Vengeance

by Susan Lewis

  Laurence withdrew himself carefully, nevertheless Kirsten, still lying across the desk, groaned her disappointment as he left her. He laughed and was idly fondling her breasts when they heard someone racing towards the trailer.

  ‘Laurence! Kirsten! Are you in there?’ Alison cried, banging frantically on the door.

  ‘Be right there,’ Laurence shouted as both he and Kirsten hurriedly made themselves decent.

  ‘Oh Christ!’ Alison gasped, when Laurence threw open the door, her agitation making her green frizzy hair seem even more outlandish. ‘You better come quick, both of you. There’s been an accident . . .’

  ‘What kind of accident?’ Laurence demanded, starting down the steps as Kirsten grabbed for her coat.

  ‘God knows,’ Alison answered. ‘It was really weird . . .’

  ‘Who is it?’ Kirsten wanted to know. ‘Are they badly hurt?’

  ‘It’s Jake and Elizabeth . . . They’ve – oh God, you’d better come and see for yourselves.’

  ‘What’s happened to them?’ Kirsten persisted.

  ‘I’m not sure. They were on the set alone, everyone was having coffee. It seems like Jake was on a ladder doing something or another with a light and he fell. Elizabeth ran to get help and she fell too. Oh God, I don’t know . . . She seems pretty badly hurt though. But at least she’s conscious.’

  ‘You mean Jake’s not!’ Laurence cried.

  ‘He wasn’t when I left. There was blood on his forehead so he must have hit it as he went down.’

  ‘Where is he now?’ Laurence said, breaking into a run through the gardens.

  ‘Still in the library. Elizabeth’s in the pantry place outside. The nurse is there . . .’

  When they reached the house it was to find the entire unit crowded into the hall outside the library. Immediately a path opened for Kirsten and Laurence to push their way through. The first thing Kirsten saw when they entered the room was the small pool of blood beside Jake’s inert body. Then, as she moved her eyes to watch the nurse she felt a sickening paralysis grip her insides. The nurse lifted her head then lowered it again to resume the kiss of life. Laurence and Kirsten exchanged a quick look, both horribly struck by the fact that they had witnessed this scene before.

  ‘An ambulance is on its way,’ the stunt-coordinator told them. ‘Seems like Elizabeth has broken her leg.’

  ‘Where is she?’ Kirsten demanded.

  ‘I think one of the sparks carried her into the drawing room.’

  Kirsten and Laurence pushed their way out again, both trying very hard to remain calm. Elizabeth was stretched out on a sofa, Helena and some of the other cast and dressers were with her, she looked to be in a great deal of pain.

  ‘It’s all right,’ Kirsten assured her, ‘the ambulance is coming. What happened?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Elizabeth said, wincing as she tried to move. ‘One minute we were chatting while he was climbing the ladder, the next he was on the floor in front of me. I could see he’d hit his head so I went to get help. On the way out I tripped over one of those damned prop machines and before I knew what was happening I was on the floor myself. I tried to get up, couldn’t, fell back against the door, which was why they carried me over here so’s they could get in to see to Jake. How is he?’

  ‘The nurse is with him,’ Kirsten answered, glancing at Laurence. Inside she was screaming. This couldn’t be happening, it just couldn’t. It was a nightmare and any minute now she would wake up. Jake had merely bumped his head and Elizabeth had twisted her ankle. That was all. It would be all right. They could go on with the film . . .

  ‘Laurence!’

  Kirsten and Laurence turned to see Jane standing at the door holding Tom by the hand.

  ‘Laurence, it’s Ruby,’ Jane said softly.

  ‘What about her?’ he snapped.

  Jane’s normally pallid face turned puce at the way everyone was looking at her. ‘She’s . . . Well, she’s run away,’ Jane said.

  ‘What do mean, run away?’ Laurence demanded, going to her.

  ‘She came running out of here and went off in the direction of the other set. She – she was screaming.’

