You can sometimes earn a client’s buy-in by suggesting a line of questioning was their idea, and without them realizing it, they are now invested in telling you this very tale. It feels wonderful when a query unfurls a juicy confession or intimate anecdote. But it’s okay if the storytelling is mostly workmanlike. It’s remarkable how little time it takes to share a whole life—maybe thirty or forty hours. Of course, some books are written with even less collaboration. You can fill in background with research, outside interviews, and your own intuition. As long as you have learned to think—and speak—as your celebrity, you will know how to weave the info into their own story.
The night passed in a haze of caffeine and writing. As the sun rose over the burnt-out Strip, Mari brewed coffee to kick-start her morning. To kick-start her face, she completed a mini-version of her new Anke-inspired beauty routine with organic serums she’d found on markdown.
Mari was startled by a burst of noise, but it was only Vivienne stumbling back from her after-hours. Mari looked at her computer’s clock. It was 8:10 on Saturday morning. She opened her mouth, but she had worked all night, except for a quick nap. Everyone had their vices.
“You’re welcome to use my room today,” Mari said, grabbing her bag. “I have an interview, and a long meeting with Dante, so I’ll be gone until tonight.”
“Thank you a thousand million trillion times,” Vivienne said, flopping down on the bed. “Are you happy now?! Besides, you should be thanking me.”
Mari was halfway to the door. She willed herself to keep going. But she could never resist. “What?” Mari asked. She hoped, whatever V had done, Mari wouldn’t have to pay.
“You’ll never guess who was at the after-hours,” V said. “Sir Dante Ashcombe.”
Of course she couldn’t have one thing of her own. V had probably fucked him in the toilet, causing him to divorce and shelve his memoir, because the optics would be all wrong.
“Just tell me,” Mari said. “Or I’ll get it out of Dante.”
“Well, you’d have to be a pretty fucking good interrogator since he had no idea who I was. Or that I was eavesdropping while drinking champagne with his lovely wife, Fiona.”
“I didn’t request your help with Dante,” Mari said.
“It’s not Dante you should watch,” Vivienne said. She pulled off her false eyelashes. Under her makeup was the last remnant of a black eye.
“Oh, V, your eye,” Mari said, immediately regretting her tone. Like her, V was proud.
V ignored her, continued undressing. The empty feeling of being ignored reminded Mari of Dad, and she hated it. She had been trained to only push so far, so she kept silent and still.
“It’s Sigrid who pulls the strings,” Vivienne said.
“Day-to-day managers keep the trains running on time, so that’s normal,” Mari said.
“Maybe usually, but she and Fiona had the most covert fight I’ve ever seen—you know, all smiles and air-kisses on the surface, but fire and brimstone beneath. Just because Fiona suggested Dante was working too hard and should be resting before tour.”
It was possible V had some power for good within her after all.
“Maybe you misunderstood,” Mari said. “Sigrid seems quite devoted to Dante.”
“Or to what Dante can earn for them,” Vivienne said. “She was obsessed with his book. Coaching him on what he should say to you, about stuff that happened fifty years ago—I mean, please, the guy’s a sweetie, but he’s burned holes in his memory with all the reefer. And it was two in the morning. Fiona said Sigrid and the band have him booked twelve, fourteen hours a day. But the more you earn, the more you need. It’s the kind of quality problem I’d like to have.”
Vivienne gave Mari a pointed look. “Thank you,” Mari said, meaning it.
One refreshing anomaly about Vivienne was that she was indifferent to celebrities. She’d had enough weird flings with too many of them—usually the ones with drug problems—to hold them in high regard. She would enjoy the perks of their money and their fame, but she never lost her head around them. Although she had downplayed it, Vivienne had gotten close to Dante out of loyalty to Mari, unlike anyone else, who would have been agog just to land themselves at his table. It was a kind gesture. V wasn’t really a monster. Just scratched up inside with the same wounds as Mari, camouflaged in a flashier, more self-destructive package.
Mari vowed to make time. She had to survive this day, this deadline. Then it would all be okay. Maybe they could even go away together. It was hard to picture, but for once, Mari tried.
