The Pictures

by Guy Bolton

  “Would you like something to drink?”

  “What are you drinking?”

  He winced. “Pink Lady.”

  “I’ll have one too. Sounds . . . interesting.”

  O’Neill thumbed at his menu. “I hope you don’t mind coming here.”

  “Oh, that’s fine. Easy to get to.”

  “Oh, good. Yeah, I eat lunch here sometimes.” Very often, in fact. Sometimes every day.

  “So do you know what’s good here?”

  “The penne comes highly recommended.”

  “Really? By who?”

  “Well . . . the waitress. She said it was good.”

  O’Neill played with his wrists as Gracie continued to look at the menu. She smiled, then placed it down in front of her. “Decided. Seafood penne.”

  He’d never tried it. “Good choice,” he said, “I’ll call her over.” O’Neill turned around with his finger in the air but it became clear pretty quickly the waitress was ignoring him. “She’ll come over when she’s ready,” he said, turning back to Gracie. “No rush, I guess.”

  After a few awkward seconds Gracie said, “Well. It’s, um . . . nice to meet you. My aunt and your mom. It’s like they’re conspiring against us.”

  “Yes,” said O’Neill, “my mother can be very . . . persuasive.”

  “You needed persuading?”

  “No, not me,” he said, suddenly worried. “Your aunt.”

  “Relax, I was only kidding. You know we’ve actually met before.”

  “Really?”

  “I was six years old. You were eleven or so. I had a birthday party and my aunt invited you and your mom. I remember one of the girls kissed you and you cried.”

  “Wow.” O’Neill couldn’t help feeling self-satisfied. “A girl kissed me?”

  “And you cried,” she reminded him with a chuckle.

  The waitress approached their table and brought out a little notepad.

  “You ready to order yet?” she asked, scratching her nose with the knuckle of one finger. “I got a cigarette break in five minutes.”

  Gracie pointed at her menu. “Can I ask you . . . What’s the seafood penne like?”

  The waitress looked at her with something approaching annoyance. “You like seafood?”

  “Yes.”

  “You like pasta?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you’ll like it.”

  After she left with their orders, O’Neill leaned over the table. “She really is mean, isn’t she?”

  Gracie laughed and Patrick chuckled back. That was the second time she’d laughed in as many minutes and he hoped it wasn’t the last.

  O’Neill wasn’t aware of everything they said that evening but he knew he was relaxed enough to talk freely; he was pretty convinced that Gracie felt the same because when their food came he realized that both of them had barely paused for breath.

  “So am I right in thinking you work in fashion?”

  “God, no. That’s so embarrassing. My aunt always tells everyone I do. I work in textiles. A textiles factory. We also make shoes.”

  “And what do you do there?”

  “I’m a secretary. In the shoe department. I graduated from secretarial school two summers ago. This is my second job.”

  Gracie was honest and open and it made him feel like he could talk to her without constantly worrying he looked foolish. “Interesting,” he said. “You like it?”

  “Not really. But I do get free shoes.”

  “That’s pretty good.”

  “Well mostly they’re men’s shoes.”

  “Huh. Well, I could always do with another pair.”

  Gracie held her fork out to one side. With her other she brushed her hair behind her ear. “Maybe if we go out for dinner again I’ll get you some,” she said quietly with a nervous smile.

  O’Neill flushed, with pleasure or embarrassment he wasn’t sure. “I’d like that,” he said. “I’d like that very much.”

  When they’d finished their meal and ordered another drink, their conversation took a more personal turn. There was an ease between them and as they got to know each other better, both felt more willing to probe into each other’s backgrounds.

  When O’Neill told her he was a detective she said openly, “Quite some shadow, I guess. With your father being so famous, and all.”

  He was surprised by her frankness but not put off by it. “Yeah. I think about him a lot. I guess people compare us. I do too. I think about what he’d do in different situations.” People said a lot of things about Quinlan O’Neill, quite a few bad things too, but no one ever doubted his integrity as an officer of the law. He was what people termed “good police.” But could they say the same about his son?

