Fade to Black (10 page)

Like a set.

Yeah, he thought. Like a set. Everything in place, the crew all in place, hidden from view. Going for the docudrama effect. He was the leading character, the cameras were on him. What was the movie? He had to figure it out. Ten seconds before they started rolling.

Ten . . . nine . . . eight . . .

There, at the corner, A couple walking. Young, innocent enough. But there’s more to it. A twist. There has to be a twist. Am I a spy? Gumshoe? Maybe Tony Alabama.

Seven . . . six . . . five . . .

Ah! They’re walking off, through the parking lot, between Westwood Books and the theatre. Past the booth. No cars in the lot. The yellow lines are faded, marking off the parking spaces. Dark spots where the oil leaks, reflecting the lights.

Eric walked until he was passing the vacated booth servicing the parking lot. Then he stopped, took a wide, sidelong step, merging into the booth’s shadow, cast by the spotlights affixed near the tops of both buildings touching up against the lot.

Four . . . three . . .

He peered around the corner, watching the couple step into the black shadow of the alleyway. He could make out only the dull silhouette of their heads, moving closer. Lips meeting. A kiss. Long. Sustained.

Two . . . one . . .

Down at his feet. An empty bottle. Southern Comfort. Empty. Well balanced in the palm of his hand.

A prop.

Zero . . .
action!

Gripping the empty bottle as if it were a hand grenade, Eric bit off an imaginary pullpin and heaved the glass across the parking lot. He broke into a run, and was several buildings away when the glass splintered into jagged shards against the brick wall, five yards from the necking couple. The girl screamed. The boy cried out, stepping out into the light, challenging unknown assailants.

At the corner, Eric crossed the street diagonally and ran off down Weyburn in the direction of Bullocks. He laughed out loud, a B-movie cackle, equal parts of Peter Lorre and Richard Widmark as Tommy Udo. He heard the faint echo as he came to a parking structure. He slowed to a walk and faced the structure directly, placing his hands on his hips and cocking his head backward, giving the laugh his all. The echo ran into the parking lot, raced up and down the concrete tiers, then vanished into the night.

Marilyn climbed out of the cab in front of Ship’s, three hours late for her rendezvous. She’d had more Burgundy than she thought, and she wobbled unsteadily on her spiked heels as she stepped up onto the curb.

He was nowhere to be seen.

Coffee, she thought reflexively. I’ll have a cup of coffee and see if he stops by.

She brushed her hair out of her face and laughed bitterly. Who are you kidding? she told herself.

How could she have forgotten? The poster had to have been from him, too. And now she couldn’t even remember his name. Derek? Richard? No, no, that wasn’t it.

“Dumb blonde,” she cursed, standing in front of the coffee shop. She was letting the act get the best of her, letting it rule her life.

She started for the coffee shop when she saw a westbound bus coming her way down Wilshire. He’s already gone anyway, Marilyn thought to herself as she flagged the bus down and boarded it. She took a seat near the driver, ignoring the lecherous gaze from the man across the aisle.

Eric paced the streets of the Village until past midnight, watching a few of the theatre crowds let out, eyes sorting through the faces for a glimpse of Marilyn. She wasn’t there.

To hell with her, he thought.

To hell with Aunt Stella, too. Let her fall asleep waiting for him. She couldn’t treat him any worse, anyway. Let her demand a backrub. He’d throw the money back in her face. The bitch! Hellish old crone! Why couldn’t she love him, treat him the way he deserved. Like Ma Jarrett in
White Heat.
Cagney’s mother, Margaret Wycherly, always wishing her boy the best. Top o’ the world, she always told him. Always there, understanding, ready to help. Not that Cody Jarrett needed any help. He was the toughest, the smartest. It was Cagney’s best role, Eric thought. Arthur Cody Jarrett.

He stopped in the arcade at the corner of Broxton and Westwood Boulevard, a brick-walled detour that arched through an old adobe façade. A shoe store had set up a display window featuring a line of cowboy boots. Part of the display was a cardboard cutout of Hopalong Cassidy, one-dimensional but larger than life, grinning out at the customer with the implied assurance that if he were still in the saddle today, this here was the footwear he’d have poking through the stirrups.