  ‘What the hell is going on around here?’ Laurence cried, dashing a hand through his hair. ‘Has everyone gone crazy? Billy! Billy, get a few of the guys together and go after Ruby. Don’t bring her back here. Take her to the hotel and shut her in her room and keep her there until I get there. Jane, get Tom out of here, will you? No, son,’ he said as Tom started to protest. ‘You gotta go with Jane. How’s Jake doing?’ he said as Lindon came into the room.

  Lindon’s face was horribly pale. ‘It’s not looking good,’ he said. ‘The ambulance is here.’

  Pushing past him Laurence ran back to the library arriving just in time to see a blanket being drawn over Jake’s face.

  ‘Oh my God!’ Kirsten gasped.

  Numbed by disbelief and horror Laurence pulled her into his arms, burying her face in his shoulder. Then, along with everyone else, he watched in terrible silence as the ambulancemen lifted up the stretcher and carried it out of the room. It was only when they had gone that Laurence spotted Detectives Kowski and Greengage watching from the back of the crowd.

  ‘Jesus Christ Almighty,’ he muttered. ‘Just what the hell is going on?’

  30

  ‘You’ve got my word on it, Dyllis,’ he said, speaking into the phone as he straightened his collar in the mirror, ‘I had nothing to do with it. She just went off at the deep end. I don’t know what set her off. I had no idea it was going to happen. She’s crazier than I thought . . .’

  ‘Well there’s no point worrying about it now,’ Dyllis’s taut voice came down the line. ‘We’re just going to have to see how we can use this to our advantage. Did she use the same method as last time?’

  ‘Yes.’ He watched his own eyes round with amusement and incredulity at the way Dyllis discussed murder as though it were some piquancy she was adding to a stew.

  ‘Where was the whore at the time?’ she demanded.

  ‘Whoring, apparently. In her trailer with Laurence.’

  ‘Don’t they ever think about anything else?’ Dyllis said waspishly. ‘How are the police dealing with it? Are they treating it as murder?’

  ‘Don’t think so. They’re still waiting for the Coroner’s verdict and they’re making a few enquiries, but everyone reckons it’s going to be accidental death.’

  ‘But you’re telling me it wasn’t.’

  ‘Not as such.’

  ‘What do you mean, not as such? Either it was or it wasn’t.’

  ‘I reckon it could have been an accident.’

  ‘But you said . . .’

  ‘An accident in that she got the wrong person. Either that or she had something going with the Director of Photography that I didn’t know about. Poor bastard. He’s married, apparently, got a couple of kids too.’

  ‘So how do we make it look like the whore did it if she was screwing around in her trailer?’ Dyllis enquired, sparing no time for sympathy.

  ‘Same way as last time. She doesn’t have to be right there when it happens. No one does – except the victim of course. I told you before, it’s the perfect murder.’

  ‘So what motive would she have for killing this DP?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Either of them. Kirsten.’

  ‘Search me.’

  ‘Then you’d better think of one, my friend.’

  ‘I’ll do my best, but you’re going to have a hard time proving this one, Dyllis,’ he warned. ‘There’s no accounting for what the real killer might take it into her head to do. I mean, what if she goes and confesses?’

  ‘Just make sure she doesn’t,’ Dyllis snapped.

  ‘And how am I supposed to do that? She doesn’t even know I know she did it. And I don’t want her to know or I might find myself next on her list.’

  ‘That’s your problem, you work it out. And don’t plant any suspicion anywhere until you get back he
re. Then I’m going to sit back and watch that whore’s life crumble. Have you still got the keys to her house?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then hang on to them, you might need them again.’

  ‘No way. The last time I went in there she came back. I stayed shut up in that bloody cupboard for over nine hours before they went off to the airport.’

  ‘But you planted the formula, that’s what matters.’

  ‘It’s with her script.’

  ‘Are you mad?’ Dyllis cried. ‘If she’s carrying it around with her script it won’t be in the house anymore. In fact she’s probably thrown it away by now not knowing what the hell it was. You’ll have to go back in there. Anyway, we’ll discuss that when you come back to London. When’s that likely to be?’

  ‘In the next few days I should think. I can’t see how we can go on over here. The lighting guy could have been replaced, but the star can’t. Her leg’s broken in two places. She’s going to be laid up for months. Of course, the insurance will cover it.’