Mari was feeling exhausted and overcaffeinated, and she knew Simon’s sharp edges would further snarl her nerves. But she was also eager to see what she could get out of him. Her conversations so far, and Syd’s book, had eliminated him as a potential suspect. They had also supported Anke’s assessment that Simon had seen himself as a bandmember who should have replaced Mal. He wasn’t the only one in the inner circle with a motive, but he would have seen the biggest improvement in his circumstances after Mal’s death—if things had gone his way.
It was no surprise Simon was fifteen minutes late. Normally, she would have been polite, as Simon worked closely with Dante and had made time for her during a busy day of tour prep. But he soon made it clear a different approach would be necessary to get anywhere.
“You’re the last person I would expect Dante to hire as his ghostwriter,” Simon sneered.
“Why, because I’m a chick, and we don’t know anything about gear?”
“You said it, not me.” But he let a snort of laughter escape, which felt like a victory.
“Well, I do know Sir Dante Ashcombe is a Fender man, except for his ’59 Gibson 335, which he plays on songs that call for more of a bluesy, vintage B. B. King sound. And that while most rock guitarists favor a Marshall full stack, especially for stadium shows, Dante prefers a Fender Vibrolux, as he has for decades.”
“Listen to all the pretty words she knows,” Simon said.
“She even knows what they all mean,” Mari said. “Now let me buy you a beer.”
He didn’t pretend to protest, although it was just after nine in the morning. He wasn’t exactly pleasant, but he did give up his perch on the table’s edge and move into a chair.
After the waitress had dropped their beers, and Mari had made it clear she would be paying, Simon was as relaxed as she had seen him. It was remarkable, really, that the band and their entourage had put up with his attitude for so many years. It was usually a must for the support staff of stars to be unfailingly pleasant, or at least mellow, since their way of life necessitated lots of time together in close quarters. Mari was even more curious about this guy.
He wasn’t the least bothered when, after a few easy questions about how he had come to work for Dante, and his duties in the studio and on the road, she nudged him toward Mal.
“You must be the most veteran employee—well, except for Sigrid.”
“I was there the night Anke met Mal, and she didn’t come on the scene until after.”
“Wow, you’ve seen it all,” Mari said. “In fact, you’re one of the few people who was around on the night Mal met his tragic end—”
Before she could ask about Syd, to suggest she wasn’t suspicious of Simon, he cut her off. “Tragic?” he said. “I may be an asshole, but that guy makes me look like Mother Teresa.”
“Yes, I’ve heard he was violent, untrustworthy, abusive,” Mari said. “But he was also very young. Were you surprised when he died?”
“And here I thought you wanted me to tell you about Dante’s gear, how we achieve his trademark sound,” he said. “These questions are above my pay grade.”
“In my experience, most of a band’s entourage thinks they’re at the same pay grade as the members themselves, but perhaps you’re the one exception—”
She paused for ironic effect, and he smirked at her, drained his beer, waved for another.
“You were at practice that night, helping Dante?”
“That I was. It was a big show for ’em, and they wanted to sound sharp.”
“Even without Mal, the founding member and leader of the band?”
“Mal had vision in the early days, I’ll give him that. But by that summer, he was a drag on everything—the live sound, the overall morale. What they needed was a reliable rhythm guitarist to take his place, allow Dante to step forward, where he belonged, and shine.”
“Who did you have in mind?”
“The band could have had anyone in the world at that moment, but Clapton, Bolan, they would have just been more flash. Jack and Dante had that in spades. A working guitar player to hold down the back end of the songs, be a bridge with the rhythm section.”
Mari was starting to feel bad for Simon—he’d had a whole plan. She wondered that he had been able to remain so close to the band after such a vicious letdown. Or maybe it underlined how remarkable it was Anke had left. After only one day with the band, Mari wanted to stay.
“You and Dante arrived at practice late that night,” Mari said. “Were you together between dinner and turning up at the rehearsal space?”
“That’s my job, to be with Dante.”
“Why were you late, then?”
