Anatomy of a Crossword (15 page)

“Is Senator Crane still planning on being in Sacramento this week?”

“Oh, Hal and his ‘energy crisis' investigations. Yes, indeed, he will be here. One would think one could travel across this grand country of ours and be able to escape the watchful eye of one's ‘elder brother.' It makes me feel like I'm positively back in grade school.”

Rosco laughed. “Los Angeles is a long way from Sacramento, Sara. Your visiting at the same time is purely coincidental. And if memory serves me, I believe the senator did plan his trip right after the recall count.”

“Humph … So you say. Well, on with the show,” Sara added. “My new career! Aging thespian! And a stranger in paradise!”

At a rented beach house directly below the path of the 767, the picture was not one remotely resembling paradise or even earthly contentment or peace. The rooms in Chick Darlessen's home were unlit, the silence inhospitable and grim. Having watched the Lakers's game with a number of sitcom writers up in the highlands of Pacific Palisades, Chick had consumed more than one too many Bloody Marys. Two or three too many, in fact. Then, absolutely blotto, he'd managed to climb behind the wheel of his new Porsche and had driven woozily home at 6 P.M.

Debra hadn't been on hand to great him, and he couldn't remember whether she had “spinning class” or yoga or step-aerobics—or whether she might have mentioned something about visiting friends. Alone, he'd breathed a sigh of relief at finding himself in a solitary state, then walked through the pitch-black sitting/dining area and entered his private office, where he'd immediately proceeded to pass out on the couch without bothering to flick on so much as his desk lamp. Now, at 7:30, the space was disorienting in its utter darkness, so the voice that roused him from his sodden sleep seemed to come from nowhere, almost like a ghost or a bad dream.

“We need to talk, Chickie.”

“Who …? Wha' the …?” Darlessen thudded from the couch to the floor, and struggled to get his still-drunken bearings. Once he'd discovered where he was—home, in fact—he crouched there panting as a wave of nausea came and went.

“We need to talk—now,” the voice repeated.

“Later …”

The unwanted visitor moved to the desk, depressing the button on the table lamp until a stream of yellow light spread across the desktop where the .38 revolver remained, having never been relocated to the kitchen as promised. Chick gazed at it briefly, then returned his concentration, such as it was, to the interloper's shoes. Queasy as he felt, it was remarkable how much energy he could expend in hating those particular shoes.

“What are ya tryin' to do? Give me a damn heart attack? Jumpin' in here … yellin'.” Chick felt bile rising in his throat, as well as the unpleasant aftertaste of tomato juice, horseradish, Tabasco, and vodka.

“I'm not yelling. Far from it. There's no point in having the neighbors listening in. Besides, you're too drunk to be startled.”

Darlessen grabbed at his throbbing head with both hands, then rubbed at his eye sockets with the tips of his fingers. “Ha, ha … guess you're on the money about tha'—”

“We need to talk—”

Chick groaned. “Tomorrow … We can talk tomorrow. Monday. Can't you see I'm wasted?” He clambered back onto the couch, flopped face down and placed a pillow over his head.

But an angry hand grabbed the pillow, and flung it across the room. “Sit up, and look at me!”

“Uh-oh, somebody's in a foul mood … Again.” The words were slurred; halfway along Darlessen started to laugh. It was a wheezy, helpless sound. “I suggest you—”

“We need to iron out a few details in this relationship of ours—”

Chick laughed louder. “What ‘relationship'? Our so-called relationship's over … As of now.” He rolled around and tried to sit up, but he kept sagging sideways. He wiped a drop of drool from his mouth with his shirttail, allowing his pale belly to hang out over the elastic waistband of his sweat pants.

“You look disgusting, Chick.”

From his half-prone position, Darlessen belched loudly. “There, how's tha'? Give you somethin' extra to be disgusted about.” A case of the hiccups was beginning to set in. “This may come as a …
hic
… big surprise to you, but I could not care less about you … and our
relationship
… I just want you the …
hic
… hell out of my space—”

“Sit up straight.”