  Gracie dabbed at the corner of her mouth with a napkin. “So were you involved in those shootings at that Hollywood party? You know, with your job?”

  “Um. Yeah. I was there.”

  Her eyes lit up. “You were there? Is it true what they say? Did that celebrity detective wrestle the shooter to the ground? Held him ’til the police arrived?”

  The alcohol must have got to him because his face felt unusually warm. “No. That’s, um, not how it happened.”

  “You’re kidding? Those papers make that stuff up, don’t they? Like saying Greta Garbo called the police. Wow. I’m so impressed. You’re a real hero. I mean, that love triangle thing sounded pretty incredible. Can you believe it?”

  “Yeah, yes,” he said, not quite believing it at all. “The love triangle.” Even after all these weeks, something about the Loew House shootings still bothered him. Unconvinced by the stories in the press, he’d tried to make a connection between Stanley, Rochelle and Campbell but Captain Simms had brought him into his office and instructed him to delve no further into Stanley’s suicide or the Loew House shootings. He was cajoled into dropping any attempts at reopening an investigation and was instructed to focus on new, incoming crimes.

  He’d felt embarrassed, of course. He’d betrayed his intuition and bowed down to the politics of the department. His father would have been ashamed, but the truth was that these situations had become increasingly common for O’Neill. He wasn’t capable of standing up for himself. Late at night he found himself dreaming of avenging these past affronts, replaying conversations in his head, telling his seniors where to stick their orders, altering the course of history with pithy retorts and swift punches to the jaw.

  But dreaming changed nothing.

  Chapter 27

  July 7th

  Craine’s promotion came with the start of the department’s second quarter, when senior command could use the occasion to boast of the new administration’s latest quarterly crime statistics. Craine would be their talisman, their Buffalo Bill of the coastal West, heroic detective symbolic of the new police department’s achievements.

  And so it was, at three minutes after noon, in front of a full briefing room of work colleagues and press delegates, that Craine was awarded his two single silver bars by the Los Angeles Chief of Police. Shaking Chief Davidson’s large and club-like hand, he glanced to the front row where Celia once sat. She used to come to these events. She was present when he was promoted to Sergeant. That was before she was sick, before she decided she bitterly hated what he did for a living.

  His thoughts turned to Gale. If during the first few days and nights their conversations had been awkward, a strange combination of addled laughter and prolonged silence, then they had settled into a more relaxed rapport and began to see each other every spare moment they had, Craine even staying at the house on Easton Drive when Gale decided to move back home. They never met with friends, although she admitted she had told Joan, whom Craine had always known as a gossip. It was a private relationship, and he preferred it that way.

  They laughed a lot together, which was novel for Craine. Often they would stay up all night talking about books they had read, pictures they had seen, places they wanted to visit. They were planning a future t
ogether. Rarely, though, did they talk about family, past or present. He turned away her questions about Michael, told her very little about Celia. She didn’t discuss her marriage with Herbert and he, in turn, didn’t ask. Only once, before Independence Day, had Gale pushed him to introduce her to Michael. Craine had resisted. He knew he needed to address some issues with his son soon enough but now didn’t seem like the right time. If there was ever going to be a right time. It was as if their old lives had never existed. They were newborns, blissfully happy with new opportunity.

  But still, sometimes a voice inside his head told him that this happiness was borrowed and didn’t belong to him. The rug would be pulled from underneath him at any moment. And no matter what he told himself, he knew that happiness couldn’t be confused with contentment. They weren’t the same thing.

  His distant reverie was cut short by the cold metal Lieutenant bars thrust into his palms. Flashbulbs blinded him, then the room thundered into applause as the well-wishers rose for a standing ovation. Flanked either side by the District Attorney and the Los Angeles Mayor, Craine posed for pictures, pumping Chief Davidson’s hand until he could feel the blood squeezed from his palms like a wet sponge.

