CHAPTER ELEVEN

 

 

Hayden gave her statement to the second responders like it was the script pages she’d memorized for that day’s filming. The first responders had taken Bimbo to a hospital, one with barred windows I hoped. The police asked about the drugs Bimbo obviously was on. Hayden was vague about their source and the officers let her be, since she had a face and a name they knew. She was more specific about meaningless things like the front door, mentioning in passing that she’d only set the button lock on the knob when she’d entered and not its several deadbolts. That detail was meaningless because Bimbo had already been inside the house, but it did explain how an aging security operative had been able to crash through the door like George Reeves through a cardboard wall.

After the official questioners had left, it was my turn. I started with Amos Decker’s trip to Las Vegas.

“That’s just Amos,” Hayden said. “He should be here, making sure the studio releases his cut of his movie, so naturally he’s off partying. Later, when the movie tanks, he’ll blame the studio editors who recut it. He’ll call them hacks, but they’re more disciplined than he is, just not as talented. Amos doesn’t see that having a special talent doesn’t get you life achievement awards. Showing up every day does.”

She then segued smoothly to an unrelated subject. “Thanks for showing up today, Scotty. I’m sorry it got you beaten up.”

“That’s my special talent,” I said. “Why aren’t you in Vegas?”

“Because Amos is tired of my nagging. Because I’ve got my own awards to earn. Because Amos is throwing me over for a younger woman. Take your pick.”

“The one about the younger woman true?”

Hayden shrugged. “He hasn’t admitted it yet, but that’s the way things work out here. The studio will throw me over for a younger woman too, if I don’t show it I’ve got more than youth to sell.

“Amos doesn’t see that threat either. None of these film school wonders do. They don’t seem to remember that the film schools turn out a new class every year. If Amos and the others want to keep their spots, they have to do good work, now, while they have a chance.”

“Speaking of Decker’s work,” I said, “what do you know about The Shuffle?”

“I know it’s the latest shiny object that’s caught Amos’s eye. And I know he’s counting on you to supply him with background. I really didn’t know that when you came here that first day. Honest, Scotty.”

“Do you know where he came across the idea?”

“No, honest.”

She surprised me then by giving me the same maternal look she’d used when apologizing for my bruises. “Don’t get your hopes up over this movie. Amos gets a lot of can’t miss ideas. The latest one is always the best.”

I would have told her that I hadn’t gotten my hopes up over a movie since her mother last wore bobby socks, but she veered again, back to her own problems.

“I guess it’s the same with lovers, the latest one is always the best.”

“Not if you’re going for a life achievement award,” I said, though my own had been recalled by the Academy. “What now?”

“I finish what I came here to do, collect my stuff and clear out. Would you mind waiting around while I do it?”

I told her I’d stay. In exchange, I asked for directions to Decker’s office. She led me to one of the ocean-view bedrooms.

“You would’ve had to fight Bimbo all over again to get in here, if the cops hadn’t hauled him off. He guarded this room like a bulldog.”

Bimbo might have been protective of Decker’s drug paraphernalia. I found enough of it after Hayden left me to supply a small college dormitory. What I didn’t find were any notes on The Shuffle. There were plenty of scripts lying around. I’d never met a producer or director who didn’t have those to burn. None of Decker’s concerned a con game, not in 1952 or any other year.

I found some correspondence connected with the production company he’d mentioned, Windjammer, and, in the same drawer, a book of checks bearing the company’s name. I started backward in the checkbook’s register but didn’t have to go very far. Just a few days before Decker called Hollywood Security to request my services, he’d written a check for five thousand dollars to a Helen Gallimore.

I knew the name. I was sure of it, though I couldn’t place it. I sat there listening to the surf boom and wishing I had Paddy or, better still, Peggy Maguire to ask. Paddy had rarely forgotten a name and Peggy never had. I decided to run through the names of the people connected with the con and that proved to be all the prod my memory needed. When I got to Ted Mariutto, I had Gallimore. She’d been his secretary. I’d only seen her once, but I was still surprised that I hadn’t IDed her immediately. I was fairly certain that I’d forget landing on Utah Beach before I’d forget the day I met Helen Gallimore.

