Show Business Is Murder (24 page)

He arrested the Brown Shirts and prepared to bring them to trial. Of course, there were heated denials. Even some threats on his life. His case, nonetheless, was solid: he had the manager's story and Ilse's friend's. He also had the casings from the Luger, which everyone knew was their weapon of choice. He ignored Ilse's claim that they came to
Der Flammen
the night after. She was a whore; she had fled. Dead or alive, her word would be suspect at best.

By the time it came to trial a year later, though, everything had changed. Hitler was in power, and the Brown Shirts were acquitted. The next day the detective told his
wife to pack. They would go to Switzerland or Holland. Perhaps, if they were lucky, New York.

A LIGHT DUSTING
of snow coated the streets. Hobbling on a cane, the former detective let his grandchildren drag him towards the skating rink. It had opened in Thirty-six, just after they came to New York. Now, twenty years later, it was a family tradition. Every December, he and his wife brought the children, and now the grandchildren, into the city to take in the tree, the glow of lights, the holiday glitter.

The children chattered excitedly, their cheeks red from the cold. They watched the skaters circle the ice, dipping and gliding to the music. His attention was drawn to a tall, graceful girl, whose helmet of bright hair gleamed as she twirled.

Shadows chased the sun away, and dusk settled over the rink. The skaters cut sharp silhouettes against the pale ice. But it wasn't until the lights snapped on that he noticed the group at the next table. A tiny woman wrapped in a fur coat, her hair pulled back in a bun, surrounded by children and two adults.

“Oma.”
A little girl squealed in delight. “You must taste the chocolate. Like Lindt's, but hot.”

“You taste it for me.”

Steam rose from the cup. The little girl sipped and smacked her lips. Chocolate rimmed her mouth. Her smile revealing a deeply lined face, the old woman brushed her hand across the girl's hair. Then, as if aware she was being watched, she turned toward the detective.

The old man blinked. He knew this small, birdlike woman. The steady gaze. The clear blue eyes that, after a moment's appraisal, deepened in recognition as well.

“Herr Inspektor.” Her voice was serene and pleasant. “How delightful to see you again.”

His forehead wrinkled. “Madame, I apologize, but—”

“I am Frau Hesse, Herr Inspektor.” She smiled. “Wife of Friedrich Hesse.”

Her name burrowed into his memory, and the long ago case sprang into his mind. He rose and slowly made his way to her table.

“It is good to see you on this side of the ocean.” Her smile made it seem she'd been expecting him.

“We came from Holland.”

She nodded. “I came after the trial.”

He remembered the trial. He leaned his hand on his cane. “My one regret was that I did not bring them to justice, Frau Hesse. In failing them, I failed you. And your family.”

She looked at him for a long moment. “No. You did everything you could.” The thin smile on her face made him frown. This woman had the ability to surprise him, he remembered. Anticipate him. Say the unexpected.

“You see, Herr Inspektor, justice
was
served. The men who were tried, they were not guilty. They did not kill my husband.”

He chose his words with care. “Madame, please do not spare my feelings. We are both too old for that.”

“Deanna, take the children. I will follow.”

The young woman collected the children and walked them to the ice. She tapped the chair next to her. The detective sank into it.

“Do you remember what my husband was working on at the University?”

“Radiation, was it not?”

“Not quite,” she said, the teacher correcting a student. “Radioactive elements. Subatomic elements that could be isolated in uranium.” Her expression softened. “What neither I nor my colleagues told you was how far his work had taken him.”

The detective held up his hand. “No Madame. You are mistaken. It was not radioactive isotopes—uranium or otherwise. It was simple radiation.”

“Inspektor, do not presume to tell me about my work. I was a physicist, too, if you recall.”

“Yes, Frau Hesse. I remember. It was radiation. Not the other.”

She frowned, the lines at the side of her mouth tightening. “Perhaps you should tell me what it is you remember.”

He cleared his throat. “What I remember is that a group of Nazi thugs ambushed your husband. He was set up by a prostitute in a cabaret. Unfortunately, those type of incidents were all too common back then.”

She tapped her spoon against her cup. “But Inspektor, that was only part—”

He rode over her words. “No, Madame. You are wrong. You see, if it were any other way, if it were radioactive uranium your husband and his colleagues were experimenting with, I might have deduced something quite different.” She studied her tea cup. “I might have suspected they were trying to create nuclear fission.”

She jerked her head up.

“Which would mean they would soon be able to build a nuclear bomb.”

