Edwina started in surprise. “The Gloria Linwood? The film actress?”
“Yes, that’s her.” Bunny set her purse on her lap and rummaged around in it a bit, then pulled out a folded piece of paper. “She’s in town making a movie, and she’s been getting letters.” She handed the paper to Edwina, her face grim.
“Terrible letters.”
Scanning the paper quickly, Edwina immediately understood why Gloria Linwood and Bunny were alarmed.
DOUBLE THE NEXT PAYMENT OR THE PAPERS GET THE PHOTOS
I’D HATE FOR ANYONE TO GET HURT
was all it said, but that was enough. It was written in dark, capital letters.
All business. All threatening.
Edwina glanced over the top of the letter at Bunny, who was fidgeting nervously in her chair. “So, Miss Linwood is being blackmailed. Is that correct?” she said, already knowing the answer, and Bunny’s frightened nod confirmed it.
“Yes, she is. She paid the blackmailer once before, but this time he wants more, and now he’s threatening to… well, to go to the press.”
“And I take it that’s a bad thing, right?”
Bunny stared at her, surprised. “Well, of course. It could kill her entire film career!”
Edwina knew better than to ask what was shown in the photos. “So, what can I do for Miss Linwood? How can I help?”
Setting her purse on the floor, Bunny leaned forward, her eyes earnest. “We need to find out who’s doing this. Miss Linwood is filming her newest picture, A Beastly Affair, here in Chicago, and we’d like you to come protect her. I have a friend with a brother on the police force, and she’d heard him talking about how good you are at getting to the bottom of things. Miss Linwood would like you to come on the set and pretend to be her assistant. I’ll help her out when you’re not available, but the wardrobe mistress needs some help, too, and I’m supposed to make the excuse that’s why I’m not around Miss Linwood as much.” She licked her lips, her eyebrows pulled together in worry. “Do you think you could do it? Protect her, I mean, and investigate to see who’s doing this to her? We think it’s someone on the film crew, because it happened when we were back in Hollywood and now we’re here in Chicago, it’s happened here, too.”
“Can I bring some friends with me?” Edwina asked. She pulled a small pad of paper from her coat pocket, along with a stub of a pencil, and started jotting down notes next to her grocery list. “I know some people who may be helpful, doing small jobs for me while on-site.”
“If you can trust them, that would be fine,” Bunny said. She sat a bit straighter and smiled timidly. “Does that mean you’ll take the job?”
Edwina stood up and stuck out a hand. “Yes, it does.”
Bunny giggled as she shook Edwina’s hand. “Oh, I’m so glad! This has been a terrible stress on Miss Linwood, and I don’t know how to help her. She just hasn’t been herself lately.”
It only took a few minutes for Edwina to get the information about where and when she was going to meet Miss Linwood, and then she was bidding her newest client goodbye and shutting the door behind her. Reaching for the phone, she hurriedly gave the operator the number and waited while the line connected.
“Preston! Hi, it’s me. Hey, I may need a hand with something. Do you like going to the pictures?”
Chapter 4
The next morning, Edwina pulled out from the Winterwood estate in a car belonging to her chauffeur, Mr. Edmondson. It certainly wouldn’t do for her to show up in one of the shiny new ones belonging to her family, and there was no way she could look like an underpaid assistant if she arrived in her new Auburn Bobtail Speedster. She was doing her best to be undercover, including doing her best to figure out what sort of clothing would be appropriate for pretending to be an assistant to a movie star, and had finally settled for a simple, plain dress with sensible shoes, a thick wool coat, and a wool hat. The dark blonde wig she was wearing wasn’t exactly comfortable over her curls, and she had to resist the urge to adjust it or scratch around the edges.