“Syd was supposed to pick us up, but he had taken the band’s car to score drugs for Mal,” Simon said. “So, we waited at our usual bar till he turned up.”
“Did anyone ever question Syd about Mal’s death?” Mari asked. “I heard he was fired.”
“Fired? He overdosed the day after Mal died. I found him in the loo. Resuscitated him. By the time he got out of hospital, we’d gone back to the UK for Mal’s funeral.”
“Did you read his book?”
“’Course, wanted to see if he made me look bad. Wouldn’t you?”
“And?”
“We all looked bad. But—” Simon shrugged. Syd had not made any friends in his lifetime, except maybe Mal.
“Bad, like murderers bad?”
“Cheeky,” he said, laughing. “You should read it yourself.”
“I have,” Mari said. “Why didn’t you get dropped off at ten with the rest of the band?”
Simon drained his beer. Crossed his arms against the idea of having a third, gave in. “You are going to talk to Dante for his own book, are you not?”
“We’re meeting all day.”
“Ask him, then,” he said. “I can talk downtuning. Beyond that, it’s not my tale to tell.”
Mari sighed as she turned to the gear talk that would have to be worked into Dante’s book as elegantly as possible. The only juicy detail was his aside expressing displeasure about being supplanted by Ody as Dante’s guitar tech. A lot of trouble had been taken to shoehorn Ody into this tour. Mari again wondered if it was just so Dante could spend time with his son.
Then, as Simon was talking about amp wattage and, yes, about Dante’s unique approach to downtuning, Mari had a flash of insight. As Simon had noted, he was one of the few inner circle people left who’d known Anke all this time. She tried a new tack.
“You were there the night Mal and Anke met,” she said. “Were they an obvious match?”
“She and Dante were the first to start talking,” Simon said. “But Mal caught sight of that and wanted in on the action. He could be very greedy.”
“Well, I suppose it all worked out for the best,” Mari said.
“Not for Mal, the poor bastard,” he said.
“I’m surprised you have sympathy for him.”
“Didn’t like him, but I’d have been content if he’d left the band to people who had half a brain cell to play with. I thought Anke’s plan was grand—just have him fall asleep was all.”
“Wait, you knew?”
He picked up his new beer bottle, put it to his lips.
“That definitely wasn’t in Syd’s book.”
“Syd might have been the only one who didn’t know—and Mal, of course. In a real band, one built to last like the Ramblers, there are no secrets. You can try, but everybody’ll find out.”
Of course Simon would think that because he wanted so badly to believe he was on the inside. But Mari had only been around the band’s inner circle for a week now, and she already knew a secret that had been kept from most of the players, if not all.
“Did people blame Anke?”
“Not any more than they blamed themselves.”
“How so?”
“All I can say is, if I’d known which way Mal would go, I would’ve warned Anke off,” he said. “I guess she did all right in the long run, but I wouldn’t want my daughter to wind up with any of the lot of them. Well, not Dante, he’s different—he and Fiona have a good life.”
“It does seem like women were a bit”—Mari considered her next word—“disposable.”
“You said it, not me, but yep. And you shoulda seen Anke. She was a stunner. I don’t know how to put it, except she glowed. She and I always got along well. We’re both direct, if you know what I mean. She was fierce. But still, Mal wasn’t satisfied. He went off and got that other poor girl in the family way. If Mal had lived, Anke would have been out.”
Except she was secretly having an affair with Dante, or about to launch one—a wise tactical move, although it did seem born of genuine passion. So Anke was fine. And since Simon had stayed with the band, even when he hadn’t been upgraded to rhythm guitarist, he had been fine, too. Who else had been poised for a downgrade or promotion?
“Since Anke got Mal to hire Sigrid, she would have been out, too,” Mari said. “That’s crazy, given how important she’s become to the band.”
“Anke brought Sigrid over from East Germany. You didn’t hear it from me, but—”
Mari’s breath caught as she waited for Simon to spill.
“—the overbite she had on her. Could have cut timber with those teeth. But she got herself made over. And got herself promoted. Made herself useful in the end, and still, to this day.”
