by Kim Izzo
“From what I know, he wasn’t the only one,” I said, silently referring to Niall.
“True. I had more than a few reporters chasing me, trying to prove my guilt and, thankfully, my innocence. A few of them paid for it, though, in the end.”
I shifted uncomfortably on the couch at the cloaked reference to Niall’s time in prison, and wondered whom else Frederick got even with. “Then you got lucky,” I said, provoking him.
“Luck had nothing to do with it. Innocence prevailed. Good triumphs over evil,” he said flatly.
“Does it? Well, I know Larry; he’s good at what he does.” Again I was goading him.
He eyed me suspiciously. “You know Larry? Is he a friend?”
“We’ve worked together. You know how it is with us tabloid reporters; we talk to each other, look out for each other. Get it?”
“I’m sure that I don’t.” He eyed me suspiciously. “But I had hoped to see you before you read it, so we could chat.”
“Well, I didn’t, and I’m here, so cut to the chase,” I said. “You can’t cast Amber. We had a deal.”
He laughed like I had said something highly amusing. It annoyed me. He took two long sips from the teacup and placed it down on a side table with the carefulness of a jeweller returning priceless diamonds to their glass case.
“I’m sorry you feel that way. But I’m a successful producer for a reason. Amber was right for the part, better than right, she knocked my socks off. And to top it off, she’s a sweetheart of a charmer. She knows how to play the game, if you know what I mean.”
I did and recoiled. I knew enough about Frederick to know being irate wasn’t going to work, so I softened my tone. “But you haven’t even seen Alicia Steele’s screen test yet,” I pleaded. “What if she’s better than Amber?”
He shrugged. “I doubt it.”
“That’s not fair. You could at least watch it before signing Amber’s contract.”
“I’ll watch it, but it won’t change things. You know, I did screen He Gave No Answer.”
My heart lifted a little. “And? She’s great, isn’t she?”
“She’s good. I’ll give you that. But I didn’t see her comedic side. If anything, she’s a dramatic actress. Maybe in my next film …”
“But there’s not time for that!” I shouted, then took a deep breath when I saw his displeasure at my outburst.
He picked up his teacup and drank again. “As you are aware, her screen test is today. That much I will do for you.”
I felt a surge of hope return. “Will you promise not to sign Amber’s contract until then?”
“Too late, I’m afraid. I signed it this morning. She’s the star. Another discovery by Frederick Marshall. David is thrilled to act opposite her.”
“David Niven?” I asked.
“Who else?”
“I heard you didn’t hire Dean?”
“He’s not up for the job. So no,” he said plainly. “How did you find out?”
“Larry, who else?” I said it to provoke him. “He’s quite tight with Amber.”
“That won’t continue. I can assure you.”
I stood and moved to a sideboard where an array of framed photos was displayed. One in particular caught my attention. It was Frederick with Marilyn Monroe. The actress was wearing a white fur coat and a high-wattage smile no other actress could match. Certainly not Amber. Even with Marilyn’s troubled life and rotten work ethic, she was heads and tails above Amber. Few actresses around could survive such rumour and innuendo, which got me thinking. Amber may worship Marilyn, but the world didn’t need two.
“You met Marilyn Monroe,” I said.
“Yes, in Hollywood last summer. She’s extremely smart and witty. Now that’s a talented actress.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” I said and smiled, regaining my composure. “I thought of a way for you to make this up to me.”
He laughed out loud but I ignored him. “I’ll get my contacts in the press to write all about Amber during rehearsals and also after filming begins. The adoring public will know where she shops, what she likes to eat, even who she dates,” I gulped, thinking of Dean. “I can make her a household name. Not a bad thing for publicity, no matter how successful the producer is.”
I looked at Frederick. I could tell I had his attention. “Go on.”
“Only once filming begins, the stories start to change. They’ll focus only on her diva behaviour: not showing up on time, if at all, arriving drunk or on drugs, how the director and cast hate her. How she thinks she can get away with what Monroe does. The public will turn on her. It will be such a fall from grace that you’ll have no choice but to fire her. She’ll flee to LA with her tail between her legs. The only acting role she’ll ever get again will be in porn. You’ll still benefit. You know what they say, there’s no such thing as bad press.”
“You really hate this girl that much?” he asked.
“I want Alicia Steele to get the part that much,” I said sternly.
He shifted in his chair. “Need I remind you that to fire a star once filming begins is expensive. The British film industry isn’t Hollywood, Miss Bishop. We’re not made of money.”
“No? Too bad,” I said. “Then you should do the right thing and fire Amber now and cast Alicia.”
He sighed impatiently. “No.”
As I turned to face him, I knocked one of the framed pictures to the floor. It was a silver filigree frame, and the glass shattered into a few large pieces on the hardwood.
“Oh, I’m sorry!” I exclaimed. I kneeled down and carefully picked the pieces up. Frederick rushed to the sideboard and stood over me like I was a scullery maid. I cautiously turned the frame over, wary of the glass shards poking out, and saw that it was a photo of his dead wife, Mica. He held out his hand and I gave him the photograph.
