Docketful of Poesy (13 page)

“Who’s that?” Cordelia whispered, nodding to where
Tracy stood still frowning over chimney pots.

“That, my dear, is the new and improved Grace
Hollister.”

Cordelia giggled. “I love what you’ve done with your
hair.”

“Speaking of which…”

“Oh, it’s for a role in
Uncle Vanya
. But I
like it.”

I protested—knowing I sounded like I’d been boning up
on the Official Guide to Adulthood, “But your own hair is so
beautiful.”

Cordelia tossed her head—and the artificial golden
locks. “I know. I feel like a change. It’s a woman’s
prerogative.”

“So are tattoos and permanent makeup, but I’m telling
you now, not every prerogative is worth exercising.”

Cordelia just giggled. “Who are we spying on?” she
whispered. “Him or her?”

“We’re not
spying
on either of them,” I
whispered back. “What an idea!” I could hear the elegant young man
talking to Peter about dates. Apparently the lady MP was getting
married in the near future. Peter jotted down some notes. He was
being more polite than usual, so I knew the MP was going to be the
proud owner of some very fine and
very
expensive pieces of
furniture in addition to the magnificent angel wings.

The door opened with another silvery swing of bells
and Pammy poked her head inside requesting Tracy’s presence.

Tracy threw a long look at Peter who—utterly
oblivious—was glancing over a list handed him by the young man.
Reluctantly, she withdrew from the field of contest.

“Can we go outside and watch them film?” Cordelia
inquired hopefully, and I nodded.

We followed Tracy down the winding flagstone path to
the garden, and I introduced Cordelia to Roberta and Todd.

Roberta was distracted but gracious. Todd was
personable. In fact, Todd was very personable—if not quite as
avuncular as I’d have liked. I could see Cordelia’s dark eyes
beginning to sparkle in that way that never boded well.

“Nah, RADA’s for snobs, innit?” he was saying as I
stepped away to glance over the newly revised shooting script that
Pammy had just thrust into my hands.

The shooting script is a detailed description of
characters, locations, actions, sounds, camera angles. It’s
everything from dialogue to the most elaborate technical points
like camera heights and angles. The day’s shooting script lets the
cast and crew know exactly what and who are needed during any given
day’s work. In theory, anyway. The practical application seemed to
be a little more…fluid.

I absently flipped through my copy. We were still
mostly working from Walter’s script, as little as I liked it. The
dialog, in particular, was squirm-making, but I was focusing my
efforts on the later scenes. As I had received permission to scrap
the original plan of sinking the Derwent steamer, I had to come up
with a suitably thrilling, but more feasible, climax for the film.
So far nothing brilliant had occurred.

When I noticed the two men in black ski masks
advancing toward us from the woods behind Craddock House, my first
reaction was exasperation. I began flipping through the script
trying to see where they fit into the scene.

They didn’t.

They weren’t anywhere in the day’s shooting schedule.
I glanced over at Roberta and Miles, who were in conference again.
No one appeared ready to resume filming. Crew members were still
adjusting lights and cameras and reflectors.

“Hey!” shouted Pammy, spotting the approaching men.
“Hey, there!”

I turned back in time to see the two men come from
behind the house. They raised shotguns and began to fire—at us.

I heard Pammy shriek. She threw herself flat on the
grass.

I’m not sure how I managed to shake off that moment
of paralyzed shock, but without thinking about it I ran forward,
grabbed Cordelia, and yanked her down with me behind the boxwood
hedge. Around us people were running for cover and screaming. Todd
Downing had ducked down and was crawling swiftly along the
shrubbery. It would have been funny if it hadn’t been so
frightening.

I started to follow—and then a terrible thought
occurred to me. I stayed put, heart hammering—and made Cordelia
stay as well. She was shaking beneath the fierce grip I had on her
arm, and swearing in a high breathless voice. I ignored her,
watching Todd.

He slipped out from behind the banks of rosebushes
and scurried, hunched over, across the lawn, making for the blue
Mini parked beneath the trees across the road. The gunmen advanced
down the hillside, pumping their guns and firing at the car.