“I got stood up, Hoppy,” Eric mumbled, blinking back tears. “Double-dealed by a tramp. What do I do with someone like that Hoppy?”

Hopalong offered no advice. Only shoes.

Eric walked back down Westwood Boulevard to his bus stop. He wasn’t sure how late the buses ran, but someone else was waiting at the bench, so he assumed he was in time for the last run.

He sat on the top of the backrest of the bench furthest from the other man. Eric’s feet were on the seat and he hunched forward, lighting another cigarette.

Ten minutes passed by without any bus appearing on the street. He asked the man two benches down which bus he was waiting for, but he was an Oriental who apparently didn’t understand English. He smiled and nodded his head politely at Eric.

Then, out of the coffee shop came a young woman, wearing lavender pants and a glitter tank top. Jewelry gleamed around her neck, wrists and fingers. Her hair was a curled nest of henna, matching her lipstick and makeup. She walked deliberately out to the curb in front of Eric and stopped, watching the intermittent flow of traffic but making no effort to cross the street when it cleared.

“Excuse me,” Eric called out to her. “Do you know what time the next bus is, please?”

“I’m not waitin’ for no bus,” the girl told him dryly. “I’m working.”

“Work at night, huh?” Eric asked innocently, glad for someone to talk to. “Where do you work? Where are you headed?”

The girl stared at Eric a moment, but her look of annoyance wasn’t sufficient to dematerialize him.

“Shut up, will you, numbnuts!” she shouted at him. “I’m trying to hitch a ride . . . on my back. Get it?”

It took Eric a moment, but he brightened some when it came to him.

“I’ve got ten dollars,” he told the girl, going for his pockets as he came down from his perch on the bench. “What about me?”

“Ten bucks?” the girl said smugly. “For what, cat food? Get lost.”

A Buick Skylark slowed down and moved over to the lane closest to the curb as it approached the girl. The driver made a gesture. The girl nodded. The Buick pulled to a stop beside her, and she opened the door. She paused a second to look back at Eric, mocking, “Hope you freeze your balls off . . . if you got any.”

Eric watched the Skylark swerve back into traffic and speed off.

“Go to hell,” he cried out petulantly into the night.

He was about to sit back on his bench when he saw a cab dropping a passenger off in front of the coffee shop. On impulse, he ran over to the taxi and climbed in. The driver was tall and fat, his cap brushing against the roof of the cab.

“Follow that car up at the light,” Eric ordered eagerly.

“What the hell is this?” the cabbie said, “some kind of a joke?”

Eric handed his ten-dollar bill over the front seat.

“Just follow it!”

The cabbie slipped the bill into his shirt pocket and pulled out into traffic, starting his meter.

“Ten bucks ain’t gonna get you far, ace,” he said. “I hope you’re figuring a tip into—”

“Step on it! Please,” Eric said, “that one there. The Buick.”

“Don’t sweat it, Mac,” the driver said, veering over one lane and falling in behind the Skylark. He was chewing tobacco, and he lifted a glass beaker to his lips, discharging a mouthful of brown saliva. He looked at Eric in the rearview mirror, noting his outfit.

“If you want, I can pull alongside so you can climb out on the running board and blast ’em with your heater.”

Eric saw that the cabbie was laughing and sat back against the seat, sulking.

“Just drive.”

“You’re the boss,” the driver said, spitting another load into the beaker and setting it aside as he stayed on the Skylark’s trail.

Eric had no plan in mind, and he was surprised to find the Skylark continuing west toward the beach. When it turned on Lincoln and passed over the freeway into Venice, he found himself wondering if this were all an elaborately staged prank perpetrated by Marilyn. The more he thought about it, the more sense it made. The whore had been wearing so much makeup it could have been her. She could have been following him around all night, just to see how he’d react, then goaded him along with the insults, knowing he’d get in the taxi. No, that seemed too improbable. Too much left to chance. But still . . .

“You only got another mile, ace,” the cabbie told him as they passed Hill Street. When they stopped at the next light, Eric leaned forward and stared out the windshield at the Buick. He could see the girl lean over and kiss the driver.

If it was her . . .

Less than a quarter of a mile further down the road, the Buick flashed its blinker and turned right onto Ozone Avenue, heading toward the coast. The street was lined with cramped bungalows wedged into even more cramped lots.