Her eyebrows arched. “Indeed.”

“I might also have suspected that word leaked out, as it always does in these matters, and that the Nazis demanded he turn over his work. Your husband would have refused, but it would have only been a matter of time. They would have blackmailed him, exposed his “activities,” perhaps even tortured him. And not just him. His colleagues, too. Your Friedrich would have—”

“We couldn't allow that to happen,” she said quietly. “In the end, we had no choice. We had to protect the work. You
must understand.” She drew in a long, shuddering breath. “It was decided I should come here.”

“Where you met with scientists who would later work on the Manhattan Project.”

She nodded.

“And let the Brown Shirts take the blame for his death.”

“So we hoped.” She shrugged her delicate shoulders. “Indeed, our biggest fear was you, Inspektor.”

“Me?”

“We were certain you knew. Or would discover it soon enough. You made us hasten my departure. Later, we were surprised by your silence. We decided you were a friend.” She paused. “And so you were.” She leaned back in her chair. “But how? How did you know?”

He hesitated. “His mistress confessed that the Brown Shirts came to the cabaret the night after he was killed. The rest was not difficult.” He stared at the skaters. The tall blonde was now partnered with a dark young man. Arms entwined, they skimmed the surface of the ice, skating in perfect synchrony. “But my dear Frau Hesse, I have a question for you. How could you do it?”

Swallowing, she stared at her teacup for so long he wondered if she would reply. Then, she looked up and waved a hand towards the children. “There is your answer, Inspektor.”

He twisted toward the children, his and hers. Their eager young faces sparkling as they followed the skaters. Bright new stars shooting across a cold, dark heaven. He looked back at Frau Hesse. Her eyes filled.

“You see?” Blinking hard, she smiled her tears away. The gentle smile of a friend. “Perhaps you will join me for a schnapps, Herr Inspektor? It was my husband's favorite.”

CHARLES ARDAI

I

Arthur French, a man whose bearing and expression were not so much boyish as they were a failed attempt to appear so, looked down at the avenue outside his office and wished he had the guts to open his window and throw himself out of it.

But he hadn't, so after a few minutes of staring at the traffic below while a cigarette burned itself to ash between his fingers, Arthur returned to his desk. The portfolio he had been going through when he had been overcome with his sudden attack of self-revulsion lay open on his blotter. Arthur stubbed out his cigarette and went back to work.

He had already discarded twenty-three women, turning the pages that held their hopeful eight-by-tens without so much as a stirring of interest. He had only pulled two photos from their plastic sleeves: Lisa Brennan, a striking blonde who'd have to look over her shoulder to see thirty, much less the twenty-seven she claimed, and Angela Meyer, a homely brunette—that nose!—whose bikini shot had nevertheless caught Arthur's eye. He'd covered her face with his hand. Maybe she'd do for some body doubling, or for the shower scene establishing shot where they'd need extras. Nobody
would have to see her face. Arthur had pulled the picture and dropped it face down next to his telephone.

Angela's credits, listed on the back, read like a young actress's dream: Cordelia in
King Lear,
the baker's wife in
Into The Woods.
But that's probably all they were—a dream. What she'd left out was that
King Lear
had been a showcase in someone's apartment on the Upper West Side and that
Into The Woods
had been summer-stock in Connecticut. Or vice versa. Hell, Arthur told himself, a woman who wants to do Cordelia doesn't send her agent around with a photo that shouts “playmate of the month” at the top of its lungs.

Brennan's credits had sounded more realistic: bit parts on a couple of soaps, some commercials, guest spots on two short-lived sitcoms. Plus one feature a few years back where she'd played Goldie Hawn's sister, a two-line part that had gotten her into SAG. At least she wasn't as likely to embarrass herself in front of the camera.

Arthur flipped through the rest of the portfolio, his interest waning from minimal to zip. Bunch of hungry little tramps who'd push each other in front of a train for a line of their own in the end credits, especially as a character with a name instead of something like “Woman In Cab.”

Hell, they'd kill for “Woman In Cab,” too.

He closed the book and zipped it up, then slipped the two photos he'd selected into his project folder. Two appointments for Rose to set up, two distant, distant,
distant
possibilities for
Goin' West,
and one less agent to deal with on the project. He stuck the portfolio in its mailer and started it on its way back to Jennifer Stein, the madam who had pulled this Kodacolor harem together and dropped it on his desk.

