Getting Garbo (20 page)

“What about silent alarms?” The gurney wheels are squeaking as they wheel her away.

“Most folks who invest in security systems don't want silent alarms—they want all the noise they can buy.” The smirk. “One thing's for sure—these robberies are selling a helluva lot of alarm systems in the neighborhood. You see Armed Response signs sprouting on all the lawns.”

“Maybe you ought to look in that direction—some alarm salesmen drumming up new business.”

“We're already on that one. But keep those Jack Havoc suggestions coming.” He gestures around the den. “Anything else you notice that's gone?” I study the room, shake my head. He suggests we check out the other rooms, although they don't seem to have been disturbed. I do what he asks but don't have anything to add to the list.

“That's it then, I guess.” Arzy is leading the way back to the front door. “Know what movie your pal Wellman made that really knocked me out?
Battleground.
‘Sound off, one-two, sound off, three-four…' Slogging through the fuckin' snow. Battle of the Bulge. Thought I was living a rerun couple winters later, when I was in Korea with the Marines, freezin' our ever-lovin' noogies off.”

He opens the front door and I see a mobile TV van parked at the curb. A reporter and camera team are shooting the loading of Addie's body into the ambulance. The TV reporter spots me and instantly refocuses his camera crew. I've seen him on the channel five news but never met him before.

“Roy,” he sticks his microphone in my face, “are you under arrest?”

Before I can tell this asshole to go fuck himself, Arzy intercedes. “Mr. Darnell is here at the request of the sheriff's office to aid us in our investigation. At the moment we are pursuing several leads but do not have an official suspect yet. But we believe the murder took place during the commission of a house robbery.”

The TV news reporter asks Arzy to identify himself and he does. Then the reporter shifts back to me. No more Mike Wallace belligerence. Now he's Mr. Sympathy. “This must have come as a terrible shock to you, Mr. Darnell. How long were you and Adrienne Ballard married?”

“Six years. She was a wonderful woman. There'll never be another person like her.” All true. Depending on how and when you read it. But the TV snooper can't let it rest.

“Even though the two of you were getting divorced?”

“Things change—but I still thought of her as my best friend.” Little white lies. What the hell.

“I think that's enough for now, guys.” Arzy takes my arm. Walks me away from the electronic grave-robbers, who switch focus back to the ambulance. Getting the tag shot of it pulling out into the street.

“Thanks, Arzy.” We're back at my T-Bird.

“No sweat.” He leans against the T-Bird door. Preventing me from getting inside. “Know something? When I see the break-in marks, all gouged out like that, sometimes I think, Maybe this turkey's sending us down the wrong trail. Maybe he doesn't get in with a crowbar—maybe he uses a key. And the rest is just frosting. Oh, I almost forgot.”

He takes a set of keys out of his pocket. My keys. From when he was driving us here. He tosses them to me. Gives me his Mr. Innocent smile.

“Hey. Do you still have keys to this house, Roy?”

What am I going to say? I open my palm, point at the key ring. “Just this one. Gave all the others back when I left.”

The smirk. “Might as well throw that one away. Doesn't work. I tried it while you and Harry were doing the inventory. She had the locks changed a couple weeks ago. We found the locksmith's bill in her papers. Guess she didn't trust you anymore, Roy.”

“Look, Arzy, you're gonna hear a lot of stuff. I mean, it's no secret that Addie had officially resigned from my fan club.”

“Yeah, I figured. Lots of photos all over the place, but none of you.”

I shrug. Give him my best Jimmy Stewart. “When you're gone, you're gone.”

It's the right thing to say. He claps me on the shoulder. My buddy.

“Hey, we've all been there, pal. Go ask my ex for her opinion of me.” He opens the driver's door for me. “Take it slow. I'll be in touch.”

I get behind the wheel and pull out. In the rear view mirror, I can still see him. Standing in the middle of the street. Watching me go.

“What's he looking at me for?” I say.

Jack Havoc doesn't answer. He just laughs.

“Think that's funny?”

He's not looking at you, narcissist. It's the car. He likes my car.

“Then what's all that cat-and-mouse shit? About the keys and photos and all.”

It's his job. Check out every angle. Just like in the movies.

“Then you don't think he thinks I—”

What I think is you've gotta watch what you say.

“Like what?”

