"Coldheart Canyon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Barker Clive)

PART SEVEN. THE A-LIST

ONE

In March of 1962 Jerry Brahms had bought a small two bedroom apartment a block or two within the gates of Hollywoodland, a neighborhood created in the twenties which encompassed a large parcel of land in the vicinity of the Hollywood sign. The house had cost him nineteen thousand seven hundred dollars, a relatively modest sum for a place so pleasantly situated. Back then, he'd still indulged the fantasy that one day he'd meet a soul-mate with whom he would one day share the house, but somehow his romantic entanglements had always ended poorly, and despite three attempts to bring someone in, the chemistry had failed miserably, and each time he'd sent the man to be on his way, and he'd ended up alone. He no longer hoped for an end to his solitude: even the most optimistic of the cancer doctors who'd seen him gave him at best a year. The tumor in his prostate was now inoperable, and spreading.

For all his love of the dreamy far-off days of Hollywood, Jerry was a practical man, and -- at least when it came to himself -- remarkably unsentimental. The prospect of dying did not move him particularly one way or another: he was not afraid of it, nor did he welcome the eventuality. It would simply happen -- sooner rather than later. Sometimes, when he got melancholy, he contemplated suicide, and in preparation for such a moment had amassed a considerable number of sleeping pills, sufficient, he felt sure, to do the job. But though he had very bad days now, when the pain (and, for a man as fastidious as himself, the practical problems of advanced bowel disorders) were so nearly overwhelming that he thought hard about tying up all the loose ends of his life and simply knocking back the pills with a strong Bloody Mary, somehow he could never bring himself to do it.

He had a sense of unfinished business, though he could not quite work out what the business might be. His parents were long since dead, his only sibling, a sister, also passed away, tragically young. Of his few friends there were few that he cared to say anything of any great profundity to. If he slipped away, there'd be little by way of tears: just some fighting over his collection of movie memorabilia -- which he'd never had evaluated, but was probably worth half a million dollars at auction -- and a few tear-sodden, bitchy remarks at Mickey's (his favorite bar) when he was gone. Lord knows, he'd made enough of those kinds of remarks in his life: he'd been the kind of queen with a feline answer to just about anything in his heyday. But there was no joy in that kind of thing anymore. His style of queendom was long out of fashion. He was a dinosaur with prostate cancer; soon to be extinct.

Lately he'd found that his condition made him vulnerable to every little sadness that touched his world. The passing of Todd's dog, Dempsey, had left him in tears all day, though he barely knew the animal. And then the death of Marco Caputo: such a senseless waste of life. He hadn't ever been close friends with Caputo, but on those few occasions when he'd met the man, Caputo had always been polite and professional, rare enough in these days of mediocrity.

The funeral had not done justice to the man, in Jerry's opinion. It had been small (there were a couple of family members in from Chicago, but they looked as though they were more interested in what his will would say than in mourning their brother). Todd, of course, was not on hand, though Maxine was there as his representative. Jerry took the opportunity to ask her how much longer she thought the stalker business would be going on for. Were the police trying to catch this woman, and prosecute her, or was poor Todd just going to have to sit it out? Maxine said she didn't know. She wouldn't be dealing with Todd's affairs for very much longer, she told him: it was a waste of time and energy.

The conversation, the tiny, disinterested congregation, the coffin and the thought of its unviewable contents, all sent Jerry back home to his apartment in a blacker mood than usual. But even so, even on a day when it seemed that all decency and all hope had gone from the world, he found it impossible to take his stash of pills and finish the business.

Why, for God's sake? Something nagged at him; that was all he knew. Something told him: wait, just a little longer.

"It's not over," the opera-queens of his acquaintance used to say, "'til the fat lady sings."

Well, somewhere deep in his soul, he knew that the fat woman still had an aria up her sleeve.

So he kept on living, which was often a wearisome business, all the while waiting for whatever it was that was nagging at him to make itself apparent.

Finally, on the night of March 31st, it did.

The circumstances were peculiar: he had a dream so powerful that it woke him. This in itself was odd, because he usually went to bed with a couple of scotches to wash down his sleeping pills, and as a consequence seldom woke.

But he woke tonight, and the dream he'd dreamed was crystal clear.

He had dreamed that he was sitting on the toilet, of all places, in a state of agonizing constipation (which was in his waking life a consequence of the pain-killers his doctor prescribed). As he sat there he realized that there were wooden boards on the floor of his toilet, not tiles as there were in life, and the cracks between the boards were so wide that he could see right down into the apartment below. Except that it wasn't another apartment, it was -- in the strange logic of this dream -- another house. Nor was it just any house. It was Katya's dream palace that was spread below him. And as he realized this, the gaps between the boards grew wider, so that he dropped down between them, slowly, as though he were feather-light.

And there he was, in Katya's house, in Coldheart Canyon. He pulled up his pants and looked around.

The dream palace was in a state of considerable disrepair. The windows were broken, and birds flew in and out, shitting on the fancy furniture. A coyote skulked around in the kitchen, looking for scraps. And outside in the tree there were dozens of little red-and-black-striped monkeys, chattering and screeching. This was not so fanciful a detail as it might have seemed to someone who'd not known the house, as he had, in its heyday. There had been monkeys there -- escapees from Katya's private menagerie; and for a while it seemed the climate suited them and they would proliferate, but after a year or two some virus had decimated them.

Something about the place in its present condition made him want to leave. He knew, however, that he couldn't. Not without paying his respects to the lady of the house. So rather than wait for her to show herself, he went to look for her, figuring that the sooner he found her the sooner he'd be released from this dream. He started up the stairs. There were flies crawling on the ground beneath his feet, so densely assembled and so sluggish that they refused to move as he ascended, obliging him to crush them under his bare feet as he climbed.

The door to the master bedroom was open. He stepped inside, somewhat tentatively. He had only been into the room once before. He remembered it as being large; but here in his dream it was immense. The drapes were partially drawn, and the sunlight that streamed between them was a curious color, almost lilac.

There was an enormous, but extremely plain, bed in the room. And sitting on the bed was the only woman, besides his mother, whom Jerry had loved: Katya. She was naked; or -- more correctly stated -- unclothed. Ninety percent of her body's surface was covered with large snails, the common tortoiseshell variety that every gardener curses. They were moving all over her skin. They were on her face, on her breasts and belly, on her thighs and shins. Her hair was matted with their silvery trails, and thirty or forty of them were arranged on her head like a grotesque crown. Her legs were open, and they were also investigating the crevice between her thighs. As is so often the case in dreams he saw all this with horrid particularity. Saw the way their boneless grey-green bodies extended from their shells as they moved over Katya's skin; their horns extending tentatively as they advanced, then retracting as they encountered an obstacle -- a nipple, an ear, the knuckle of her thumb -- only to stretch out again when they were certain there was no danger in the encounter.

Without speaking, Katya looked down and very delicately plucked one of the creatures off her breast. Then she spread her legs a little wider, so that Jerry had an even more intimate view of her private parts. He was no connoisseur, but even he could see that there was a certain prettiness to the configuration of her labia; she had the pussy of a young girl. Putting her hands down between her legs she spread her lips and delicately applied the snail she'd taken from her breast the flesh there.

Jerry watched with a kind of appalled fascination as it responded to its new perch, expanding its horns and investigating her.

Katya sighed. Her eyes fluttered closed. Then, suddenly, they opened again. When they did they were fixed on him, with startling fierceness.

"There you are, Jerry," she said, her voice full of the music he remembered from his childhood: the kind of bitter-sweet music by which he had judged the voice of every woman he'd met since.

Later he'd learned that silent movie stars had been notorious for having voices that precluded them from careers in the sound cinema: but Katya had been one of the exceptions to that rule. She had the slightest foreign inflection (nothing recognizable; just enough to add a certain poignancy to her sentences); otherwise she spoke with a beguiling elegance.

"I need help," she said to him. "Jerry, will you come to the house? Please. I am alone here. Utterly alone."

"What happened to Todd?" he said to her.

"He walked out on me."

"I can't believe that."

"Well it's true. He did. Are you going to choose between him and me?"

"No, of course not."

"He was just another empty shell, Jerry. There was no substance to him. And now I'm alone, and it's worse than death."

His dream-self was about to get clever and ask her how she could possibly know what death felt like, but then he thought better of asking her. Perhaps she did indeed know. It wasn't beyond the bounds of possibility. He'd never understood exactly how her life had worked, up there in the house in the Canyon, but he suspected there were terrible secrets in that place.

"What do you want me to do?" he asked her.

"Come back up to the Canyon," she said.

That was the end of the dream, at least as he remembered it when he woke. The image of her body covered with snails disgusted him, of course; especially its sexual details. Had she conjured that, in dispatching this dream, or had he dug it out of the recesses of his own subconscious? Whichever it was, it had done its duty: making certain he understood the pitiful state she was in.

All through the following day, as he went about his chores-down to the market, back from the market, cooking himself chicken, eating the chicken, washing the plate from which he'd eaten the chicken, talking with Luis, who lived below, about how the apartments all needed painting, and who was going to talk to the manager because it had to be done soon; and so on, and so forth -- through all of this he kept thinking about the dream, and whether it was really trying to tell him something or not. Out of the blue, he said to Luis: "Do you believe in dreams?"

Luis, who was a plump, amicable man who'd been in Christopher Street the night of the Stonewall riots, in full drag, or so he claimed. "Like how?" he said. "Give me an example."