I realized to my horror that they were closing in on
him—that they must have thought he was Peter. And at that moment
Peter landed in the grass next to me. He was holding a
pistol—black, compact, deadly-looking—holding it with the assurance
of someone who was used to handling guns. And that in itself was
very hard to wrap my mind around.

“They’re going to kill him,” I told him. “Todd.
They’re going after him.” I could hear the bewilderment in my voice
as though I were listening to someone else—someone I heard from a
distance.

Peter’s eyes met mine. Then he reached across,
ruffled Cordelia’s hair, and said lightly, “Is it true about having
more fun?”

She gulped. We both flinched at the repeated sound of
shots.

To me, he said calmly, “Stay low. The garden gate is
unlatched and the back door is open. Get her and yourself into the
storeroom passage. Don’t come out until I tell you.”

“Wait.
What are you planning to do?”

His smile was wry.

“Peter.” I grabbed his hand. “You’re not trained for
this kind of thing —”

“I don’t think people train for this kind of thing.”
He linked fingers with me quite casually and then released my hand.
“I’ve rung the police, but they’ll likely be too late. Move.”

Cordelia was already crawling swiftly across the
grass.

“She doesn’t know where she’s going,” he told me.

“Peter —”

“It’ll be all right.” And then he was moving along
the edge of the shrubbery.

“Grace!
” hissed Cordelia, looking over her
shoulder.

I turned her way, turned back toward Peter, but he
was gone. What choice was there? I began to crawl towards
Cordelia.

And then it sounded like World War Three had started.
Automatic weapons, bursts of gunfire, explosions…

I couldn’t help it. I had to see what the hell was
going on. Cautiously, I poked my head up, then ducked back down at
the thuds of feet in damp earth. The men with the shotguns sailed
over the hedge—one of them landing a few feet from me. I froze but
he never looked my way, taking off with his companion, racing for
the back of the house, the lake and the woods beyond.

The firing and explosions died away, and I realized
that the screams and yells of fright had turned into cheers and
whoops. I stood and saw several members of the production team
armed with enough guns and assorted weapons to run a small war.

Prop guns.
Props.
Make-believe.

Miles scrambled to his feet, snatched his cowboy hat
off his head, and smacked it against his thigh, exclaiming, “Now
that’s
Hollywood!”

Chapter
Ten

“N
o sign of ’em anywhere,
sir,” a young uniformed constable reported to Brian. “We’ve got
tire tracks in the woods that look promising. They might have
parked there before walking across the meadow.”

“Thank you, MacMillan,” Brian answered. He turned to
me. “Well, well. Your Mr. Fox has got up someone’s nose.”

I opened my mouth for an automatic,
He’s not my
Mr. Fox
, but then I recalled that, oh yes, actually, he
was
. Instead, I said, “What a charming phrase. I’ll add that
to my list of favorite Briticisms. It’s right up there with
snogging
.”

“You have a problem with snogging?” Brian inquired,
interested.

Tearing my gaze from the emergency services van where
the various minor injuries received by the cast and crew were being
patched up, I answered, “Not with the act itself, just the term.”
Snogging
was British slang for kissing, and a more
unromantic word for it I would personally be hard pressed to find.
(Possibly
suck face
, but that’s almost too ghastly to
contemplate.)

“You’re a fascinating woman, Miss Hollister,” Brian
stated, although I suspected he meant “fascinating” in the way a
scientist might observe insect colonies going about their business.
I made a face at him.

“One thing’s clear,” Brian said. “If they’d wanted
people dead, there would be people dead. They were firing shotguns,
for godsake. It’s a miracle this garden isn’t awash with
blood.”

Now there was a jolly thought. But Brian was right.
It was obvious the men in black had interest in one target and one
target alone. True, they had got the target wrong, but how were
they to know Peter had a near-double on the premises?

The police had arrived at Craddock House shortly
following the attack on the Kismet Production film crew, and
several constables had set out eagerly across the fields searching
for the gunmen—to no avail.

