by Parnell Hall
I frowned. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying it’s possible Sidney Garfellow had seen those crates before. That when he walked into the warehouse he knew they were there, that he’d already planned on a warehouse fight scene, and knew he was going to ask you to write it.” Richard smiled. “Which would mean he’d been in the warehouse before. When? The day before when he killed the bum.”
“Good god.”
Richard put up his hands. “Hey. I’m not saying he did. I’m just making a point. When you tell me there’s nothing to go on. Well, maybe Sergeant Clark has nothing to go on. But that doesn’t mean there is.
“But to get back to my original point. There’s nothing to connect you to the death of the bum in the warehouse?”
“No.”
“And the death of this boom man—even if we concede you had a reason to hate Jason Clairemont—Sergeant Clark, for all his failings, is relatively rational. I can’t believe he really thinks you did it.”
“I’m sure he doesn’t.”
“Good,” Richard said. “Then as your attorney I’d like to give you some advice.”
“Advice?”
“Yes. My advice to you is forget it. You’re not involved. It’s got nothing to do with you. Now, Sergeant Clark and I may have a bet, but that’s got nothing to do with you either. Don’t get some crazy idea you gotta win my bet for me. If it happens it happens, but it’s got nothing to do with you.
“Now, then, this movie you wrote—the one you took four weeks off from my work to watch ’em film.”
“What about it?”
“You say this kid’s fuckin’ it up. Well, maybe so. That’s your area of expertise, not mine. Even so, you got your movie being filmed. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime thing. Never happened before, may never happen again. It’s a big deal. Which is why as your attorney I advise you to leave this murder to Sergeant Clark. It’s got nothing to do with you. But as to the movie ...”
“Yeah?”
Richard smiled, shrugged.
“Enjoy it.”
25.
EASY FOR HIM TO SAY. RICHARD Rosenberg never wrote a word in his life outside of a legal brief. And he couldn’t have given a damn whether anyone rewrote him unless it directly cost him money. The way I saw it, what Jason Clairemont was doing to the script was indirectly costing me money, but that was the least of it. He was also, tearing my heart out and stomping on it with soccer cleats.
Aside from that, what Richard said made sense. I wasn’t involved in this murder, and I was under no obligation to solve it. Sergeant Clark, though not to my taste, was a perfectly competent investigator. No, that’s not fair. To give him his due, the man was damn good. If he wasn’t, I wouldn’t have this nagging desire to wipe that smug smile off his face by solving the crime first.
No. Bad thoughts. Stick to Richard’s advice. Enjoy the movie.
Hell, that was the problem. With the movie a hopeless mess, the impulse was to run from it and embrace the crime. It was almost as if Jason Clairemont had beaten me and I had conceded defeat, and now I needed to reassert myself by beating Sergeant Clark.
I was sitting alone on the bench thinking that. Richard had strolled off and was on the dock watching them rehearse the scene they were about to shoot. And so was every other male within a hundred yards, thanks to the extraordinary attributes of Hot Babe Number Two.
Actually, if the truth be known, the young lady was Hot Babe Number Four. Because you don’t shoot a movie in sequence. As I said, you shoot all the exteriors first. And since Hot Babes Two and Three appeared only in interior scenes, we had skipped directly to Hot Babe Number Four.
I was actually rather proud of her. As I said, I’d created her, and I’d created her out of whole cloth. Sidney had asked for four hot babes. There was only room for three in the script. Try as I would, I couldn’t crowd the fourth one in. Unless I made one of the girls twins, which didn’t really fit with the plot.
Sidney, naturally, was totally unsympathetic—he wanted four hot babes, and there were gonna be four hot babes. It was up to me to fit ’em in, and if I couldn’t, it was my damn fault.