"Like: you have a dream and it seems like it's telling you something."

"Oh yeah. I've had those."

"And were they?"

"Like I had a dream in which my mother told me to get out of this relationship I was in with a guy. I don't know if you met him. Ronnie?"

"I remember Ronnie."

"Well he was a sonofabitch. He used to beat me up, he'd get drunk on tequila and beat me up."

"What's this got to do with the dream?"

"I told you: my mother said throw him out. In the dream. She said throw him out or he'll kill you."

"What did you do?"

"I threw him out. I mean, I was ready to do it anyhow. The dream just confirmed what I'd been feeling."

"Did he just go?"

"No. He got physical, and we ended up fighting and -- " Luis pulled up his sleeve, exposing a six inch scar, pale against his mocha skin. "It got nasty."

"He did that?"

"We were fighting. And I fell on a glass-topped coffee-table. I needed sixteen stitches. By the time I got back from the hospital, the motherfucker had gone. He'd taken all my shoes. And they weren't even his size."

"So you do believe in dreams?"

"Sure I believe. Why'd you want to know?"

"I'm trying to figure something out."

"Well, you want my opinion? Dreams can be useful doing that sometimes. Then again, sometimes they're full of shit. It depends on the dream. You know how I know? My Momma got really sick with pneumonia, and she was in the hospital in New York. And I had this dream, and she was telling me she was fine, there was no need to spend the money and fly out East, because she was going to get better. Next day, she was dead."

Jerry went back to his apartment and thought about his dream some more, and about what Luis had said. Gradually, it crept up on him why he was being so reluctant about the decision. He was afraid that if he went up to (if he sided with Katya, knowing her capacity for cruelty), it would be the end of him. He'd seen so many movies in which the queen ended up dead in the second act, superfluous to the real heart of the story. Wasn't that him? Hadn't he lived his life at the edge of Katya's grand drama; never important enough to be at the heart of things? If events in were indeed coming to an end -- as it seemed they were -- then what was the likelihood of his surviving to the final reel? Little or none.

And yet, if this was the inescapable truth of his life, then why fight it? Why lock himself away in his little apartment, watching game-shows and eating frozen dinners for one, when the only drama he'd ever really been a part of was playing out to its conclusion twenty minutes' drive away? Wasn't that just throwing more time away: waste on waste?

Damn it, he would go. He'd obey the summons of the dream, and go back to Coldheart Canyon.

This course determined, he set about preparing himself for an audience with the Lady Katya. He chose something elegant to wear (she liked an elegant man, she'd heard him once say); his linen suit, his best Italian shoes, a silk tie he'd bought in Barcelona, to add just a touch of color to the otherwise subdued ensemble. With his clothes chosen, he showered and shaved and then -- having worked up a bit of a sweat shaving -- showered again.

It was late afternoon by the time he started to get dressed. It would soon be cocktail hour up in Coldheart Canyon. Tonight, at least, Katya would not have to drink alone.

TWO

About the time Jerry Brahms had been waking up from his dream of Katya and the snails -- which is to say, just half an hour before dawn -- Tammy and Todd were slipping -- 'quietly, quietly,' she kept saying -- into the little hotel where Tammy had been staying. The last few days had provided Tammy with a notable range of unlikely experiences but surely this was up there amongst the weirdest of them -- tip-toeing along the corridor of her two-star hotel with one of the most famous celebrities in the world in tow, telling him to hush whenever his heel squeaked on a board.

"The room's chaos," she warned him as she let him in. "I'm not a very tidy person ... "

"I don't care what it looks like," Todd said, his voice so drained by exhaustion it had no color left in it whatsoever. "I just want to piss and sleep."

He went directly into the bathroom, and without bothering to close the door, unzipped and urinated like a racehorse, just as though the two of them had been married for years and he didn't give a damn about the niceties. Telling herself she shouldn't be taking a peek, Tammy did so anyway. Where was the harm? He was bigger than Arnie, by a couple of sizes. He shook himself, wetting the seat (just like Arnie) and went to the sink to wash, splashing water on his face in a half-hearted fashion.

"I keep thinking -- " he called through to her. "Can you hear me?"

"Yes, I can hear you fine."

"I keep thinking this is all a dream and I'm going to wake up." He turned the water off and came to the door, towel in hand. He patted his wounded face dry, very gently. "But then I think: if this was a dream when did it begin? When I first saw Katya? Or when I first went up to Coldheart Canyon? Or when I woke up from the operation, and it had all gone wrong?"

He tossed the towel onto the floor of the bathroom; something else Arnie always did. It used to irritate the hell out of Tammy, forever chasing around after her spouse, picking up stuff he'd dropped: towels in the bathroom, socks and skid-marked underwear in the bedroom, food left out of the refrigerator, where the flies could get at it. Why were those habits so hard for men to change? Why couldn't they just pick things up and put them away in their proper place?

Todd was still talking about when his dream had begun. He'd decided it started when Burrows put him under. "You're not serious?" she told him.

"Absolutely. All this ... " he made an expansive gesture that took in the room and Tammy " ... is part of the same hallucination."

"Me, included?"

"Sure."

"Todd, you're being ridiculous." Tammy said. "You're not dreaming this, and neither am I. We're awake. We're here."

"Here, I don't mind." Todd said, looking around the room. "I can take being here. But Tammy, if this room exists then so does all that shit we saw up at Katya's house. And I'm not ready to believe in that." He bit his nails as he spoke, pacing the floor. "You saw what was in the room?"

"Not really. I mean I saw the man who killed Zeffer -- "

"And the ghosts. You saw the ghosts."

"Yes, I saw them. And worse."

"And you believe all that's real?"

"What's the alternative?"

"I've told you. It's all just some hallucination I'm having."

"I think I'd know if I was having an hallucination."

"Have you ever done LSD? Really good LSD. Or magic mushrooms?"

"No."

"See, you do some of that stuff and it's like you never look at the real world the same way again. You can never really trust it. I mean it's all consensual reality anyhow, right?"

"I don't know what the hell that is."

"It's a phrase my dealer uses. Jerome Bunny is his name. He's a real philosopher. It isn't just drugs with him, it's a way of looking at the world. And he used to say we all just agree on what's real, for convenience sake."

"I still don't get it," Tammy said wearily.

"Well he used to explain it better."

"Anyway, I thought you didn't do drugs. You said in People you were horrified to see what drugs had done to friends of yours."

"Did I name anyone?"

"Robert Downey Jr. was one. 'A great actor,' you said, 'killing himself for the highs,' you said."

"Well I don't fry my brains every night like Robert did. I know my limits. A little pot. A few tabs of acid -- " He stopped, looking a little irritated. "Anyway, I don't have to justify myself to you."

"I didn't say you did."

"Quoting me -- "

"Well that's what you said."

"Well it's bullshit. It's his life. He can do what the hell he likes with it. Where did all this start anyhow?"

"You saying -- "

"Oh yeah, we're having this dream together, because that way doesn't exist. Can't exist. It's all something invented. I mean, how can any of that be real?"

"I don't know," said Tammy flatly. "But whatever you say about dreams or consenting reality or whatever it was: that place is real, Todd. It's up there in the hills right now. And she's there too. And she's planning her next move."

"You sound very sure." He was studying his reflection in the mirror of the dresser as he talked to her.

"I am sure. She's not going to let go of you. She'll find a way to get you back."

"Look at me," he said.

"I think you look fine."

"I'm a mess. Burrows fucked it all up." His hands went up to his face. "It's gotta be a dream ... " he said, returning to his old theme. "I can't look like this in the real world."

"I do," Tammy said, considering her own unhappy reflection. "I look like this." She pinched herself. "I'm real," she said. "Yeah?" he said softly.

"I know who I am. I know how I got here, where I came from, where my husband works."

"Your husband?"

"Yes, my husband. Why? Are you surprised a woman with my dress size has got a husband? Well, I have. His name's Arnie, and he works at Sacramento Airport. And you don't know anything about him, do you?"

"No."

"So you can't have dreamed him, can you?"

"No."

"See? That's my life. My problem."

"Why's it a problem?"

"Because he drinks too much and he doesn't love me and he's having an affair with this woman who works at the FedEx office."

"No shit. Is he the violent type?"

"He would be if I let him."

"But you don't."

"I fractured one of his ribs the last time he tried something stupid like that. He was drunk. But that's no excuse."

"So why do you stay with him?"

"You really want to know?"

"Yeah."

"Sound like you mean it."

"I mean it."

"If I tell you, you've got to promise me one thing."

"What's that?"

"Promise first."

"Shit. I promise. Scout's honor. Why'd you stay with him?"

"Because being alone is the worst. Especially for a woman. I walked out on him two and a half years ago, when I found out about one of his women, but after a month I had to go back to him. Being on my own made me crazy. I made him tell me he was sorry for humiliating me and that he'd never do it again, but I knew that wasn't true. Men can't help being pigs. It's the way God made them."

"And I suppose women are -- "

"Bitches, most of us. Me included. But sometimes you need to be a bitch so you can get through the day."

"And Katya?"

"I wondered how long it would take you to get round to her," Tammy said. "Well I'll tell you how much of a bitch she was. You know the man she threw into the room?" Todd nodded. "His name was Zeffer. He was the man who made her into a movie-star. That's the kind of woman she was.

"There was another side to her, believe me."