He fingered his lead-crystal ashtray, overflowing with Camel butts, then pulled a new cigarette from his pack and lit it. Somewhere halfway through the pack, Freddie Prinze's agent blew Arthur off, followed by Jason Biggs's and James
van der Beek's. Never mind Ashton Kutcher's—it wasn't worth the phone call. Not for a project that would get a five-week theatrical release, if that, on its way to video stores across the U.S. of A. James
van der Beek
was too big for this project, for God's sake.

Arthur ran his hand through his hair, permanently damp from a steady diet of Grecian Formula and Nexus, then slid the project file into its pendaflex folder and left it for Rose to file. The women would be easy to cast—no star or even B-lister needed. The male lead and his buddies, on the other hand, had to be names that meant something to teenage boys.

If all else failed, he'd go after Corey Dunn or Jon Farrell. William Fitch, their agent, owed Arthur favors that had major price tags hanging all over them. Shame to call them in for a dog like
Goin' West,
though.

He made one more phone call before cutting out early. Then he took the elevator down the thirty floors to street level, a slower method than the one he'd contemplated earlier, but at least you didn't end up a stain on the concrete. He picked up his Audi in the building's garage, spent a good half-hour in Manhattan traffic (a lousy half-hour, actually, city driving was always lousy), fought a traffic jam all the way out to Bronxville, and parked in front of his townhouse. Sandy was waiting for him when he got home and he got up a smile for her when he walked through the door. That was the most he could get up, though, and they went to sleep apologizing to each other.

All night Arthur dreamt about going through with his suicide, opening his office window and smashing to a jelly on the pavement. In a strange way, the dream didn't feel like a nightmare. In it, he left a note to his wife saying, “It's not you, honey, I can't stand this stinking business.” Which was his dream's way of making him feel better, because in his waking moments he knew it was her, as much as it was anything.

Sandy would never let him forget that “East Coast casting director” was a contradiction in terms, especially when it came to features. You had to be in California to really be in the business, unless you were Juliet Taylor and did the casting for Woody's pictures, but he wasn't, and he didn't, and he never would come close.

Arthur French was a peripheral figure in the industry, a name people half remembered in connection with films they would just as soon have forgotten. He'd given up, years before, his original ambition to do work he was proud of and had become a whore for the mid-budget studios who were still willing to use him. Sandy would ask him from time to time why he'd pissed away such talent as he'd had when she'd met him—as though he knew the answer himself. Over the past few weeks Sandy had also started asking him about other women, stopping just short of accusing him of having an affair. Then she was surprised when he flopped worse than
Waterworld
in bed?

It didn't help the situation that Arthur couldn't divorce her, mainly because his townhouse was really Sandy's townhouse and
Goin' West
wouldn't pay for a replacement. Twenty years of films like
Goin' West
hadn't, and twenty more wouldn't.

Arthur sat up in bed next to where Sandy lay, blowsy and paunchy and forty-eight, and dragged on his first Camel of the morning, thinking about divorce and thinking about suicide. Suicide seemed simpler and less painful.

He tried to go back to sleep, but he found he couldn't keep his eyes closed. He went to work instead.

ARTHUR MADE SOME
more calls before the girls started filling Rose's office, touching up their makeup and hiding their bra straps. The calls didn't go well, but why should they? The script for
Goin' West
had made the rounds and
every agent Arthur called knew it was garbage. No agent would let his actors appear in the film. If Kreuger had been willing to cut the scenes on the beach, maybe, but the bastard had been stubborn. How can you fight a writer-director-producer who's making his own film? On the other hand, how do you get any actor who's got a sense of self-preservation to go in front of the camera and play the sort of scenes Kreuger wrote? He made the Farrellys look like Noel Coward.

Arthur ran his fingers through his hair, wiped his hand, threw the tissue out, smoked halfway through a cigarette, and buzzed Rose to start sending the girls in.

The female roles were interchangeable. Arthur kept a checklist and marked off character names one by one. Kreuger would have to approve his choices, of course, but that's what callbacks were for. Arthur picked two women for each part, jotting down information on the Polaroids Rose had taken while the girls were waiting in the front office.

Angela Meyer showed up at eleven, uglier in person and less talented even than Arthur had expected. She did have a good body, though, and Arthur wrote her down for extra work: the shower scene, the skinny-dipping scene, wherever they needed background T&A. Angela's face fell when Arthur told her this was all she could get, but what could he do? Ugly is ugly.

