High Risk 6.4

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[Continuing chapter six]

“This probably hasn’t been a good day for you,” Desiree said as she poured a generous slug of something amber into a glass.

“That would qualify as an understatement,” Casey said. “If I thought that Hollywood was capable of understatement.”

“Which we aren’t.” She disappeared behind the living-room bar for a second, emerging with a siphon. Casey nodded, and she spritzed some soda into his glass.

The Scotch was magnificent, rich and smooth and with just a hint of smoke from a peat fire. It had been over a decade since he’d tasted anything this good: For a moment, Casey was back in the 85 Squadron mess, arguing with Bishop and Springs and the others about the best way to sneak up on a Hun. Then the memory of Lily Cross’s battered body jolted across his mind, like a shot inserted into some Soviet director’s montage.



The moment passed, and he sat down beside Desiree on a long leather couch. “So what happened?” she asked. “Sorry if that was a bit crude,” she added, seeing his reaction. “I’m not famous for tact. If you don’t want to talk about it—”

“No, that’s all right,” he said. “I haven’t had a chance to really talk about this—those men back there don’t count—and I think I need to.” He repeated the story of the interrogation, with a touch less profanity than he’d used in telling it to McMahon. When he’d finished he asked, “How corrupt do you think the police are? Hogan said they were pretty much all bent.”

“I wouldn’t say they were all bad,” she said, slowly. “But most of the important ones seem to be.”

“I can’t think of any other reason why Clark would still be after me. I spent hours in that police station, being harassed by a pair of idiots, when it should have been obvious to the greenest man on the force that I couldn’t have done this horrible thing. I scarcely knew the woman. I didn’t even know how she died until McMahon told me tonight.”

Desiree laughed bitterly. “The reason Clark’s going after you is easy to figure. You’re in the movie business now, Casey. That makes you vulnerable as far as Clark and his type are concerned.”

“You’ve got to be kidding. I can’t afford to pay him off. I can’t afford to pay my landlady. And you saw what was going on in there; the studio isn’t going to lift a finger for me.”

“Then you just have to make sure that you’re close enough to the studio that when our district attorney protects us you get a bit of shelter too.”

“I admit I’m surprised about that,” Casey said. “I thought the new fellow was supposed to end this sort of thing.”

Desiree snorted. “Fitts?” She made the word sound like an obscenity. “He certainly promised a cleaner D.A.’s office. But he’s just like all the rest. Look at the Doheny case. He folded quickly enough on that one.”

Casey tried to remember where he’d heard the name. “Oil millionaire, right?”

“Son of a multimillionaire, yes,” Desiree said. “In the Teapot Dome scandal up to his neck, apparently. And six months or so before he’s supposed to testify in the big bribery trial, he’s murdered, supposedly by his secretary. Who then obligingly commits suicide with the same gun.”

“I remember now,” Casey said. The murder had happened in mid-February; the mechanics at the garage had talked about it pretty much non-stop for a day or two. He hadn’t followed the story in the papers; papers were luxuries he couldn’t afford at the time.

“I remember it too,” Desiree said. “I remember Fitts announcing on the Monday that there’d be a sweeping investigation. One day later, he wraps the whole thing up. In spite of the fact that the doctor lied about the position of the body, and everyone knows he lied.” She drained her drink and got up to pour herself another.

“Buron Fitts is a punk,” she said, “just like Asa Keyes was. The only difference between them is that Fitts seems to like Hollywood a bit more, and maybe money a bit less. “

“You don’t think too much of the law enforcement profession, do you?” Casey smiled at her.

“Why should I? Do you remember the William Desmond Taylor murder? Bill Taylor was a friend of mine, and look at what the law enforcement profession did—and didn’t—do about that. In any other city in the world the guilty woman would have been arrested and tried and maybe even executed by now. It’s been over seven years since Bill was murdered, and they aren’t even trying anymore.”

Casey remembered the scandal about Taylor’s death. He’d been barnstorming at the time, but it had been in just about every paper in the country—even up in Canada—so even the pilots knew about the director’s mysterious murder. “I didn’t realize he was a friend of yours. You don’t look old enough to have been working in Hollywood in 1922.”

“Oh, you smooth-tongued devil,” she said. “I’ve been out here almost ten years. I started when I was sixteen—do you have any idea how many fifteen- and sixteen- and seventeen-year-old girls got dragged by their mothers to Hollywood back then? I’m lucky I didn’t end up married to Chaplin.”