"Don't tell me: she loves dogs."

"Wait ... " he said wearily, waving away her cynicism. "I'm trying to explain something here."

"I don't want to hear about her kinder, gentler side."

"Why not?"

"Because she's a bad woman, Todd. They named Coldheart Canyon after her, for God's sake. Did you know that? Anyway, we're neither of us going back up there. Agreed?"

Todd didn't reply. He simply stared at the faded photograph of the Hollywood sign that hung above the bed. "Didn't somebody throw themselves off that?" he said finally.

"Yeah. Her name was Peg Entwistle. She was a failed actress. Did you hear what I said?" Tammy said.

"About what?"

"Neither of us is going back up to see Katya again, agreed? You're not going to try and sneak back up there the moment my back's turned?"

"Why? Would it matter so much if I did?" he said. His belief that all this was a dream seemed to have lost credibility in the last few minutes, "You're never going to see me again after this anyway."

It was true of course: this was the first and last time she'd sit in a motel room and have a conversation with Todd Pickett. But it still stung her to hear it said. Hurt, she stumbled after a response. "It only matters because I want the best for you."

"Then move over," he said, coming to the bed, "and let me lie down and sleep. Because that's what I want right now." She got up off the bed. "You not going to sleep?" he said. "There isn't room for both of us."

"Sure there is. Lie down and get some rest. We'll talk about this when we've got some sleep."

He slipped off his shoes and lay down, placing one of the paper-thin pillows beside the other so they'd both have somewhere to lay their heads. "Go on," he said. "Lie down. I won't bite."

"You do know how weird all this is for me, don't you?"

"Which part: the girl, the house, the Devil's wife -- "

"No. You and me, together in one bed."

"Don't worry, I'm not going to be making sexual advances -- "

"I know that -- "

" -- I'm just suggesting we get some sleep."

"Yeah. Well. Okay. But it's still weird. You know, you used to be somebody I idolized."

"With a heavy emphasis on the used to be," Todd said, opening one eye and looking at her.

"Don't be so sensitive."

"No. I get the message. It was the same when I met Paul Newman, in the flesh," He closed his eye again. "I always used to think he was the coolest of all the cool guys. He had those ice-blue eyes, and that easy way of ... " his words were getting slower, dreamier " ... walking into a room ... and I used to think ... when I'm famous ... " The words trailed away.

"Todd?"

He opened his eyes a fraction and looked at her between the lashes. "What was I saying?"

"Never mind," she said to him, sitting on the bed. "Go to sleep."

"No, tell me. What was I saying?"

"How much you wanted to be like Paul Newman."

"Oh yeah. I just used to practice my Newman act for hours on end. The way everything he did was so relaxed. Sometimes he looked so relaxed you couldn't believe he was acting at all. It looked so ... easy ... "

While he talked Tammy took off her own shoes (her feet were filthy, and ached, but she didn't have the strength to get into a shower), and then lay down beside Todd. He didn't even seem to realize she was there beside him. His monologue continued, though it became less coherent, as sleep steadily made his tongue more sluggish.

"When I met him ... finally met him ... he was ... so ... small ... "

His conclusion reached, he began to snore gently.

Tammy sat up on her elbows and looked at him, lying there, wondering how she would have felt if she'd been told a few days ago that she'd be sharing a bed with Todd Pickett. It would have made her heart jump a beat to even contemplate the possibility. And yet here she was, lying down beside him, and she felt nothing; nothing except a vague irritation that she was not going to get a fair share of the bed with him sprawled out over it. Oh well, she had no choice. She could either sleep on the bed with Mr. Heart-throb, or take the floor.

She closed her eyes.

She was exhausted: sleep came in a matter of moments. There were no dreams.

THREE

While the two mismatched adventurers slept in the subterranean murk of Room 131 in the Wilshire Plaza Hotel, a sleep too deep to be called comfortable; too close to death, in fact -- the city of Los Angeles got up and went about its daily business. There was profit to be made. There were movies being shot all over the city. Joyless little pornos being made in ratty motels, witless spectacles with budgets that could have supported small nations made on the soundstages of Culver City and Burbank; penniless independent films about the lives of hustlers, whores and penniless film-makers shot wherever a room could be found and the actors assembled. Some would go onto glory; even the pornos had their nights of prize-giving now, when the lucky lady voted Best Cock-Sucker was called to the podium to humbly thank her agent, her mother and Jesus Christ.

But the fictions, whether sex or science-fiction, were not the only dramas that would be played out today. This was a city that made its profit by selling dreams, not least of itself, and so every day young hopefuls arrived by bus and by plane to try their luck. And every day a few of those dreamers, having been here a few months (sometimes a few years) realized that their place in the food chain of fame was lower than a piece of week-old sushi. It was not going to happen for them: they weren't going to be the next Meryl Streep, the next Todd Pickett, the next Jim Carrey. They'd have to wait another lifetime for their slice of fame; or the lifetime after that, or the lifetime after that. And for some, it wasn't news they could bear to take home with them. Better to buy a gun (as Ryan Tyler, real name Norman Miles, did that morning) and go back to your one room apartment and blow out your brains. He'd had two lines in one of the Lethal Weapon movies, which he'd told everyone in Stockholm, Ohio, was the beginning of a great career. But the lines had been cut, and for some reason he'd never caught a director's eye ever again. Not once in six years, since he'd had those two lines, had he been called back for an audition. The bullet was kinder than the silent phone. His death didn't make the news.

The suicide of one Rod McCloud did, but only because he'd thrown himself off a bridge onto the 405 and brought the morning traffic in both directions to a halt for an hour. McCloud had actually won an Oscar; he'd been the co-recipient (with four other producers) of the coveted little icon fourteen years earlier. There hadn't been time for him to reach the microphone and thank his agent and Jesus Christ; the orchestra had started playing the exit music before the man in front of him had finished giving his thanks; then it was too late.

At noon, another suicide was discovered; that of a man who, unlike McCloud -- who had been sixty-one -- was still at the beginning of his life. Two years ago Justin Thaw had been named by Vanity Fair the Most Powerful Agent In LA Under Twenty-Five (he was twenty-two at the time), and had been groomed by the greatest of the city's agent-deities as the inheritor of his chair, made a noose and hanged himself in his brother's garage, leaving a suicide letter that was arranged as a series of bullet-points (in the style his ex-boss had taught him), for maximum clarity. He could no longer fight his addiction, he said; he was too tired of feeling as though he was a failure, just because he was hooked on heroin. He was sorry for all the heartless things he'd said and done to those he loved; it had been the drug doing, the drug saying: but it was he who was sorry, and he who was glad to be leaving today, because life wasn't worth the effort anymore. He was wearing the ten thousand dollar suit he'd had made for himself in Milan, the shoes he'd purchased in Rome, and (so as not to make as much of a mess of his death as he had of his life) a pair of adult diapers.

The news of Justin's death would spread quickly, and a few executives' doors would be closed for a while, giving the man behind them a moment to remember the occasions they'd got high with Justin, and wonder whether it wasn't time they asked for help from Narcotics Anonymous. Then the phones from their powerful contemporaries started to ring again, and the pressure of the day meant that meditation had to be put off for a while; they took a snort or two of coke put Justin out of their minds, and got on with the deal-making. They could think about him again at the funeral.

Speaking of which: the ashes of one Jennifer Scarscella were on a Chicago-bound plane that afternoon, headed for interment in the city of her birth. Jennifer had died nine months ago, but her body had only recently been found and identified in the LA Morgue. She had left home seven years before, without telling her parents where she was headed, though it wouldn't have been hard for the Scarscellas to figure out that their daughter had left to try her luck in Tinseltown: all she'd ever wanted to do was be a movie star. She had been murdered by her boyfriend, because she'd refused, he said, to take a role in an X-rated movie. He was now in jail, and Jennifer was going home, having kept her ambitions high, and died for doing so.

And so the day went on, the shadows of the city lengthening as the sun began to drop from its high-point at noon.

At a little after four, there was a crisis at Warner's, when a set under construction caught fire, gutting an entire sound stage, and badly damaging two adjacent sound stages. Nobody was killed, but there were still grim faces in the boardroom that afternoon. Insurance would cover the reconstruction of the stages, but the set had been built for the Warner's Christmas offering Dark Justice. With an elaborate post-production schedule for the picture that required the main shoot to be over in a month's time, things looked bad. There had been a great deal of 'creative debate' about the script, which had no less than fourteen writers presently attached to it. Arbitration by the Writer's Guild would thin those numbers, but nothing would make the calculation look any better if the picture missed its Christmas release date, which it now looked likely to do. Two executives received calls from their superiors in New York, pointing out that if they hadn't warred so much about the script the picture would have been shot by now and the agonizingly slow post-production underway. Instead they had a smoking shell of a building where the big scenes were to have been shot, starting in two days. There was a fiscal disaster in the offing, and certain people should be ready to hand in their resignations before they were embarrassed into leaving by the imminent and unflattering analysis as to why ninety pages of dialogue about a man who dressed up as a jaguar to fight the villains of some fictional metropolis could not have been agreed on earlier, when there was four and a half million dollars' worth of writing talent on the job. The observation that 'we're not making fucking Citizen Kane here' dropped from several mouths that day; more often than not from men who had never seen Kane, nor would have cared for it even if they had.