Lisa Brennan appeared after lunch, when the crowd had thinned out. Arthur was already numbed from the morning's parade of spandex-and-silicone hopefuls, and he didn't stand up when Lisa came in. He was tired of standing up. Lisa sat opposite him and handed him another copy of her headshot. Arthur dropped it on his desk and stared at her.

You could see the desperation in her face, and with thirty-plus showing around her eyes, Arthur wasn't surprised. Her hands were twisted around one another in her lap. He glanced at Lisa's credits again and noted that her
last project was half a year old—which meant she hadn't worked for the better part of a year, and that in turn was why she was in his office trying to get a part in a teen sex comedy.

Arthur launched into his spiel. “We're casting a new film by Daniel Kreuger called
Goin' West
. There are several parts for young women . . .” The words poured out of him on automatic, along with pauses during which he waited for Lisa to answer the standard questions. She answered them. The answers were standard, too. Arthur started to feel his stomach.

When Arthur told Lisa to undress, she stood, pulled her sweatshirt over her head, and undid the knot on her hip that held her wrap in place. Under it she wore an orange two-piece swimsuit. She turned in a circle, then bent to pick her wrap off the floor.

Arthur made a gesture with his hand. The gesture wasn't any gesture in particular, just a tired wave of the hand that wasn't holding his cigarette, but Lisa knew what it meant and she forced a smile as she unclasped her top in back and slipped it off her shoulders.

Lisa had a nice body, but that smile . . . smiles like that gave Arthur ulcers. He forced himself to smile back, but he knew it came out wrong, a pained, cut-the-crap expression that he quickly wiped off his face.

Lisa stopped smiling, too. Arthur waited, but she just stood there, not smiling.

The ones who stripped naked without being asked were bad enough, the ones who thought that seeing another naked, young body could be any sort of bribe at all for Arthur. The ones Arthur had to ask were worse. But it was his job and he did it.

Arthur made his gesture again, knowing already that he wouldn't use Lisa, knowing that Kreuger would laugh if he sent him any woman who didn't have the body of a teenager. Laugh, hell, Kreuger would find another casting director.
But Arthur made his gesture and waited for Lisa to pull down her swimsuit, let him see what he'd be casting if he'd cast her, which he wouldn't. Though he'd have liked to, Arthur realized suddenly, since personally he found her more attractive than the twenty-year-olds who had been in and out of his office all morning.

Lisa hesitated. “Do I have to? If you think it's likely that I'll get the role, fine, but if not I'd rather not.” She had her thumbs hooked under the straps at her hips.

Arthur's stomach burned. “You don't have to do it,” he said. “I don't care. You don't have to do anything you don't want to do. You don't have to be in the movie. No one's going to force you.” Lisa stood uncertainly while Arthur stared at her.

Here's a woman who's done commercials and soaps, Arthur said to himself, and she's dying inside but she's letting you get away with this because she's desperate for a break, which you're not going to give her anyway. For God's sake, let her go.

“Listen—” Arthur started, but Lisa had made her mind up and was bending over, stepping out of her bikini, standing up naked in a stranger's office to get a role where she'd have to do more or less the same thing in front of a million moviegoers.

“Get dressed,” Arthur said, disgusted with himself.

Lisa stared at him. “Is something wrong?”

“Please.”

“Is there something wrong with me?”

“Just get dressed.” She was frozen. “Christ, there's no part for you, okay?”

She didn't say anything, just picked up her wrap from the arm of the chair, wound it around her waist, tied it, and quickly pulled the sweatshirt over her head. She grabbed her photo and her bikini.

He turned his chair to face the window and heard the door slam.

The next girl he saw was a nineteen-year-old from Toronto, a bottle blonde whose headshot mentioned parts in
Hollywood Hookers
and
Hollywood Hookers in Bermuda.
He stopped her before she could unbutton her shirt and told her she had the part and asked her to leave. She blushed tremendously and thanked him.

Bill Fitch didn't return his calls all afternoon.

ARTHUR TOOK LISA'S
headshot home with him, hidden between two pages of budget projections for
Goin' West.
Some time after midnight, he got out of bed and carried his briefcase into the living room. He turned on the lamp next to the TV set and angled its shade so that no light shone toward the bedroom. Then he took Lisa's photograph out and looked at it for a long time. He lit a cigarette, but it burned most of the way down untouched on the rim of the ashtray.

He had no idea whether Lisa Brennan had talent. But hell, what was talent anyway? Didn't plenty of successful movie actresses come up short in the talent department?