The Stand-In (11 page)

He turned and slid back into the pool. “Let me tell you something else, Alec. I've known a long time if you had a friend you'd gun him down, but I didn't think that included me.”

“Nube!”

“Yes, Alec. You got there first with Nube. Maybe I was smart enough to know the kid had it, maybe not, but you got in there first with that contract. You cheated
me
, Alec! Me, who's been carrying you all these years. That's
your
loyalty, cousin!”

“Nube—Nube—”

“So I've had it! As of now, you're off my back. You're off my payroll.”

“What'll I do, Nube? Okay, okay, but what about the kid, Nube? Forget me, I'm off the payroll, but what about the kid's life, Nube?”

“I will get another kid like her for tomorrow's shooting and because, believe me, cousin, she's ten for a dime, with Carlos doing a make-up job, a hair job, a clever camera, not one in a hundred thousand will notice. If she's dead I'll cry a little, I have a big Armenian heart, but she isn't going to hold up the shooting one day.”

Watching Nube swim to the middle of the pool and turn on his back again, outstretch his thin arms again, all at once Alec felt how hot it was in the Turkish bath. Usually, because of the lousy colds he got, he was very careful about overheating himself; tonight he hadn't even unbuttoned one button. This was because the man who had promised Millie to get the money and who had rushed here to find Nube had not felt like Alec Agathon. The man who had squatted at the edge of the pool had not felt like anyone Alec Agathon had ever known. Now he shambled away from the poolside and pushed through the heavy doors.

“Did you find Mr. Ossian, sir?”

The attendant, who had, after all, allowed him in without charge, wanted a tip but Alec just nodded, walked through the massage room, through the dressing rooms, through the entrance hall and out. He had found Nube and also Alec Agathon in the Turkish bath.

He opened the cab door and Millie's white face swam towards him. Alec said dully, “I couldn't get it.”

“No? Oh, why? Why?”

“Here's why!” He took out the contract and with difficulty, because of his awkward position, he had one foot in the cab and was bent forward, tore it across and across, while, sitting forward on the seat, Millie watched. “Because she's ten for a dime! Because she's nothing!”

She whispered, “Alec, it's Kitten, Kitten.” She reached out to grab his arm but he stepped back.

“I'm off the payroll as of now. I'm finished. You didn't know I'm sixty-two years old, you didn't know that, did you, but Nube knows, and he throws me away like a used paper napkin!” He slammed the door and gave the driver the St. Georges address.

As the taxi started, Millie held on to the door handle and twisted her head back, watching him standing on the curb tearing the contract into smaller pieces.

Still holding on to most of the paper, Alec waited for another cab. It wasn't that he didn't want to litter; Alec was scared someone might pick up the pieces, put them together, and find out why Nube had fired him.

9

“Did they call, Coral?” Millie, leaning against the door, was clutching her elbows again.

Coral carefully shook her head so the room wouldn't whirl. “There was only one phone call. It was Nube calling Bran. What was it about, Bran?”

“About an interview we gave Eunice Merson.”

“About an interview, Millie, not Kitten.” She cautiously carried her half-full glass to her sister and tried to make her take it.

“Coral, I couldn't get the money.” Coral was shoving the glass at her. She pushed it away. “You've got to help me, Coral. You're my sister.”

“How can your sister help you?” Bran asked. “Your sister and I own a house in Beverly Hills, couple of cars, the new Ferrari, a Chagall and a Jackson Pollack. Couple of thousand in the bank. This is what I've been reminding your sister, who wants to help you, Millie.”

Millie ignored him. “Coral, you realize they only took Kitten because they thought she was Cornie. She saved Cornie's life.”

“Let me talk, Coral! Are you blaming us, Millie? You have the nerve to blame us? How about when Coral got her the screen test, did you blame her then? Kidnapping is one of the occupational hazards, Millie. Coral will tell you that when I was a kid I was kidnapped off the Paramount lot, and I'm still here. Pinch me, Millie. I'm for real!” Smiling, he held his arm out, but Millie shoved it aside.

“Coral—first you thought it was Cornie. I figured that out. You first thought it was Cornie and then your husband called me and found out it was Kitten. What I want to know, Coral, is when you thought it was Cornie what were you going to do?”

