Radiance

It was going so well. Just like a movie. Right now, in my stateroom, in the silence of the deep, woeful night, I think it was going so well because…that’s what happens in a movie. I cast a spell, and for a moment, just a moment, life had a script. The detective locks the door and names the suspects and, eventually, someone confesses. That’s how the whole business works. It’s instinct. Freddy couldn’t resist it. Or Percy couldn’t. Couldn’t resist the desire to crawl inside the script. It’s safe in there. Nice. Warm. The script will look after you.

But Percy stopped it.

“Everybody cool off!” Percival Unck, for all his faults and virtues, can yell louder than anyone I know. Quiet on set! “Listen to me. This was an accident. Mary, I appreciate what you’re doing, but it’s not necessary. I am telling you the truth. Freddy and I were having a few scotches out on the deck, talking about the new camera line. Fred clapped me on the back, and when he turned around, he saw Penny and Thad through the ballroom windows. Thaddeus kissed Penny, and Freddy saw black. You can’t blame a man for that. He shouldered the door in, confronted Thad, it came to blows, we struggled—all of us, all four of us! We struggled and the gun went off. It could have been any of us who pulled the trigger: me, Penny, Fred—we all had our hands on it at some point. But it was an accident. And what we have to decide now is: How many lives does this terrible accident destroy?”

I had such a horrid feeling in the hollows of my stomach.

He’s lying.

Like MM always said, it’s bad maths. The sun might come up blue as Neptune in the morning, ice might turn to fire when it melts, I might become the long-jump champion of the world, but Thaddeus Irigaray did not kiss Penelope Edison. It didn’t happen. I go for a bit of each, but Thad was true blue. I wanted to say so, but I couldn’t. Not in that room. Not with all those people who Thaddeus didn’t trust enough to tell when he was alive. Not with that Algernon B-for-Bastard already writing next week’s column in his head. Even a corpse can be ruined. And a corpse’s reputation doesn’t mend. So I kept mum. God help me. I wouldn’t let Thaddeus go down in the books as just another dead pervert. Because that’s how we all end up, of course. No. I wouldn’t let his heart be somebody’s morality tale.

Or maybe I was just afraid. Of Freddy, of Percy, of all of them. I couldn’t help it. I thought, Percy, baby, you wanna run it back and do it again so you can get a better angle on the bullet? Make certain the shadows are right on Thaddeus Irigaray’s eyes when the light goes out inside them? Or was there a better line you could’ve hurled in his face? Or at Penny, or Fred? And why would you lie for them? Why would you bother? You don’t even know Penny, not really. You’ve been chummy with Fred since you were kids, sure…but the fraternal bubble never extends to wives. So what did Thad do to you, Percy? How did he really earn his bullet? Why is this happening?

“Whose gun was it?” I asked.

“What?”

“Whose gun? Who brought a gun to a wrap party?”

“It’s mine,” Percy admitted. Oh, Percy. No. “I was showing it to Fred. Showing off, I suppose. I don’t fancy ending up in a Plantagenet vault, Mary. I protect myself. Maud’s got a pistol strapped to her thigh. Ask her. It’s not so strange.”

Then Percival Unck told us how it was going to be. His best directorial effort and only thirteen people ever saw it. Thaddeus had a heart attack. The ship doctor could be paid off; he barely graduated from medical school, anyway. We’d clean it all up, all of us together, and Thaddeus would be cremated before anyone knew the difference. The rest of us would keep the secret for our own reasons. Because we were accessories, because we wanted system-wide distribution for our tawdry little magazine, because we didn’t want a divorce to leave us penniless, because we wanted a part, because we didn’t care, because we loved Thaddeus Irigaray and didn’t want him to be remembered as a homewrecker or worse, because we could live forever on the favours Unck and Edison could do us.

What about me? Will I keep quiet? I said I would. I promised. With blood on my cheek, I promised. I took my silver—any part I want, and the director’s chair, too. Though, honestly, I think it might be time to retire.