The Baker Street Letters (13 page)

Reggie smiled as she passed by, and she avoided eye contact with the air of a woman who knows she's been smiled at by someone beneath her.

This was a tough sort of glamour. Reggie couldn't recall being hit with that degree of indifference since his first year at Cambridge.

The building had no lift; Reggie took the stairs to the office marked for the Silberman Agency. From the size of it, the agency was not likely to be mistaken for William Morris.

The woman seated behind a desk in the outer office—or maybe it was the entire office—swiveled in her chair and asked Reggie how she could help him. He asked to speak to Leslie Silberman.

The woman first studied Reggie's face for a moment, then leaned back in her chair and conspicuously appraised the rest of him.

“We've got about a dozen of your type already,” she said. “But Spielberg isn't on the line right now, so I'll forgive you. Can you do anything special? Martial arts? Impersonations? You can drop the British accent shtick.”

“I'm not an actor. I'm looking for one.”

She pushed out a chair for him. “Just tell me what you need.”

“An actor by the name of Lance Slaughter?”

She frowned. “Lance Slaughter. Aka Howard Fallon. Classic reality show reject. Yeah, I represent him. Pretty much.”

“I'm hoping that you can—”

“I don't think he's available,” she interrupted, “but I got a dozen better of the same type. No one broke any mold when they made Howie, whether they should've or not, know what I'm saying?”

“I'm not interested in anyone else.”

She shrugged agreeably and turned to a file cabinet to locate the actor's folder. “Just so it's clear from the start that all payments to Howie are going through me as his legal agent and representative. The standard deal. Clear enough?”

“Of course.”

“Yeah, well, I got burned by this guy once already,” she said as she gave Reggie the folder. “I got him an assignment early in the summer, tremendous break for the kid. A full year of busting my tail for him, one day this guy from something called New Vista Productions calls. Heard of them?”

“No,” said Reggie.

“Me neither, and that shouldn't be. But what they ask for fits Howie's profile perfectly. So I set up a meeting; he goes and reads for the part, and that afternoon they call back and say he wasn't right after all.

“I figure the kid feels real bad that he didn't get the part, and I make a special effort to find something else for him, which isn't easy, reason being he has the talent God gives a clam. I find something, a walk-on, that maybe he can do if he remembers not to open his mouth.

“I call his numbers. Disconnected. No message machine, nothing. I figure the kid's given up and gone back to Omaha, or wherever. Two days later, I'm having lunch at Hanrahan's, I walk outside, and there the creep is. He's driving a brand-new
Porsche. He's stopped at the light. I go up to him, ask him what the deal is, and he says he doesn't need an agent, he's got his own connections. He says he's got an in that I'd kill for. I ask who, then the light changes; he gives me the finger, honks that obnoxious Porsche horn, and drives off.

“I know what this means. This means Howie and New Vista decided to cut out the middleman. So I go back upstairs and I call the only number I had for New Vista, and guess what?”

“Disconnected?”

“Damn right. I thought maybe they were on the Paradigm lot, because I saw a Paradigm parking sticker on his car—but nobody at Paradigm had heard of them, and at a certain point it's just not worth the trouble.”

“Paradigm. I think I've been there,” said Reggie. It was the general area where he had tracked Nigel's cab. “That's the tall glass thing in Burbank?”

“Well, that's the corporate headquarters. The lot is just south of it. Same parking for both. But like I said, they'd never heard of New Vista—somebody's tax dodge, I bet.”

Reggie opened the folder and turned quickly past the glossy head shots to the résumé.

“He hasn't much professional experience, has he?” said Reggie.

“You kidding? The highlight of this kid's résumé is the ability to carry four dinner plates simultaneously. In fact, zero screen credits was something they were looking for.”

Now she reached across and took back the folder. “Which makes me wonder,” she said, “why you or anyone else would be wanting to hire him. So what's this really about? And don't give me any nonsense about looking for a fresh face. You're no casting director. And if you really were looking to hire this guy, you would have just phoned.”

