Girl About Town

by Adam Shankman

  The man stood watch at the door, making sure Freddie didn’t try to escape. Unfortunately, he didn’t know about the back door to an adjoining room with an exit outside, and by the time he realized that most baths don’t last an hour, Freddie and Lulu were long gone.

  “How did you manage it?” Freddie asked from the passenger seat of Mugsy’s black Duesenberg. Lulu was wiping away the contouring makeup that had changed the shape of her face.

  “Well, it was surprisingly easy,” she said as she stripped off the caramel-colored wig and fluffed her platinum waves. “Thanks to you I already had the nurse’s uniform. Beyond that, I just had to pay off the real nurse to let me take her place.”

  “How much?” he asked grimly.

  “I asked her how much a doctor makes in a year,” Lulu said. “She told me about three thousand dollars, so we settled on that. Really, that poor girl makes a paltry amount, considering she actually has to bathe people. You’re not bad, but imagine all those unappealing mounds of flesh she has to scrub.” Lulu was delighted with her success, but she sensed a certain stiffness from Freddie. “Darling, what’s wrong? I would have saved you faster, only . . .”

  “Three thousand dollars,” he said slowly. “I know you don’t have that kind of money. Not on short notice, maybe not even if you sold all of your things. Who gave it to you?”

  “Why, Freddie, what does it matter? You’re free now, and Mugsy booked passage on a ship to Macao, which isn’t quite Hong Kong, but close enough.”

  “Was it Sal?” he asked through clenched teeth. “Did you agree to . . . to . . . ?” He couldn’t choke the words out.

  “No! What do you think I am?”

  Freddie relaxed visibly. “I think you’re a brave girl who would sacrifice yourself for the people you love, if you thought that was the only way. But I wouldn’t let you. You know that, don’t you?”

  “Look here, mister. If this fling is going to last, you have to stop with the ‘I won’t let you’ garbage. I make my own decisions, and you just have to live with them.”

  He grinned at her, then sobered. “So where did the money come from, then?”

  Lulu looked at Mugsy uncertainly.

  “Tell him, kiddo,” Mugsy urged her.

  “It was your father’s money,” Lulu confessed.

  Freddie drew in an angry breath, furious. He’d sworn never to touch that money, those wages of sin. He hadn’t when he was in jail, not even when Ben died. Not even to get Lulu the best team of lawyers money could buy. And now, while he lay helpless, those proceeds of blood and tears and suffering had been put to use for his benefit, the last thing he would ever want, ever allow.

  But he looked at Lulu’s anxious, loving face, and let his breath out. “How did you get it?”

  Mugsy answered with an embarrassed little shrug of his hulking shoulders. “I’ve been handling your school fees and bar tabs and tailor’s accounts for years, boyo. You think by now I can’t forge your signature or your old man’s? How do you think I got it? I stole it. Your pop’s involved with plenty of criminals. What’s one more?”

  Using his father’s money was anathema. Stealing it, though—that was another story. Freddie burst into laughter and put his arm around Lulu, squeezing her tight.

  TWENTY-NINE

  He wouldn’t accept passage to Macao, though. Not yet, anyway. “We have a job to do. We have to clear your name.”

  “Oh, Freddie,” Lulu said. “I don’t care about that! What will it matter when we’re living under assumed names with fake mustaches in Macao? Won’t I look adorable in a Fu Manchu?”

  “You love acting, Lulu. I won’t let you give up your career to run away with me.”

  “There’s that bullyboy ‘I won’t let you’ again. I’m not asking you what I should do. I’m telling you what I’m going to do.”

  Freddie shook his head. “I’m not leaving until you’re cleared of attempted murder. We have to find out who put the bullets in the gun. Then, once you’re off the hook, you’ll be free to make the choice for yourself. I don’t want you with me just because you’re running away.”

  “But if you stay, your father might catch you again,” Lulu said.

  “Maybe,” Freddie admitted, “but now we have Mugsy on our side. My father thinks Mugsy’s helping him, but really he’ll be looking out for me.”

  Mugsy had hidden Freddie in a seedy hotel room he’d rented under an assumed name on the outskirts of town. Lulu contacted Roger and made arrangements to see the overlooked bullet.