By five, with the freeways bumper to bumper as people got out of town for the weekend, there were a plethora of accidents, but nothing of consequence. Scripts were delivered for the weekend read; writers crossed their fingers and hoped that somebody would read what they'd slaved over without kids fighting at their feet or their dick in somebody's mouth or a smudge of coke on their nose; plans were made for weekend adulteries; those letters of resignation were penned by smiling assistants.

And through it all Todd and the woman who had once idolized him slept side by side in the stale darkening air of Room 131.

FOUR

Tammy woke first, rising up out of a dream of the very room in which she was sleeping, except that all the furniture had for some unfathomable reason been piled against one end of the room, including the frame of the bed in which she was sleeping, leaving her on a mattress on the floor. When she woke, of course, nothing had changed. It was still an ordinary room with one extraordinary element, surreal in its lack of likelihood: the sleeping figure of Todd Pickett. There he was, sprawled across three-quarters of the bed, his head deep in the pillow, his face -- his poor, wounded, face -- free, it seemed, of troubled dreams.

What she would have given, once upon a time, for a moment like this: a chance to lean over and kiss him awake. But she'd lost faith in such fairy-stories. She'd seen too much of their dark side, and she never wanted to go there again, even for the kissing of princes. Better to let them wake of their own accord, dragon-breath and all.

She glanced at the cheap digital clock on the bedside table. It was five-twenty-one in the afternoon. Surely that couldn't be right? That they slept for almost eleven hours? And Todd still sleeping?

Well, the latter she could believe. She knew from her years with Arnie how some men loved to sleep. In Arnie's case he'd loved it more than anything else. More than eating, more than drinking, certainly more than sex.

She left Todd to it, went into the tiny bathroom and switched on the light. God, she looked terrible! How had he ever consented to get into the same bed as her? She started her clean-up by vigorously scrubbing her teeth, then ran the shower very hot, the way she liked it even when she felt clean, and got in. Oh, it felt good! The soap smelled flowery, and the cheap shampoo didn't work up a satisfying lather, but she was happy nevertheless, getting herself clean for the first time in days: washing off the freaks, the ghosts, the dirt, the darkness. By the time she drew back the plastic curtain the steam was so dense she could barely see across the bathroom to the door. But it was being opened, that much she could see, and there was Todd, standing looking at her. She grabbed the towel off the sink where she'd left it, and used it as best she could to cover her considerable nakedness.

"Good morning," he said.

"Good afternoon," she replied.

"It isn't."

"Almost five-thirty," she said. "There's a clock beside the bed. Why don't you go look? And close the door after you."

"I gotta take a leak first. I'm sorry. But I gotta."

"Let me get out first."

"Just don't look," he said, unzipping himself.

She drew the shower curtain back, and continued to dry herself, while for the second time in the last twelve hours she heard the solid splash of him emptying his bladder. He took an age. By the time he was finished she was almost done drying herself.

"Okay, I'm done," he said, with evident relief. "Does this place have room service?"

"Yes."

"You want something to eat?"

This was no time to be ladylike, she told herself. "I'm starving," she said.

"What do you want?"

"Just food. Nothing fancy."

"I shouldn't think there's much danger of that."

She waited until she'd heard the door click closed, then she pulled the shower curtain back and finished off drying her nooks and crannies. She could hear his voice as he ordered food on the phone. It sounded like the soundtrack of a Todd Pickett movie playing on the television next door. Stepping out of the bath she cleared a hole in the steamed-up mirror with the ball of her hand and regarded her reflection balefully. She was cleaner, but that was about the only improvement. She opened the door a crack.

"I need some clean clothes."

Todd was sitting on the bed. He'd finished making his order and had turned on one of the late afternoon chat shows.

"You can come in here and get dressed," he said, not turning from the screen. "I won't look."

She discarded her sodden towel and ventured in, sorting through the meager contents of her suitcase for something presentable.

"I ordered club sandwiches," Todd said. "That was pretty much all they had. And coffee."

"Fine."

As she pulled on her underwear she glanced up at the television. A woman in a red polyester blouse three sizes too small for her was complaining vociferously to the host of the show that her daughter, who looked about eleven, went out every night 'dressed like a cheap little slut.'

"I love this shit," Todd said.

"People's lives," Tammy replied.

"I guess they're happy. They get their fifteen minutes,"

"Did you like yours?"

"I got more than fifteen," he said.

"I didn't mean to offend you. I was just asking."

"Sure, I enjoyed it. Who wouldn't? The first few times you're in a restaurant and a waiter recognizes you, or somebody sends over a drink, you get a buzz out of that. In fact, you feel like you're the only person who matters ... " His voice trailed away. The daughter on the screen, who had the seeds of whoredom in her pre-pubescent features, was telling the audience that if she wanted to dress like a slut that was her business, and anyway who did she learn it from? She stabbed her finger in the direction of her mother, who did her best to look virtuous, but given what she'd chosen to do with her hair, makeup and outfit didn't have a chance. Todd laughed, then went back to what he was telling Tammy.

"The whole 'look at me, I'm a star' thing gets old pretty quickly. And after a while you start to wish people didn't know who you were."

"Really?"

"Actually, it's more that you want to be able to turn it on or off. Oh shit, look at this -- "

The sluttish daughter was now up off her chair, and attempting to attack her mother. Luckily, there was a security man ready to step in and stop her. Unluckily, he wasn't quite fast enough to do so. The girl threw herself upon her mother with such violence the woman's chair topped over, and the security man, who had by now taken hold of the girl to keep her from doing harm, fell forward too, so that chair, mother, daughter and security man ended up on the studio floor together. Todd continued to talk through it.

"There are days when you really want to feel good about yourself; you want to be recognized, you want people to say: I loved your movie so much I saw it six times. And then there are other days when it's a curse to have people know who the hell you are, because there's no privacy, no way to just go out and be yourself. Everything becomes a performance." He pointed at the brawlers on television. "Look at these stupid bitches. What are they going to say when their friends see this?" He pondered his own question for a moment, then he said: "Actually, I know exactly what they're going to say. They're going to say: did you see me on the TV? That's all that matters. Not: did you see me being smart or looking beautiful: just did you see me?"

He watched the women's antics for a while longer, shaking his head. Then he glanced over at Tammy and said:

"I've been thinking maybe I'm done with the movies. Or movies are done with me. It's time to buy a ranch in Montana and raise horses."

"Really?" Tammy had finally got dressed, and came to sit down on the unmade bed beside Todd. "You're going to retire?"

He laughed.

"What's so funny?"

"Oh, just hearing the word. Retire. At thirty-four."

"I thought you were thirty-two. Your bio -- "

"I lied."

"Oh."

"But I'm still young. Right? I mean, thirty-four is still young."

"A mere kitten."

"I just can't face the idea of that circus for one more day ... " He turned off the television. The room was suddenly very silent.

After a few moments Tammy said: "Are we going to talk about it or not?"

Todd stared at the blank television. She couldn't see his expression but she was certain it was just as vacant as the screen.

"The Canyon, Todd," she said again. "Are we going to talk about what happened in the Canyon or not?"

"Yes," he replied finally. "I suppose so."

"Last night you said it wasn't real."

"I was tired."

"So?"

"It's real. I knew last night I was talking bullshit ... "

He kept his back to her through this, as though he didn't want to let her see his incomprehension; as though it were something to be ashamed of.

"You saw more than I did," she said to Todd. "So you've probably got a clearer idea of what's going on. And you talked to -- "

"Katya."

"Yes. And. What did she tell you?"

"She told me the room downstairs had been given to her."

"By Zeffer. Yes, I know that part."

"Then what are you asking me for?" he said. "You probably know as much as I do."

"What about Maxine?"

"What about her?"

"She must have checked out the house for you -- "

"Yeah. She took photographs -- "

"Maybe she has some answers."

"Maxine?" He got up off the bed and went to the table to pick up his cigarettes. He took one out of the packet and lit it, inhaling deeply. "As soon as she'd moved me into that fucking house she told me she didn't want to manage me any longer," he said.

There was a knock at the door. "Room service."

Tammy opened the door and an elderly man, who frankly looked as though this might be the last club sandwiches and coffee he delivered, tottered in, and set the laden tray on the table.

"I asked for extra mayonnaise," Todd said.

"Here, sir." The old man proffered a small milk jug, into which several spoonfuls of mayonnaise had been deposited.

"Thank you, it's all fine," Tammy said.

Todd went into his jeans pocket and pulled out a bundle of notes. He selected a twenty -- much to the antiquated waiter's delight -- and gave it to the man.

"Thank you very much sir," he said, exiting rather faster than he'd entered, in case the man in the filthy jeans changed his mind.

They set to eating.

"You know what?" Todd said.

"What?"

"I think I should go and see Maxine. Ask her what she knows, face to face. Maybe this was all some kind of set up -- "

"If you get her on the phone -- ?"

"She'll lie."

"You've had that experience?"

"Several times."

"Where does she live?"

"Well she's got three houses. A house in Aspen, a place in the Hamptons and a house in Malibu."

"Oh how she must suffer," Tammy said, teasing a piece of crispy bacon out of her sandwich and nibbling on it. "Only three houses? How does she manage?"

"So eat up. We'll just drop in on her."

"Both of us?"

"Both of us. That way she can't tell me I'm crazy. What I saw, you saw."

"Actually, I saw some shit you didn't see."

"Well, we'll be sure to get some answers from her."

"Are you certain you want me to come?"

