Angel’s Gate

by p. g. sturges

  Luis returned in an hour, gave the man the sum he had requested. The man held the bill up to the light. Ulysses S. Grant. The bill was legitimate. Probably the only legitimate document on the whole street. Perhaps in the whole MacArthur Park district.

  The man reflected. What had the American hero, MacArthur, said? That was it. I shall return. And that was what he, Mario Topa, ensured; that his countrymen would return, from deportation, from desperation, from the Aztlán diaspora; singly, by the platoon, by the regiment, by the army. And Mario would further ensure, that this time, with the documents he would manufacture, for a modest profit, these men would stay to father many children and eventually take back the land stolen from their ancestors. Democracy was a numbers game. And the numbers were on his side. Success, eventually, was a certainty. Democracy was a wonderful thing. Though you could take it too far.

  Luis stepped into the sun, looked down at what he had paid fifty dollars for. A name and a phone number.

  Ten minutes later, from the Grand Central Market, Luis placed a call.

  “This is Melvin,” said the voice.

  “Buenos dias, Melvin,” returned Luis, cheerfully. “How the hell are you? And how’s that girl?”

  There was a pause.

  “Who is this?”

  “This is Juan Valdez.”

  FIFTY

  Last Supper, Interrupted

  That stupid shit Wolf. Hiring two clowns for serious work. That was what invariably ruined perfect crimes. The coincidence, the loose end, the irresponsible agent.

  Now he was being blackmailed by a couple of wetbacks who’d dropped out of school in the fourth grade. Then the perfect solution came to him.

  “Juan Valdez? Geez, dude, I was hoping you’d call.”

  “Well, here I am, Melvin. We need to talk.”

  “Of course, we do. We need you guys back.”

  “You need us back?”

  “Pronto. Rapeedo. You need to pick up the girl. Take her back to Fairfax Convalescent.”

  “Take her back?”

  “Take her back, dude. To Fairfax. She’s a lot better. You have to come get her.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Cabrillo Marina.”

  “Where is it?”

  “San Pedro.”

  “What’s the address?”

  “I’m not a fuckin’ taxi driver, ameego. Cabrillo Marina in San Pedro. At the end of the Harbor Freeway. The 110. Come to slip 814. Big white motor yacht. It’s called Hush, My Baby.”

  Melvin checked his watch. He could do it this afternoon. He had found and stolen the extra key to the Nazi’s yacht. Just in case he might need to get back on it for something or other. Because the Nazi didn’t like him. And now this. Perfect. “Come around three. Call me when you get here. I’ll come out and meet you.”

  “Same money. We want same money. Cash.”

  “Fine.”

  And that was that.

  And how appropriate. Hush, My Baby. Hush, hush, my Rhonda. Like those melodious fags in their straw hats, the Beach Boys.

  • • •

  He arrived just after two. He loved the salt air. He brought a couple of sacks of Mexican food and the smell filled the enclosed salon. He laid a plastic tarp on the floor.

  The wetbacks arrived at a quarter to three. Prepared by their call, he’d waved them in to visitor parking, led them down to the boat.

  He shook both their hands, smiled warmly. He apologized for his behavior on their last get-together. “I had a lot of shit on my mind, dudes, no time to get it all done. Know what I mean?”

  Luis and Ernesto seemed to be alright with that. Melvin led them past some beautiful boats and finally gestured them aboard the Hush, My Baby.

  “This the doctor’s boat?” asked Luis, stepping on.

  “Sure is, brother.” Melvin shrugged. “He makes money hand over fist—and he’s stingy as an old woman. Tacaño. Cheap. He makes money on the poor folks. Crazy money.”

  Melvin watched Luis and Ernesto appreciate the craft. Eveything was white, chrome, teak, polished brass, and gleaming. They had learned the art of seeming to be unimpressed by the things they would never own. Things that would remain, for their lifetimes, hopelessly out of their grasp, in the hands of rich gringos. Stupid gringos. It was funny, when you met a few, how dumb they were. How ordinary. Estúpidos.

  But food was another matter. He saw Ernesto inhale and hunger.

  “You dudes hungry?”

  Ernesto looked to Luis. But Luis had smelled it by now, too.

