Citizen Hollywood (Hollywood's Garden of Allah novels Book 3)

by Martin Turnbull

  Francine’s bungalow was perhaps a third the size of the one Orson lived in when he first got to Hollywood. He’d moved out while Kane was in production, but Kathryn had been inside his bungalow more often than she’d been inside her mother’s.

  Francine’s was really just a studio apartment, a living room combined with a small dining area that led directly into a kitchenette. Farther back was a cramped bedroom large enough for just a single bed, and an even smaller bathroom. But it had windows on three sides, which filled the living room with sunlight all day long. Management allowed Francine to decorate it any way she liked, so the place was filled with potted plants of all kinds—daffodils and tulips, mainly, with some ferns, miniature roses, and Francine’s favorite: dahlias.

  The steamer trunk Francine used as a coffee table sat in the middle of the room, covered with a navy blue lace cloth and crowded with plants. Kathryn stared at the trunk for a few moments. It was the last of the four trunks they’d packed their life into when they moved out from Massachusetts to California. Kathryn knew her mother kept her most precious things in there. She went back to the front door and peered out. Francine was nowhere in sight.

  The plants were off in less than a minute, and the lace cover took only a second, but the lock put up a fight. Hmmm, Kathryn mused, where would Mother put the key to the trunk where she keeps her most precious things? Kathryn decided Francine was silly enough to hide the key under the trunk. She lifted up the end, but there was no key.

  “What’s all this?”

  Francine stood at the open front door, still in her coral-red and pewter-gray hotel uniform, clutching a bottle in a brown paper bag.

  Kathryn glanced at the potted plants on the floor. “I was looking for something.” She stood up and closed the space between her and her mother. She leaned in for a hug but Francine pressed her lips together and swept past her.

  Francine deposited the bottle on the tiled counter. “So you wouldn’t mind if I snuck into your place and started rifling around your things?”

  “Carla let me in, and I guess I just got carried away.”

  “What were you looking for?”

  “My birth certificate.”

  “Why would you want that?” Francine lifted her hands off her hips and pulled out the brandy.

  “Because I’m thirty-three and I think I should have it.”

  Francine’s eyes narrowed. “Is that man getting a divorce?”

  “No, Mother, he can’t.”

  “If you ever do get married, you’ll have to do without. It was in the missing trunk.”

  Ah, yes, Kathryn thought, the famous missing trunk.

  Francine’s story had always been that when Daddy died unexpectedly, she moved the two of them to California. Francine never talked about Daddy, what he was like, where he came from. She didn’t even have a photo of him. “The railway company lost one of the trunks on the way to California,” had always been Francine’s explanation. As the years of Kathryn’s childhood passed by, she noticed that anything connected with the life Francine had left behind—photographs, addresses, letters—always seemed to have been packed into the famous missing trunk.

  Whenever she complained about it to Marcus, he reminded her that he was given fifteen minutes before his father ran him out of town, and he had no photographs of his childhood, either. When she bent her roommate’s ear about it, Gwendolyn brought up the fact that her mother was usually too plastered to focus a camera in her children’s direction, so she didn’t have any photographs, either. Neither of them were terribly sympathetic, but it still niggled at her.

  “A lot of important things were conveniently lost when that trunk went astray.”

  Francine regarded her daughter coolly. “I lost one whole quarter of my life. There was nothing convenient about it.”

  “It just seems to me that whenever I want something important, it always turns out to have been in the trunk that went astray. Like photos of my father, for instance.”

  “Your father? Why all of a sudden—”

  “I have no idea what my father looked like, because all the photos of him were apparently in that trunk.”

  Francine’s face took on the pinched look she got whenever she became defensive. “I have no photographs of my husband. Do you think I like that?”

  There was an awkward pause, then Francine returned to the cramped kitchen. “You planning on staying long enough for a drink, or do you have to rush off for dinner plans with someone famous?”

  “Why does Louella Parsons think I’m illegitimate?”

  Years ago, when Louella invited Francine to join her Hollywood Mothers Club, Kathryn thought it smacked suspiciously of a hidden agenda. She held her tongue at the time, but now the question was out and Kathryn felt like a blundering rhinoceros.