Mari felt for Sigrid. She could relate. She doubled down—something crucial was here.
“You said Anke would have been out, but Dante was in love with Anke,” Mari said.
“That may be, but Dante fell in love every other week back then,” he said. “He would have moved on. It wasn’t until he became a dad that something in him changed.”
“You don’t think their relationship would have lasted, if not for Ody’s birth?”
“It didn’t anyhow, did it? Anke got lucky where she landed. Sigrid saw to that. A lady-in-waiting is only as powerful as her lady.”
Mari nodded, trying not to let on how excited she was, formulating her next question. The hair on her arms stood up, and Simon got to his feet, still sipping his beer, as Sigrid materialized.
“Enough, Simon,” Sigrid said. “If you drink like this, we will have to question the wisdom of having you out with us for this tour. For your health.”
There was no edge in Sigrid’s voice, but she was serious. She handed him a to-go coffee cup. “The driver will take you to the rehearsal space to pick up items for Dante.”
“Ta,” he said, downing an obliging sip. He nodded and, with a salute to Mari, hurried off.
Mari hoped Sigrid noticed she had ordered only one beer—and it was mostly full—unlike Simon’s three beers. But having supplied him with booze seemed to be enough of a sin.
“Sigrid, I’m so sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to get Simon in trouble.”
“No one is in trouble,” Sigrid said. “But he must pace himself. The days are long, and not everyone has the constitution of Dante,” she said. “No one has the constitution of Dante.”
“Too true,” Mari said.
The two women paused for an awkward beat. Mari was all but certain Sigrid had been eavesdropping, but she couldn’t see an obvious hiding place. And Sigrid had given her blessing for the meeting, had seemed pleased at Mari’s suggestion it would take work off Dante’s shoulders. Sigrid stood there, innocent as could be, extending a holder of to-go coffees to Mari.
“I am on a coffee run,” Sigrid said. “I am aware you prefer tea. But would you like one?”
“Yes, thank you,” Mari said, gently pulling out a cup. “So, I’ll see you—”
“You will see us at eleven, as we have agreed,” Sigrid said. “Ciao.”
Mari tilted her face for the air-kisses, sitting only when Sigrid had walked away. Simon had suggested Sigrid had more influence when she had first arrived than would have seemed likely. But it was obvious he had a personal agenda on just about every front. What was more surprising was the possibility he had known about the Quaaludes. That everyone had known.
There was some significance there, some key to the inner circle; Mari just had to see it. Until she could, her best hope was to keep asking Dante questions, she supposed. Because from what the celebrity doctor and everyone else, except Anke, had told her, the Quaaludes had been only a blip in the grand toxicology report of Mal’s life. Everyone in the band’s circle had been routine users. And they had all been sick of Mal’s bullshit. Even if Anke had drugged him, it wasn’t a secret, and no one seemed to think it had caused his death. Not even Syd, whom no one believed anyhow, and who had caused his own premature death. Mari needed greater access.
Then it came to her: Izzy. She seemed inclined to help. Mari knew from experience, assistants were often the most powerful people to befriend—they could smooth over gaffes, offer access and intel, if so inclined. Make phone messages and emails disappear, if crossed.
Izzy hesitated on the threshold of Dante’s suite, surveying Mari.
“Izzy, I’m sorry I’m late,” Mari said. “Are they waiting on me? Ugh, I’m so embarrassed. I was typing up notes for today, and I lost track of time. I swear I wasn’t playing the slots.”
Izzy gave Mari a quizzical look. She had witnessed everything during her tenure with the band, and Mari suspected she could see right through her. But would she help her anyway?
“Morning,” she said. “Your meeting isn’t until eleven. You’re quite early, actually.”
Mari held up her phone, as if checking the time. “No? Yes! Now I am embarrassed.”
They both stood on the threshold of the suite. Mari was an insider because she worked for Dante. But one drink together was only that, and she respected Izzy’s caution. Opting for the nuclear option, Mari said a silent eulogy for her untouched matcha latte, handing it to Izzy.
