Private Screening (41 page)

Hands folded, she touched them to her chin, turning to him. “But you didn't want me singing
before
this, did you!”

Lord looked away, then back at her. “By demanding that the money you raise go to charity,” he finally answered, “Phoenix doesn't
directly
benefit from the concert. But he also gets you from behind your security. That creates some possibilities I can't ignore.”

Stacy shook her head. “I've already promised him. If I let some crackpot back me off, he says John dies.”

“I'm not so sure he's just a crackpot.”

“I'm
scared
, all right?” She stood, walking to the bookshelf. “God, I wish I hadn't said that.”

Stacy heard him move behind her. “Did you think I'd missed it?”

“Talking makes it real. And that only makes it harder.” She turned to him. “What do I tell myself if I don't go on tonight, and never see John again? Or maybe Alexis?”

Lord tilted his head. “I don't know.”

“Then if you want to help me, Tony, help me do this.” She gave him a tired, ironic smile. “Really, there'll be no living with me if I don't.”

It was four o'clock.

Lord stood atop the second tier of the Arena, three hundred feet from the stage. Both tiers formed a horseshoe overhanging the floor where five thousand fans would stand. As janitors swept it, amplifiers blasted “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.” Their heads looked like dots; the Beatles echoed off concrete; the place felt vast and cold and empty.

At the end of the horseshoe, where Kilcannon had stood, a crew carried equipment boxes from the loading dock to the stage. Between cuts on the tape, Lord heard their footsteps and metal boxes unlatching.

After some time, he moved to the exit ramp. The route he chose took him down two flights to the corridor surrounding the floor; Lord followed the right arm of the horseshoe until he'd passed the last entrance. Three police who blocked the remaining corridor nodded him through. Behind them were a series of doors: the ones on Lord's left concealed stairwells to the stage; the right-hand doors were offices.

He stopped in front of the last office. The door seemed to have a new lock; the dent beside it was the size of a boot heel.

Turning, he opened the door across from it and climbed the stairwell to the stage.

He stopped next to the telephone Carson had used, checking his watch. It was less than four hours to the concert now, and there was no one close enough to hear.

Quickly, he called Shriver. “I just got back from seeing Harry,” the psychiatrist said. “I've been trying to reach you.…”

“What did he say?”

“Nothing. He went into a shell—absolutely refused to talk about it.”

Pausing, Lord watched the stage. “Do you know why?”

“Maybe I insulted him.” Shriver sounded weary. “Maybe anything.”

“Okay, Thanks.”

“Anyhow, good luck.”

Lord replaced the telephone.

In front of him, Curtis Blake directed the crew. Their work was silent, abstracted. Where Kilcannon had fallen, the stain had been scraped off with sandpaper; the wood was now a slightly different color. Curtis stepped around it.

“Hello, Curtis.”

His look was guarded. “'Lo, Mr. Lord.”

“Your crew works fast. How do they know to put which box where?”

Curtis shrugged. “You call tell by the shape, usually.”

“And weight?”

“Yeah. Sometimes.”

Lord nodded. “I guess you're setting up later than last time.”

Curtis's eyes flickered toward the discolored wood. “Stacy didn't want to do a sound check.”

“Doesn't she need one?”

He shrugged again. “I think maybe the band'll run through it.”

“Then I won't interrupt you.” Lord followed Curtis's gaze. “By the way, a little wax might help cover that up.”

Curtis stared at him. Then he nodded, turning to the crew, and Lord took the catwalk to the loading dock. Through its entrance, he saw SNI's satellite truck, then more cameras panning a long line of fans who stood with stolid patience in the drizzle. Behind a line of police, the crew off-loaded boxes from the truck to the freight elevator, passing through a metal arch wired to a detection device. A cop sat watching it.

Lord climbed the catwalk three flights up.

Standing above him, Johnny Moore checked vantage points with two police snipers. Lord turned to watch the crew.

After a while, he heard Moore's hard-soled shoes clanging down the steps. When they stopped behind him, Lord said, “Glad the bomb squad's here.”