Like that crap about Addie not being a member of your fan club. Want to give him any more hints where to go looking?

“That didn't mean anything. It was just a cute way of letting him know that Addie was pissed at me. He's gonna find that out anyway.”

C'mon, Roy. Fan club. Just 'cuz it's in your mind, it doesn't have to be comin' out of your mouth.

He's right, of course. All I can think of is Reva. What she's heard. What she's making of all this. Where I can find her.

Now you're talkin', kid,
Jack Havoc says.

• • •

When I walk into Romanoff's, it's a show stopper. Instantly half the lunch crowd spots me and whispers to the other half. The noise level noticeably decreases. Now I've got several hundred of Hollywood's elite all pretending they're not gawking at me. Gossip in filmland moves faster than a speeding bullet. So everyone in the room knows about Addie's death. But suddenly these diners have ringside seats at the best show in town. The first public appearance of Roy, the widower.

I'm dressed appropriately. Wearing an MCA black suit, white shirt, dark tie. Mourning clothes. Went home after Kings Road. Called my lawyer. Nate Scanlon said he wanted to see me immediately. But he thought it was important that, as he put it, “We show the flag.” I let him talk me into it, when all the while Romanoff's was where I desperately want to be anyway. Reva's happy hunting ground.

The frozen moment as I stand here in the entrance to the dining room seems to call for the MGM orchestra to begin playing a Rachmaninoff dirge. Prince Mike himself comes forward. Looking more lachrymose than ever. He puts a hand on each of my shoulders. “My dear fellow,” he says, “what can one say at a time like this?” He hugs me to him. I hug him back. Feels like a cue for the audience to burst into tears and applause. But instead, chewing and chattering resumes as Prince Mike leads me to the second booth on the left. Bogie's booth. Bogie's still in Europe. Nate Scanlon is already there. Waiting for me. He half-rises, gives me a serious handshake. “Sit down, laddie, I'll buy you a drink.”

I nurse a glass of white wine and ignore a plate of scrambled eggs while Nate and I discuss current events. I tell him what happened with Arzy and Harry. He says it sounds like I handled the situation very well. Not to worry about any of the questions pointed my way. The police must be thorough in a high-profile case like this. But clearly it's a burglar who ran amok. Of course, my reputation for temper tantrums is a factor to be considered. But given my very conspicuous presence elsewhere at the time of Addie's death, that can become a plus factor. Perception is everything in a situation like this. Sympathy can accrue to a man of action, frustrated by the inability to act. “They'll feel for you.”

It's already happening. Our conversation is interrupted a number of times by people stopping by the table. Expressing condolences. Hang in there, man! Our thoughts and prayers are with you! They'll catch that guy!

Out of respect for Addie, what Nate and I don't talk much about is money. Just a few quick, discreet mentions. Our combined estates will very likely be entirely mine, he says. “But there's plenty of time to explore those matters, Roy. We mustn't seem precipitous.”

Someone else approaches the booth and I look up. It's Guy Saddler. Tears welling. Looks like he's lost his last friend in the world. He probably has. I feel an unexpected jolt of compassion for the old queen. He just stands there. So I get up and, to my own surprise, I hug him. He does not hug back. Instead, he hisses in my ear. “You cocksucker. I don't know how you did it, but you killed her!”

My arms fall away from him. Nate is the only one close enough to have heard what he said. And he's out of the booth now, draping his arm around Guy's shoulder, smiling, as he murmurs in a soft voice: “Mr. Saddler, if you ever repeat what you just said publicly, we will sue you for malicious slander and take every penny you have in the world.” He squeezes the nape of Guy's neck and gently sends him on his way.

I slump back down in the booth. Nate moves in beside me. “He's just overwrought,” he says. “I think I calmed him down.”

When it comes time to leave, Prince Mike stops by again and rips up our check. Lunch was on him. “I wish I could do more,” he says. “I'm so glad you came here today, Roy. My place is always your place.” And, of course, all the gossip columns will mention I was at Romanoff's. So everybody wins.

Now I'm anxious because this is what I'm really here for. We go out onto Rodeo Drive and there are the autograph collectors. My plan is to play it casual with Reva. Then drive away, circle back, keep an eye out—see which way she goes and make my move. “Just have a chat,” I think.

Yeah, sure,
Jack Havoc scoffs.