“Have you had the Japanese tea latte from the Urth Caffé downstairs?” Mari asked. “It’s like a seven-day juice cleanse with a caffeine buzz. I grabbed you one.”
“Thanks?” Izzy said, trying to catch all the ping-pong balls of conversation Mari was serving up. But she pulled Mari into the suite, lowering her voice.
“I have my own office,” she said. “Correction, Dante and Sigrid both have suites, which means I have the lone room down here. You can hang there until eleven.”
“You’re an angel,” Mari said. “Of course. Can’t work in these circles and not have the personality of the Dalai Lama dancing backup for Beyoncé. I knew I liked you.” Izzy’s back stiffened. “But I’ve been wrong about the Dalai Lama before.”
A ripple of laughter passed along the back of Izzy’s Alexander McQueen sweaterdress, where it was bisected by a bold silver zipper. Mari fell silent. She was always on her best behavior in her clients’ private spaces. Except for Anke’s journal. And she had paid for that.
“This is primo,” Izzy said, sipping her latte as she closed the door to her office.
Izzy’s phone, resting on the coffee table, buzzed. She snatched it up. Close as the two were sitting, Mari could hear the call.
“Come to Dante’s room,” Sigrid said. “We need you before he starts with the writer. And watch her. I don’t believe she has worked with a star of his caliber. And you saw what happened with Axel. When he went AWOL, I have to clean out his room—empty bottles up to your elbows. But no documents or notes. We don’t need another drunk and disorderly on our hands.”
“Righto,” Izzy said, offering Mari an apologetic grimace. “On my way.”
Izzy zipped to the door. Mari had never witnessed anyone throwing hairbrushes or f-bombs at their assistants, but of course she had heard the legends. And Sigrid had an imposing strength behind her pleasantries and accommodating smile.
Grabbing a stack of printouts, Izzy left. Her laptop was open, and Mari couldn’t help but notice the screen was full of news items about Mal’s death. Was Sigrid boning up Dante on his story? That was the impression Vivienne had gotten last night.
The coffee table—set up with a laptop, calendar, and stacks of paperwork, as well as a water bottle and Weleda hand cream—was clearly Izzy’s improvised office. The doorknob turned. To deflect any suspicion of snooping, she stood quickly, purposefully tipping Izzy’s cup, splashing liquid across her computer. As Izzy entered, her gaze jumped to her ruined keyboard, which dripped green liquid from where Mari held it aloft, as if she’d just rescued it.
“Bollocks,” Izzy said. “What happened?”
“I’m so sorry. I was digging in my bag for my mini-recorder, so I’d be ready. I must have tipped over your drink. I’ll pay to fix your computer, of course.”
Izzy started to laugh. Mari was jittery with nerves and caffeine, but relief crept in.
“Seriously, pet, your face. Don’t worry about a thing. It’s all on the cloud. I’ll pilfer a laptop from the production office. I’m the only one who knows how to turn them on. They still message London via fax. I have to sleep with the travel fax by my bed—” Izzy stopped short. “That’s not, you wouldn’t—none of that is for the book.”
“I’m sure Dante’s fans would be titillated by his fax habits, but we’re already overlong. I’m desperate to keep us on topic.” Mari glanced casually down at Izzy’s open computer. “Oh, great, you were pulling articles on Mal for Dante. He wants to talk about Mal today. Could you please print me a copy of those stories—you know, in case Dante’s recall is a little—foggy?”
“Ace, he told you about his memory thing, then—that’s a relief,” Izzy said. “I’m never sure how to handle it if he doesn’t.”
Mari suspected there was more to Dante’s “memory thing” than anyone was letting on, but at least she now had a truer idea of the landscape. And maybe it was because he had just gone over them with the first writer, or because Mari knew how to draw him out, but Dante was proving to be full of hilarious and heartfelt stories from all eras of the band’s reign. Feeling less worried about whether she could get what she needed from him to fill out his book, Mari decided she could safely turn the conversation back to Mal’s death, as the clock ticked down. But although Mari had implied otherwise to Izzy, she’d gotten no promise from Dante to talk about Mal. Izzy had just ushered Mari into Dante’s suite and returned to her own office. After their usual warm hellos, Mari studied her notes for an entry point. Dante started fidgeting with his Zippo.