“Ain't gonna happen that way, Tony—not on my watch.” Moore spoke in an undertone that didn't carry to the stage. “Still drawing a blank on that call?”

“Uh-huh.”

Moore paused. “How about on DiPalma's question?”

“I don't see any connection but the trial.” Lord turned. “I was hoping your gang of four hundred might be doing something more relevant.”

“Oh, Phoenix was spotted near Gillette, Wyoming, today. Turned out to be a hunter in a ski mask.” He scowled. “We're wallowing in tips, all of them bad, and no closer to helping the hostages than we were two days ago.”

“Swell.” Lord leaned on the railing. “Only three and a half hours now.”

“It's a real event.” Moore slouched next to him. “I saw some asshole in the parking lot selling Phoenix T-shirts.”

“Jesus.”

“We ran him off. Incidentally, did you hear the tickets are free? Courtesy of Stacy and the Arena.”

“At least she can't get ripped off.” Lord kept watching the crew. “While we're here, tell me how that happened last time. Because I've got no idea at all, let alone any notion of what Harry would stand to gain.…”

“You've gotten a lot of mileage out of that one, Tony.”

“At the moment,” Lord answered quietly, “that's not a very useful observation.”

“My theory's still evolving, actually. I can tell you what the police reports say—I was up all last night reading them.” Moore began to watch with Lord. “Once he was shot, all the security fell back around Kilcannon—no one watched the office when Damone ran in with the paramedics. So the cops think someone kicked the door open, grabbed the bag of money, closed the door again to look normal, and split in the general chaos.”

Beneath them, Jesus Suarez took another box off the elevator. As he crossed the stage, Lord responded, “There's no witness to anyone leaving with a satchel.”

“According to conventional wisdom, Tony, her fans were too shocked to notice.”

Jesus opened the box. Lord felt Moore's gaze, moving from the roadie to him. As if he could see his thoughts.

“Of course,” Lord said finally, “someone could have waltzed it out of here in a box.”

Moore's eyes glinted. “Which means the crew.”

“After the shooting, did anyone check that out?”

“More or less—given Kilcannon, the cops' initial work on the robbery was pretty screwed up. But they questioned the crew and impounded the truck and any equipment boxes lying around. Nothing there.”

“Sorry. Because that's my best shot.”

“Still, it's a thought.” Moore kept watching Jesus. “It really is a thought.”

2

S
TACY
got out of the limousine.

She moved toward the loading dock, wearing blue jeans and a khaki work shirt, carrying a travel bag. It was like a dream repeating, except that the crowd was so silent, and she was alone.

Police trotted her up the ramp, and then the iron grid of the freight elevator was closing behind her.

It was 7:30, and she'd heard nothing from Lord.

She rose past concrete and catwalk. On the darkened stage, Curtis waited with a flashlight.

They looked at each other. Then Stacy nodded, and followed him toward the dressing rooms. Instinctively, she glanced at the wall beneath the telephone. No one was there.

The band was in the tuning room. She hugged them, Leon Brennis last. “Thanks for coming,” she said.

“No problem, Stace.” Leon gestured at the others. “We went over what you told me. Think of anything else?”

“Not yet. Let's run through the list before I go on.”

When he nodded, she kissed his cheek, and went to the dressing room.

Opening the door, she half-expected Damone to turn from the mirror. Then she walked to the empty stool, trying to imagine that this was the last time she would sing.

There was no sound at all.

She began to do her makeup in a kind of trance. Vaseline, then kohl for her eyes, half-hoping that Lord would call with something to keep her offstage. Her watch read 7:50.

Her hand slipped.

“Damn,” she murmured. Reapplying kohl, she found that her fingers were trembling.

Someone tapped on the door.

She started. “Yes?”

Lord leaned through the door frame.

It gave her a momentary frisson. A split second's hope followed, and then she saw that he was holding a dozen roses.

“If you don't like them,” he said lightly, “I've got peonies outside.”