  “Don’t worry,” Roger said over the phone. “I won’t let the police know where you’ll be. I know if I did, you’d blab my secret to the world.”

  “Why, Roger, I’d never . . .”

  “I’ll leave the alley door to studio C unlocked,” he said, and hung up.

  He was leaving the bullet in his desk drawer. They were to go to the studio after dark, once most of the crew had cleared out.

  “But what are the odds that one bullet will tell us anything?” Lulu wanted to know. “Every minute you stay here makes it that much more likely your father will catch you. What do we do after that?”

  “I’ll kiss you, and we’ll go out for ice cream,” Freddie said, making good on the first part of his threat.

  “Freddie! Be serious!”

  “I’m always serious when it comes to ice cream. And kisses,” he added, taking her in his arms again.

  That night Lulu, Freddie, and Mugsy crept into the deserted studio. Mugsy held the flashlight, but Lulu took the lead, moving silently by memory through the dim halls. It seemed like Lux was empty.

  They locked themselves in Roger’s large windowless office before shutting off the flashlight and turning on a lamp.

  “Here it is,” said Lulu, pulling out a paper bag with its top secured with a rubber band.

  “Don’t touch it,” Freddie cautioned. “They might be able to get prints.”

  “Never mind about that,” Mugsy said. “Maybe they coulda got prints from the bullets fresh from the cylinder, but this one’s been kicking around in this guy’s pocket and who knows what else.”

  Lulu dumped the bullet on the table, and they all looked at it.

  “It looks . . . like a bullet,” Lulu said helplessly. She leaned heavily against Roger’s desk. “I don’t know what this was supposed to accomplish. One bullet looks exactly like any other. There’s nothing we can learn from this.”

  “Don’t be so sure,” Mugsy said. He picked up the bullet and let it rest against the calluses of his meaty palm. “This ain’t your ordinary bullet.”

  Lulu leaned forward eagerly.

  “I carry a gun, and I’ve been shot a time or three, so I made it a point to learn something about ballistics and gunshot wounds,” Mugsy said.

  “You’ve been shot?” Lulu and Freddie asked at the same time.

  “Sure. You don’t know all my secrets, whippersnapper. Once as a kid in the Great War, once during a robbery, and once when a couple of kidnappers tried to swipe you when you was three years old.”

  “I never knew,” Freddie said.

  Mugsy shrugged. “Didn’t want you to think you owed me one.”

  “Mugs, I owe you about a million.”

  “Nah. Your pop already paid me that, and more. How do you think I’m driving a Duesenberg? Protecting you pays well. Too bad your pop never figured out I’m really working for you, not him. Anyway . . .”

  “What about the robbery? When were you robbed?”

  Mugsy fixed Freddy with an even stare. “Who says I was the one being robbed? Maybe I was the robber. Now,” he said decisively, “to stick to the matter at hand. You might not think it, but when a bullet hits you, it’s the speed that takes you out.”

  Lulu asked, “You mean, a fast bullet does more damage?”

  “Not at all. It’s when a bullet slows down that it tears a real hole in you. Think of a bullet as a bunch of energy. When the bullet is moving, the energy is in the bullet, right, giving it speed. But wh
en it slows down, that energy has to go somewhere. Where does it go? Into your flesh. A slow bullet rips a much bigger hole than a fast one, and does a lot more damage.”

  “Mugsy, I do believe you just quoted one of the laws of thermodynamics,” Freddie said. “Never knew you had it in you.”

  “What does that have to do with Ruby?” Lulu asked.

  “Most people buy bullets that have a lot of stopping power. When they shoot something—a deer, a person—they want it to go down and stay down with as few shots as possible. See this bullet?” Mugsy held it up for their inspection. “It comes to a perfect point. Since they started making hollow-point bullets, almost no one uses these anymore.”

  He set the bullet down on the desk and twirled it so it spun like a dervish. “It’s jacketed, too.”

  “Meaning?”