“Have I told you about my honey, luv?” Dante asked.
Not the goddamn bees again, Mari thought, smiling and nodding. “Yes, let’s start there.”
“Golden,” he said.
“Which brings to mind your wonderful lyric Love like golden honey from your hive,” Mari improvised the best pivot she could. “Now, with Jack and Mal writing for the band, it must have been hard to get your songs included on the albums. How did you handle your frustration?”
“Dante has never been the least bit insecure about his role in the band,” Sigrid said.
“Even with Mal clinging to a leadership role he was too far gone to handle?”
“You want to talk frustration with Mal,” Dante said. “That was all Jack.”
“You didn’t get worked up when Mal was burning the house down around you?”
“Getting worked up ain’t my scene, pet. When did that happen? I remember, of course, but if you could just give me a wee jog. We were in—”
“Yes, you remember, Dante, we were in LA during Mal’s final summer,” Sigrid said. “Mal had gotten it into his head he should have a séance.”
“That’s right, he was lighting—”
“—candles,” Sigrid picked up the thread.
“Candles, that’s what I said, and his kaftan went up, like a string of firecrackers. But a lot of fires were happening back then—literal and metaphorical. Come on, baby, light my fire, an’ all that? We weren’t the knights of the realm we’ve since matured into, were we?”
“Yes, good point, you were babes in the woods—barely twenty-four. And full of fire. I know toward the end Mal had to be coddled. But you mentioned you came to blows on occasion. The first time you punched Mal, you must have been frustrated. Angry. Over the edge.”
“Fucking pathetic worm hit Anke in her lovely face. I couldn’t not.”
“Although it must be admitted, Anke could be provocative,” Sigrid said.
“I’m surprised to hear you say that,” Mari said. “I think of Anke as so elegant and cool—like a goddess, almost. Above the petty fray of us mere mortals.”
“I like that, I like that,” Dante said. “Write it just like that in the book.”
Dante had slid toward Mari and was gesturing with his cigarette. He was so present in his body, the weight of his attention was magnetic, heady. It made Mari realize how distracted most people were, only giving half their focus—like her, for example, always scheming beneath the words she spoke, trying to shape the narrative to her favor. Anke was like Dante. Immediate. You either had her, or you didn’t. Together, they must have been combustible.
“I’m just making sure I have that down in my notes,” Mari said. She was typing her own observations now, while throwing out asides to buy her time.
“Coolio,” Dante said.
Mari became aware of the weight of a stare and looked to Dante. He was stretching his gnarled fingers across imaginary keys on the coffee table as he hummed “Light My Fire.” It was Sigrid. When Mari caught her eye, she smiled, but she’d been watching Mari closely.
“What was Mal like as a bandmate?” Mari quickly asked, to break the tension she felt.
“There are several adequate Ramblers biographies I could point you to.”
Sigrid smiled warmly, as if she wasn’t trying to brush off Mari’s inquiry. “If we were in London, I would give you copies. But we are a band on the run these days.”
“Yes, but what did you think of Mal as a bandmate, Dante?” Mari kept on.
“We used to call him Mad Mal, didn’t we? Toward the end, I mean. It was sad, really. He went away for treatment twice that year, and he only lived to see midsummer.”
“Treatment?”
“Nervous exhaustion. That’s what management called it to the press. I guess it was the drugs, but he was always a few notes short of an octave if you ask me. Jack was the one who wanted him in the band, not I. Well, at least until he didn’t anymore. And there was the matter of the publishing and that whole ball and chain. I stayed out of it.”
“Out of what?”
“Everything, if I could help it.”
“Did anyone ever think to tell Mal no?”
“‘No’ wasn’t in our vocabulary, luv. We were the poster boys for a Dionysian revolution, not three square meals and a pint on payday. That was the whole point of all we stood for—you must say yes to everything.”
“Did anyone consider the possible fallout when Mal moved in his new girlfriend?”