  Francine reached for a couple of tumblers. “If you’re referring to what she said about you in her column, I think you’ll find she meant your skills as a columnist.”

  “That’s not what she told me.”

  “If you’ve already had this discussion with Louella, then why are you bothering me?”

  Francine started to make a couple of brandies and ginger ale, but Kathryn walked across to the other side of the counter and laid her hands on top of her mother’s. “Why does Louella think I’m illegitimate?”

  “For heaven’s sake, nobody in Hollywood takes anything Louella prints as gospel.”

  “So I was not born out of wedlock?”

  Francine let out a forced sigh and looked her daughter squarely in the face. “Your father and I,” she said slowly and deliberately, “were married at St. Peter’s Church, in Dorchester, Massachusetts, on New Year’s Day in 1908. My dress was made of ivory silk overlaid with matching lace. It had a scoop neck, a long train, and a twenty-two-inch waist, of which I was inordinately proud. Now, are you staying for a drink or not?”

  Kathryn felt the grip of tension loosen her chest. All she’d ever wanted was to be the normal product of a happily married couple. She smiled at her mother. “Thank you,” she said. “I’m sorry I believed Louella so quickly.”

  Francine went to say something, but stopped herself. Instead, she went to her icebox and retrieved a tray of ice cubes. She cracked a couple in each glass. “We’re all human,” she said. “Why don’t you take a seat and tell me some of the Hollywood gossip that you don’t dare print.”

  It wasn’t until three brandies past eight o’clock, as she was strolling home down Sunset Boulevard to the Garden of Allah, that it occurred to Kathryn that the last time her mother talked about her wedding day, she said it was in St. Paul’s Church in Worcester, Massachusetts, on an unusually warmish January day in 1907.

  CHAPTER 42

  Marcus parked Alla Nazimova’s silver Pierce-Arrow out front of Hugo’s apartment building on Melrose Avenue and grabbed the William Tell outline sitting next to him. After the night of the effigy party, he knew he had to confront Hugo over what he’d found in the Remington Morgue. He wanted to do it at the right time, in the right place, and he wanted the element of surprise.

  He was about to climb out of the automobile when he saw Hugo dash through the ornate brass front doors, cross the sidewalk and get into the taxi cab waiting for him. The whole scene played out in less than ten seconds, but even in the dim moonlight, it was enough time for Marcus to make out that Hugo was dressed in clothes that matched items from Marcus’ closet, even down to the corduroy patches on the sleeves of his olive-green tweed jacket.

  Hugo’s taxi pulled into traffic heading west. Marcus followed at a careful distance for a while as the cab turned north and headed into the Hollywood Hills. His hands slipped off the driving wheel. “Don’t turn onto Valley Oak Drive. Any street but—”

  Hugo’s cab turned onto Valley Oak Drive. Marcus knew which number Hugo would pull up at: 5609.

  He watched Hugo walk up to Ramon’s front door. The lights inside the house shone through the rectangular stained glass window. Hugo didn’t even knock. He grabb
ed the door handle as though he knew it was unlocked and walked in.

  Marcus stared at the closed door. Hugo and Ramon? Surely not. They must be getting together because . . . because . . .

  “Marshmallow balls!” The William Tell outline with his father’s voice sat on the passenger seat and glared at him. “Creampuff! FAIRY!”

  “Shut up,” Marcus told it.

  He stared at Ramon’s front door for a full five minutes before he grabbed the outline and got out of the car. He let himself inside Ramon’s house and looked around. A couple of Tiffany lamps Marcus had never seen before shone in the living room and another new one—a six-foot standard lamp made of black wood carved with an angular chevron pattern—stood watch at the base of the stairs leading to the second floor. He heard a sound, a grunt, then another one, deeper, a different voice. They came from upstairs.

  Marcus’ legs folded beneath him and he crumpled onto the bottom step. He gripped two of the banisters and leaned his head between them. The memory of the first time he saw Ramon’s face conjured itself, clear as Christmas. Marcus was a Western Union delivery boy, and a telegram had come in for Ramon Novarro at MGM. How dashing Ramon had looked, so handsome, so suave. That was more than ten years ago.

  Have I really spent ten years holding the same torch for the same guy?