Just past Seventh Street, the Skylark rolled to a stop in front of Ozone Park, a small playground for children.

The cab drove past and turned on Ruth before stopping. Eric got out of the taxi and hurried back toward the park, taking care not to show himself. He stole across the grass to the cover of a Monterey pine, its limbs bent and twisted as if weathering a tempest.

The man and the girl strolled casually past the playground equipment, talking softly back and forth. After stopping a brief moment inside a squat geodesic dome used for monkey bars, they made their way behind an equipment shed painted bright red with white trim. The shed blocked the streetlight, and Eric could only see them outlined in shadow through his cover behind the pine.

He saw the girl bend down slowly to her knees, facing the man, who in turn placed his hands over her head and guided it to his waist. Eric watched, intrigued, hearing the man’s intermittent gasps, then a single, extended groan.

Soon afterward, they emerged from behind the shed. The man headed back toward his car, but the girl walked across the grass toward Eric.

Eric stood still, holding his breath.

She walked past the pine without seeing him and continued down the sidewalk, taking Ruth Street as far as Rose. Eric followed half a block behind her and watched as she went into the parking lot next to a Mexican restaurant, which was closed. Reaching into her purse, she pulled out a set of keys and let herself into a cherry red Corvette. Starting the engine, she backed out of her parking space.

Eric ran forward, blocking the driveway as he smiled flirtatiously. Under the lights in the parking lot, he could see it wasn’t Marilyn.

“How much?” he asked her, “I’m close to home. I can—”

“You a cop or something, following me around?” she demanded angrily, leaning her head out the window.

“No, I just—”

“Then get the hell out of my way, you worm!”

She revved the Corvette’s engine and drove forward. Eric darted to one side, and the car sped past him, tires chafing loudly against the asphalt.

“I don’t need you!” he shouted at the fading taillights. He turned around in an unsteady circle as he vented his anger and frustration at the world in general. “None of you! I don’t need any of you!”

The streets were empty.

Dejected and miserable, Eric started home.

His head was beginning to ache.

CHAPTER •
12

“They can’t cut your hair like that!” Moriarty cried indignantly as an officer ushered his first client into the office. “It’s unconstitutional, as of—”

“Can it, cretin,” the juvenile said, rubbing his hand across the top of his crew cut. “This is the way I wear it.” Besides the crew cut, the offender standing before Moriarty had a ring through one nostril and a tattoo on his jaw reading “Ruff and Tumbel.” He wore faded jeans and a black T-shirt.

The officer behind the juvenile told Moriarty, “Gallagher said I can only stand guard for ten minutes.”

“Go tell Gallagher thanks for the offer but we don’t need a babysitter,” Moriarty said.

“Right arm,” the juvenile said.

“Shut up,” the cop told the kid.

The juvenile whirled around to face the officer.

“Hey, oinker, why don’t you go rooting for acorns?”

“Maybe I should rearrange your face instead,” the officer said threateningly, taking a step toward the kid.

“All right, knock it off, both of you,” Moriarty intervened. “Officer, I’ll handle him alone. Okay?”

The officer looked from Moriarty to the kid and sighed.

“Sure, suit yourself. It’s your funeral.”

The officer left the cell. His footsteps sounded loudly as he walked down the basement hallway and started up the steps.

“Strange pad you got here for a pigsty,” the juvenile remarked, taking in the converted cell.

Moriarty took a file off his desk and read off the name on it. “Okay, Franco. For starters, I’m not a cop. I got a way to keep you from doing time, but you’re going to have to co-operate with me.”

“I ain’t no joy boy, if that’s what you’re looking for,” Franco taunted.

Moriarty eyed the juvenile patiently.

“Sit down, Franco. Let’s talk.” He pointed to a director’s chair across from his desk.

Franco looked at the chair, twisting his lips wryly. “I thought you guys used couches.”

“Well, guess again,” Moriarty said. “You probably noticed I don’t have a gray beard and I don’t talk with a phoney Austrian accent, either.”

“So what’s your gig, then?” Franco said, sitting down.

Moriarty sat on the edge of his desk and opened Franco’s file.

“It says here you were picked up at a rock club after you stabbed four people in the buttocks with a paring knife,” he read. “Do you have any idea why something like that might appeal to you?”