  He should feel better about this than he did. He felt lousy, but he wasn’t sure why. Doubt whispered in his ear. Maybe because your promotion is an embarrassment, Craine. Maybe because it’s a complete sham.

  He shut the screaming apostle Thomas from his head. He should think positively. He had earned a new start. A nascent relationship with a woman he was lucky to have. A career in the higher echelons of the Bureau. He’d made three thousand dollars from his percentage of the studio bonus, and now his efforts were being recognized with a promotion. So what was it that was bothering him so much?

  Off the stage now, through the gauntlet like a grinning bride. Posing, shaking hands. Through gold trim and lace piping, he spotted Simms cheering from the third row, his dress blues freshly pressed, the brass and nickel polished. Peterson was behind him, the clichéd wink, hands applauding high above his head, leading the cheers. Elaine the steadfast, the sturdy constant in his life, dabbed at her eyes with a proud handkerchief. He shook a few more familiar hands, ignored the jealous associates from the Bureau. They’d never liked him anyway. That grousing Patrick O’Neill was at the back, hands by his sides, a sober look on his face. Avoid his scrutinizing eyes like the plague.

  But still the doubt remained.

  Afterward he went upstairs to the Bureau and started feeling better almost immediately. Elaine helped him pack the few personal possessions he had in his old office and moved them to his new corner office down the hall from Simms. She brought him his mail, presenting him with a sealed package from Chicago R. & I. labeled Private and Confidential.

  “This one came in this morning. Should have arrived last month. Not sure what the holdup was.”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Can I get you a coffee?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Nothing, thank you. Oh, actually yes, my car, the insurance for my car—any news?” In spite of a better parking space nearer the elevator, he was still driving unmarked police cars to and from work. His insurance paperwork had yet to come through, one of those typical administrative holdups that never got resolved.

  “It’s with Accounts for consideration,” she screwed up her face apologetically. “It was an expensive car.”

  “Yes, yes it was. Not your fault.”

  “I’ll chase them up.” She lingered in the doorway. “Congratulations on your promotion, Lieutenant Craine.”

  A weak smile from Craine as she closed the door behind her. He sat back in his chair and tapped his fingernails on the desk. A wider, better desk, in fact. Mahogany maybe, or good enough to pass for mahogany. Brass knobs. Telephone. Not new. A little old, actually. Was that rust on the dial? He should have it replaced. But now he had a window where he could see buildings, other buildings, not just another brick wall.

  LIEUTENANT CRAINE was already painted on the frosted glass. The polished wood floor was covered in a Gulistan rug. It didn’t matter that it was cream. Maybe he should embrace Art Deco—modernize. Wasn’t this a new beginning, after all? Things were looking good for him. He’d done well for himself.

  He turned over the mail package and tore open the bindings: it was the Chicago file on Campbell. He stared at it for a long moment, unsure whether he wanted to look at the contents. Could he be bothered to work today? There was a stamp on one side indicating it was lost in transit. This should have been delivered weeks ago. Inside he found Campbell’s Chicago criminal history and a brief employment record. He thumbed through the file. Clipped to a carbon copy of a R.A.P. sheet was a set of black-and-white booking photographs, front and profile pictures taken when Campbell was arrested for distributing heroin. He looked at the man in the photos and shifted uneasily in his chair. Something wasn’t right. His fingers tightened round the card. His head started to throb. His office suddenly felt stifling. He looked closer at the lines of Campbell’s facial features in the grays and blacks of the prints.

  Shaking, Craine dropped the pictures on the desk.

  The man in the pictures wasn’t the Loew House shooter.

  That night, as he lay awake beside Gale in her bed, the migraine slowly returned, that soft pulse behind his eyeballs building into a heavy thump until finally it seemed to shake his whole skull.