  ‘Not when they find out foul play was involved,’ Dyllis sneered. ‘This is going to bankrupt them.’

  ‘Well, it’ll bankrupt Laurence, that’s for sure. He’s got his house up for this.’

  ‘Shame. Well, he’s got a few more surprises coming his way, did he but know it. In fact he’s going to end up rueing the day he ever laid eyes on that woman. And she is going to find out just what it’s like to have him walk out on her a second time. I wonder if she’s pregnant yet,’ she mused.

  He felt himself shiver as Dyllis started to laugh. Then, quite suddenly, the line went dead.

  The Coroner’s verdict of accidental death was delivered less than twenty-four hours after Jake had been carried from the house. By then both Kirsten and Laurence had been interviewed by the police and neither of them were left in any doubt that Kowski was deeply unimpressed by what had happened.

  Kirsten could hardly come to grips with the fact that she was once again face to face with this man. She had thought never to see Kowski again in her life, but his wolfish teeth, elongated cheeks and predator’s eyes were right there, swimming before her as he asked her about a death she still couldn’t believe had happened. His presence, just like his questions, was as nightmarish as the newspaper headlines that had been faxed over from the UK.

  ‘Kirsten’s DP Falls to his Death’ one of them said. ‘New Orleans Police Question Kirsten.’ ‘What’s it all about, Kirstie?’ another asked. ‘Star breaks leg, DP dies, Kirsten questioned.’ There were so many of them and most all of them were linking her to what had happened in a way that was as terrifying as it was unjust.

  When the British press started swarming into New Orleans Laurence refused to make any comment on what had happened and no one got even close to seeing Kirsten. She remained in their suite where the police came first to interview her then to tell her the verdict on Jake’s death. It seemed to her that Kowski no more believed it was innocent this time around than he did the last. The blow to the head, he told her, wasn’t normally enough to kill a man, but in this instance it seemed it had . . .

  ‘Seemed,’ Kirsten said to Laurence as soon as the door closed behind Kowski. ‘He doesn’t believe it was an accident, does he?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Laurence sighed. ‘It’s hard to tell with the cops. They’re a real cynical bunch. He was probably just saying it that way ’cos it gives him some kind of kick to do that to people.’

  ‘Do you believe it was an accident?’ she said, her lovely face pale and anguished.

  ‘I sure as hell wish I knew what to believe,’ he sighed, shaking his head. ‘This is just too much of a coincidence, having two deaths on the same movie. Just thank God we were together when it happened and that Ruby and Alison saw us.’

  ‘That’s not stopping the press though is it? They’re trying to make out I had something to do with it.’

  ‘I know.’ His hand suddenly crashed against the wall. ‘Shit! What is going on here?’ he seethed. ‘Why can’t that fucking woman just leave you alone?’

  ‘Maybe she will once the verdict is made public,’ Kirsten suggested, though there wasn’t much hope in her voice. ‘I suppose what’s important is that we know I didn’t do it and no one can prove otherwise.’

  ‘Dermott’s flying in later today,’ he said after a pause. ‘Did Helena tell you?’

  Kirsten nodded. ‘I wish we could just get out of here and go home,’ she said.

  ‘There’s nothing stopping us doing that,’ he said, pulling her into his arms.

  ‘But I thought . . . Aren’t we going to recast Moyna and carry on?’

  He shook his head. ‘No. We can’t do that. I know we only shot a few scenes with Elizabeth and the insurance will cover, but the cast, at least most of them, are saying that unless their fees are doubled – trebled in some cases – they don’t want to continue. Two deaths on the same movie they reckon is a jinx and they don’t want to run the risk of any more unless they’re well compensated for it. And we just can’t afford what they’re asking. So I’m calling the whole thing to a halt.’

  ‘But Laurence, what about the completion bond?’

  ‘We’ll just have to sort it out once we get back to London,’ he said.

  Kirsten put a hand to her head as it started to spin. ‘Oh God, I’m sorry,’ she whispered.

  ‘Hey, hey,’ he said, pulling her back. ‘Will you stop that? It’s not your fault.’