"There's safety in numbers," Todd said. "Drink your coffee and let's get going."

FIVE

Katya hadn't wasted any time weeping over Todd's departure. What was the use? She'd shed more than her share of tears over men and their betrayals across the years. What good had any of her weeping ever done her?

Besides, it wasn't as if she'd truly lost the man; he'd simply drifted away from her for a few hours, that was all. She'd get him back, humbled and begging to be returned into her company. After all, hadn't she let him kiss her? Hadn't she let him fuck her, there in the Devil's Country? He could never forget those memories.

Oh, he could try. He could put a hundred women, a thousand, between the two of them, but it wouldn't work. Sooner or later he'd come crawling back to her for more of what only she could give him, and nothing that fat bitch of a woman who'd coaxed him away could say would keep him from coming back. A man like Todd had nothing in common with a creature like that. He understood the world in ways she could not even guess at. What hope did she have of seeing with his eyes, even for a moment? None. She was a workhorse. Todd had lived with beauty too long to put up with the presence of something so charmless for very long. After a few hours of her clumsy company, he'd be off.

She had only one fear: that owing to the artful way her Canyon had been hidden, he wouldn't be able to find his way back to her.

The city had never been a simple place even during the years she'd lived in it; it was easy to get lost or distracted. How much more complicated would it be now, especially for someone like her poor Todd, whose soul was so muddled and confused. She knew how that felt, to have everyone falling over themselves to adore you one moment, and the next to find that those same people had given their devotions over to somebody else. It turned everything upside down when that happened; nothing made sense anymore. You started looking around for something to hold on to; something firm and solid, that wouldn't be taken away. In such a mood of desperation, it was possible you could make a mistake: choose the wrong person to believe in, the wrong path to follow. Even now, he could be moving away from her.

The more she contemplated that prospect the more it became apparent that she was going to have to go and find him.

The idea of venturing out of her Canyon filled her with a mingling of fear and anticipation.

The world! The great, wide world!

It was three quarters of a century since she'd stepped beyond the bounds of the Canyon; and though she'd had plenty of clues as to the way things had changed, from those who'd come here after their decease, it would still be an intimidating experience for her to venture out there, even on a mission of love.

But what other choice did she have? Without him, her hopes were in ruins. She had to go and find him, it was as simple as that. And on the way back, once they were together again maybe she'd have the strength of heart to visit some of the places she'd known and loved in her youth; just to see how time had altered them. But then again perhaps that wouldn't be such a good idea. It troubled her enough to look out of the window and see the stretches of land that had been dust roads and shacks and orange groves in her time now completely transformed into towers of steel and glass. What if she were to discover that some precious place she'd loved had been desecrated; rendered unrecognizable? Though she liked to think she was fearless, in truth time was taking its toll on the resilience of her soul.

But then, of course, this whole quest was a test of her strength, wasn't it?

Venturing beyond the perimeters of her Canyon, beyond the reach of the magic that had preserved her perfection, was gambling with her life. She had no way of knowing for certain but she guessed that the further she ventured, and the longer she remained away from the Canyon, from the house and all it contained, the more vulnerable she'd be to the long-postponed indignities of old age. After all, a beneath this veneer of youth she was a Methuselah. How long could she afford to be out in the raptureless world before the shell cracked and the crone inside, the hag that the Devil's Country had obscured with its magic, was unveiled?

It was terrifying. But in the end, it came down to this: finding Todd was worth the risk. If she survived the journey they would come back to the Canyon and initiate a new Golden Age. It wouldn't be like the previous Age of Gold, with its foolish excesses. This would be a more profoundly felt time, when instead of using the Devil's Country like a cross between a two-bit ghost-train ride and a fountain of youth, it would be respected as the mystery it was.

Despite the perverse pride she'd taken in showing Todd the orgiasts in the Canyon, and in letting him share their excesses, Katya's appetite for the witless hedonism of the twenties had long since passed away. And though Todd had happily played the sensualist, she was sure that he too had seen enough of the tawdriness of such spectacles. It was time they behaved as owners of something genuinely marvelous; and treated it respectfully. Together, they would begin an exploration of the world Lilith had made. Katya had never possessed the courage to explore as it deserved to be explored, road by road, grove by sacred grove. Certainly she'd seen plenty there over the years that had inflamed her sexual self (women tethered to the underbellies of human-horses, in a constant state of ecstatic agony); and she would not scorn such spectacles if they came on them again. But these were other sights, designed to arouse the spirit not the loins; and it was to those places she wanted to take Todd.

There were enough diversions and wonders to keep them enchanted for decades to come. Though the heavens were fixed in the same configuration whenever she visited the Country, there was nevertheless evidence that the earth was still obeying some of its ancient rhythms.

There was, for instance, in the swamp, a manmade lake perhaps half a mile wide, which seemed to have been for many generations the place where a certain species of eel, the infants silver-blue, with great golden eyes, came in their millions -- each no longer than her little finger -- but sufficient in number that they filled the place of their birth to brimming when they spawned. For a day -- when the larval eels appeared -- this Genesis Bowl, as Katya had named it, was a feasting place for birds of every kind, who were literally able to walk on the squirming backs of their feast, taking all they could before lifting off (some so fat with food they could barely fly) and retiring to the nearest branch to digest their mighty meal. The next day (if the Country could be said to have days) the Genesis Bowl was empty, but for a few thousand runts that had perished in the exodus, and were being picked up by carrion cows and wild dogs.

She wanted to show this glorious spectacle to Todd; wanted to wade into the living mass of baby eels and feel them against her naked flesh.

On another day they might to a place she knew where there was a beast that spoke prophetic riddles; which had twice engaged her in conversation which she knew would make sense if she had the education to decode its strange poetry. It had the body of a huge bird, this tiddler, with a man's head, and it sat, close to the ground, with a vast array of glittering gifts around the base of its tree, offered for its prophecies. She'd come to it a year ago, with some jewelry she had worn in Nefertiti.

"Is it real, the gift you give me?" the creature, whose name was Yiacaxis, had asked her.

"No," she had admitted. "I am an actress. These baubles are what I wore when I was an actress."

"Then make them real for me," Yiacaxis had said, clicking his old grey tongue against his cracked beak. "Play me the scene in which you wore them."

"It was silent," she said.

"That's good," he replied. "For I am very deaf in my old age."

She shed most of her clothes, and put on the jewelry. Then she played the scene from Nefertiti in which she discovers that her lover is dead by the order of the envious Queen, and she kills herself out of tragic longing for him.

The old bird-man wept freely at her performance.

"I'm pleased it moved you so much," Katya had said when she was done.

"I accept your offering," the creature had replied, "and I will give you your answer."

"But you don't even know my question yet."

Yiacaxis clicked and cocked his head. "I know you wonder if there will ever be a love worth dying for in your life? Is that your question?"

"Yes," she said. She would perhaps not have asked it that way, but the prophet was notoriously short-tempered with those who attempted to press him.

"There are two multitudes," he said. "One within you. One without. Should he love you enough to name one of these legions, then you will live in bliss with the other."

Of course she desperately wanted to ask him what this meant; but the audience was apparently already over, for Yiacaxis was raising his black wings, which were lined with little knots of human hair, tied up in ribbons that had long-ago lost their colour. Thousands of locks of hair, in wings that spread perhaps twenty feet from tip to tip. Without further word, he closed them over his melancholy face, and the shadows of the tree seemed to close around him a second time, so that he was invisible.

Perhaps, if she had the courage, she would go back to Yiacaxis, with Todd, and ask him another question. Or this time Todd should do the asking.

And when they had questioned the Prophet Bird, and seen half a hundred other wonders in the Devil's Country, Katya would take Todd to a certain ship with which she was familiar, which had surely been made for a king, it was so finely wrought.

It had foundered on some rocks along the shore, and there it had been left, high and dry, many years ago. For some reason no looter had ever attempted to despoil this sublime vessel, perhaps because they feared some royal revenge. The only damage done to the vessel was the breaking of its hull by the rocks; and the inevitable deterioration of its exterior paintwork by wind and rain. Inside, it remained a place of incomparable luxury, its beautiful carved bed heaped with white furs, the wine still sweet in its flagons, the tinder in its fireplace still awaiting a flame. She had often fantasized about taking a lover to the ship, making love to him on the furs. If they were lucky, the wind would get up when they were cradled in the comfort of one another's arms. The wind would whistle in the ropes and the scarlet sails would billow, and they would imagine, as they made love, that they were on a voyage to the edge of the world.

It would be naive to speak lovingly of the Devil's Country without allowing that it had its share of horrors.

There were species in the forests, and the ravines and the black silent pools between the rocks, that had been invented by some benighted mind. There were terrible arenas, where monsters were goaded to perform acts of horrible violation upon women, and sometimes upon men and even children. But having viewed several of these spectacles herself, she could not deny that they were perversely arousing. Some had the rigor of ceremonies, others seemed to be simple arenas of cruelty, where anything might be viewed if it was paid for.

The point was that she'd seen so little, and that there was so much for her to see; a private wonderland where she and Todd could go adventuring whenever they tired of the Canyon. They could explore it to its very limits; and when they were weary and needed to sleep, they could simply step through the door and lock it, and retire to bed like any loving pair, and sleep peacefully in one another's arms.