The collectors are all mobbed around Audie Murphy, who's just driven up. He's the little baby-faced farm boy who was America's most decorated hero in World War II. Starting with the Congressional Medal of Honor. He's since come to Hollywood as the star of Western “B” pictures. I don't know him well, but we've chatted at parties. He's a Jack Havoc fan. Tell you the truth, he makes me nervous. Here's a guy who personally annihilated a regiment of Nazi soldiers. For real. He sees me now and his face transforms into a storm cloud. He breaks away from the fans. Grabs me off to one side. Nate moves with us. To protect me, if needed, I guess. I may need the help.

“Sonuvabitch,” Audie says, “goldang it t'hell.” He punches my biceps. It hurts. “Heard the news. M'heart went out t'ya, pardner. Then I got this great idea, wanted t'find you soon as I could, tell y'the idea.” He moves closer. Conspiratorial. Nate closes in. Audie looks askance at Nate. It's scary.

“He's okay, he's my lawyer,” I say.

Audie eases off. “Well, then, counselor, you might wanta cover your ears 'bout now.” He's got hold of my arm. Like a band of steel. “When the cops nab the guy who wasted Addie, whaddayasay we put up bail for him, get his ass out of the cage—and then we blow him away! You and me, Roy! Don't fuck around with the courts. Just ice him! BLAAAM! Adios, amigo.” He gives me his choirboy smile. Huck Finn gone apeshit.

Nate chortles. “Now here's a man after my own heart.”

I tell Audie it's a good idea and I'll give it serious thought. The collectors are snapping pictures of Audie and me. I recognize a number of their faces. From all these years. There's that guy, goes back to New York, the kid with the spiky crewcut. Funny name. Podolsky! What's his first name. Oh yeah. “Can you write, To Barry, with something nice like best wishes…”

“Hey, Barry,” I say, “where's our best girl? Where's Reva?”

“Dunno, Mr. Darnell, she was supposed to be here. I'll tell her you were askin' for her.”

“Yeah, do that, please.” I want to ask Podolsky how he's going to get in touch with Reva? Does he have a phone number? An address? But I don't need Jack Havoc to tell me that's going too far. Too conspicuous. Particularly if something happens to Reva later on.

The valets have brought up my T-Bird and Nate's Lincoln Continental. We go for the cars. Podolsky calls after me. “We're all very sorry about what happened, Mr. Darnell.”

I make a sad-brave face and give him a little wave of gratitude. For all the good that does me. But you never know who's watching. I slip the valet a fiver and get in the car. Put it in gear. Roll away. With absolutely no idea where I'm going. Always knew where to find Reva before. No problem. Just look over my shoulder. Always right there. Whether I like it or not. Except now, when I need to find her. If she was going to miss a session shadowing the stars, why couldn't it have been last night? Then she wouldn't have that locket in her pocket that can shatter my alibi. Proof beyond a reasonable doubt that I was up at the house on Kings Road last night.

“Where the fuck are you, Reva?” I want to shriek.

Jack Havoc reads my mind.
Maybe she went to the cops.

Hollywood is a state of mind. How's that for a deep thought? Geographically it doesn't exist, at least not the way I imagined it did when I was still back in Brooklyn. The word used to conjure up a vision of a movieland village, all the studios in a bunch, surrounded by the palatial residences the stars lived in. Of course, the map of L.A. has a section called Hollywood. But I discovered that hardly any of the stars live there and most of the studios are somewhere else. MGM is in Culver City, Warners and Disney are in Burbank, Twentieth Century Fox is in Westwood, Universal is in a patch of the San Fernando Valley. The stars live all over the place.

When I first came to California, I took five buses out to the far reaches of the valley and walked two miles up a hill to Clark Gable's ranch. All the other collectors said he'd set the dogs on me, but instead he offered me lemonade and signed my book with a neat dedication: “To Reva, You have the determination the pioneer women had…” and he drove me in his pickup truck back to the bus stop in Encino. My point is, if Clark Gable lives in Encino, then that's definitely part of Hollywood, too. Despite what the map says.

But if there is a center to Hollywood, I guess it's Grauman's Chinese Theater. It's located on Hollywood Boulevard, and everybody who comes to town visits the forecourt of the theater, where all the handprints and footprints and autographs of the top stars are preserved in cement. That's where I am now. Don't ask me why, because I'm not exactly sure.

