myself. I sniffed the air for traces of gunpowder.

"I'm talking about this as a screenplay," she remarked.

"Oh, really?"

She nodded sincerely. "Yes. I'm writing a script."

"Oh, really?"

She wasn't a good actress, and she was an even worse liar.

"It's a secret," she said, her accent wavering between California American and her native European. "I haven't told Torrance. I haven't told anyone. And I don't wish you to tell anyone about it, either."

"Why do you want to write a screenplay?"

"Because, for once, I wish to make up my own lines."

I studied her face. It told me absolutely nothing.

"First of all," I said. "Don't use a gun."

"Why not? I want the girl to shoot the man in the head."

"Guns make too much noise and too much mess. Have her strangle him."

She shook her head. "He's bigger than her. He's stronger than her."

"Hit him in the head with something solid." I spied a three-foot-long elephant tusk on a side table. "Hit him with something like that ornament over there."

She glanced at the ivory.

"Hit him hard. And while he's unconscious, strangle him."

Her eyes settled on me. "How do you strangle a man, Mr. Gloucester?"

"Put your hands around his neck and squeeze with everything you've got."

She thought about that, and then patted the edge of the bed alongside her. "Show me. Pretend to strangle me."

My brain said no. The rest of me cheerfully accepted the invitation, and I joined her on the edge of the mattress.

She guided my hands to her. "Grip tightly at the sides," I said, holding her delicately by her neck. Her pale skin was smooth and warm. "Grip as tight as you can."

"Won't he struggle?"

"You knocked him unconscious with the elephant ornament, remember? He's out cold on the floor." I could feel her pulse. "Grip firmly and hold for as long as you can."

I stared into her eyes. They really were very special. I'd never seen that shade of hazel in any girl's eyes. No wonder men went wild for this woman.

"Have you ever killed a man?" Miranda asked.

"Yes."

"In the war?"

"Yes."

"Did you enjoy killing?"

It was like she was asking me if I liked root beer. I took my hands from her neck. I stood up and walked over to a window. I could see my car waiting for me down in the driveway. "Maybe you should find another screenwriter, Mrs. Taunton."

She came across the room after me, flicking open a silver cigarette case. She put a cigarette between her lips and then passed the case to me. "The killing part seems easy. How does the woman get away with it?"

I slid out a cigarette of my own.

She lit us with her lighter.

I placed the case down on a side table next to a vase. "It has to be plausible."

"Plausible?"

"It has to seem reasonable and likely."

She was standing close enough to me to dance.

"Think of the audience as your jury," I said. "They're sitting there in the theater, in the dark. They have to absolutely believe everything they're seeing."

She nodded.

"Motive and clues, Mrs. Taunton, that's how the girl gets away with it."

"Call me Miranda."

I decided I would like to do that. "And someone needs to wear those clues and motive."

"You mean I need a fall guy?"

"Yes."

She went to the drinks cart that stood by the bed. She poured brandy into two glasses. She brought the glasses over and gave me one.

"The fall guy has to have a bankable reason to want to kill that man in the bathroom," I said. "And there need to be clues that lead the police to that fall guy."

"And it has to be plausible?"

"Yes."

I sipped on the brandy. It reminded me that I needed to use a bathroom. It reminded me of the bathroom on the other side of the room and how I'd really like to open that white door. "Why kill him in the bathroom?"

"I have my reasons." Her right hand held her cigarette and brandy, and the fingers of her left hand ran up my lapel. "What motive would convince a jury?"

"Something they can understand."

"Such as?"

"They're human. What motivates human beings the most?"

"Tell me." Without taking her eyes away from mine, she took hold of my tie and straightened it. We were close enough to be related.

"Sex," I answered.

"I like sex."

"Money."

"I like money, too."

"There are others, Mrs. Taunton, but those two are the most compelling."

She was still holding my tie. She was still staring into my eyes. To hell with it, what was I waiting for? The traffic signal was green.

I grabbed her and I kissed her.

The kiss wasn't entirely reciprocated. She drew away from it. She looked confused. Or was it me who was confused? I don't know. I honestly could never figure women out. Anyway, I'd kissed her, and now the kiss was over, and a respectable distance had once again opened up between us.

I apologized. I stubbed out my cigarette in an ashtray. I stood my empty brandy glass next to it, and I left. I found my way back to the front door and back to my car.

As I drove back to my apartment, I realized I had left fingerprints on the brandy glass and on her cigarette case. I had smoked a cigarette and left it in her ashtray. Threads from my clothes probably lay strewn on her bed. Servants had seen me arrive. They'd seen my car parked in the drive. They'd seen me come and go from her bedroom.

Was I the fall guy . . . ?

Be sure to read the exciting conclusion in our  
May issue, on sale now.
 
"THE WHITE DOOR" by Stephen Ross,
 copyright © 2010 with permission of the author.

To keep these great mystery stories coming all year long ... Subscribe now