  Melvin knew he had them. “Come on below. I ordered up some chow. Maybe you dudes can do some other work for me, too.”

  Down the quay, a belt sander started up. Fantastic. A hundred forty decibels of noise. Come on, feel the noise. Noise ordained by the God Who Wasn’t There. The scream of teak. “Down in the salon, guys.” Again, the grand gesture.

  He followed the duo down the ladder into the quiet. The food was laid out on the table. A small cooler with some Dos Equis on ice.

  Ernesto reached for a taquito, Luis for a cold one. Luis turned to thank him but by that time Melvin pulled his revolver from under a stack of folded laundry. Leaving it wrapped in a thick towel, he shot Luis in the balls and watched him crumple to the floor. Ernesto turned. Right between the eyes.

  He could hear the belt sander.

  Back to the writhing Luis. “So, motherfucker. How does it feel? You were gonna blackmail me? You and your crude, wetback shit? No, man. Not in this world. This is the white man’s world. And you know what I’m going to do?”

  He pointed the gun inches from Luis’s face.

  “Fuck you, cabrón,” gasped Luis.

  “I’m going to recycle you. Round midnight tonight, those San Pedro bay crabs’ll be eating your fucking eyes.” Melvin grinned. “And you won’t feel a thing. You’ll be holding hands with Rhonda.”

  Melvin put a bullet through Luis’s knee. It had to hurt. Had to hurt. And an elbow shot for radial symmetry. Symmetry was important. Balance.

  Good and evil. Light and dark. Up and down. Sick and well. Rise and fall. In and out. Yin and yang. Life and death.

  He was a god. He put the weapon to Luis’s forehead. Then sent him on his way. It would be nice if God was Caucasian. And He was. Had to be.

  • • •

  He locked up the boat, used Luis’s key to start up their white van. Fifteen minutes later, across the two big bridges, he was in Long Beach. In North Long Beach, he parked the van, wiped down the steering wheel and abandoned the vehicle, keys in the ignition, windows down, door unlocked. It wouldn’t last twenty minutes. Bon voyage, Bait Car.

  He took a taxi back to Cabrillo, hopped into the Beemer, rolled for Hollywood. Mission accomplished.

  FIFTY-ONE

  Ion Winds at the Edge of Time

  And now for that quality morning libation. Montgomery checked his watch. Morning had passed. Still, it felt early. Nessie had arranged champagne and ice water, with slices of fruit, cheese, and sourdough bread. Under his large Spanish umbrella by the pool.

  He sat down in his woven wicker chaise longue and achieved a perfect recumbency. A bird tweeted and he entertained the thought of a nap, a brief nap, but, no—first the business at hand. He sipped the champagne and reached for the screenplay. Good champagne after all. Dry.

  A good screenplay was good on page one. A bad screenplay was bad on page one. Soon he would know what he was holding. He settled in and began.

  San Pedro . . . by A. Davis.

  By page five he was uneasy. By page twelve he was horrified. At page thirty, he thrust it away, and rose, an old man. His respiration was quick and shallow, his limbs enervated and trembling, his scalp damp and hot.

  The impossible had occurred. His most private nightmare had been twisted into black and white, flesh and blood. Into a story of drugged, bestial homicide.

  This is Owsley, someone had said, the ultimate concoction from the ultimate chemist. This was how the Beatles had dreamed up
Sgt. Pepper. Peter Max, Claes Oldenburg, Roy Lichtenstein—that’s where they came from, right? And so he’d swallowed the little red barrels.

  At first they’d done nothing. Duds. So he took two more. Suddenly he realized he could see around corners. That he could levitate if he chose to do so. In fact, simply bringing his attention to bear created what he wished to contemplate. He. Was. God. And he always had been.

  His hearing was granular, precisely aware of even the subtlest contributory vibration. He could travel through space and time, on and with any frequency he chose to entertain or augment. He. Was. Music.

  Then he saw the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. Her skin was light brown, a living duskiness that invited his fingers to feel. He wanted to fill her with his god-seed. Looking down upon his member, he saw that though it was part of him, it also had independent life. He summoned it to steel. It rose, by degrees, with every beat of his heart. Steel. Bursting with vertical energy, flag-bearer of indomitable spirit.