  A loud HA! followed by a YES! shot down the stairs and hit Marcus across the head. “No,” he muttered. “Not anymore.” He took the stairs two at a time.

  There was a lamp on in the hall. At the end of it, a door was open but there was no light coming from inside the room.

  Another grunt like the last one.

  Marcus headed toward the open doorway but stopped just short of it when he heard more panting. Then, “Give it to me, Ramonito. Give me everything you’ve got.”

  Marcus hesitated. Part of him wanted to switch on the bedroom light; another part dreaded forever etching the sight into his memory. He peeked around the corner and into the room. The light from the hallway spilled as far as the foot of the bed, but it was enough for Marcus to make out what was going on. The silhouettes of two bodies, both facing the mattress, one on top of the other. He’d seen enough and turned to leave.

  “Someone’s there,” he heard Hugo whisper.

  “What?” Ramon sounded annoyed, probably because his rhythm was shot to hell.

  “Out in the hallway,” Hugo replied, then, “Who’s there? I saw you!”

  Tears blurred the flowery wallpaper along the walls.

  “I HOPE YOU TWO BURN IN HELL!” The force of his own voice surprised even Marcus. “FOR ALL ETERNITY! BASTARDS!”

  Marcus made it to the top of the stairs, but couldn’t move any farther. He clung onto the banister to steady himself, barely able to breathe.

  “Marcus? Marcus, is that you?” Hugo called out.

  A figure appeared in the doorway to the bedroom, but Marcus didn’t linger long enough to see who it was. He charged down the stairs. Both of them called his name but he ignored them until he was back in the foyer. He heard his father’s voice again. “Creampuff.” He stopped and turned around.

  Ramon, a towel around his waist, and Hugo, in navy blue boxer shorts, bolted down the stairs. Marcus could feel the heat radiating from his face, cool air sucking past his clenched teeth. Ramon and Hugo stopped at the last step, as though the Persian rug at the bottom was a pit of quicksand.

  Marcus fixed his glare on Ramon. “You’re the only one I’ve ever wanted!” he bellowed, barely knowing what he was saying. “Just you. Just—nobody else—mattered—just—you.”

  Marcus thought of all those hurried furtive gropings. Dark shadows, pants down, half an eye out for the cops, don’t kiss me, tug tug. No names, no eye contact. The absence of anything close to true intimacy made it easier for Marcus to pretend it was Ramon each time. He looked at Ramon’s pale body, sagging and bloated from too much booze. Marcus realized what a self-deluded waste of time his love life had been. You should have aimed higher, he told himself. “What about your precious Alessandro?” he asked Ramon. “Or is he up there, too?”

  “There is no Alessandro,” Hugo said darkly.

  “WHAT?!”

  “Don’t listen to him,” Ramon told Marcus. “Of course there was an Alessandro, but his visa ran out. They deported him.”

  “You know what?” Marcus was feeling sick to his stomach now. “I really don’t care anymore. Do whatever the hell you want.” He raised the papers in his hand. “You know what this is?” he asked Hugo. “The outline for William Tell. My outline.”

  “How the hell—?”

  He shook the pages at Hugo. “You know what’s missing? Your attempt at a script. Or six other scripts by six other writers.”

  Hugo started breathing hard through his nose.

  “Marcusito,” Ramon began.

  “SHUT UP,” Marcus yelled and turned back to Hugo. “You know what the Remington Morgue is, don’t you, Hugo?” Hugo stared at Marcus, silent and inert.

  Marcus started lumbering toward them. Hugo had backed up onto the next step by the time Marcus was within walloping distance. His boxer shorts were the same brand Marcus wore. It was all so disgusting, so pathetic.

  He faced Ramon. “And as for you. I’d have given you everything I had. It was yours for the asking. All of it!”

  Before he knew what he was doing, Marcus hauled back and slugged a right hook into Ramon’s jaw. A squirt of red sprayed out across the banister and onto the rug below. Ramon collapsed like a señorita’s fan.

  Moonlight spilled through the open front door. Marcus’ knuckles flamed with pain but he didn’t shake out the agony. He marched to the door, stepped through it, and stormed down the driveway. It wasn’t until he reached Nazimova’s car that his stomach lurched. He tripped over the curb and heaved up ten years of pain and anguish across the passenger-side door.