As she maneuvered the chauffeur’s car through narrow streets toward the address she’d been given, she looked around her in wonder. Edwina had been to many places in Chicago before, but this was the first time she’d traveled to the meatpacking district. This was an old part of town, nearly on the other side of Chicago from her home, close to the many railroad lines that kept the city’s goods moving all through America. Long rows of brick warehouses were interspersed with train rails, and cobblestone courtyards with steaming grates and scattered cars surrounded them. As she turned into the address she had been given, she leaned forward to look up at the three-story brick buildings nearly surrounding her. Around a common open space, they were crammed together as if leaning on each other for support, many with loading docks and stairs up to employee entrances. Clustered outside two of the huge rollup doors, butchers wearing long white coats leaned against the cold wall of the warehouse and smoked, the relentless wind pulling the breath and smoke from them. Dark smoke rose lazily from tall chimneys, and there was an odd scent to the air, like a smokehouse. She could hear sounds of hammering and sawing coming from the loading dock
Bunny had given her detailed instructions on where to park and when to arrive, so Eddie wasn’t surprised to see a lone figure, wrapped in an enormous coat and with a thick knit hat pulled down over flame-red hair, poke her head out from one of the employee doors. As she walked to the bottom of the stairs, Bunny hurried down to meet her steps, her face troubled, gripping the railing with a gloved hand.
“You’re almost late! Do you have any idea how mad Mr. Gridhorn is going to be if we interrupt him while he’s shooting?”
Maybe it was the lack of coffee, or maybe it was because she’d had to drive so far in a car she didn’t like, but it wasn’t exactly the positive greeting Edwina would’ve preferred.
She slammed the heavy car door behind her and adjusted her fur collar against the wintry wind. “Hey, almost late is the exact same as being not late. Hasn’t anyone ever told you that?” she said as she walked toward Bunny. “I would’ve been here earlier, except there are some people who drive like drunk turtles.” She’d done her best to control her usual urge to treat the roads of Chicago like a racetrack, but sometimes she got very frustrated that her usual need for speed was blocked by slow drivers.
Turtles.
Bunny met her at the bottom of the steps. “Well, say what you will, but late is late. You’ve obviously never met the director, Albert Gridhorn. I’d doubt he’d agree with you. Come on,” she said, urging Edwina to follow her up the stairs.
That name sounds familiar, Edwina thought. A few months back, she’d read a short article about a scandal with a young wannabe actress and some seedy night club in New York. Gridhorn’s name had been mentioned as the man behind her downfall. It may have been idle gossip, or it may have been absolutely true.
Looking at the brick warehouses crammed close together around her, Edwina wasn’t surprised at how rundown they seemed. A director who was known for making movies fast and on a shoestring budget, Gridhorn wasn’t exactly Cecil B DeMille. For a man coming from Hollywood who needed a large building to make a movie, this would be a true bargain.
Next door, a lone figure separated himself from the cluster of watching men and quickly loped toward them. His broad face was lined with fatigue and concern, and he was wearing a butcher’s apron around his portly middle and a white fabric cap. Just as Bunny put her hand on the door handle to go inside, the man grabbed the handrail with a raw, red hand and put one boot on the first step.
“You said you were going to get me a job,” he said to Bunny, his dark eyebrows pulled together in consternation. “You promised I’d be able to be part of the picture!”
Bunny blew out a long sigh of frustration and turned around, her hand still on the door handle.
“Mr. Gustavson, I never promised you anything. I said I’d see what I could do, that’s all.”
“But, but that’s n
ot true!” he sputtered. “I told you what you wanted! I did what you said, and now I think you should keep your part of the bargain.” He took one step up the stairs, his mouth set in a grim line of defiance.
Eyes widening in alarm, Bunny ran up the last few steps and banged loudly on the metal door.
“Gerald!”
A fresh-faced young man opened the door and peered out. He was wearing a security guard uniform and a concerned expression.
“Yes, Miss Elmer?”
Gustavson paused, seemingly unsure whether he should go any further up the stairs, but the security guard instantly sized up the situation and helped make up his mind for him.
“Stop right there, buddy,” he commanded, taking a step out from behind the open door. “Miss Elmer doesn’t seem to want you following her, and I should inform you that I’m armed.”
“But I want —”
“I don’t care what you want,” Gerald said as he cut him off. “Go back to your packing room or your pickling vat or whatever, but you need to leave right now. I mean it.”
Edwina could see a moment of hesitation in Gustavson’s eyes, before he finally stepped down the stairs and took his hand off the rail.