Chief Constable Heron was now in deep conversation
with Peter; I could see from Peter’s expression that it was not an
enjoyable encounter. And the Chief Constable didn’t look much
happier. There were police and their vehicles everywhere; probably
every law enforcement officer in the county—if not the neighboring
counties as well—was present. Nothing like this had ever happened
in Innisdale. In fact, nothing like this had probably happened in
the entire Lake District.

The police were methodically taking statements from
the rattled cast and crew members. Granted, they weren’t as rattled
as the natives would have been—Hollywood is a rough town—but a lot
of flasks and a lot of Valium vials were unobtrusively making the
rounds. I’d already given my version of events to Chief Constable
Heron—and then again to Brian. Not that there was a lot to
tell.

Brian said abruptly, yanking me back to awareness,
“You do realize you might’ve been killed?” His eyes were slate
gray, his face grim. There was no sign of my former agreeable
escort.

“I realize, yes. So could have every person here.
Including Peter.”

“Yes. Todd Downing for example.”

I nodded noncommittally. After hearing that Todd
Downing had been targeted by the men in black, it hadn’t taken the
police long to put two and two together—and their conclusion was
not flattering to Peter. For the first time I got an inkling of why
Peter had so little trust in the justice system. While no one
actually came right out and said the attack on the production
company was his fault, the implication was there.

“Fox knows these villains. And if he doesn’t know
them, he surely knows why he’s on someone’s hit list.”

“I’m telling you he doesn’t. I know you think I’m
blinded by some romantic fantasy, but if he knew, he’d…” I stopped
at Brian’s expression. I finished mildly, “He’d go to the
police.”

Brian snorted. “Right.”

Cordelia wobbled up in her high red boots. “I am
so
bloody late! Bri, can I go? Auntie is going to murder
me!”

That was the beauty of being young. Cordelia was
already over her fright and even sort of enjoying her recent brush
with murder and mayhem.

Brian raised his eyes to heaven. “Go,” he said.

Cordelia turned to me, the heavily made-up eyes
studying me hopefully. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Grace?”

“If you can’t think of anything better to do.”

She grinned, and departed on those ridiculous spiked
heels. Brian stared disapprovingly after her coltish figure as she
took the flagstone steps two at a time.

“She shouldn’t be hanging about here. Neither should
you.”

“I agree with you about Cordelia, but the worst thing
would be to deny her access. Don’t worry. Making movies is
surprisingly dull. It’s mostly about standing around and waiting.
I’m hoping she’ll soon get bored and find something else to amuse
her.”

(True, my idea of a splendid time was poring over
research materials or spending hours in a dusty archive
somewhere….)

Brian turned away, spoke briefly to a constable, and
then turned back to me.

I said, “Do you think it means anything that they
used shotguns? I don’t really think of professional hit men using
shotguns.”

“Do you think a lot about professional hit men?”

“More than I used to.”

His mouth quirked but he didn’t allow himself a
smile.

I tried another angle. “Just a thought, but is it
possible these goons might have thought the new MP Angela Hornsby
was at Rogue’s Gallery?”

Brian stared at me. “An assassination attempt? Is
that what you think?”

Not really, but I did wonder if the police were
entertaining any theories beyond the idea that Peter had brought
all this on himself. I replied, “I don’t know. You get these cranks
sometimes who have different political views and take them out on
public figures. Is Ms Hornsby very popular?”

“She’s not unpopular. Not
that
unpopular.
You’ve been in the States too long. Besides, your theory wouldn’t
explain why these same men tried to kill your Mr. Fox a week
ago.”

“If they were the same men.”

“True,” Brian said equably. “He may have legions of
people eager to kill him.”

“Funny.”

“Not really. Someone could have died here today. It’s
a miracle no one was really hurt.” He was right. Apart from a few
scrapes, sprains, and some minor injuries from shotgun pellets,
Kismet Productions had escaped virtually unscathed.

“Yes, I know that, Brian.” I watched Peter turn away
from Chief Constable Heron, and even at this distance I could see
the lines of his face were tight with anger.