Which is how Cassie was born. Since there was no room for her in the plot, I added her to the movie without affecting the plot. During the chase scene at the end of the movie where the bad guys are all after Rick, I have him come screeching into the boat basin, run to the end of the dock, and steal a yacht. Just as he pulls away, who should wake up but Hot Babe Number Four, who had fallen asleep while sunbathing on deck. She’s there for the entire chase, adding visual delight and chipping in an occasional one-liner. Actually several one-liners, in the hopes two or three of them would be funny enough to survive the final cut.
Anyway, after seeing her bikini, I had to admit it probably would be worth it even if none of them survived the final cut.
Perhaps it was that thought that drew me to the dock. At any rate, I found myself walking toward it. I went out, joined the crowd at the far end. It was standing room only. I had to stand on tiptoes, crane my neck to see.
It was worth it. Hot Babe Number Four was in position, lying on her stomach on the deck of the yacht. The back of her bikini bottom consisted of an invisible string running up the crack of her ass. It might as well have not existed. The string of her bikini top didn’t exist—it had been untied. Her oversized breasts were bulging out from under the sides of her body.
While I watched, they did the final rehearsal of Jason Clairemont jumping off the dock and stealing the boat.
Ever do something, you want to shoot yourself in the head? I did just then. Because I had written the sequence of Jason stealing the boat. And here’s what I’d written: Jason hops in the boat, starts the engine, he pulls away from the dock, and the bimbo wakes up.
What a schmuck. Why couldn’t I have written: Jason hops in the boat, starts the engine, the bimbo wakes up, and he pulls away from the dock? I mean, here is this hot babe, with more pounds of breast than you would see on most entire cheerleading squads, lying there with her top off, and I don’t have her hop up until the boat’s out in the middle of the fucking river. Why did I write it that way? Was I out of my mind? Was I in a coma?
Yes, I’m a sexist pig. I wanted to see them. But give me a break. We’re talking natural phenomenon here. Even the women on the dock wanted to see them.
No such luck. After we shot the scene they’d rehearsed, cutting before the boat pulled out and the bimbo woke up, they moved the camera onto the boat and took off for the middle of the river. The two principals, Jason and the bimbo, and a skeleton crew of essential personnel. These included the producer-director, the director of photography, the first assistant cameraman, the sound mixer, and the script supervisor.
No, they did not include the screenwriter.
They didn’t include the first AD either. As the boat pulled out from the dock, she came walking up to me.
“Say, what’s with him?” she said.
“Who?”
She jerked her thumb. “The cop.”
“Sergeant Clark?”
“Yeah. What’s his story?”
“Why? Is he bothering you?”
“I’ll say.”
I looked at the end of the dock. Clark, MacAullif, and Richard were in the crush of people watching the yacht sail away. Well, hell, no one’s letting me enjoy the movie, and if she’s gonna come dump it in my lap ...
“It looks like we’re not needed here,” I said. I jerked my thumb at the catering truck. “How about grabbing a cup of coffee?”
We went ashore, got coffee, strolled over by the Little League field.
“Okay,” I said. “What’s the problem?”
“The problem is, what right has he got to intrude on my personal life?”
“What do you mean?”
“The guy wants to know where I was the night before the boom man fell.”
“It’s no big deal. He’s asking that of everybody.”
“No. He just asked me.”<
br />
“Huh?”
“He came here this morning just to ask me. He spoke to Clarity too, but he didn’t ask her that at all.”
“It doesn’t mean anything.”
“The hell it doesn’t. What business is it of his if I went out with Jason Clairemont?”
I’m afraid my eyes widened slightly.
And she caught it. “See? See? You too. And there was nothing to it.”
I put up my hands. I wanted to placate her, but I was sure nothing I could say was gonna work. “I’m sure there wasn’t,” I said. “What you’re saying is, you’re the one he took out to dinner?”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“Absolutely nothing. But Sergeant Clark came here this morning, asked you a lot of questions about it, and got you upset. Right?”
“Yes. Yes, he did.”
“If you hang on a moment, I think I can explain.” I took a breath. She was obviously upset, and I had to be careful not to offend her. “Well, look,” I said. “The problem is, Jason Clairemont is young.”
