Murder! Hollywood Style
Page 24
“Je ne comprends pas.” Val hoped to high heaven that the dear old nuisance sitting next to her didn’t speak French.
“Oh dear, I’m sorry to say I don’t speak any other languages. Oh you poor thing.”
“Vous etes une vache, madame.” Val smiled at the woman, as she told her in French that she was a cow.
“Maybe the stewardess can help you.”
Val made the gesture that she wanted to sleep and closed her eyes. The woman finally got the message and shut up.
Los Angeles—finally she was on the coast. No limo, no agents, no hangers-on to meet her. She went to the bus counter and bought a ticket to the bus terminal in town. The ride wasn’t at all what she had expected. The palm trees were nice, but she’d had her fill of those in Florida. The sun seemed to be trying to shine through the smoky haze over the city—probably the smog she’d read about. At the bus terminal, she rented a locker and changed her trench coat for a jeans jacket, her wool cap for a baseball cap, and her briefcase for a small gym bag.
She went to Information and was told there was a bus that went along Hollywood Boulevard. She felt like a tourist, an ordinary person. When the bus stopped at Hollywood and Vine she just had to get off and go into the famous drugstore where Lana Turner had been discovered. A few young guys looked at her and she thought they recognized her, but then realized they were gay and thought she was a boy. They were cruising her! Any other time she would have found this amusing and could have had fun, but not that day. That day it made her angry. She didn’t have time for such nonsense.
She started walking up Hollywood Boulevard. It wasn’t at all glamorous. In fact the area where she was walking looked downright neglected. She did stop at Grauman’s Chinese, where the premiere had been, not to remember that hideous night but rather to pay homage to the tiny footprints and handprints and names in cement. They belonged to the real movie stars as far as she was concerned.
Then she had to get on with her business at hand. She came to a hotel and the doorman found her a cab. She lowered her voice and gave the driver an address. Her timing was good. It was dusk when she got out of the cab. She knew from the map she had studied that she had to walk two blocks north and three east to reach her destination.
Not many people were about. How different from New York. She only passed two people walking their dogs. Then she saw the name she was looking for on the street sign. She easily found the apartment building and purposely walked past the entrance, ducking down an adjacent alley that was filled with an overgrowth of tropical plants. She could stand in the middle of that convenient jungle and wait, something she was prepared to do for however long it took. Her watch said six-thirty. She laughed at how precise she had become and felt calm and excited at the same time. Not many people came or went out of the building and the street was quiet. When a cab arrived, she knew immediately—it was him.
Val called his name. He looked, not seeing her in the half-light.
“It’s me, Nicky.”
She walked toward him. He still didn’t recognize her. But it was something about the voice. He knew that voice. He shielded his eyes and finally saw who it was.
“Well I’ll be…”
“Are you surprised?”
“That’s the understatement of the year. What are you doing here?”
“I’ve got something for you.”
“Oh really? Now I wonder what that could possibly be.”
“Yes really. I’ve been waiting to give you this for a long, long time.”
He started to get impatient.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
She came toward him.
“This.”
She plunged a knife into his chest where she hoped his heart was. He looked at her, not knowing what had just happened.
She watched as he started to feel something. There wasn’t much blood when she pulled out the knife. His knees started to buckle. Still looking at her as he fell to the ground, he managed to say one word.
“Why?”
“Why not.”
She said this to herself as she walked briskly to the corner going in the opposite direction from the way she had come.
The knife was already in the small gym bag wrapped in a face cloth she’d brought with her. She took off her jean jacket and tied it around her hips and started jogging like she was out for her evening run. After two more blocks she took of her ball cap and put it in a convenient garbage bin and let down her hair. Her glasses were dropped in the next garbage can she passed. She glanced at her watch, it was precisely seven twenty-six. She could easily make it to the airport, catch the red-eye, and be in New York by six-thirty a.m. Eastern Standard Time.
At the terminal, she opened her locker, took out the briefcase and trench coat, and went to the ladies’ room. Inside a bathroom stall, she pulled out the knife, put it in the bowl, and flushed. She did this three or four times, making sounds like she was throwing up in case anyone came in. She picked it out with toilet tissue, wiped it dry, and put it in the sanitary napkin disposal box without touching it. She put the gym bag with the face cloth and sneakers in the briefcase. She would dispose of them easily in New York. She put on a push-up bra she’d brought with her and turned her T-shirt around and tied it under her boobs. She turned up the bottoms of her jeans and put on the high-heeled pumps she had in the briefcase. Adding lipstick, a little blush, and a pair of sun glasses, she put the jeans jacket around her shoulders, shook out her hair, and walked out of the ladies’ room with the trenchcoat over her arm, totally transformed.
She took the bus to LAX, went to the ticket counter, and booked a seat on the red-eye to New York.
Darcy Holmes then bought gum and a crossword book and sat down at gate forty-two with an hour to kill before boarding.
The Funeral
“Come on, Val. It’s time to go.”
She stood transfixed, watching the dirt being shoveled onto the lowered casket.
“Come on, Val. Let’s go home.”
She took the arm of the person who had spoken. It was good old faithful Joe.
THE END