All I know is Mother got me up this morning, yelling through the door. “Reva, wake up, they're talking on the television about Roy Darnell.”

“What're they saying?”

“I don't know. He got robbed or attacked or something.” By the time I reach the kitchen, the newscaster is on to a possible strike at the Goodyear tire plant in Downey, so I go back into my room and turn on the radio, and while I'm getting dressed I listen and it's awful. A daily report being made in this real pleasant voice of all the shitty things going on in the world. After a while, they come around to Roy Darnell. That's when I hear about the burglary at his old house and how Addie is dead. It knocks me for a loop.

Most of all I'm flooded with relief that Roy's still alive and well. Then comes a wave of shock as I think, oh God, he might have been up visiting Addie at the time the mad dog burglar struck. Roy would surely have been killed defending her. Or maybe the killer was really after Roy and Addie just had the bad luck to get in his way. Or…am I impressing you? Because I'm totally knocking myself out. With my resourcefulness! With my inventiveness! With my ability to elaborately ignore the absolutely obvious! Isn't it incredible? I could probably sit here on the edge of my bed and think of twelve more possibilities. All but one.

Jimmy Durante once did a show on Broadway called
Jumbo,
and he's stealing Jumbo, who's an elephant, and somebody yells at him, “Where you goin' with that elephant?” And Durante, who's standing in Jumbo's shadow, gives this innocent shrug and says, “What elephant?” So that's me. Trying to ignore the idea looming over me big as an elephant because I simply just do not want it to be true. That Roy murdered Addie and stole her jewelry to make it look like a burglary and didn't have time to dump it because he had to race back to the Academy to create an alibi.

I'm shaking.

“What the hell's the matter with you?” Mother is standing in the doorway, dressed in her bank teller's clothes, ready to roll off to the B of A.

“I dunno,” I say.

“Don't you catch a cold, Reva.” She advances on me. “Take some vitamin C. Wear a sweater. You start up with one of your famous summer colds, you're gonna get a smack!” She looks like she wants to give me one now just to be on the safe side.

I promise that I'll never get sick again and she's reassured enough to take our scuffed '52 Nash Rambler and drive off to work. I'm supposed to meet the kids in Beverly Hills at Romanoff's to cruise the lunch crowd. But when I'm standing at the bus stop on the corner of Bundy and Santa Monica Boulevard and the bus into Hollywood pulls up, I get on. I'm not ready to go talk to people yet. Not even the collectors.

So here I am at Grauman's Chinese standing in Judy Garland's footprints. They're very dainty and tiny, and my feet fit perfectly. Only it's not like
Cinderella,
and simply because I can fill her shoes doesn't make me a movie queen. All around me, tourists are doing the same thing. First ogling the autographs. I see how impressed they are that they're at the spot where all the big stars once actually were. The men try Gary Cooper's shoeprints on for size. The women see how they compare to Ginger Rogers. They all ooh and aah over the novelty items pressed in the cement: Betty Grable's legs, John Barrymore's profile, Al Jolson's knees (from kneeling and singing “Mammy”). But, of course, no Greta Garbo, no legendary gunboat-size feet, no autograph; not even theater showman Sid Grauman got Garbo.

I pause at Humphrey Bogart's footprints. “Sid,” Bogie had etched in stone to Showman Grauman, “May You Never Die Till I Kill You.” What a weird thing to write. Bogie must've been drunk and trying to live up to his tough guy image: “Drop the gun, Louie!” But still weird, even as a joke.

Bogie. Roy's pal, Roy's booster, Roy's role model. Maybe Roy's gone his teacher one better. Bogie gets into real life fights in saloons (so does Roy) and Bogie kills enemies in his make-believe life (and Roy…?). I turn my back on Bogie. There's a blue-uniformed policeman leaning against his parked black-and-white cruiser, flirting with a pair of cute tourists in tight pedal-pushers, and I'm walking toward them.

I could do it.

I should do it.

It's too big a secret for me to carry around all by myself.

I'm still just a kid.

So why not do it?