But first she had to find him; and to find him she needed a chauffeur. Only one man fitted that bill: Jerry Brahms. They had known one another for so many years. That was why she'd sent out the dream-summons to him. He was loyal; he would come without fail. It was only a matter of time before he turned up at the house, ready to do her bidding. He was probably on his way up, even now.

It didn't take her long to dress. She had wardrobes full of gowns designed by some of the greatest names in Hollywood history, but they were all too showy for this modest adventure. So she chose conservatively: an immaculately-tailored black dress. She kept her hair simple and her makeup discreet.

She was all dressed and ready to go, but there was still no sign of Jerry. Thinking that perhaps he'd mistakenly assume she would wait for him in the big house, she decided to wander down through the twilight to look for him. If he hadn't arrived then she'd wait for him at the front gate, so that there'd be no chance of their missing one another.

It was a walk she'd taken countless times, of course; though the pathway rose and dipped, she could have done it in safety blind-folded.

The night wasn't as clear as it had been when she and Todd had come out walking; there were rainclouds banked in from the north, and the air was sultry. It was going to be one of those nights when you longed for a heaven-and-earth-shaking thunderstorm, the kind she remembered from her childhood. But such events were rare in Los Angeles. All the great storms she'd seen here had been cooked up by lighting men and rain-machines; pure artifice.

She knew she was being watched as she walked. There wasn't a movement she made in the open air that the ghosts or their half-breed children did not observe. They had even made spy-holes in the walls of her little house, she knew. They watched her at her toilette; they watched her as she read and day-dreamed; they watched her as she slept.

She'd several times attempted to stop them and punish their voyeurism; but every time Zeffer plugged up the holes more appeared, and finally she'd given up the game as fruitless. If they wanted to watch her while she slept, then let them go ahead. Indeed until Todd had come into her life the idea of having somebody to watch over her -- even if their motives were as hard to calculate as those of her voyeurs -- was close to comforting.

Needless to say there was also a measure of danger in the proximity of these revenants. Katya didn't doubt that there was amongst their number some who would gladly have seen her dead, blaming her for the fact that their afterlife in was a pitiful thing. Of course she didn't blame herself. If her guests hadn't been so hungry to taste the pleasures of the Devil's Country then they wouldn't be so obsessively drawn to it. But as long as they kept a respectful distance (why would they not, when she controlled the very thing they wanted for themselves?) then she would not persecute them.

They had their journey, she had hers.

She had reached the unkempt lawn, and paused there to take in the spectacle of the house. The wind-chimes rang on four or five balconies, lending their beauty to the grand facade. As she listened to their music she heard sounds from the thicket on the other side of the lawn.

She glanced back. There was still sufficient light in the evening sky to see the motion in the blossom-laden branches. There were several creatures following her, she guessed.

She watched the bushes for half a minute, until the motion died down. It wasn't unusual for creatures to follow her when she went out walking, but there was something different about this. Or was it that she was different? That tonight she was alive as she'd not been alive in many years, her heart quickened by love; and that they sensed a new vulnerability in her?

She didn't like that. The last thing she wanted was for them to imagine they could intimidate her, or somehow wrest a little power from her. Love might have made her step a little lighter, but she was still the Queen of Coldheart Canyon, and if they pushed her she would respond with her old severity.

As she watched the thicket, the last of the light went from the sky, and the darkness revealed several bright points of light in the bushes, where the revenants were standing, watching her. Even after all these years she could still be discomfited by a sight like this; by the fact that the dead were around her in such numbers.

Enough, she thought to herself, and turning on her heel hurried towards the stairs that led back up to the house.

As she did so she heard the swish of grass against swiftly running limbs. They were coming across the lawn in pursuit of her.

She picked up her pace, until she reached the relative safety of the stairs.

Behind her, a soft voice, sounding as though it came from a palate full of pulp and disease, said: "Let us in."

There was a moment's silence. Then another said. "We just want to come back into the house."

"We won't do any harm." said a third.

"Please, let us in ... "

She'd been wrong about the numbers of revenants assembled here, she slowly realized. She thought there'd been perhaps ten, but there were two or three times that number out there in the darkness. Whatever the decayed and corrupted condition of their palates, they all attempted to say the same thing:

"Let us in. Let us in. Let us in."

She would have ignored them, once upon a time: turned her back on their pleas and climbed the stairs. But she was changing. Katya the heart-breaker -- the woman who'd never given a damn for what anybody wanted but herself -- was rapidly becoming a thing of the past. If she was going to come back with Todd and live here, they couldn't live the idyllic life she had in mind while these hungry souls waited outside. Even with the five iron icons hammered into the threshold of each of the doors, and in the sills of even the smallest windows, their presence preventing the dead from ever setting foot in the house, the occupants were in a state of siege. It was no place to have a honeymoon.

She raised her hand to silence their murmuring.

"Listen to me," she said.

The chorus began to subside.

"I'm going to be leaving the house for a few hours," Katya said, her voice a little tentative at the beginning, but gaining strength as she proceeded. "But when I come back I intend to make some changes. I don't want you living in misery. That has to stop."

She started to turn away, intending to leave the statement there. But some of her congregation didn't want to let her go without hearing something more specific in her reply.

"What changes are you going to make?" someone demanded.

"Is that you, Roman?" Katya said, scanning the crowd.

The speaker didn't have time to identify himself. There were more questions. Somebody wanted to know why she was leaving; somebody else demanded to know how long they would have to wait.

"Listen to me, listen to me," she said, quieting the rising hubbub. "I understand that you all want to come into the house. But I don't think you understand the consequences."

"We'll take them, whatever they are," somebody said. There was a general murmur of agreement to this.

"If that's what you want," Katya replied, "I will consider it. When I get back -- "

"What if you don't come back?"

"Trust me. I will."

"Trust you? Oh please." The mocking voice emerged from a bitter, painted face amongst the crowd. "You tricked us all. Why the hell should we trust you now?"

"Theda," Katya said. "I don't have the time to explain right now."

"Well you hold on, honey, because we want some answers. We've had years of waiting to go back into that room -- "

"Then you can afford to wait a few hours more," Katya replied, and without waiting for Theda Bara to come back with a retort she turned and headed on up the steps to the top of the flight.

There was a moment -- just a quarter of a beat, there at the top of the stairs -- when she thought she'd misjudged her audience, and they'd come up the stairs after her, their patience finally exhausted. But they'd stayed below. Even Theda. Perhaps somebody had caught hold of her arm, to keep her from doing something stupid.

Katya opened the back door, stepping over the threshold. Occasionally, in the last several decades, one of the assembly outside had taken it into their heads to test the power of the icons Zeffer had brought back from Romania, and had personally hammered deep into the wood. The five icons were called, Zeffer had told her, the Iron Word. It was powerful magic designed to drive off anything that did not belong beside cot or hearth. Katya had never actually witnessed what happened when one of the phantoms had tested the threshold. She'd only heard the screams, and seen the looks of terror on the faces of those who'd goaded the victim. Of the trespasser himself, nothing remained, except a rise in the humidity of the air around the threshold, as though the revenant had been exploded into vapor. Even these traces lingered for only a moment. As soon as the air cooled the witnesses retreated from the door, looks of terror still fixed on their faces.

She had no idea how the Iron Word worked. She only knew that Zeffer had paid a member of Sandru's scattered brotherhood a small fortune to possess the secret, and then another sum to have the icons created in sufficient numbers that every door and window be guarded. It had been worth the investment: the Iron Word did its job. Katya felt like her mother, who'd always boasted that she kept a 'clean house'. Of course Mother Lupescu's definition of moral cleanliness had been purely her own.

You could fuck her twelve-year-old daughter for a small coin, but you could not say Christ when you were shooting your load between her tiny titties without being thrown out of the house.

And in her turn that twelve-year-old had grown up with her own particular rules of domestic cleanliness. In short: the dead did not cross the threshold.

You had to draw the line somewhere, or all hell would break loose. On that Mama Lupescu and her daughter would have agreed.

She got herself a cup of milk from the refrigerator to calm her stomach, which always troubled her when, as now, she was unsettled for some reason or another. Then she went through the house, taking her time passing from one room to another, and as she came to the front door she heard the sound of a car coming up the street. She stepped outside, and walked along the front path until she reached the pool of light from the car's headlights.

"Is that you, Jerry?"

A car door opened.

"Yes, it's me," he said. "Was I expected?"

"You were."

"Well, thank God for that."

She went to the little gate, and stepped out onto the narrow sidewalk Jerry had got out of the car. He had a barely-suppressed look of shock on his face, seeing her step beyond the bounds of her little dominion for the first time.

"Are we actually going somewhere?" he asked her.

"I certainly hope so," she said, playing it off lightly. She could not completely conceal her unease, however. It was there in her eyes. But there was also something else in her glance, besides the unease: something far more remarkable. A kind of sweetness, even innocence. She looked like a girl out on her first Prom Night, tip-toeing to the edge of womanhood.

Amazing, Jerry thought. Knowing all that he knew about Katya -- all that she'd done and caused to have done -- to be able to find that look in her memory banks, and put it up there on her face, so that it looked as real as it did; that was a performance.

"Where will I be taking you tonight, ma'am?" Jerry asked her.

"I'm not exactly sure. You see we're going to be looking for somebody."

"Are we indeed? And may I take a guess at who?"

Katya smiled. "Too easy," she said.

"We'll find him for you. Don't you worry."