Bran tried to stand between the sisters, but Millie sidestepped him stubbornly. “I'm asking
you
, Coral! What were you going to do when you thought it was Cornie?”

Bran, behind Millie, whined. “What could we do? We didn't know what to do. First we went nuts like you're nuts, but in the end we would've called Scotland Yard.”

“You're a liar,” she said. “Now, Coral, I'm talking to you, so you answer me.”

“She's stoned, Millie, leave her alone. I just told you what we would have done. Leave Coral alone, she's had enough.” He grabbed Millie's arm, but Coral grabbed his.

“You leave
her
alone, Bran! We'll get the money, Millie. I promise you, Millie darling, in the morning we'll have it, and no cops. Now, please, I
am
tight. Please go to bed or something.”

“Can't I stay here? I mean, they'll call.”

Coral closed her eyes to make the room stand still, then opened them, and looking at Bran saw the blue blaze in his eyes and the muscle jumping in his cheek. Drunk or not, she knew what she had done to him, but how could she help it? “Then go in the bedroom and lie down, Millie. Shut the door.” When the door closed, she tried to embrace her husband but he evaded her. “I was hoping, God knows where, she'd get the money, Bran, that's why I went along with you. But where would she get it? Where has she ever got anything? I just hoped because I know what
Wind
means to you. Oh, Bran, oh lover, there'll be another picture! I'll make it up to you. Even when we thought it was Cornie, you didn't want to sign over the contract to Nube. It was on your mind the whole time. You can't think of anything else. You don't even answer these days when I talk to you, but I couldn't help it, Bran; I couldn't.

“Where are you going, Bran? I can't go after you! I have to stay here, Bran.” He took his coat from the back of the chair and put it on in his careful way, wriggling to set the shoulders. There was nothing more incongruous than the look on his face and the care he took with his coat. Coral said, “Bran,” again but although he turned toward her, faintly smiling now (the show must go on) she had become one of the faceless, one of the public. She was nothing to him. She had spoiled his chance. She was wiped out.

10

Although they could have used the big brass bed—all they had to do was take off the bedclothes and then put them back on again—Desmond had liked ordering Ronnie to sleep on the floor. It was cold as hell, but he remembered the extra red velour curtains Cyril had sent because Mr. Ossian couldn't be sure they wouldn't have to drape a couple more windows, and they used these as blankets. Ronnie had slept all night and the kid, too, because each time he went into the hall to listen there wasn't a sound from up there, anyhow not until he finally fell asleep, then she woke him with her crying.

Desmond looked at his watch. Eight forty-five. He went out, closing the door so Ronnie wouldn't hear him using his high voice. She was crying “Mommy, mommy,” but then must have remembered where she was, because she changed it to “Lady!” (She meant nurse.) He called up that he was coming and was halfway upstairs when Ronnie came out, yawning and stretching. Desmond still had the red velour curtain wrapped around him, but Ronnie didn't find him funny.

“It's morning. The kiddie must be hungry, Desmond. I am. You must have cached some food.”

Click, click
. “I certainly did, but I can't get it now. I was supposed to pick it up last night, but then you came along.”

“Sorry.”

The kid was still crying. “I can't go into a store in this nurse's uniform. Ronnie, you pick up some food, and I don't have to tell you it better not be any place around here where they might remember the young squire.”

“I know just the shop. It's new.”

“Okay.” He took out the adhesive to show Ronnie he was prepared. “I can keep
her
quiet, but not my belly. I haven't eaten since breakfast yesterday.” He told Ronnie to buy some bread and milk and some paper cups and a couple of chocolate bars, then, feeling his power, added that Ronnie might as well make the telephone call. “Use a handkerchief to disguise your voice.”

“You're the boss,” Ronnie said. “Will I pick up a paper to see whether they've brought the cops in?”