“How old was Lily Cross?”

“Eighteen or nineteen, I think. I don’t know a lot about her, I’m afraid. She was registered with Central Casting, that much I know.”

“Miss Adams said they’d lived together once.”

“That’s possible. Eve’s up from Central Casting herself. All of that bushwa in the fan magazines covers a small piece of truth, Casey. Sometimes girls can be discovered while working as extras.”

“That’s what happened with Lily Cross?”

“Near as I can tell. As I said, I didn’t concern myself with her too much. She was hired as an extra for a speakeasy scene we shot on the first day. By the end of the week Jerry had given her a small speaking role and she’d been signed to a contract.”

“She had everything going her way.”

“And a lot of good it did her.” Desiree finished making her drink and took a sip. “How long have you been here?”

“Two years,” Casey said. “I was in Texas while they were making Wings, and figured this might be a good place to find work. Barnstorming had gone bust, and I couldn’t get work as a mail pilot. Thought I’d be able to get a job on an airline run by some fellows I knew during the war, but that didn’t pan out.”

She looked at him for a moment before replying. “Seems to me you’ve been wandering for the last decade.”

“You make that sound like a bad thing.” He laughed, though he didn’t like the way the laugh sounded. “I haven’t exactly had a lot of luck in sunny California. I just can’t seem to get motivated to leave. Moving on’s not as easy as it was a few years ago.”

“I know what you mean,” she said. “Maybe better than you think I do.”

Casey paused for a moment, wondering what she’d meant by that. “I’m beginning to think,” he began.

“All of the best ideas start that way.” He glared at her. “Sorry,” she said.

“I’m beginning to think that maybe I should really do what I was joking about back in the library. Maybe I ought to try my hand at solving this murder. After all, if the police are more interested in blackmailing your studio, how much time are they going to spend looking into the death of an extra?”

“Is there an amount of time less than ‘none’?” Desiree asked. “I think that’s a splendid idea, Casey.”

“You do?” That surprised him a bit. There were so many ways this project could have been considered bone-stupid.

“And I think that I should help you.”

“What? Oh, no. No. I appreciate the offer, thanks, but no just the same.”

“Oh, come on, Casey. I have a lot to offer.” She gave him another of her wicked grins, and leaned over to take his empty glass from his hand. Casey had to make a deliberate effort to keep his eyes directed at her face.

“For example: have you ever solved a murder?”

Casey shook his head. “Not unless you count figuring out who shot down whom. Sometimes aerial combat seemed like murder.”

“That doesn’t count. And I have solved a murder. In my first film for Monarch, in fact. Dear Suspect; I made it with Don Snider. He’s a very good director, and he wrote the scenario too, and I learned a lot from it and from him. I’ve read all of Conan Doyle, and plenty of Hammett and Edgar Wallace. I know just about everything a body needs to know about bodies, discovering the murderers of.”

“You’ve got to be kidding,” Casey said. “Miming in a movie isn’t the same as actually solving a real crime. And mystery novels aren’t like real life at all. They’re totally unbelievable. If solving murders was as easy as those writers make it out to be, everybody would be doing it.”

“You should read more,” Desiree said. “You might actually learn something. For example: I know that you had at least one serious crash before you came to Hollywood. I’d guess that it happened during the war.”

Casey stopped in mid-rejoinder. “What, is my limp that obvious?”

“No, it isn’t,” Desiree said. “And that’s precisely the point, you fool. Ninety-nine people out of a hundred wouldn’t notice it. But it’s my job to observe people and notice things, Casey. That’s how an actress develops her craft. And what I’ve noticed about you is how hard you try not to make that limp noticeable.

“And that’s the kind of thing I can do for you. Not to mention the fact that I know all of the likely suspects.”

“There’s something to be said for that, I guess.” Casey got to his feet and began pacing. “Damn it, though, it still isn’t a good idea. On all the evidence, there’s a man out there who didn’t hesitate to brutally beat a woman. The only way I could conceive of you helping me is if you stay away from doing anything dangerous.”

“If I don’t have to do anything dangerous,” she said, “I’m not interested.” She reached for the decanter. “Have another Scotch. It might help you see things more clearly.”

Next     Prologue    Chapter One    Chapter Two    Chapter Three    Chapter Four    Chapter Five
Chapter Six