Hayden signaled me that she was ready by sounding the horn on her Mercedes. I found her standing next to it, the girl Friday she’d called to drive her home sitting behind the wheel. The amount of stuff they’d crammed into the car suggested that Hayden’s relationship with Decker hadn’t been a weekend fling. Even so, she was sniffle free as she stood looking up at the house. She was closer to tears when she hugged me good-bye and thanked me for standing by her.

“Thanks for standing by me,” I said.

 

I drove home to change out of my suit and throw it away—it was that sprinkled with blood from Bimbo’s busted nose. I had a visitor, one with a house key of her own, Gabrielle. She gave me another of her inherited looks when she saw the blood.

“I led with my left, I swear.”

“I can tell by your swollen knuckles. Over Paddy?”

“No, over something else.”

She didn’t call me Mannix that morning, but the nickname would have fit for once. Before I’d left Decker’s desk, I’d called Hollywood Security for a little of the legwork the television detective always turned over to his high-tech employer. Hodson McLean had encouraged me along those lines, after all. I’d asked Vickie to locate the current whereabouts of Helen Gallimore—there been no address or phone number for her in Decker’s office—and any other information on her she could find.

I similarly delegated lunch. Gabrielle had it ready when I came out of the shower. She’d selected soft foods, in case my teeth were loose. While we ate, I explained the blood. The story didn’t hold Gabby’s interest, not even with Polly Hayden in a principal role. My daughter had brought along her own agenda, which she served as our dessert course.

“I heard you dropped in on Mom.”

“That was business.” I’d mentioned Amos Decker during my explanation of the fight but not how we’d met in the first place. I told Gabby now about Decker’s wanting everything I could remember about a certain old case.

“Mom told me that and how you thought she might be the one who’d recommended Hollywood Security. I told her you’d just used it as an excuse to see her.”

That was news to me, though it could still have been true. A character didn’t always understand his own motivations. Ella the screenwriter had taught me that.

“And what did she say?”

We were seated across from one another in my breakfast nook, Gabby idly rubbing her thumb across the copper band on my wrist at the spot where her brother’s name was engraved.

“I think she’d like you to stop by more often, but she might not realize it.”

“So we’re both acting unconsciously?”

“Everybody acts unconsciously, Dad.” Gabby was another graduate of the Ella Elliott screenwriting school. “Take Paddy. He had a good reason to be in that alley that night, one he knew about. But he had other reasons he didn’t know about.”

That reminded me of Captain Grove’s theory. “Maybe Paddy was after the big score that could have put him back on top.”

“Maybe he was after what he found. Maybe he just hadn’t admitted it to himself.”

I sat there wishing that, if Paddy had gone into that alley hoping to die, it had been an unconscious hope.

Then Gabby said, “Why are you still wearing your wedding ring?”

“I’m self-conscious about my tan line.”

“Dad.”

“Your mother and I aren’t divorced. Would you be happier if we were?”

“Less happy. But less confused.”

“I guess I like to cling to a little happy even at the cost of a lot of confused.”

Gabby nodded. “Mom’s hurting again. She was getting better, but now she’s not.”

“I know,” I said.

We did the dishes. I thought Gabby would say good-bye after that, citing some late school year or early summer break business. Instead, she said, “How much of this old story have you told Amos Decker?”

“Not much, yet. I’m still trying to remember it. And, as an audience, he’s a moving target.”

“Tell it to me,” Gabby said.

“Why?”

“For practice. And because I’d like to hear it. It’s set in 1952, you said? That should be an upbeat story. The old Hollywood Security was alive and kicking back then. Your later stories are too elegiac.”

“I’ll look that word up later.”

“Do.”

We sat out back, on my sandy concrete patio, and I recapped the conference in Paddy’s office that had begun with Rosa Mariutto and Guy De Felice and ended with De Felice alone. When I’d finished the intro, I hesitated, and Gabby picked up on that.

“Reached terra incognito?”

“No. Just terra not cognitoed in a long time. Let’s see. Where was I?”