“Yes. I was going to tell you to get a couple of papers.” The truth was, he had only thought of the papers in case he was caught, seeing the headline:
Kidnapper Tells Why He Took Star's Child
. He was going to make his reason very plain. It was to teach them a lesson. (The cops couldn't make him pose in old Daph's uniform, could they? Yes, they could, but then there would certainly be two pictures, one in drag, and one as he really was, and he could camp the drag one. He who laughs first laughs last. Too true. He who laughs first laughs last. Desmond remembered the times that Louella Parsons had printed kid things he said on the lot, only she gave Bran the credit. He remembered his mother reading the quotes in Louella's column, but he'd never told her that they were his. She probably wouldn't have believed him anyway.)

Ronnie was asking for money for the food and telephone and Desmond gave him a pound and a ten shilling note.

“I call the St. Georges and ask for Miss Reid's room.”

“Suite. Stars rate suites.”

“Damn it, Desmond! Oh, very well, Miss Reid's suite.”

“She's seen the mail by now. You ask if they've got the money. They'll have it. Remind them Coral Reid must come alone in the Ferrari or we won't show. Tell them the next call will tell them were to bring it and to be ready to leave.”

Alone, Desmond shook out the red curtains carefully and put them back. He decided to bring the kid down. He would rather use his old high voice in front of Ronnie than leave her alone up there crying. (It didn't matter what voice he used, he had Ronnie's respect now.)

When he opened the door, he saw that she was still on the bed with the cape over her as if she hadn't dared move. He gave her his handkerchief to mop her tears and told her they were going downstairs and would soon have something to eat.

“There's Jim,” Desmond said when he heard the door opening. He had decided to call Ronnie “Jim” in front of the kid. She went right on telling him
Cinderella
. Not wanting stray prints around, he'd made her sit still and she'd asked him to tell her a story, but when he said he didn't know any she told him one. If she hadn't said it was
Cinderella
he'd never have guessed, but it wasn't bad for a kid of five until she said her mommy was like Cinderella. Coral Reid Cinderella, that was a good one!

Ronnie was carrying the food, and the newspapers were stuffed into his pockets. “Hello, Jim,” Desmond said. “Everything okay, Jim?”

The kid said, “That's not Jim, that's Ronnie.” Nothing wrong with that one except thinking her mother was a Cinderella.

He had to take the package from Ronnie, who just stood there looking at him in the old way, giving him the old Ronnie high-hat. He began to sweat. “What did you do wrong?”

“I was about to ask you that.”

To stop his nervousness, Desmond started the kid eating. He spread the sports pages of one paper on the floor and sat the kid on them so there wouldn't be any spills or crumbs. Then he tore off a hunk of bread for her and a good piece of the cheese Ronnie had bought and poured her a paper cup of milk.

Ronnie was pulling at his earlobe. “There's something up.”

“In the hall,” Desmond said, but he had to repeat it and pull Ronnie by the arm; he wasn't snapping to attention any more.

Ronnie said that he had been put through to the suite and had spoken to the husband. He had made his little speech and Collier agreed that his wife would be ready to leave in the Ferrari at whatever time and place they chose “with a reasonable sum.” “Can you tell me what that means? A reasonable sum?”

“It means for his kid fifty thousand is a reasonable sum.”

“Stuff that.”

“Forget it, Ronnie. Forget it. Everything's set. It's
set.”
But Ronnie wasn't forgetting it and stayed in the hall when Desmond went back to the kid. She was chewing away on the bread; when she saw him she held out her cup and Desmond poured more milk and then sat on the edge of the paper and broke off a piece of bread and cheese for himself, but although he chewed on his bread he didn't want it any more, his gut hurt. Because the bread wouldn't go down, he drank some milk. Then Ronnie came in and just stood there picking his nose as if he was alone. Hell with Ronnie. Desmond made himself open
The Chronicle
. When Ronnie heard the rustle, he came to and opened
The Daily Comet
.

There were no headlines about the kid in
The Chronicle
. “Nothing here. Believe me, it would be what we call front-page stuff. Anything in yours?” Ronnie was turning pages fast.

Then when Ronnie saw that Desmond was still on the first news page, Ronnie muttered something under his breath, yanked his paper away, and began to go quick through that one.

Suddenly he swore and tossed the open paper over to Desmond. Desmond saw the picture of Coral Reid and Bran with the kid standing between them; then he began to read the story that went with the picture.