I offended her. “So I shouldn’t go out with him?”
“No, no. Not at all. This is nothing to do with you, it has to do with him. The thing is, when he was questioned by Sergeant Clark he said he’d been out to dinner with someone but he wouldn’t say who.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Exactly. That’s why I say he was young. It was a young thing to do—protecting your good name.”
“But this policeman noses around, finds out about it, and asks me all these questions.”
“Of course. You can see why. Jason Clairemont gave a rather dubious alibi. Of course he’s gonna check it.”
“Oh, yeah? So why’s he care about my personal life?”
“I just explained.”
“No, not that. No, he wants to know about me and Sidney.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, and what business is that of his? He wants to know, were Sidney and I dating? Did we break up? When did we break up? Why did we break up? Who broke us up? Who broke up, me or him? And did Sidney know I was going out with Jason Clairemont?”
Well. Easy enough to follow that line of reasoning. Sidney Garfellow, the jealous, jilted lover, attempts to bump off rival Jason Clairemont. There were a few flaws in it, like why give him an eleven-o’clock call so the boom man dies instead, but as a working theory it had possibilities. It was certainly interesting that the attractive AD had gone out with the nerdy twerp superstar.
And that he hadn’t wanted anyone to know about it.
26.
YOU KNOW THE EXPRESSION, DON’T rub it in? Happens to me a lot. Getting it rubbed in, I mean. On this occasion it was the sexist-pig bit. Because I’d just admitted to being one with regard to Hot Babe Number Four, when who should come driving up but Jake Decker with our new boom man.
Who was a woman. Which shouldn’t have been that much of a surprise. It was just that with no one knowing Charles Masterson’s name, everyone referred to him as the boom man. And with him getting killed, everyone was referring to him. So the words boom man had been on everyone’s lips.
Bad words. Sexist.
Because now we had a boom woman. Only you didn’t say boom woman. That was sexist. So what did you say, boom person? No, that was sexist too. You wouldn’t call a boom man a boom person. So what the hell did you call her?
Jake Decker solved the problem for me. “Stanley,” he said as they came walking up. “I’d like you to meet Judy Bloom. Judy’s our new boom operator.”
Yes, of course. Boom operator. Totally nonsexist.
Except.
It immediately reminded me of telephone operator, a traditionally female job.
I know. Don’t rub it in.
Anyway, as Jake led the distaff boom man out to the dock, it occurred to me she was now the one person on the whole movie crew who wasn’t a suspect in Charles Masterson’s murder.
Until I realized, as the new boom operator she was the one who profited most from his death.
Just kidding.
I watched as she and Jake Decker walked out on the dock. Richard and MacAullif were still standing there looking out over the river where the action was taking place. I wondered how much they could actually see. Probably not much. Still, I considered joining them.
I realized I didn’t see Sergeant Clark. I looked around, trying to spot him, but he was nowhere in sight. I looked some more, saw what might have been the back of his brown suit jacket disappear behind Jason Clairemont’s Winnebago.
I wasn’t about to go see. But surely there was no harm in walking a little ways along the riverbank. Which is what I did. And now when I glanced back over where the production vehicles were parked, I could see the other side of the Winnebago just fine.
Sure enough, there was Sergeant Clark. He was talking to Dan the gofer, who had just driven up.
That computed in my mind. Of course. Dan was the one who’d originally picked up the keys to the warehouse. Sergeant Clark, having bet that crime would tie in with this one, now had to prove a link. Hence he’d start with Dan.
I looked back over at the dock, where Richard and MacAullif still stood watching. I wondered if I should warn Richard. I immediately stopped myself.
Schmuck. It’s none of your business. It was Richard himself who told you that.
To hell with it. I wandered over to the catering truck for another cup of coffee. The girl from the truck was arranging a tray of blondies, those delicious, scrumptious, incredibly high-calorie vanilla brownies that only a saint could refuse. I am not a saint. I would have succumbed, but the girl informed me they were for lunch.