  “It won’t fragment. It’s designed to be fast and clean—to go straight through something without expanding or breaking up. Sometimes you see these in large-caliber hunting ammunition, for big game, something with a lot of flesh and fat around its vital organs. If you want to stop a charging rhino, you need a bullet that will go in the neck and come out the rear end. A bullet that stops after six inches is only going to tickle him. But I’ve rarely seen it in small caliber handguns. It would make a wound like being poked with a big pencil, clean and straight through. It will do damage, but all things considered, a neat in-and-out is less likely to kill a person.”

  Lulu scrunched up her forehead. “So you’re saying that whoever put the bullets in there didn’t want someone to die?”

  “That doesn’t make sense,” Freddie said. “If you don’t want someone to die, why do you shoot her in the first place?”

  Lulu’s eyes were opened wide. “It makes sense if you’re the one getting shot!”

  Freddie gasped. “You mean Ruby . . .”

  “Shh!” Mugsy hissed, and flicked off the light. There was a sound from the hallway.

  “Probably a janitor,” Lulu whispered. She thought she heard the hushed swish-swish of a broom.

  They stood together in silence until the sound of sweeping subsided.

  “So it was Ruby after all,” said Lulu wonderingly.

  “Maybe not,” Freddie said. “It could have been one of the others, and they just didn’t want to kill anyone.”

  “Seems to me the next thing we have to find out is where this bullet was bought,” Mugsy said. “It’s unusual enough that the shop owner will probably remember whoever bought this kind of ammo in the last few weeks. Only problem is, ammunition must be sold in a dozen sporting goods stores in the city and probably another hundred within a day’s drive. Whoever did it was probably too smart to buy locally.”

  “Don’t be so sure,” Lulu said. “Actors aren’t always the sharpest tacks. I guess we just drive around and ask everyone?”

  “Only thing we can do,” Freddie said. “Let’s take the bullet and get to work first thing in the morning. Ow!” He hit his shin on a chair.

  “Let me put the lights on,” Lulu said.

  “No.” Mugsy caught at her in the dark. “Someone might still be out there. Use the flashlight.” But when he hit the switch, it flickered just long enough to make them see spots and then died.

  “Wait a minute. I have a matchbook here somewhere.” Freddie struck the match and retrieved the bullet by its orange flame.

  As he was shaking it out, he heard Lulu’s startled cry. “Let me see that matchbook!” she said, fumbling for his hand in the darkness. She opened it and struck another match, then bent to read by its light. “Bighorn Sporting Goods. They must sell bullets there. Oh, Freddie, do you remember? This is the matchbook I took out of Roger King’s pocket. He must be involved.”

  It came back to Freddie then: the bustle of the set the chaotic day of the shooting, the props man asking for a light, the dark-haired, green-eyed girl tossing him a matchbook that spun through the air, shining black and gold. . . .

  “No. It was Ruby’s matchbook,” Freddie said, telling them about the memory. “I’m sure of it.”

  “Next stop, Bighorn Sporting Goods,” Lulu said, her eyes glowing with excitement.

  “But they won’t be open for hours.”

  “Then we’ll go back to Mugsy’s hotel.”

  “I won’t be able to sleep a wink,” Freddie said.

  “Who says I’ll be letting you sleep?” Lulu asked with a roguish grin.

  Before Lulu could recover from being shocked at her own outrageous flirtation, they heard a crash of shattering glass and a man’s demented voice shouting, “What have you done with it? Is this what you want, you tramp? Ruby Godfrey, I swear that one way or another, I will finish this now!”

  THIRTY

  Lulu and Freddie raced down the hall in the direction of the uproar, while Mugsy—the only one of them actually armed and prepared for a fight—tried to hold them back from what was clearly the hysterical confession of a would-be killer. He grabbed at their shoulders to slow them down and managed to stop them in the hallway before they could burst into the dressing room where a confused commotion was still emanating. He dragged them next door instead and hissed, “Stop and think! I ain’t havin’ neither of you gettin’ hurt on my watch, and this guy sounds bent outta his tree. Let me handle this.”

  “Listen!” Lulu whispered, and they pressed their ears to the adjoining wall. They could hear pacing and a slurred voice saying something indistinct about lies and blackmail. They were in the female dressing room section. Lulu looked around her, recognizing the chamber belonging to Elizabeth Holdridge, the faded silent film star who was playing her fading and anything but silent mother in Girl About Town. So the next room over was Ruby’s.