“Nobody takes advantage of a Gustavson,” he pronounced, his face thunderous with suppressed anger. As Gerald held the door open for Bunny and Edwina to slip inside, Gustavson raised an accusatory finger at Bunny.
“You told me I could have a job and now you’ve broken your word! I’ll be back, Miss High-and-Mighty! You just wait and see!”
As the door closed behind them, leaving the frustrated butcher outside, Bunny looked shaken but Gerald did his best to make light of it.
“Well, it seems someone’s had too much coffee today,” he said with a grin. “Don’t you worry about him, Miss Elmer. I’ll keep an eye on the door and make sure he doesn’t bother anyone.”
“Thank you, Gerald,” Bunny said as she unbuttoned her coat. “He’s been hanging around since yesterday, trying to get a job, and he’s starting to get on my nerves. I think he’s some kind of a crackpot.”
Gustavson didn’t seem like a crackpot to Edwina. The man sounded sincere and upset, as if he’d been cheated out of something that he felt was owed to him.
It took a moment for Edwina’s eyes to adjust to the dim light in the large warehouse. Beneath her feet, wide planks of the flooring were pocked with long scratches and dents, and otherwise worn smooth from countless hours of people working in the cavernous space of the warehouse. It was a huge room, segmented into smaller areas designed to be movie sets for different scenes, and with several smaller rooms built along the back wall. There was a smell of old smoke and fresh sawdust in the air, and Edwina could see several people bustling about with tools and furniture, seemingly intent on preparing for filming. The high ceiling was crisscrossed with dark wooden beams, and she could hear hammering from behind one of the temporary walls propped up by hastily constructed braces. A heavy-set woman was using a broad brush to swipe wallpaper paste on it, while an angular man on a ladder smoothed a panel of red flocked wallpaper against the top.
“So, why did he rent a place out here, in the meatpacking district?” Edwina asked as she looked around, her eyes following a man in overalls carry a potted plant in a bucket past her.
“It was cheap,” Bunny said, confirming Edwina’s suspicions, “and the building’s big enough to handle sets being assembled inside it. The only problem is it costs an arm and a leg to heat the place, so you’d better wear a coat when you’re in the main room. The office and cafeteria are pretty warm, though,” she said, looping a stray red curl behind one ear as she pulled off her hat. “It’s not like Gridhorn’s production company has a ton of cash, you know. I mean, he’s no Charlie Chaplin. You know the title of this picture, right?”
Edwina nodded. “You said it was called A Beastly Affair.”
“That’s the ticket. Sounds like some sort of highbrow drama, doesn’t it?” Bunny said with a smirk. “Well, it actually is a retelling of Beauty and the Beast, complete with a guy in a fake fur suit chasing around Miss Linwood, all while she’s dressed in about as little as we can get past the censors these days.”
The women hastily backed out of the way of a quick-walking man pushing a cart of packing boxes, then Edwina asked, “And Miss Linwood is playing the part of Beauty, I take it?”
“Yep.”
Edwina followed behind Bunny as she threaded her way through the construction and props. As they walked by a large camera set up near one end of the room, she couldn’t help but see the intense conversation between the two men standing beside it. Their voices were rising and falling, the tone of their conversation tense. The older man leaning against the camera seemed fairly calm, a slow smirk spreading across his face as he listened to his counterpart. He was wearing a sweater vest with a bright yellow bowtie, and had a shock of nutbrown hair, completely unruly as if he’d run his hands through it recently. The other man was probably fifteen or so years younger, shorter, and looked like he was too young to have ever used a razor in his life. His hands were stuffed into the pockets of an oversized fur coat, and he was wearing a porkpie hat. He was obviously intent on getting his point across, as he kept using his hands to talk, finally shaking a finger in the older man’s face, his face full of frustration.
Bunny ignored them. “Also, it’s got great insulation from the weather outside. These sorts of buildings keep the cold in during the summer and the heat in during the winter. Sawdust insulation helps keep a lot of the outside noises quiet, so they don’t show up on the film.” She shrugged. “Never had to worry about that before talkies, but now it’s a big deal. We have an investor that’s putting out big bucks for us to film with sound, but that’s about all he’s willing to pay for. He says we should be able to do the rest ourselves. We’re not the only movie company scrambling to find cheap, quiet places to shoot movies these days.”