I contented myself with a coffee. As I wandered off sipping it, I realized it was my third this morning. I also realized I hadn’t been to the bathroom since my first.
Anytime you start thinking how glamorous the movies are, try hanging out on a location set and drinking lots of coffee. Jason Clairemont and the bimbo had bathroom facilities in the Winnebagos. The rest of us had to use the john on the crew bus.
It was small, cramped, and stunk. Really stunk. The thing reeked to high heaven. I took one whiff and almost gagged. And, wouldn’t you know it, when I finished peeing I got an attack of diarrhea and had to stay in there.
I have to tell you, I thought I was going to die. I sat there on the toilet thinking, what else can go wrong? I wondered if the diarrhea was the result of too much coffee or if it had been brought on by nerves. Anyway, I took my infirmity as a final sign, a message from the gods, stay out, schmuck, you’re not involved.
With that firm resolve I washed my hands, pushed open the bathroom door.
And heard, “He’s onto you!”
A female voice. Fearful. Hushed. Urgent.
Then, in counterpoint, a male voice, cocky, assured. “Relax. It’s all right.”
I froze in the doorway. Listened.
“You’re gonna get caught.”
“No, I’m not.”
“And you’ll get me in trouble.”
“I won’t.
I pushed the door open slightly, peered out.
There were two people in the front of the bus, but I couldn’t see either clearly. The woman was leaning against the arm of one of the seats with her back to me. The man was behind her, out of view.
There was something vaguely familiar about the woman’s long brown hair, but I just couldn’t place it. Then her head turned slightly and I caught a glimpse of her features. The ski jump of her nose.
Of course. The girl from the catering truck.
Her head moved again and I saw the man behind her.
It was Dan.
My stomach felt hollow. Jesus Christ. Talk about signs from the gods. Here it is, laid out for you. Sergeant Clark questions Dan. Minutes later the girl warns him. He’s onto you! Sorry, Richard. I’ll butt out on the crime if I can. But if they’re gonna go drop it in my lap.
“Dan—”
“Oh, Christ,” Dan said. He looked around.
As his eyes darted my way, I instinctively pulled the door shut. But not so much that I couldn’t see what he was doing.
He took a deep breath, blew it out, ran his hand over his head. “Oh, all right,” he said. “I give up. You win.”
The girl looked up at him. “Huh?”
Dan put his arm on her shoulder. “All right. When you’re right, you’re right. Come on. I’ll put it back.”
“Dan.”
His left hand was on her shoulder, escorting her off the bus. Now his right hand came up into view.
In it was something small and rectangular. Something I thought I recognized.
A vanilla brownie.
“Come on,” Dan said. “I’ll put the blondie back.”
And with that they were gone.
Do I have to tell you how stupid I felt? Suffice it to say, that was the last kick I needed to drive the point home.
Hey, I already said I wasn’t investigating the crime.
They didn’t have to rub it in.
27.
THE PHONE RANG IN THE MIDDLE of “L.A. Law.”
I hate that. Even if Alice and I gripe about the plot lines and say the show’s not what it used to be. Still, come ten o’clock Thursday night I like to relax and wind down from the day. I do not like to answer the phone.
But I did. Because that late at night I’m always afraid it’s an emergency. And I can’t bear the thought of someone making an emergency phone call and having my answering machine pick it up—not when I’m really there. I rolled over on the bed and grabbed the phone on the second ring.
It was Richard.
With something on his mind.
“Do you think he’s gay?”
“What?”
“Sergeant Clark. Do you think he’s gay?”
“Good god, why do you say that?”
“He wants to have dinner with me. I was just thinking. Isn’t that strange? Wanting to go to dinner?”
“Richard, I think it’s just what it appears to be. You pissed him off and goaded him into making a bet. He’s a cop, so he doesn’t want to bet money. So he bets you dinner. He’s also a smug son of a bitch, who’d like nothing better than to lecture you on how he happened to be right.”