“You're right,” said Reggie. “I'm making inquiries for a friend. I think your Mr. Fallon has been doing some moonlighting.”

“What sort of moonlighting?” said the agent.

“I don't know yet. Maybe something you wouldn't want to accept a commission for. Thank you for your help.”

“You know, you've got a nice voice; you might consider voice-overs.”

“I'm hoping it doesn't come to that.”

“But like I said, you should tone down the accent. I've heard better.”

“I don't suppose you've heard one exactly like it recently?”

“No. And I'd remember.”

Reggie exited the office and took a cab back into the Valley, traveling the same route he had taken earlier.

The Paradigm studio lot comprised several acres of square stucco buildings, wood-slat bungalows, and exterior sets. It was just on the other side of the parking garage for the corporate tower that Reggie had already visited.

There was a guard booth, but the guard was preoccupied with a delivery van.

Reggie strolled in casually as if he belonged. He walked past several aluminum-faced production stages until he found a row of off-pink wood-slat bungalows—surprisingly casual and unsubstantial structures, given the money amounts he knew such ventures involved.

But then this was the production lot. The real money and power had to be in the tower.

Reggie found the bungalow for Selman Productions—the first company Nigel had phoned from the Roosevelt.

At a receptionist's desk, in front of stacks of scripts with titles written on their spines in black felt pen, sat a tanned young woman, perhaps twenty-five, with suspiciously perfect white
teeth and a professionally flirting charm done so well that Reggie couldn't tell at all whether it might be directed at him personally.

“Mr. Selman isn't in,” she said almost musically. “The whole office is out protesting the Great San Fernando Shaft.”

“The what?”

“This monster hole they want to dig in the Hollywood Hills. For one of the subway lines; I forget which. All the canyon people aren't real thrilled about it. You hadn't heard?”

“No.”

“That must be because you're from out of town. But trust me—if you want to get invited to parties, you're against it.”

“I'll keep that in mind. What about the little ditch at the end of the street? Am I against that as well?”

“Oh, no. Not that one. We're all for it. I've got a memo from our corporate owners to prove it.”

“I see. I'm for the ditch. I'm against the Great San Fernando Shaft.”

“Right. Also known simply as the Shaft, as in . . . well, you know.”

“Yes, I get it,” said Reggie. “I'm sure everyone gets it.”

She looked at Reggie to verify that his pun was intentional, then smiled.

“So. Do you have an appointment?”

“No, but perhaps I won't need to speak to Mr. Selman at all,” said Reggie. “I'm just looking for someone who might have been here yesterday. His name is Nigel Heath.”

The young woman shifted just the slightest bit of her charming resources to saying no, she could not give out that kind of information about Mr. Selman's appointments.

“I doubt that my brother had an appointment,” said Reggie.

“Your brother. Hmm . . .” She studied Reggie a bit more closely, and something seemed to be clicking. “So—someone who sounds like you, looks sort of like you, only a little bit—” She hesitated for just an instant.

“Shorter,” Reggie interrupted.

“Younger,” she continued.

“Slightly.”

“Uh-huh. Well, I think we're talking about the pizza guy. Although, come to think of it, not the regular pizza guy.”

“A substitute pizza guy?”

“Apparently.”

“What did he want?”

“What all pizza guys want, I hope—to deliver. Although it was looking doubtful at first.”

“How so?”

“I saw him through the window, driving real slow, up one end of the parking lot and down the other, like he's looking for a parking space or something. Finally he stops right in front of the entrance, like every other pizza guy in the world, comes running in, drops the pizza on my desk, and then takes off again without even waiting for a tip. But at least he got the order right. One pepperoni with onion, and one veggie.”

“What did he do then?”

“Beats me. Finished his route, I guess. Bunches of people eat pizza on this lot.”

“I expect so. Would you mind taking a look at this?”