“Your wife was very beautiful,” I said.
“She was on the outside,” he said coolly. “Mica was troubled. She was also trouble. But most women are.”
“Still, it must have been awful seeing her lying in that pool,” I said, wanting to see his reaction, anything that would allude to guilt or innocence.
He didn’t satisfy me. Instead, he turned the photo over on its face and stared at the backing. “You know there are people out there who still think I killed her?” He stared straight through me until I took a step back.
“I may have read something like that,” I admitted cautiously. I didn’t like how the power between us had shifted. He was like a mobster in that way; no matter how tough a dame I was, he was tougher.
He took up residence again in the armchair, with the oriental screen drawing its perfect stripes across him. This time I skipped the chaise and sat in a wingback chair opposite him, allowing the light to cast its canted slats across me too.
“So, my dear Clara. As I was saying, Amber will star and that is that.”
“That’s your final decision?”
“It is.”
“Then our deal is over.”
Then he smiled and held it there. It unsettled me.
“I give up,” he said at last.
I sighed deeply, relieved. “So you’ll do it?”
“I give up,” he repeated. “On this little game of ours. It was amusing for a while. I admit, I adore the chase, but now you’re too much trouble.”
“What do you mean?” I asked anxiously.
“What I mean simply is that London is full of gorgeous redheads. You’re a dime a dozen, and I no longer covet you as a lover. It’s too bad, really. We would have had such fun.”
I didn’t know what to do or what to say. There was no doubt that I had become embroiled in a mess, a dirty rotten revenge of my own making. But what of it? My grandmother’s life mattered more than anything else. Even if I was in over my head, there was only one way to go, and that was all the way. I had to take a chance and use the one piece of information that Niall had let slip and that I’d filed away for safekeeping; it was now or never.
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br /> “I think you will change your mind,” I said and rose to leave. “Because if you don’t, then I’ll give the photographs to the press.”
“What photographs?” he scoffed.
“Only the photographs a certain journalist secretly took at your country house. It’s quite scandalous stuff. Enough to reopen those rumours about Mica and how she died. Enough to make people despise you and boycott your films. You’ll be back to making cheap slasher films.”
His eyes went dead. “I don’t believe you.”
“Don’t you?” I walked to the door with him on my heels. I opened it and saw the reassuring sight of the black cab. Frederick saw it too. “Do you really want to take that chance?”
“There are no photos. This is absurd!”
“Suit yourself. But I’d think good and hard about it, especially once you see how amazing Alicia Steele is.”
Without waiting for an answer, I stepped into the street, the air thick with charcoal smoke, and got into the cab.
Police Station—Cirencester
Sergeant Hooper was sucking on his pen.
“Are you saying Frederick Marshall did in fact murder his wife? If you have proof, you must tell me; otherwise, it’s obstruction of justice!”
“I’m just getting started. Now, if you’d let me finish.”
Hooper was practically tearing the pen in half with his teeth, like a wolf with fresh-killed meat.
“You know that you can get thrown in jail for blackmail?”
“You know what sort of man Frederick Marshall is. He had it coming to him.”
He threw the pen on the desk with a force that was intended to startle me, only the pen wasn’t cooperating and rolled off the desk onto the floor. Hooper fumbled about to catch it, but he missed and resorted to crawling under the table to retrieve it. I took the opportunity to uncross and cross my legs, knowing the slit on the side of my gown would provide ample viewing pleasure of my upper thighs. He took his time, and when he reemerged, his face was beet red, from embarrassment or exertion or both.
“Find your pen?” I asked.
“Tricky bugger,” he said and sat back down. “Where were we?”
“I got into the cab …”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
I wrapped my coat tightly around me and curled up in the corner of the back seat. The driver rolled the car slowly away from the curb. There wasn’t much to look at but for a few abandoned cars. The streets were clogged with people, their faces covered, fighting their way through the murkiness. It was a living nightmare, and I was glad to be safely tucked inside the cab.
“You’re a brave girl,” the cabbie said, peering at me through his rear-view mirror. “It’s not the best time to be out and about.”
“No,” I agreed. “Then why are you driving today? Isn’t most of London covered in soot?”
“Aye, it’s true. Doing my civic duty, that’s all. Saving damsels in distress.” He winked and I turned away to stare into the mist. That’s what Niall called me. Thinking of my hubris moments ago, I’d never felt less like a damsel. Why can’t a woman fight for good any way she sees fit? If that meant sometimes doing wrong in order to do right, then it was perfectly justified. After all, Niall had implied there might be evidence of some sort; photos were a possibility. I chose to believe there were. I could rewrite the truth to suit my needs. That’s what reporters like me did with a nugget, an innuendo, a whisper; we turned it into a full-blown story, fit to print. Once out there, it became true, for the most part, or at least long enough to place doubt.
Yet despite my momentary bravery, the encounter with Frederick had taken its toll and I was shaking when I got to the flat, from fear or the cold, I didn’t know and I didn’t care. There was little that I could do except sit around and wait for him to come to his senses. Trinity was getting ready to leave for her physical. Every movie production requires the major players to get a doctor certificate for insurance purposes.