"You were the one who got him to come up here in the first place, Jerry. So you're the match-maker. And thank you. From both of us, thank you. It's been quite a remarkable time for me, Jerry. I never thought I'd ever fall in love again. And with an actor." She laughed. "You'd think I'd have learned by now."

"I hope it's a happy mistake."

"Oh it is, Jerry. It's perfect. He's perfect."

"Is he?"

"For me. Yes. Perfect for me."

"So will you be joining him somewhere?"

"Yes."

"But you're not exactly sure where?"

"That's right."

"Well, I'm going to hazard a guess and say he's at Maxine's, because I know she's having a big bash tonight. Do you want me to call her, and ask her if he's there? Maybe tell her I'm bringing a special guest?"

"No, I think it's best we just do this quietly, don't you?"

"However you prefer. Tonight's your night."

"I don't want any big hoopla," Katya said. "I just want to find him."

For a moment the illusion disappeared completely, and reality showed itself: the desperate hunger of a woman who needed to find the love of her life. Not tomorrow, or the day after, but tonight. She had no time to waste, this woman; no time for error or procrastination.

"Shall we go?" she said.

"Ready when you are."

She went to the car and started to fumble with the doorhandle.

"Please," Jerry said. "Allow me." He came round to the passenger side and opened the door.

"Thank you, Jerry. How nice. Old-fashioned manners," she said. She got in into the car in one elegant movement. Jerry closed the door and went to the driver's side. She was trembling, he saw; just the slightest tremor.

"It's going to be all right," he reassured her when he was settled in beside her.

"Is it?" she said, with a smile too tentative to survive more than a breath. "

"Yes. It's going to be fine."

"He's the one, Jerry. Todd is the one. If he were to turn me down -- "

"He's not going to do that, now is he?" Jerry said. "He'd be a fool to say no to you. And whatever else Todd is, he's no fool."

"So find him for me. Will you?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Then I can start to live again."

SIX

It had taken Todd a few minutes to get used to sitting behind the wheel of the old Lincoln sedan which Marco had chosen, many years before, as the vehicle in which he preferred to anonymously chauffeur Todd around. Sitting in the seat adjusted for Marco's huge frame made him realize -- for the first time in the chaotic sequence of dramas that had unraveled since Marco's sudden death -- how much he would miss the man.

Marco had been a stabilizing influence in a world that was showing signs of becoming more unstable by the hour. But more than that: he'd been Todd's friend. He'd had a good nose for bullshit, and he'd never been afraid of speaking his mind, especially when it came to protecting his boss.

There would come a time, Todd had promised himself, when he would sit down and think of something to do that would honour Caputo's name. He'd been no intellectual, so the founding of a library, or the funding of the Caputo Prize for Scholastic Achievement, wouldn't really be pertinent: it would need some serious thought to create a project that reflected and honored the complexity of the man.

"You're thinking about Marco Caputo." Tammy said as she watched Todd adjust to the spatial arrangements of the driver's seat.

"The way you said that, it didn't sound as though you liked him very much."

"He was rude to me on a couple of occasions," Tammy said, making light of it now. "It was no big deal."

"The fact is he was more of a brother to me than my own brother," he replied. "And I'm only now realizing how much I took him for granted. Christ. First I lose my dog, then my best buddy -- "

"Dempsey?"

"Yeah. He died of cancer in February."

"I'm sorry."

Todd turned on the ignition. His thoughts were still with Marco. "You know what I think?" he said.

"What?"

"I think that the night he got killed he wasn't just drunk. He was panicked and drunk."

"You mean he'd seen something?"

"Yes, that's exactly what I mean. He'd seen something up at the house and was running away." He drew a loud breath through his nose. "Okay. Enough of the detective work. We can do some more of that when all this is over. Right now, we're heading for Malibu."

On the way down to the ocean, Todd provided Tammy with a little portrait of where they were going. She knew about the Colony, of course -- the guarded community of superstars who lived in houses filled with Picassos and Miros and Monets, with the ever-unpredictable Pacific a few yards from their back door, and -- just a jump across the Pacific Coast Highway -- the Malibu Hills, which had been the scene of countless wildfires in the hot season, and mud-slides in the wet. What she didn't know was just how exclusive it was, even for those who were powerful enough to write their own rules in any other circumstances.

"I was planning to buy this house next door to Maxine's place, way back," Todd told her, "but my lawyer -- who was this wily old fart called Lester Mayfield said: 'You're going to want to rip out that concrete deck and take off the old shingle roof, aren't you?' And I said: 'You betcha.' And he said: 'Well, dream on buster, 'cause they won't let you. You'll spend the next ten years fighting with the Colony Committee to change the color of your toilet seat."

"So I didn't buy the place. They've lightened up on the rules a lot since then. I guess somebody must have pointed out that they were preserving some pieces of utter shit."

"Who ended up buying the house next door to Maxine?"

"Oh ... he was a producer, had a deal with Paramount. Made some very successful movies for them. Then the IRS taps him on the shoulder and asks why he hasn't paid his taxes for six years. He ended up going to jail, and the house stood empty."

"Nobody else bought it?"

"No. He wanted to be back making movies when he got out of the slammer. Which is what he did. Went straight back into the business. Made six more huge movies. And he still snorts coke from between the tits of loose women. Bob Graydon's his name."

"Isn't he the one who had an artificial septum put in his nose because he'd had the real thing eaten away by cocaine?"

"That's Bob. Where'd you hear that?"

"Oh, the National Enquirer probably. I buy them all in case there's something about you. Not that I believe everything I read -- " she added hurriedly.

"Just the juicy bits."

"Well after a time you get a feeling about what's true and what's not true."

"Care to give me an example?"

"No."

"Go on."

"That's not fair. I'm screwed whatever I say. No! Wait! Here's one! About two years ago they said you were going into a private hospital in Montreal to have your ding-a-ling enlarged."

"My ding-a-ling!"

"You know what I mean."

"Do you say ding-a-ling to Arnie? It is Arnie, isn't it?"

"Yes it's Arnie and no I don't say ding-a-ling."

"Tell me about him."

"There isn't much to tell."

"Why'd you marry him? Tell me that."

"Well it wasn't because of the size of his dick."

"Dick! That's what you call it: dick."

"I guess I do," Tammy said, amused, a little embarrassed to have let this slip. "Anyway, back to the story in The Enquirer. They said you were in Montreal getting your thingie -- your dick -- made bigger. Except I knew that wasn't true."

"How come?"

"It just didn't make any sense. Not after the articles I'd read about you."

"Go on," Todd said, fascinated.

"Well ... you know I read everything that's ever been written about you? Everything in English. And then if there's a really important interview in, say, Paris Match or Stern, I get it translated."

"Jesus. Really? What for?"

"So I can keep up with your opinions. And ... sometimes in the foreign magazines they write the kind of things you wouldn't read in an American magazine. One of them did a piece about your love-life. About all the ladies you'd dated, and the things they'd said about you -- "

"My acting?"

"No. Your ... other performances."

"You're kidding."

"No. I thought you knew about these things. I thought you probably signed off on them."

"If I read every article in every magazine -- "

"You'd never make another movie."

"Exactly. So, go back to the article. The ladies, talking about me. What does that have to do with the story in The Enquirer!"

"Oh just that here were all these women talking about you in bed -- and a few of them were not exactly happy with the way you treated them -- but none of them said, even vaguely intimated that ... "

"I had a small dick."

"Right."

"So I thought, there's no way he's gone to Montreal to have his ding-a-ling enlarged because it's just fine as it is. Now. Can we move on, or shall I throw myself out of the window from sheer embarrassment?"

Todd laughed. "You are an education, do you know that?"

"I am?"

"You are."

"In a good way?"

"Oh yeah, it's all good. It's all fine."

"You realize, of course, that there's stuff being written about you right now, a lot of people upset and worried."

"Why?"

"Because nobody knows what happened to you. There are plenty of people, fans of yours, like me, who think of you practically as a member of the family. Todd did this. Todd did that. And now, suddenly, Todd's missing. And nobody knows where he's gone. They start to fret. They start to make up all kinds of ridiculous reasons. I know I did. It's not that they're crazy -- "

"No, look. I don't think you, or any of them, are crazy. Or if you are, it's a good crazy. I mean, what you did last night ... none of my family would have done."

"You'd be surprised how many people love you."

"They love something but I don't think it's me, Tammy."

"Why not?"

"Well for one thing, if you could get inside here, in my head with Todd Pickett, you wouldn't find much worth idolizing. You really wouldn't. I am painfully, excruciatingly, ordinary. My brother, Donnie, on the other hand: he's worth admiring. He's smart. He's honest. I was just the one with this." He turned on his smile as he drove and gave her the benefit of its luminosity. Then, just as easily, he turned it off. "See, you learn to do that," he went on. "It's like a faucet. You turn the smile on, and people bathe in it for a while, then you turn it off and you go home and wonder what all the fuckin' fuss was about. It's not like I deserve the adulation of millions. I can't act. And I've got the reviews to prove it." He chuckled at his self-deprecation. "That's not mine," he said, "it was Victor Mature."

"Okay, so you're not the best actor in Hollywood. You're not the worst either."

"No. I grant you, there's worse."

"A lot worse."

"All right, a lot worse. Still doesn't make me a good actor."

He obviously wasn't going to be moved on the subject, so Tammy left it where it was. They drove on in silence for a while. Then he swung the mirror round, and checked out his face. "You know I'm nervous?"