  CHAPTER 43

  When Kathryn arrived at her villa with a huge pumpkin under each arm, she saw that Gwendolyn had left a Western Union telegram on the kitchen table. She set the pumpkins to the side and slid her fingernail across the top of the envelope, telling herself to remain calm no matter what it said. She read the telegram out loud.

  “As requested confirm birth details for Kathryn Jane Massey born 8.37 AM on January 24 1908 STOP Mother Francine Mary Mae Caldecott STOP Father Not Applic—OH!”

  She couldn’t pull her eyes from the paper, but she no longer saw the words printed there. She heard only her shallow breaths, in, out, in, out. Not Applicable, she thought. My father is not applicable. The two words resharpened into focus when Gwendolyn floated in. “Guess what,” Kathryn said. “I’m a bastard!”

  “Don’t you mean ‘bitch’?” Gwendolyn asked.

  “No, I mean an actual and literal bastard.”

  “Does this have something to do with that telegram crumpled in your fist?” Gwendolyn asked.

  Kathryn unfurled her hand. “Remember I told you my mom always said she married my dad in Worcester in 1907 but when I confronted her about it, she said they got hitched in Dorchester in ’08? Well, it’s been eating at me, so I contacted the hospital where I was born. This is their response.”

  As she handed the telegram to Gwendolyn, Kathryn felt her face cave in and she burst into tears. “I can’t be illegitimate,” she howled into her hands. “I just can’t be!” Gwendolyn sat down close beside her on the sofa and wrapped an arm around her shoulder. Kathryn could smell Gwendolyn’s rosewater shampoo as she pressed her head against her friend’s.

  “But young girls make mistakes all the time,” Gwendolyn said. “Why shouldn’t Francine be one of them?” She paused, then added more softly, “I know all this must come as a terrible shock, but let’s not forget a certain trip you and I took into Chinatown.”

  Kathryn pulled her face out of her hands, shocked that Gwendolyn would bring that up at a time like this. She stared furiously into those big green eyes, but only long enough to see Gwennie had a point. “Yes, and I—handled my situa
tion,” Kathryn said. “She was twenty. Past the age of not knowing any better.”

  Gwendolyn faced her now, holding Kathryn’s hands. “Accidents happen, honey.”

  Kathryn knew Gwendolyn was doing her level best to be the oil to her choppy waters, but being reminded that she’d made the same mistake as her mother wasn’t anything like the sympathetic clucking she wanted to hear. “Oh, so now I’m an accidental bastard?”

  “Oh sweetie pie, there ain’t no such thing as a planned bastard. Could be there’s a perfectly fine explanation to why your father’s name is missing. And if not, then interesting, at the very least. And there’s only one person you can ask about it.”

  Kathryn pulled her hands away from Gwendolyn and crossed her arms like a petulant brat. But I’m afraid of the answer.

  Gwendolyn got to her feet and crossed over to the kitchen window and peered outside. “Why don’t you ask her right now?”

  “I need a bit more time.”

  “By my estimation, you’ve got about ten seconds.” Gwendolyn gathered up her handbag and gloves. She jutted her head toward the front door just as a pair of heels clacked against the wooden steps.

  Gwendolyn gave Kathryn’s shoulder an encouraging squeeze. “If you need me, I’ll be with Marcus. He’s probably dreadfully hungover, and he likes it when I make coffee.” She hovered at the front door. “Two things to keep in mind: She didn’t give you away, and she’s still around to talk to. You might be a bastard, but at least you’re not an orphan like me.”

  Had their positions been reversed, Kathryn knew she probably wouldn’t have coddled Gwendolyn with a dip in the self-pity pool. Although Gwendolyn was absolutely right to say what she said, Kathryn would have preferred a minute or two to absorb the chiding. But Francine was at the top of the stairs before she had a chance to gather herself together.

  “Mother!” Kathryn exclaimed with forced brightness. “What are you doing here?”

  Francine handed Kathryn a pile of letters. “Apparently this is your mail from yesterday,” she said. “Your over-aged bellhop at the front desk asked me to tell you sorry, but it got stuck behind the newspapers.”