“How'd you get in here, anyway? I keep this room …
hic
… locked for a reason, you know …” Chick tried to think back. Hadn't he locked the door behind him when he returned? The turning of the key had become an almost Pavlovian response after he entered his workspace—his only haven of quiet and solitude in the whole damn house.

In response, his visitor sat on the edge of the desk, the nose of the .38 almost brushing a muscled thigh. “Your sanctuary, is that it? Your private retreat? No one's allowed in without the master's say-so.” The tone was increasingly acidic; a hand began toying carelessly with the gun.

“Hey, watch that thing …
hic
… It goes off by accident, someone gets hurt …” Chick was finally able to sit up straight on the couch, but another wave on nausea started to move in. “… Here, give it to me …” He held out his hand, but his request was ignored.

“You haven't been square with me, Chickie … All those promises—”

“Wha' promises—?”

“I guess the concept of Chick Darlessen thinking of anyone other than Chick Darlessen is pretty damn remote, isn't it?”

“Wha' promises?” Darlessen repeated.

Again the question passed unnoticed while the pistol began casually passing from right hand to left hand and back again. The person holding it sighed in weariness and anger. “So, do I give you another chance? Or do I just fold this tent right here and now?”

“Fold your tent …
hic
… That's a great idea … And get the hell out … Which was my suggestion …
hic
… five minutes ago … And put down that damn … You know how dangerous—”

But the intruder suddenly stood, leveling the gun at Chick. “Things are going
my
way from now on. Not
yours
. Not yours anymore.”

Frightened into soberness, Chick's face froze. “Get out” he managed to spit out, “or I'll call the cops and have you thrown out. So, help me, I will.”

“My
way—”

Darlessen lunged forward, while almost instantaneously, the .38 fired, sending a slug into his chest, passing through his heart and lodging in the wall behind him. As his dying body jerked reflexively backward, the remaining five bullets slammed into it while the shooter stared in horror at the growing pool of blood.

Five minutes later, a scream rose from the house, spilling in successive waves of urgency and fear as Debra Marcollo stumbled onto the deck, Darlessen's blood dripping from her hands. Then still wailing at the top of her lungs, she half-skidded and half-ran down the wooden steps and out to the beach where she was finally subdued by a passing off-duty lifeguard.

The Malibu police arrived at the scene less than seven minutes after that.

CHAPTER 17

Driving south from Thousand Oaks at 8:15 Monday morning, Lew Groslir could scarcely restrain himself from pounding the molded burl walnut dashboard of his Bentley or vehemently honking his horn. The heady array of expletives he permitted himself were yet another case—giving him ample means with which to vent his disgust, fury, and outrage over the sheer stupidity of some no-talent, bimbo girlfriend murdering a man only marginally more creative than she. “The no-account little witch,” he spluttered and fumed. “Would I love to get my hands on her … What does she think …? That she's gonna throw me off schedule because I didn't listen to the Chicken man and cast
her
as my lead actress? Slow down a Lew Groslir production? Fat chance!” It never occurred to his egocentric personality that the screenwriter's death might have had nothing whatsoever to do with him or the filming of
Anatomy of a Crossword
, although he did experience a momentary pang of concern over whether Chick had completed the final rewrites of the last three crucial scenes. Darlessen was—scratch that,
had been
—a world-class sluggard when it came to work and bringing things in on time.

Barreling down the freeway, yelling into the leather-scented air of his Bentley Arnage T, Groslir began creating a list of potential Hollywood rewriters, down-and-out New York playwrights and mercenary novelists who could quickly take Chick Darlessen's miserable place. “I shouldn't have hired him in the first place,” he groused. “I don't care
whose
idea the story was! That's what script doctors are for—to make the original guy's
concept
fly. I should have just bought the damn pitch and told Chickie to take a hike. Big mistake, Lew. Big mistake. You give a writer like him an ounce of power, you throw the whole Hollywood balance thing out of whack. It's like messing with the environment. This is a pyramid system … like food … ya gotta remember that, Lew. An empty carb—that's what Darlessen was … And how may empty carbs does a body need?”