  ‘But I just know this wouldn’t be happening if I wasn’t here. It’s got something to do with me, I know it has.’

  ‘Kirstie, we’ve got to go with what the police tell us and ignore what’s going on in the press or we’re going to end up as crazy as Ruby.’

  ‘How is she?’ Kirsten asked.

  ‘Not good. The nurse is flying home with her later today. The whole thing’s terrified her out of her mind. She’s back on her coconut trip, I’m afraid. Said all this was foretold. First the castle, then a woman, then a man. Well, you know how she goes on, you heard it all before. She tried to tell Kowski that some kid inside her pushed Jake off the ladder, but Elizabeth says Ruby wasn’t even in the room. No one was except those two.’

  ‘What’s going to happen to Ruby once she gets to London?’

  ‘Thea’s sorting that out. I spoke to her while you were with Kowski.’

  Had Kirsten not been so numbed by everything else that was going on she might have been surprised to hear that, but as it was her mind was refusing to function much beyond what was happening right now. But then as she recalled the ludicrously funny image of Frank kissing Jake and Jake’s comical outrage she felt the tears sting her eyes.

  ‘God, who would have thought,’ she said, shaking her head in bewilderment, ‘while we were all messing around on the set yesterday that in less than three hours he would be dead. It’s so frightening. He was so full of life. So kind and uncomplicated. Everyone loved him. No one, just no one would have done this to him so it had to be an accident.’

  ‘Sure it was,’ Laurence said, stroking her hair. ‘That’s exactly what it was and don’t you forget it.’

  ‘Honest to God, Helena,’ Campbell said, ‘I don’t know what’s going on. I tried speaking to Dyllis again but she’s as tight as a horse’s ass. She still reckons she can prove Kirsten killed Anna, I know that, but what she’s making out of this one is anyone’s guess.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Helena said as a stewardess put a gin and tonic in front of her. ‘Well she’s sure having a damned good go at trying to pin it on Kirsten,’ she remarked to Campbell. ‘Either that or she enjoys libel suits. Anyway, you’ve got to find out somehow what’s going on, if you don’t I’m going to the police myself.’

  ‘What?’ he laughed. ‘To tell them what?’

  ‘That Dyllis Fisher has got evidence on those two deaths – or at least on one of them – that she’s with-holding.’

  ‘I wouldn’t mess with her if I were you,’ Campbell warned.

  ‘She doesn’t sca
re me,’ Helena said savagely. ‘And either you find out what she’s up to or . . .’

  ‘Don’t you start threatening me, I’ve had enough of that this past twenty-four hours with Laurence.’

  ‘What do you mean? What’s he been saying?’

  ‘He’s protecting the Kirstie Doll, what do you think? And if you ask me he’s overdoing it. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if he knew a bit more about what was going on around here than he’s letting on. His mother’s gone off her head, his girlfriend’s under suspicion and he won’t let anyone near either of them. So what’s he trying to cover up, that’s what I want to know?’

  ‘Oh get real, Dermott. You’re not seriously trying to tell me that Laurence had something to do with it all.’

  ‘The thought has crossed my mind. Either that or Kirsten did and he knows it.’

  ‘Oh yeah? And just where does Ruby fit into this little scenario?’

  ‘How the fuck do I know? All I’m saying is that Laurence is acting just a bit too heavy. Or with me he is.’

  ‘Because, you fuckwit, you work for Dyllis Fisher. And you’ve got to have seen the headlines in your own paper these past few days.’

  ‘Of course I have. And that’s why I suspect the whole damned lot of them. Dyllis would never be so stupid as to stick her neck out like this if she wasn’t sure of her ground.’

  ‘Yeah, well you better find out what she does know, Dermott, or you and I are through.’

  ‘Oh, and I suppose that’s your way of telling me that for the moment we’re not.’

  ‘For the moment I’m thinking about it. I’ll let you know my decision when you give me the information Dyllis has on those deaths.’

  ‘What are you so keen to know for? It’s not your head on the chopping block. Or is it?’

  ‘Don’t start that again. Just because you weren’t even in the country when it happened this time doesn’t mean you’re in the clear. At least not so far as I’m concerned.’