She looked around, seemingly confused.
“Max!” she said, frowning. “Max, where are you?”
The solid wooden door with a hand-painted sign that said OFFICE creaked open and a loose-jointed man of about 30 or so poked his head out.
“Good grief, what do you want now, Bunny? I’m busy trying to catch a mouse for the boss. He says he’s worried it will bring its little mousy friends in and start eating some of the film.”
“That can wait for a minute. I want you to come meet someone,” Bunny said, and when Max had shut the door behind him and strolled their way, she jerked a thumb at Edwina.
“This is Edwina. She’s going to be an assistant to Miss Linwood when I’m not available. Do you think you can set her up with somewhere to put her stuff, and introduce her around a bit?” Her gaze glanced toward the wooden stairs next to the office door, her eyes worried. “I’d do it, but I need to touch base with Miss Linwood.”
Max looked Edwina over carefully, not even trying to hide it. He was a bit taller than most men, perhaps a shade over six feet, with laugh lines around his tired brown eyes and a head of unruly sandy-colored hair. Stuffing his hands in his pockets, his weak chin and slumped shoulders made him seen almost concave.
“Sure, no problem,” Max replied, a small smile on his face. “Well, well,” he said. “You look exactly like someone Her Majesty is going to eat alive before she’s had her morning coffee. You’re just a little bitty thing. You sure you up to working for Linwood, Ed…whatever your name was?”
“Edwina,” she replied sharply, drawing herself up to every inch of her five feet two inches of height, locking eyes with him. Ever since she’d shown an interest in cars and racing, she’d had to deal with men making fun of her or discounting her brains, and she certainly wasn’t going to put up with it from some underfed male. “I didn’t quite catch your name. What was it? Lax? Tax?”
“Max Crane.” His eyes narrowed in irritation. “Okay, fine. It’s your funeral, sweetheart. Follow me, and I’ll show you the ropes.”
Edwina did her best to
suppress her irritation as she followed the lanky man around the building. It wasn’t the first time she’d had open hostility thrown at her, and it wouldn’t be the last. It’d take a whole lot more than Max’s attitude to make her give up a paying job.
Next to the office was a small cafeteria, with a huge urn of coffee brewing and several workmen sitting around at the tables. They looked up in open curiosity when she popped her head in. Through the open door outside the cafeteria was a hallway, poorly lit by two bulbs that seemed to flicker a bit in the gloom. The hallway branched off, leading on the right to a huge storage area, filled with building materials and the larger props that had been shipped ahead or rented for the production locally. Edwina tried to ignore the evidence that the room had previously been used as a meatpacking facility, as some of the original metal tables were stacked in a corner.
On the other side of the hallway were several small rooms, with hand-scrawled names on them, so Edwina figured they were probably dressing rooms. Tucked in a back corner of the storage area was a small room with a shut door. Max leaned his head toward it and rapped twice with the back of his knuckles, before unceremoniously pushing the door open and walking inside.
The room was a costumer’s workshop, stuffed to nearly the ceiling with hanging costumes, tall bolts of fabric, two tables with sewing machines on them, and an overly productive oil heater that made the whole place swelteringly warm. A middle-aged woman with dark-rimmed glasses and a beaded cloche hat regarded the two interlopers with suspicion. She was hand-sewing a hem on a long, beaded gown, and stopped immediately as soon as she saw Max.
“Max, get out! I told you not to bother me while I’m creating!” She gave a loud harrumph of irritation. “Between Gridhorn interrupting me every ten minutes to see if I’m done, and Miss Linwood wanting me to attach every sequin in the entire country to the evening dress she’s wearing in the next scene, I’m about to lose my mind.”
“Sorry, Serena, but I’m just doing what I was told to do. Bunny wants me to show Miss Linwood’s new assistant around, and I know the costume shop is the most important part of the production, so I wanted to be sure she met you.” He gestured toward Edwina. “This is Edwina, and she’s new. Don’t kill her, okay?”
A Fatal Affair Page 2