But then the producer's brain suddenly veered in the opposite direction: Hollywood murders, and the major media ink they generated. The sorry tale began to look less like a potential problem and more like a probable gold mine. “On the other hand … maybe we're dealing with a PR bonanza here, Lew,” Groslir almost cooed. “A dead writer? I like that. It's a hook, a good hook. And a sexy babe in a prison jumpsuit? I like that even better. This is beautiful. We're golden. This is money in the bank. And I'll betcha we can keep generating headlines till the show actually airs …”

As Groslir dodged the BMWs, Miatas, and Mustangs on the inbound 101 Freeway and began plotting his next move in Culver City, the cast and crew of
Anatomy of a Crossword
blissfully and ignorantly hummed with unaccustomed contentment and a new-found verve. As yet, no one had heard the shocking news of Darlessen's death or Debra Marcollo's arrest. As a result, the first order of the morning's activities was the welcoming of Sara—the real Sara—whose keen and perceptive eye would help the movie's “Belle” and “Rosco” unveil the “murderer.”

Ordinarily, the introduction of a replacement performer would have been a subdued affair, made tense and sometimes hostile by an overtaxed schedule, actors unwilling to reshoot scenes, costume refittings, and new lighting requirements as well as the hothouse camaraderie that exists in any theatrical venture. But from the onset, Sara was Sara, and her appearance among the falseness of stage “gilding” and “marble” had an eerily regal air, like Queen Elizabeth embarking on one of her famous “walkabouts.”

“Oh, my,” she said as she handed Dean Ivald her white-gloved and gracious hand. “You have perfectly recreated my cozy little nook back in Newcastle. You dear man! How very, very flattering! And that portrait of my great-great-grandfather? Why, no one could tell me I wasn't face-to-face with the genuine oil … It looks as much unlike him as the original.”

No one interrupted as Sara paraded through her “sitting room,” although a few eyebrows were raised behind her back. “A cozy little nook” would not have been the term on most on the onlookers' lips. And calling the director “a dear man” seemed tantamount to referring to the evil movie doll “Chuckie” as “Pinocchio.”

Rosco and Belle remained in the background while Sara met her fellow actors as well as the grips and scripts girls, the makeup and wardrobe artists. “Isn't this simply lovely?” the grand old lady stated in her clear, patrician tone. “We'll be one enormous family all toiling about in this cavernous place. Like ants.”

“And we all know ants have a queen …” Belle heard a voice behind her murmur. She turned and glimpsed Miso Lane in the background. To whom he was speaking, Belle couldn't see. “Didn't I tell you she was a dead ringer?”

Belle frowned, instantly cold, instantly wary and fearful for her friend's safety.
Death
and
Sara
were not words she wanted put in proximity. Belle pushed her way toward Miso. “What do you mean by ‘dead ringer'?” If there was a more diplomatic method of opening the conversation or a more subtle way of discovering what Miso had meant by the term, Belle didn't stop to consider it.

The location scout/Polaroid junkie regarded her. “A ringer for the genuine article,” he answered with a glib, dismissive shrug. “The real item.”

“But she is the real person,” Belle countered.

“That's what I'm saying.”

“But you can only be a dead ringer if you're not authentic to start with,” Belle persisted.

“Ah, the wordsmith splits hairs … Hey, she looks good,” was Miso's less-than-illuminating reply. “She looks real good. It's just super to have her out here with us—her and everything that comes with her.” Then he melted away as another bank of lights flashed on, revealing Sara in a different location on the sound stage.

“Rosco,” Belle whispered as soon as she found her husband, “I really don't like this.”

Rosco smiled and shook his head. He was enjoying watching Sara revel in the limelight. “She's having a great time, Belle, lighten up. Who wouldn't enjoy having a fling like this at her age?”

“But—”

“I know. You've got a hunch things here aren't all they seem to be—”

“It's more than a hunch.”

He looked at her, his expression serious now. “You love Sara, and you're worried because she's not as young or spry or tough as she looks.”

“That's not the problem.”

“I promise you, there aren't any sinister types skulking around here or back at the hotel.” He laughed in the hopes of sounding reassuring enough to banish her concerns. “And if there were … well, that's why they've flown in the Polycrates Agency—”