  He sought her flesh and she willowed beneath him. They were one. They were timeless. They were eternal, born in the heat of the new universe to fly before the shock wave of creation. Then she had summoned forth his seed and he gave her every atom he possessed, turning inside out and disappearing into her completely and forever.

  And the beat of her heart was the drum of high music and he was reborn in her light. But that he was reborn in it, meant that he was separate from it, and a great sadness rose within him, and flung him, like a great wind across the infinite field, and he knew that one day she would die. That her death agonies not be prolonged for eternities he took up a large clear stone and smashed it into her temple and she lay still.

  Then with a blade that appeared in his hand for that purpose, he began to disassemble her, that he might restore her to perfection, that they would again ride the ion winds to the edges of time.

  • • •

  He’d awoken the next morning at Hogue’s house. Stark naked, with five or six cuts on his fingers and hands. Did I hurt someone, he asked Hogue.

  Hogue had smiled. Of course not. You got pretty high and we found you playing with a knife. With no clothes on. You didn’t cut your cock off, did you?

  He looked down. There it was. Docile and complacent. He reached his fingers into his pubic hair, then smelled them. Smelled like a woman. He’d been with a woman. Who was I with? he asked.

  Who weren’t you with, returned Hogue, grinning.

  Not boys, I hope?

  No. Hogue laughed. But that was the only thing that could kill a career, he said. A dead girl or a live boy.

  A great relief swept through Montgomery. For half a second he remembered the glint of a blade and a brown-skinned girl lying on a huge bed. It was all a dream. Thank God.

  • • •

  It was all a dream. They told him it was a dream. Hogue had told him. Dr. Wolf had told him. That young actor had told him. The young actor who’d ended up at Camarillo.

  And he had so desperately wanted to believe them that he had. But the screenplay said different. Said the girl, Betty Ann Fowler, had been euthanized and dumped in the sea off San Pedro. That Hunt St. Everly, rising star, had been too valuable to punish. That too many people had been attached, one way or the other, to the career of St. Everly.

  His heart thumped in his chest. The screenplay was the truth. The mask with which he had hidden from himself for thirty years was ripped from his soul.

  He heard the screen door shut and Nessie appeared poolside. Her dark brown skin and white teeth. “Phone call, Mr. Montgomery. Entertainment Tonight. Your interview.”

  Instinctively, he stood up to go in. He took three dead steps toward the house and realized he couldn’t leave the screenplay out there. Lying around. Maybe Nessie, who’d never read a single word of print in their acquaintance, would pick it up. Get engrossed. And the world would fall in.

  Nessie saw something was wrong. “You okay, Mr. Montgomery?” Man looked like he’d aged twenty years in twenty minutes.

  Montgomery picked up the phone in his office, listened. A woman was happily babbling. He understood nothing, remembered nothing. It was if he had forgotten their common tongue. Oliver Sacks had recounted the results of a stroke in a certain part of the brain. With that location damaged, listeners could no longer detect where one word ended and another began. Had he had a stroke?

  “Mrmontgomery?” the woman said. “Mrmontgomeryareyoualright?” Even the phone, in his hand, looked like a foreign object. Which end did you speak into? Finally, he spoke at it. “I can’t talk to you now,” he said, “goodbye.”

  He sat down in the chair behind his desk. Nessie appeared.

  “Mrmontgomeryareyousureyou’realright?”

  He couldn’t understand her.

  Nessie dialed 911.

  • • •

  Montgomery had recovered somewhat by the time emergency services arrived. He posed for pictures with the EMTs, signed a few articles. He was perfectly fine, he assured them, he had received some surprising news, felt an irregularity in his chest. But everything was A-OK now. The ambulance rolled off.

  Nessie was mortified. “I thought you was really sick, Mr. Montgomery. I woulda never called.”

  “You did what you thought was necessary, Nessie. And I appreciate that.” He went upstairs. Slowly.

  Nessie looked after him. There was something wrong. Clearly. She’d have to watch him.

  He reached the bedroom suite, sat in his old leather chair, looked out the window into the garden. A breeze riffled the jacaranda and sent a cloud of lavender to the ground.