Reggie showed her his list of the names of all the production companies Nigel had called.

“If I wanted to deliver pizza to every production company on this lot,” he said, “would this be an accurate list?”

“Not much of a pizza list if you don't write down what they ordered,” she said. “But if you're asking whether that's a list of
all the production companies on this lot, the answer is yes. No secret there; you can get the same from a phone book.”

Reggie thanked the young woman and left Selman's office.

He returned to his cab. He considered, and then immediately rejected, the idea of visiting each of the companies in turn. The result for each would almost certainly be the same—Nigel drives the truck slowly, Nigel runs in with the pizza, Nigel leaves. There was nothing useful in that.

And in any case, now his mobile was ringing.

It was Ms. Brinks.

“I showed your fax to a friend at King's College,” she said.

“That was quick,” said Reggie.

“Of course,” said Ms. Brinks. “You know I don't dally. It's from some sort of a geological survey report.”

“And?”

“That was pretty much all he could say, not being at all familiar with the area. But I checked about, and I have the name of someone local to you. Professor Rogers at the Pasadena Geological Institute. He can see you today. He said he has an opening at one.”

“It's past eleven now,” said Reggie.

“Well, he's gone for the rest of the day after that. Said to be quite the expert—had a top-notch firm before he became an academic, according to his curriculum vitae. And the institute looks to be only about fifteen miles from where you are.”

“Fair enough,” said Reggie.

Reggie's cab negotiated its way through the motorway exchanges to get out of downtown Los Angeles, and then they drove toward the foot of sagebrush-covered mountains, dirty green and brown.

Reggie got out of the cab into air that was visible but dry and that stung the eyes.

The institute was housed in a dispersed arrangement of Spanish-style structures with red tile roofs and white plaster archways, and a plaza that reflected too brightly as Reggie walked across it to the geological sciences building.

He located the main office for the department and learned that Rogers was the department chairman. Reggie was admitted almost immediately.

Rogers, a smallish, white-haired man of about sixty, cordially offered a chair in front of the desk and asked how he could be of help.

“I've only got a scrap of it,” said Reggie. “You may not be able to tell me much.”

Rogers smiled condescendingly. “Better let me be the judge of that, shall we? After all, you came all this way.”

Reggie gave Rogers the piece of paper he had stolen from Mara's keepsakes.

Rogers looked it over with a bemused expression. “It's part of a geological analysis,” he said. “Is that what you wanted to know?”

“I had taken a wild guess for that much,” said Reggie. “But what you're looking at is twenty years old. What I need to know is, what significance would it have to anyone today?”

“Did someone tell you it is significant?”

“Not in so many words,” said Reggie.

Rogers shrugged. “There's not much remarkable here,” he said, perusing it. “You've got clay, and some sand, more sand, a layer of flinty shale, some groundwater, some gaseous concentrations—all pretty much typical for the general area.”

“What area is that?”

“Excuse me?”

“The general area?”

“Could be almost anywhere in the Valley—or any number
of valleys in Southern California, as far as that goes. I'd have expected a little igneous stratification—granite—if it were the mountains.”

Rogers gave the sheet back to Reggie now, and he began to gather together some papers of his own.

“What would have been the purpose for this particular analysis?” asked Reggie.

“Anything that breaks ground,” said Rogers. “Just from this scrap, there's not much I can tell you. I'd have to know where this data is from, and need a lot more of it, for any kind of real analysis. Right now I have a seminar, but if you'd like to come back tomorrow with the complete document, I'm sure I could be of more help.”

“I wouldn't want to take any more of your time.”

Rogers shrugged. “No big deal. Just drop it by.”

Reggie said that perhaps he would do that.

But truth was, he was not inclined to wait that long if he could help it.

He walked down the corridor toward the exit. In the open lab to his right, a graduate student was shutting down the devices she'd been working with and was about to leave. Reggie paused at the entrance of the lab. No one is more eager to tell all they know than a dedicated graduate student.