“No—they're lovely. Come in.”

“Just for a moment.” When he put them on the table, she noticed the small envelope.

Leaning forward, she began to open it. “I don't seem to talk to you too well,” he was telling her, “unless it's about some disaster. So I thought I'd say this with flowers.”

The card was in his handwriting:

“Will you have dinner with me tonight?” it asked. Beneath this was a P.S.: “Truth is, I really like you. It's just sometimes you make me a little nervous.”

Smiling, she picked up the flowers and smelled them. “You buy dinner,” she said, looking up, “and I'll forget the ten dollars you owe me.”

The way Lord's grin changed his face surprised her—it was careless and youthful and made her want to see it again.

The thought startled and embarrassed her. “I'm really hungry,” he was saying, “so I'd better let you go. Good luck, huh?”

“Okay. Thanks.”

He stopped in the doorway. “Moore and the cops have covered this place like a blanket. So your biggest problem is knowing when to quit.”

“I hadn't quite gotten that far.”

“SNI will give the audience telephone numbers for call-ins, and after that they'll start a computerized count of contributors. I'll be on the catwalk to your right, watching on a battery TV. Look up every once in a while—when SNI's count hits five million, I'll raise one hand.”

“All right.” She hesitated. “The roses really
are
nice, Tony.”

“'Tweren't nothing,” he said, and closed the door.

She stared at it for a while. Then she took an envelope out of her bag and scratched more notes on it.

Outside, she found Leon and Greg going over the list. “Let's do ‘Equal Nights' second,” she told them, “so this doesn't get too downbeat, okay?”

Leon nodded. “Anything else?”

She gave him the envelope. “I've scratched some of my nightclub stuff in the margins. If I decide to change something, I'll just tell you.”

“Fine with me, Stace. Sure you'll be okay without a set program?”

“Tonight doesn't have to be perfect—just different. We'll see how it works out.”

She followed them down the hallway.

As she waited, Curtis led the others to the platform, then aimed the flashlight so that Leon could tape her envelope on his keyboard.

Alone in the wings, Stacy looked around her.

There was a cameraman near the telephone, poised to film over her shoulder as she went through the curtain. Lord's dim figure stood above her on the catwalk. One flight up was a police sniper stationed to protect her; Stacy could see his cap and the outline of a rifle.

She folded her arms, staring down as the sick feeling came to her again. Then she saw the beam of light at her feet, Curtis waiting for her.

He glanced at his watch. She nodded, and then he was leading her forward. There was silence on the other side of the curtain.

Stacy stopped behind it. Curtis retreated; she felt the camera waiting, the invisible audience twenty feet from her. She couldn't move.

Taking two steps back, she looked up to where the sniper was, then Lord.

What the hell.

She turned to Curtis. “Just open it,” she said.

Lord could see how scared she was.

Then she stepped into the spotlight, face appearing on the overhead screen, and began to sing “Reruns at Midnight.”

For the first few notes, her voice was shaky. She sang without moving, a straight, slim figure beneath him, shirt-sleeves rolled above her wrists. On the screen, her gaze was blue and wide; the simple beginning had a quality of nakedness foreign to past concerts. In front of her there was darkness—smoke, massed bodies, silence. Three more cameras.

Lord glanced down at the mini-TV. There were no numbers beneath her face. Her voice would break, he thought, or she would; something else would happen. He bent back to check the police sharpshooter standing above him.

Below, she kept on singing. It came to him that her voice sounded rawer, older, a little smokier.

When she finished there were still no figures on the television, and no applause.

She gazed up at her face on the overhead screen. “This really isn't it,” she said softly.

The quiet in front of her was like a caught breath. She turned from them, backstage. “Could someone turn off that screen,” she asked, “and switch on the hall lights?”

When the lights came on, her audience was standing, even in the tiers.

She was staring at where Kilcannon had fallen; Lord realized that she saw the discoloration.

Her eyes rose to the screen. “I look at that thing,” she explained, “and it's like singing to a mirror. What I really wanted is to see you.”