I could say, Excuse me, officer, can I talk to you for a minute? He'll look a bit annoyed, because I'm distracting him from coming on to the teenagers, but I'd say, It's very important, it has to do with a murder. That'd get his attention. Maybe I shouldn't say murder, a killing is better. Or—a death. I'm approaching them now, only a couple more steps, the cop senses there's something up with me, probably because I'm staring so hard at him, he's laughing with the teeny-boppers but he's looking me over. Go ahead, do it, unburden, it's what a decent, law-abiding citizen ought to do. Roy may have a perfectly simple explanation for everything; this will give him the chance to clear himself, and then it won't be on my conscience, one way or the other, so do it.

“Hi, Officer,” I say.

He gives me a half-salute, three-fingers up to the visor of his cap. Like a Boy Scout. I keep walking. Toward him. Past him. Down the boulevard.

• • •

Larry Edmunds Bookshop is on the boulevard, just a couple, three blocks east of Grauman's Chinese. The Egyptian Theater is on the same side of the street, with its huge DeMille-style statues out front. Musso & Frank's Restaurant, where all the old-time writers like Dashiell Hammett and F. Scott Fitzgerald used to hang out, is across the street. But it's Larry Edmunds Bookshop that's mecca for all the devout collectors and fans. If you want lobby posters, back copies of
Modern Screen
or
Silver Screen,
books about the movies or the stars, or 8x10 glossies, including portrait shots and production photos, then Larry Edmunds is the primo place. That's why I tried them first about buying my autograph books, but no go. It's a place with crammed shelves, cramped pathways between them; watch it, bobby-soxers from nearby Hollywood High are sitting on the creaky old wooden floors, lost in a reverie while they leaf through the wonderland of glamour and glitter.

It reminds me a little of a seedy old bookstore in New York on Sixth Avenue near 42nd Street, where Tillie Lust, the sexpot of the Secret Six, first showed me the ropes. We didn't do anything decorative with our crumb books, but for our real autograph books we'd find tiny head shots of the stars and paste them on the pages where they'd signed. Some head shots were easy to get hold of, because the actors were currently popular, but then there were others who were harder to locate and that's where the Sixth Avenue Bookshop came in handy. The back issues of the magazines were a treasure trove. Of course, we never paid for anything, Tillie would chat up the store manager, her shoulders back, flaunting the nubile knockers beneath her fluffy pink angora sweater (with matching beret), while I sliced out the photos I needed with a razor-sharp Exacto knife that I bought after I joined the Secret Six.

Now I'm hunkering down on the splintery floor in the back of Larry Edmunds store on Hollywood Boulevard, riffling through the bins of 8x10s for any new production photos that may have come in. I'm in luck, there're several from
Jack Havoc.
It demonstrates the show is a hit, because they don't stock much stuff from TV shows. I study the pictures, marveling at what a good actor Roy is, you can see it even in still photos—when he's playing Jack Havoc there's a whole other look to him. Devil-may-care, still good-humored, but often with a wild glint in his eye that I find irresistible. You never know what Jack Havoc might do, and I guess that's what the audience likes, too. He might break the law, at least bend it pretty far out of shape, but always for a good reason and to help someone in need.

I can't decide which of the stills I want to buy; actually I want them all, so I think about that for a while, and it keeps me from thinking about Roy's real life situation. Then I come to a decision and I get up and stroll nonchalantly up the cluttered aisle, stepping over a scruffy Brando T-shirted lookalike, hunkered down in the Acting Scenes For Auditions section. I pause up front to examine a new picture biography of Lana Turner, and then I wander out of the store onto Hollywood Boulevard. I start back toward the bus stop that brought me here, but I hardly go a step before a foot comes down on top of my foot, and I look up and see one of the Larry Edmunds clerks, a witch named Hazel (really), who always gives everybody a hard time over nothing.

“Hi, Hazel,” I say. “You're standing on me.”

She's just bug-eyed and gloaty, like Judith Anderson in
Rebecca
when she burned down the House of Manderley. I realize I'm clamped in place. And I also realize I'm in trouble when Hazel pats my back and pulls up the shirttails of my blouse and yanks out the
Jack Havoc
stills I have tucked back there.

“Gotcha, you little thieving brat,” Hazel says. “Shoplifting snot!”

“I was gonna pay for those,” I begin and I stop because it sounds lame even to me. Hazel is really tromping on my toes. I'll have to leave this foot behind if I want to take off and I sure as hell want to. That's when the car pulls up to the red zone in front of the store. It's a police car, and the cop who gets out is the same one who was flirting with the girls at the Chinese Theater.

I guess we were destined to talk after all.