The Phantom of Oz, Installment #16
Plus Heaven Lee, Wiley B. Trusty, and Ivy Meadows
Hello! As most of you know, I’m serializing The Phantom of Oz here in a bit of an experiment. Once a month, you’ll still receive the “regular” Slightly Silly News. If you missed earlier chapters of Phantom, you can find links to all of the earlier installments here.
In the last regular Slightly Silly News, I talked about my love of the sound of certain words. That love extends to names, especially when they’re the actual given names of real people. Like Heaven Lee, a caregiver for a friend’s mother. Or Wiley. B. Trusty, who used to work in a nearby hardware store. Or Ivy Meadows, who is a social worker I knew in Arizona (really!).
In The Phantom of Oz, I got Arrestadt from an artist I met in New Orleans (actually Arrestad but my editor suggested we add the T to get away from the whole “arrested” thing). The name Normina is a nod to a friend’s mother. Babette Firmin isn’t a real name, but Firmin is taken from The Phantom of the Opera. One of the new owners of the Opera Populaire, Monsieur Firmin is often described as irritable, greedy, and nasty to staff (sound familiar?). But the absolute best names can be found at the very end of this installment, so read on!
Chapter 12
So Frail a Creature, Part One
I couldn’t stop thinking about Candy as Babette’s next It Girl. I thought about it as I drove to Good Sam. I thought it as I parked and went to the ER. I thought about it when the nurse told me I couldn’t see Candy because she was being “attended to.” I was really annoyed, but not just with Candy, who, yes, should have told me. I was mad at myself. I should be happy for my friend. This was a huge break. She’d be all over the internet and on TV and in magazines. No matter what happened, she would be a bankable commodity for a while. And though there was a bit of envy, it was only a titch. The overriding feeling was worry. I was sure Candy was sick, and Babette didn’t seem the nurturing type. More the bloodsucking, soul-eating type.
I couldn’t get the It Girl news out of my head, but at least it steered me toward my next destination. I left the ER waiting room and headed to the hospital gift shop. “Do you have a copy of Us magazine?” I asked the white-haired volunteer behind the counter. A few minutes later I was back in the waiting room with my new magazine and a Diet Coke. I plopped down into a molded plastic seat and flipped to the four-page article on Babette. It wasn’t much different than the one in the Huff Post. It had a few more photos but mostly talked about the chandelier and the ghost and Babette. She didn’t mention Candy by name, and there wasn’t much talk about the It Girl until the end of the article, when the reporter said, “Do you feel like you’ve failed in your search for Hollywood’s next big thing? After all, none of your It Girls have gone on to major stardom.”
“I think I figured out why,” said Babette. “You have to look back at the big stars of yesterday. Greta Garbo, Judy Garland, Marilyn Monroe—they all had something today’s actresses are missing: vulnerability.” And unhappiness. She forgot to say that. “We could all see their vulnerability, relate to it. This healthy self-esteem crap everyone spouts nowadays gets you nowhere in Hollywood.”
Yep, bloodsucking soul-eater.
“Ivy.” Arrestadt stood in front of me. “I got here soon as I heard. They said Candace is still—”
“Being attended to,” I finished with him.
He pushed his hair off his forehead. “God, I hope she’s okay. And I hope she’s okay in time for the show tomorrow. We don’t have anyone else to play Glinda.” Arrestadt looked around the waiting room. “Are you the only one waiting for her?”
“Yeah. You’d think that Babette would be here, looking after her newest It Girl.”
Arrestadt didn’t blink. Must’ve known about Candy and Babette. “Probably don’t allow cameras in the ER.” He saw the magazine in my lap. The cover displayed a picture of the Grand Phoenician’s chandelier with an inset photo of Babette looking terrified, a different one than the selfie she’d taken. Arrestadt snorted. “Wonder when she staged that photo?”
“Why staged?”
“You’ve met Babette. She’s never afraid. She’s the scary one.” He indicated the magazine with a nod of his head. “May I?”
I gave him the magazine, and he flipped to the story headed “Babette Firmin’s Phantom Nightmare.” The big photo was of the fallen chandelier. The magazine had inserted a big red arrow pointing at the Wicked Witch of the East’s striped stockings sticking out from underneath the wreckage. “No need for a house,” said the caption, “when the Lady in White has a chandelier!”
Arrestadt snickered. I looked at him. He tried to suppress a smile. “I know it’s not appropriate, but Normina is going to be okay, and come on: a chandelier falls on the Wicked Witch of the East? It’s too good. I mean...” He pointed at the red and white stockings peeping out from underneath the chandelier. “It couldn’t be any more perfect if it was...” He stopped smiling.
“Planned?” I said.
“But no one would do that,” he said. “People could have been killed.”
“Do you think anyone would have wanted to kill Normina?”
“She’s not...easy,” he said. “But I can’t imagine anyone wanting to kill anyone, ever. Call me naive, but...”
“Candy thought Normina was bitchy because of you,” I said. “What did she mean?”
“Oh.” Arrestadt shifted in his seat. “Well, she’s had a crush on me forever, I guess. No, I don’t guess. She made it very plain whenever I saw her, at auditions and parties. When I cast her in this show, I think she thought...” He shrugged. “She was wrong.”
“Of course, it wouldn’t have to be Normina who was targeted. After all, most of the cast was in range of the chandelier.”
“Plus you.”
“Me?” I said. “Nah. Babette seems the most likely target.”
“God knows a lot of people would like to see her gone.”
“Could she have staged the whole thing for PR? I mean, it seems awfully dangerous, but...”
“I don’t know. I don’t want to think about it. I don’t want to think about the fact that this latest accident ensures she’ll get another week of media coverage, either.”
I didn’t want to think about it either, at least not yet. “Let’s go back to the chandelier,” I said. “Do you seriously think it could have been tampered with?”
“Maybe.” Arrestadt sat forward, his elbows on his knees, a thinking pose. “The theater personnel were astounded that the accident occurred. When they renovated the theater, they did it right, with the best historic-preservation architects in the country. Plus,” he looked at me, his hazel eyes serious, “they said something odd about the chandelier. They couldn’t be sure when it happened or why, but it looked like something had been done to it.”
“Something that could cause it to fall?”
“No.” He furrowed his brow. “The opposite, actually. There was an extra cable attached, as if someone wanted to make sure the chandelier wouldn’t fall all the way down.”
A nurse clad in blue scrubs walked into the ER. “Anyone here for Candy Treat?”
“Yes.” I raised my hand. Arrestadt blinked. “Her real name,” I said.
“Wow.”
“Her niece has it worse. Her name’s Trixie.”
And yes, Candy Treat and Trixie Treat are the names of real people. I swear.
Watch next week for Installment #17, Chapter 12: “So Frail a Creature,” Part Two.
And if you haven’t read the first four books in the Agatha-nominated series:
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