  “I know that voice . . . almost,” Lulu said softly. It was tantalizingly familiar, as if someone she knew very well was acting a part. It came to her suddenly: It was the right voice, the wrong accent.

  “Vasily!” she breathed in astonishment. His Russian accent had vanished.

  “He put the bullets in the gun?” Freddie asked.

  “I have no idea. But Ruby knows his secret,” Lulu said.

  “But you told me everybody in Hollywood knows his secret. Why would he . . . ?”

  There was a loud thump, like a body hitting the ground. “Freddie! Do you think Ruby’s in there with him?” Lulu gasped, itching to go see.

  “She can’t be. She’s in the hospital.”

  “Or someone else, then. Did you hear that? He just said he’s going to finish this now. I’m going in there!”

  “Lulu, wait!” Freddie tried to hold her back, but she slipped past him and threw open the door . . .

  . . . directly into the black cavernous barrel of a gun.

  It was a sight she’d hoped never to see again. When Sal had pointed the gun at her face, she’d thought her life was over. Now here was that dark, cold eye staring her down again. You can never escape your fate, she thought.

  “Vasily, why?” she asked. She heard the others behind her, but there was nothing they could do. One wrong move, and a simple squeeze of the trigger would end her life.

  “Oh, Lulu,” Vasily moaned. “Oh God . . . I’m so sorry. It wasn’t supposed to happen this way.” His finger twitched on the trigger.

  “Where is she?” Lulu asked, trying to see around him. There was no one, just an overturned leather chair. That must have made the thump.

  “Who? What are you talking about? There’s no one else here. There’s nothing else here. It’s all over.” With his free hand, he pulled a flask from his pocket and took a swig. The smell of the cheap grain alcohol stung Lulu’s nose. She saw the glass shards of a smashed liquor bottle next to the makeup table. “But, my dear, now that you and your friends have arrived, it seems we’re having one hell of a party. And how gay a time we are having, yes? Well, bully for us! I always say, go out with a bang. BANG!”

  He jerked the gun, and Lulu squeezed her eyes shut. But he didn’t fire, only gave a strange and piteous laugh.

&
nbsp; “Vasily, you don’t want to do this,” Lulu pleaded, trying to reach through his drunkenness to find out what was really happening.

  “Do not presume to tell me what I do and do not want to do, young lady! Show some respect! And I’ll tell you a little secret: I have wanted this since I was a teenager. You see, it seems that I’m going to hell! Yes, I’m going to hell . . . and all because I fell in love.”

  Vasily’s scarlet-rimmed eyes brimmed with tears. The gun quivered in his unsteady hand.

  “I fell in love with a beautiful man, and he loved me back. He was so kind, and he was funny and he saw me for everything that was good about me. Our love was the most real thing I had ever known, and so sweet, and I felt so . . . so honest and so human. But it was forbidden, and the world wouldn’t allow anything that true and beautiful to live, so they jailed him, and I’m told he died there. But me? I got off easy,” he said bitterly. “My father simply had me put in a mental institution, where I was tortured and told that I was unworthy of love and life, but since I was so young, I could still be saved. Saved with electric shock, and needles, and . . .”

  He broke off and, gun or no gun, Lulu wanted to comfort him. She reached up to touch his face, but he jerked away.

  “Ruby knew!” Vasily ranted. “She stole my past from my bedroom. She took the proof. Do not judge me. I can see it in all your eyes. Yes, I was a fool to keep it around, but I wanted some shred of my past, some connection to the boy I left behind. Now that blackmailing vixen has it, and there’s nothing in the world that will fix the mess I’m in—nothing but a bullet to the head.”

  “I am so sorry, Vasily. Honest, I am. But why involve me?” Lulu asked. “Why put the bullets in the gun so everyone thought it was me who shot Ruby? What have I ever done to you?”

  He looked at her in drunken confusion. “Bullets? What are you talking about? I would never do that. I’m the one who needs to die.”

  He took a step back from her, and in one quick gesture put the gun to his temple and pulled the trigger.

  “No!” Lulu screamed, and surged forward.