Dante exchanged a long stare with Sigrid, but Mari couldn’t read it.
“We didn’t think it through,” he said. “Things just happened. It was a long time ago.”
Mari was no expert on memory loss, but she was beginning to be sure at least some of Dante’s issues were a way to avoid answering questions that got too close—but to what?
“You had practice the night Mal died,” Mari pressed on. “Yet he wasn’t there. Why?”
This time when Dante looked to Sigrid, it seemed clear he wasn’t dissembling—he was floundering, seeking answers.
“You recall how Mal was crazy at dinner,” Sigrid said. “He made such a scene at the restaurant, the driver took him back to the house. You and Simon went by to check on him. He didn’t like you smothering him, and he cut your guitar strings, as if this was the height of wit. You wanted to hit him. Anke, she got between you two. She said she would take care of him. She sent you away. The rest of the story you heard later. About the Mandrax she gave him.”
“Mandrax?” Mari asked. So, this was the story Simon had said wasn’t his to tell.
“That’s what we called them in the UK,” Dante said. “Everyone did them, especially Anke, that summer. Quaaludes. Liquid Sunshine was my nickname. I still maintain Mal stole most of his drugs, but if she did drug him, I’m not surprised. Anke was not to be messed with, and he was a nightmare by then. Violent. Ugly. Maybe she just wanted some peace and quiet.”
“You were at practice,” Mari said. “How can you know what happened at the house?”
“He knows because Simon knows, and if he knows, everyone knows,” Sigrid said.
“It’s not important,” Mari said, wanting to protest that not everyone knew, but trying to avoid a confrontation. “I just meant who knows what happened, except those who were there?”
“This is the kind of night you do not forget, ever,” Sigrid said. “Dante, we talked about this when we wrote your proposal. Do not give the power to Anke. Do not protect her. When did she ever think of you? You tell the writer the whole story for your book. Start with the Mandrax.”
He nodded, and as Mari considered the “we” who had written his proposal, she again wondered about their relationship—she had seen managers who wielded total control. It had surprised her until she’d witnessed how insecure some celebrities could be. Sigrid’s influence looked friendly but seemed ironclad, even if it was supposed to be for Dante’s good. If Dante was as liberated as he claimed, what role did Sigrid play in creating or putting boundaries on that freedom? Whatever the truth was, he was adept at appearing as if life itself did his bidding.
Again, he nodded at Sigrid, but he held off on speaking.
“She served him four, in his tea—” Sigrid prompted him.
Dante gave Sigrid a long look that seemed full of reluctance. Lit another smoke.
“Four Quaaludes was a king’s ransom,” he said. “But not for Mal. He was a hoover for drugs, girls. Sucked them all up, then came back for seconds. No care for anything. Or anyone.
“Drugs weren’t what was wrong with Mal,” he continued. “If anything, they set him straight. Once, back in London, we got some acid. I took one hit and lay in bed tickling myself with a feather. For eight hours. I had the consciousness of a sticky toffee pudding. Mal took three hits. He was fine. Went out to see the Yardbirds. He even sat in on sitar. Came home, wrote a song. A good one. You know how some fellas have a wooden leg? Can drink the bar and still be standing? Mal was like that with drugs. He metabolized them like nothing, like fuel.”
“Sure, there are the legends—Keith Moon. Iggy Pop. But is there any chance your recollection might be a little, shall we say, impaired, by your own altered state?”
“Could have been that night, or any Tuesday in May. He was the same, always. Pot. Hash. Mandrax. Acid. Dope. It was yet another reason he was no fun. Wins over all the girls. Does all the drugs. Gets into fights with his shadow. What’s to like about that in a bandmate?”
This was as the celebrity doctor had suggested—Mal had probably been “sober” when he left Anke’s room. Making a quick, bolded note to go back to Anke’s description of that night, Mari returned her focus to Dante. His memory had switched on, and he was rolling.