  Craine tried to tell himself that it was all in his imagination, even though he knew full well that was a lie. If the shooter wasn’t Campbell, then who was he? And why would he kill Rochelle? Why would he be in Campbell’s apartment? Questions circled around his head like a vicious fever, pulling him away from the safety of sleep like enchanting sirens calling him toward the rocks.

  When he could bear the pain no longer, and the very notion of unbroken sleep seemed completely out of reach, Craine went into the bathroom to look for aspirin. The small drawer beside the sink was empty but he found some sedatives in the cabinet behind the mirror. The bottle wasn’t labeled but he recognized the pills. They were oxycodone tablets. The same that Celia had overdosed on. Probably the same sedatives that Stanley had taken before hanging himself.

  He left the tablets where they were and washed his hands and face, rubbing the back of his neck with a wet hand. He didn’t need drugs. The summer heat had left him dehydrated, that was why he was having headaches. He needed to drink more.

  He sipped water from the faucet then took off his white undervest, soaked it with water and wiped himself down. Doctors said he’d cracked two ribs in the car crash but they’d healed well and the bruising had all but disappeared. He didn’t have any scars, which almost seemed like a shame.

  “Is everything okay?” It was Gale, standing behind him. “I woke up and you were gone,” she whispered through half-sleep. Her eyes were open but he could tell she was in that dreamlike delirium you get sometimes when you wake up in the night for a few moments before drifting back to the black. He loved that place.

  Craine kept his back to her, leaning against the sink and answering her reflection. “Fine,” he said quietly, as if he didn’t want to wake up the children. The house was empty.

  “You couldn’t sleep?” she held a closed fist in front of her mouth and yawned. She waited for an explanation but it didn’t come. “Too much coffee,” she reasoned instead.

  “Maybe.” But he hadn’t had a drop of caffeine in days. When the insomnia first started in New York, doctors told him to try and regain some rhythm to his life: work regular hours; take light exercise; improve his overall sleep hygiene. Their words exactly, and he followed their advice to the letter. They didn’t prescribe him pills, which he was thankful for. They told him to avoid caffeine and he did for the most part, drinking a cup or two in the morning to stir him into action but seldom in the late afternoon or evening.

  “You coming back to bed?”

  “In a minute.”

&n
bsp; “What’s on your mind? Is it Michael?”

  He shook his head then considered that he probably should be thinking about Michael.

  “Is it Celia? You’re thinking of Celia?”

  He shrugged. “I often think of Celia.”

  She had a hand on his shoulder now and he turned to face her. “Is it us? You feel guilty, don’t you? You think she wouldn’t want you to be here with me.”

  “It’s not like that, Gale.”

  “You don’t have to pretend otherwise. I feel like that sometimes about Herbert. But don’t you think they’d want us to move on with our lives?”

  “She’d want me to be happy.”

  “Exactly. She’d want what’s best for you. For you and Michael.”

  “She always wanted the best for me. Apart from my work.”

  “Celia didn’t like you being a police officer? Was she embarrassed?”

  “No, she was never embarrassed.” Maybe you are though, he reflected briefly to himself.

  “Then what?”

  “I suppose she didn’t like the type of policeman I was.” Craine stiffened and stared at the sweaty footprints he’d left on the marble floor. “In the beginning it was different. She thought being a policeman was admirable.”

  “It is.”

  “It isn’t. It almost always isn’t. With Celia . . . it was tricky. She had such high expectations. She used to show me off, you know. Her husband the detective. That’s when I started working in the industry. Helping people. But after Jean Harlow died she didn’t like me working the studio cases. They were friends, you see.”

  “What happened with Jean?”

  “She said I’d manipulated the truth,” he said, not wanting to go into the details. “There were things that happened with her and other people that most people will never know. I’ve spent years being a studio janitor. That’s not real police work.”

  “You’re too hard on yourself.”

  “Am I?”

  Neither of them said anything and for a moment he thought Gale might leave the room, but there was more to say and he wanted to say it. For months he’d been desperate to tell someone. To share.