“I hope I can get there in time,” she said anxiously.
“There’s a lone cabbie out stalking the streets looking for damsels in distress,” I said with a grim smile.
She was about to respond when the phone rang. I nearly jumped out of my skin. It had to be Frederick. She grabbed the receiver and put on a perky New Yawker accent like she was a switchboard operator wearing a headset and smoking a cigarette. “Mayberry residence … Aha … Clara Bishop? Sure, she’s here. Just a moment please.”
I snatched the receiver from her hand as she covered her mouth to hide her giggles. “This is Clara.” It wasn’t Frederick. It was Niall.
“Oh, it’s you,” I said and momentarily pictured him naked in my bed. But the lousy way he walked out on me made me indignant.
“You sound disappointed,” he said. “I’m across the street at The White Stallion. Can I come up?”
“Whatever for?” I asked.
“I need to talk to you.”
“Fine, I’m here.” I rang off. “Niall is coming over.”
Trinity was practically out the door. “Don’t mind me, I’m making myself scarce. Toodle-oo.”
Niall was there in a flash. He went to kiss me, but I turned my head so that his lips planted one on my cheek.
“Say, it’s colder in here than it is on the North Sea. Well, have it your way,” he said with a shrug. “I just got a call from your friend Amber Ward.”
I rolled my eyes. “What did the dear girl want? A playmate?”
“I don’t know what’s got into you,” Niall said. “But you should know she got a part in that Frederick Marshall picture. And not just any part, he gave her the lead.”
“That’s old news,” I said and showed him Larry’s story.
“I thought you’d be knocked flat by this development,” he said and flopped on the sofa.
“Why don’t you make yourself comfortable,” I said sarcastically.
“Don’t mind if I do. You want to know why she called me?”
“I’m on the edge of my seat.”
“She wants to give me the exclusive story on her rise to stardom. I get to follow her around, go to costume fittings, read-throughs and visit the set, all of it.” He paused and lit a cigarette, then another, and held it out for me. I took it. “I must have charmed her that day on set.”
“How wonderful,” I answered, watching the smoke rise in front of my eyes like a veil. “Though you should know she’s also chummy with Larry. Perhaps she’s playing you two against each other.”
“I’m not worried, put it that way.”
In truth, it would be very useful if I had to implement my plan. Niall’s articles would go far in making her a star, and I wouldn’t have to ask him to do it. He’d write them because the Daily Buzz wanted the exclusive story, and then when the time came, when Amber was the picture of the sweet, dedicated and talented actress, using a pseudonym, I would leak just enough information to set the media wolves on her. I’d sit back and watch them tear her apart piece by piece. Even Niall would have to follow the story of her destruction.
He drew long and hard on his cigarette. “And the funny part is Amber has you to thank for it.” The whirring machine of revenge stopped dead when he said it. “She said she only got to audition because she went with Dean to his interview. An interview she told me you arranged.”
“Is that what she told you?” I let out a fake laugh. I went to the kitchen and drowned my cigarette in a half-empty cup of coffee, hoping he wouldn’t press me further. He did.
“What are you up to, Clara?”
I wouldn’t look at him. “Oh, are you still here?”
“Listen,” he said and leapt off the sofa and grabbed me around the waist tight enough that I couldn’t wiggle out. “You asked me to help you once. Tell me what’s going on and I’ll help you now.”
I thought about the threat I made to Frederick. I thought of Alicia Steele on the other side of the world practising her lines. Of Marjorie, a little girl about to lose her mother. And I thought about Dean
and Amber celebrating her role of a lifetime. But I also thought of how sick to death I was of being alone in all this mess, so I told him as much as he needed to know.
“My friend, the one who’s in trouble, she’s an actress and Frederick was supposed to cast her, not Amber. She’s in a bad way, Niall. Desperate and alone. If she doesn’t get this part, I’m not sure what she’ll do. Kill herself maybe.”
I expected him to react with concern, but he took his time mulling it over. “Kill herself because she didn’t get a part in a movie?” he repeated skeptically.
It wasn’t the reaction I wanted, and I told him as much. “It’s not just the movie. You see, my friend, she’s lost everything. Her husband walked out on her, her career is going nowhere, she feels she has nothing to live for. Now do you understand?” I pleaded.
He bit his lower lip. “Are you sure you’re not talking about yourself, Clara?”
I glared at him. “I’m not. Alicia Steele is her name. She’s an actress in Hollywood and she works in the wardrobe department at a film studio. In fact, she made this,” I said and gestured to my dress. He nodded, appropriately impressed.
“Where is she now?”
“She’s in California. But she’s doing a screen test tomorrow for Frederick. I’m convinced once he sees it he’ll fire Amber, and if not, he’ll fire her anyway because I’m going to make him. I told him I could get my hands on photos that implicate him in the murder of his wife.”
I stopped, my chest heaving. Niall stared at me, but when he spoke he was calm, deliberate. “What photographs? Is this something to do with Larry?”
“No,” I snapped. “I made them up. I blackmailed him with the idea there are photos. As a matter of fact, I got the idea from you.”
“Me?”