“Yeah, Anke was at the house, but Mal stayed behind with his latest conquest. She was a sixteen-year-old model. Gorgeous girl, I don’t mind saying. But just a child. She phoned a little after I got to practice, said Mal was too shattered to come meet us, which, mind you, there was no such thing for him. I figured she wanted him all to herself, and it was easier, given the state of him that summer. The second call came in later. Mal had drowned in the pool. No one was surprised. Or devastated, truth be told. He had been our mate once, sure. But for the last little while, he’d been a drug-addled, fame-hungry monster. Anyone who could look into Anke’s beautiful face and mar it with his fist. He got what was coming to him.”
“Yes, but you were sad,” Sigrid said. “We all were sad when Mal was no longer with us.”
“I’m sorry for your loss.” Even though it had happened fifty years ago, Mari paused a respectful beat. “Was Anke usually at band practice?” she continued.
“Not always. But during our time in LA, it was different,” Dante said. “One long midsummer’s night dream.”
“Was she there, that night, even for part of practice?”
“You know how Dante’s memory is,” Sigrid said.
“Yes, thank you, Sigrid,” Mari said with a fake smile.
“What was the mood before Mal died, I mean, at least in your mind, Dante?” Mari said.
Dante gazed off into the distance, as if watching an old home movie.
“In that moment, summer of ’69, I’d pulled the sword from the stone. Anke and I had been sneaking around for more than a month, which, in retrospect, was when he met”—turning to Sigrid—“what was her name?”
“Nancy,” Sigrid said.
“That’s right. We knew it would come to a head. I was afraid Mal might kill Anke if she tried to leave him. I once saw him smash a guitar he didn’t like the tone of, into bits. It was a beaut, but it was like, if he wasn’t going to play it, he didn’t want anyone else to, either. But when Anke became pregnant, we knew we would have to tell him.”
Mari made a herculean effort to appear calm. Had Dante killed Mal to be with Anke? No, that was crazy. It was 1969—they’d traded girls back and forth like sharing a joint. But he had loved Anke with an incredible passion. And Dante had feared Mal might hurt Anke. Had he killed Mal to protect her? Holding him under the pool water, after Mal had left Anke’s room, those four Quaaludes in his system? Maybe he had implicated Anke in his proposal to avoid the revelation of his own role in Mal’s death, and Mari hadn’t wanted to see it. Had Mari allowed her romanticism to blind her? But why commit murder for Anke and then implicate her?
Mari had allowed a lull in the conversation. Dante and Sigrid were both staring at her.
“Did you have any fear, possibly, the father of Anke’s baby had just died? I mean, if—”
“Not to be crude, but the only thing Mal could get up by that point was a bar tab.”
“But Nancy became pregnant that summer.”
“I’d say that’s between Nancy and the vicar, innit? Not that she’ll ever dare to write her memoir, I’d imagine. Jack had the band’s lawyers pay her off years ago.”
Now that was an intriguing footnote, but before Mari could ask more, Sigrid stepped in.
“I can understand Mal must make some appearance in Dante’s memoir, in stories of the band’s early years, but I cannot see how this is relevant,” Sigrid said.
“Of course. We’ve been capturing some inspired material today, especially about the ’70s and ’80s. Once we do our final interview tomorrow, I’ll have enough for a sample, to get the voice down. Speaking of, if you could please send me—or my agent—the first writer’s files.”
“As you can imagine, we have much to prepare for the tour,” Sigrid deflected.
“Exactly, I don’t want to waste any more time after what happened with the other writer.”
“Axel was a foolish man,” Sigrid said. “He kept his focus all over the place. This is the book of Dante, not Mal. You will not make the same mistake. We have talked enough on Mal.”
“Thank you for the direction,” Mari said, keeping her voice bright and her recorder running. People often said something candid after she closed her computer for the day.
“The nice thing about books is you can go beyond the sound bite and dig into all the complicated ways we feel about the people we love.”
“No sound bites here,” Dante laughed. “Not really my cup of bourbon.”
“Which is why you’re a natural author,” Mari said. She knew she was pandering, but she was too preoccupied to be authentic. She thought of her conversation with Ody and his certainty that his father would never harm Anke. If Dante wouldn’t hurt Mal, either, had anyone?