  The autumnal season of all living things. The beauty time lent to life by the brevity of its passing. The flowering and the fall. Making room for the new.

  He reached for his phone, called Howard Hogue.

  “Howard Hogue’s office.”

  He recognized the voice. “Hello, Helena. This is Hale Montgomery.”

  “Mr. Montgomery! How are you, sir? Are you well?”

  Instinct reasserted itself. “I’m fine, thank you.” He spoke in movie-star cadence, automatically pitching his voice a little low. “And you?”

  “Oh, you know. Busy, busy, busy. Every day a blur. Let me see if Howard’s in.”

  Of course Howard would be in for one of the grand points of light in the Ivanhoe firmament. Then the voice of the billionaire.

  “Hale, is that you?”

  “Hi, Howard.”

  “You know what I saw last night? In Blu-Ray? Three Nights in New Orleans. I forgot how good that was. How good you were. That was a real piece of work.”

  “Thanks.”

  “It made me think. Maybe we should reprise that character. Bring him up to date.”

  “Stash Rockland.”

  Stash had been a violent, woman-chasing, live-for-the-moment motorcycle cocaine cowboy. Until the fire in the French Quarter and the discovery of a daughter he didn’t know he had.

  Only Hale Montgomery’s movie-star aura allowed the character to be perceived as real. Millions and millions flocked to the multiplexes. Purchased chemically flavored popcorn by the boxcar. By the boatload. By the landfill.

  And now to think, during all that high living and self-congratulation, he had been nothing more than a drugged-out killer, unaware of the damage he had done. A puppet, mindlessly dancing for the man behind the curtain. And what other things had he trampled and destroyed? In his ignorance and enthusiasm.

  He felt sick.

  “So, whaddaya say, Stash?”

  He could feel his mind twisting for the sun. Any actor’s reaction in the presence of cash money. “We should talk about it. Can we get Bill Staton to write?” Staton had gone on to bigger and better things after Stash Rockland, but then his ego burst. He fell from heaven to heroin in a year. Now, ten years later, his name had recently tickled the trades.

  Hogue mused. “I hear he’s writing again.” Staton would come cheap. And he was good if he was reasonably sober. “And he may be grateful
for a little something to do. Not a bad idea, Hale. I’ll have someone give him a call.”

  The conversation, having reintroduced its constituents, stepped to higher gear. “What can I do for you, Hale? Things alright?”

  “I had a screenplay delivered to me today. From Liquor Locker. With a bottle of champagne.”

  Hogue chuckled. “They say that still works.”

  Montgomery saw the green bottle on the table by pool. Warm and flat. “It’s called San Pedro.”

  “San Pedro.”

  “Produced by the San Pedro Film Company.”

  “Never heard of ’em. What’s it about?”

  “About a party thrown by a producer who lived in Hancock Park in the eighties. Hubert Hull.”

  Hogue felt his day lurch sideways. Below his desk he hit the switch that started the digital recorder. “What happened next?” The only question any theatrical audience was interested in.

  “A girl was killed and thrown into the sea. Off San Pedro.”

  Hogue bit his lip. However Hames had handled the assignment, he’d fucked it up. The ancient script would be blackmail. A script he had bought and paid for twenty-five years ago. He had destroyed it himself. And the single carbon copy.

  “Where are you, Hale?”

  “At home.”

  “I’ll send someone over to pick it up right now. And we’ll get to the bottom of this.”

  Get to the bottom of it. Where the body lay. Still. “You’ll get to the bottom of what, Howard?”

  “What are you asking me?”

  “I’m asking IF I DID THOSE THINGS,” he shouted. Some interior part of him had broken off, fallen off, had been twisted off. It slammed around his chest, a billiard ball with unlimited rotational energy, bouncing from rail to rail, bone to bone, thud, thud, thud, never stopping.

  “No, you didn’t, Hale. You didn’t. You got high but you didn’t hurt anyone.”

  “You swear to Christ? Swear to Christ?”

  “I don’t have to swear to Christ. I was there. You didn’t hurt anyone.”

  “But someone was hurt.”

  “That’s none of your business. That’s my business.”