"Why?"

"In case there's anybody at Maxine's place." He went back and forth between studying his face and checking the road.

"You look fine," Tammy told him.

"I guess it's not so bad," he said, assessing his features.

"You just look a little different from the way you used to look."

"Different enough that people will notice?"

Tammy couldn't lie to him. "Sure they'll notice. But maybe they'll say you look better. I mean, when everything's properly healed and you've had a month's vacation."

"You will come in with me, won't you?"

"To see Maxine? My pleasure."

"Mind if I smoke?" He didn't wait for a reply. He just rolled down the window, pulled out a battered pack of cigarettes, and lit up. The rush of nicotine made him whoop. "That's better! Okay. We're going to do this. You and me. We're going to ask Maxine a lot of very difficult questions, and figure out whether she's lying to us or not."

They had reached the Pacific Coast Highway, and the roar of the traffic through the open window made any further talk impractical for a time. They drove north for perhaps five miles, before coming off the PCH and heading west. The area wouldn't have been Tammy's idea of idyllic. Somehow she'd imagined Malibu being more like a little slice of Hawaii; but in fact it was just a sliver of real estate two or three houses deep, with the incessant din of the Pacific Coast Highway on one side and a narrow strip of beach on the other. They'd scarcely driven more than a quarter of a mile when they came to the Colony gates. There was a guard-house, and a single guard, who was sitting with his booted feet up beside a small television. The set went off as soon as they drove up, a broad smile appearing on the man's face.

"Hey, Mr. Pickett. Long time, no see."

"Ron, m'man. How goes it?"

"It goes good, it goes good."

The guard was clearly delighted that his name had been remembered.

"Are you going to Ms. Frizelle's party?"

"Oh ... yeah," Todd said, throwing a panicked glance at Tammy. "We're here for that."

"That's great." He peered past Todd, at the passenger. "And this is?"

"Oh, this is Tammy. Tammy, Ron. Ron, Tammy. Tammy's my date for the night."

"Good goin'," Ron said, to no one and about nothing in particular. Just a general California yea-saying to the world. "Let me just call Ms. Frizelle, and tell her you're on your way down."

"Nah," Todd said, sliding a twenty dollar bill into Ron's hand. "We're going to surprise her."

"No problem," Ron said, waving them by. "Good to see you, by the way -- "

It took Tammy a moment to realize that Ron was talking to her.

"It's always good to meet a new friend of Mr. Pickett's." There didn't seem to be any irony in this: it was a genuine expression of feeling.

"Well, thank you," Tammy said, thrown a little off-kilter by this.

"Fuck. She's having a party," Todd said to her as they left the guardhouse behind them.

"So."

"So there'll be lots of people. Looking at me."

"They've got to do it sooner or later."

Todd stopped the car in the middle of the street.

"I can't. I'm not ready for this."

"Yes you are. The more you put it off the more difficult it's going to be."

Todd sat there shaking his head saying: "No. No. I can't do it."

Tammy put her hand over his. "I'm just as nervous as you are," she said. "Feel how clammy my hand is?"

"Yeah."

"But we said we'd get answers. And the longer we take to ask her the more lies she'll have ready."

"You do know her, don't you?" he said.

"She's my nightmare."

"Really. Why?"

"Because she stood between me and you."

"Huh."

Silence.

"So what are we going to do?" Tammy said finally.

"Shit. I don't want to do this."

"So that makes two of us. But -- "

"I know, I know, if we don't do it now ... All right. You win. But I will beat the living shit out of the first person who says one word about my face."

They drove on, the houses they were driving past far more modest in scale and design than she'd expected. There was very little here of the kitsch of Beverly Hills: no faux-French chateaux sitting side by side with faux-Tudor mansions. The houses were mostly extremely plain, boxlike in most cases, with very occasional architectural flourishes. They were also very close to one another. "You wouldn't get much privacy there," Tammy commented.

"I guess everybody just pretends not to look at everybody else. Or they just don't care. That's more like it. They just don't care."

"That's the connection between you and Katya, isn't it? You've both been looked at so much ... and the rest of us don't know what that feels like."

"It feels like somebody's siphoning out your blood, pint by pint."

"Not good."

"No. Not good."

They rounded a corner, bringing their destination into view. The party-house was decorated with thousands of tiny white twinkle lights, as were the two palm trees that stood like sentinels to left and right of the door.

"Christmas came early this year," Tammy remarked.

"Apparently."

There were uniformed valets working the street; taking cars from the guests and spiriting them away to be parked somewhere out of sight.

"Are you sure you're ready for this?" Todd asked Tammy.

"No more than you are."

"Want to go one more circle around the block?"

"Yes."

"Uh-oh. Too late."

Two valets were coming at the car bearing what must have been burdensome smiles. As the doors were opened, Todd caught tight hold of Tammy's hand. "Don't leave my side," he said. "Promise me you won't."

"I promise," she said, and raising her head she put on her best impersonation of someone who was rich, famous and belonged at Todd Pickett's side. Todd relinquished the keys to the valet.

"May I assume this is your first A-list Hollywood party in the flesh?" Todd said to Tammy.

"You may."

"Well then this could be a lot of fun. In a grotesque, 'there's a shark in the swimming pool' sort of way."

SEVEN

There came a point, as Jerry's car was carrying Katya out of for the first time in the better part of three quarters of a century, when her fears seemed to get the better of her. Jerry heard a voice, as dry as a husk, out of the darkness behind him: "I'm sorry ... I don't know that I can do this."

"Do you want me to turn around?" he asked her. "I will if you want me to."

There was no reply. Just the soft sound of frightened weeping. "I wish Zeffer was still here. Why was I so cruel to him?" None of this seemed to be for open discussion. It was more like a private confessional. "Why am I such a bitch? Jesus. Jesus. Everything I've ever loved ... " She stopped herself, and looked up at Jerry, catching his reflection in the mirror. "Don't mind me. It's just a crazy old woman talking to herself."

"Maybe we should go back and find Mr. Zeffer? He could come with you. I realize there was some bad blood between you -- "

"Zeffer's dead, Jerry. I lost my temper with him, and -- "

"You killed him?"

"No. I left him in the Devil's Country. Wounded by one of the hunters."

"Lord."

Jerry brought the car to a halt. He stared out of the window, horrified. "What would you like me to do?" he said after a while. "If you can't go on without him, I mean."

"Take no notice of me," Katya said, after a short period of reflection: "I'm just feeling sorry for myself. Of course I can go on. What other choice do I have?" She took another moment to study the passing world. "It's just that it's been a long time since I was out in the real world."

"This isn't the real world, it's LA."

She saw the joke in that. They laughed together over the remark, and when their laughter had settled into smiles, he got the car going again, down the hill. At some unidentified point between the place where her faith had almost failed her, and Sunset Boulevard, they crossed the boundary of Coldheart Canyon.

Their destination was already decided, of course, so there wasn't much reason to talk as they went. Jerry left Katya to her musings. He knew his Hollywood history well enough to be sure that she would be astonished by what she was seeing. In her time Sunset Boulevard had been little more than a dirt track once it got east of what was now Doheny. There'd been no Century City back then, of course, no four lane highways clogged with sleek vehicles. Just shacks and orange groves and dirt.

"I've been thinking," Katya said, somewhere around Sepulveda.

"About what?"

"Me and my wickedness."

"Your what? Your wickedness?"

"Yes, my wickedness. I don't know why it came into my mind, but it did. If I think about the women I've played in all my really important pictures, they were all wicked women. Poisonous. Adulterers. One who kills her own child. Really unforgivable women."

"But don't most actors prefer to play bad characters? Isn't it more fun?"

"Oh it is. And I had a lot to inspire me."

"Inspire you?"

"As a child, I saw wickedness with my own eyes. I had it's hands on me. Worse, it possessed me." Her voice grew cold and dark. "My mother ran a whorehouse, did I ever tell you that? And when I was ten or so, she just decided one night it was time to make me available to the customers."

"Jesus."

"That's what I said to myself. Every night, I said: Jesus, please help me. Jesus, please come and take me away from this wicked woman. Take me to heaven. But he never came. I had to run away. Three times I ran away and my brothers found me and dragged me back. Once she let them have me, as a reward for finding me."

"Your own brothers?"

"Five of them."

"Christ."

"Anyway, I succeeded in escaping her eventually, and when you're a thirteen-year-old, and you're out in the world on your own, you see a lot thirteen-year-olds shouldn't have to see."

"I'm sure you did."

"So I put all that I saw into those women. That's why people believed in them. I was playing them for real." She fumbled at the inside of the door. "Is there some way to open this window?"

"Oh yes. It's right there. A little black button. Push it down."

She pushed and opened the window a crack. "That's better," she said.

"You can have it all the way down."

"No, this is fine. I'll take it in stages I think."

"Yes, of course."

"Going back to the pictures, I wonder if you'd do me a favor, when we get back to the house?"

"Of course. What?"

"In my bedroom in the guest-house there are six or seven posters from those early films of mine. I've had them up there for so long, all around the bed. I think it's time I got rid of them. Will you burn them for me?"

"Are you sure you want them burned? They're worth a fortune."

"Then take them for yourself. Put them up for auction. And the bed. You want the bed too?"

"There isn't room for it in my apartment, but if you want me to get rid of it for you -- "

"Yes, please."

"No problem."

"If you make some money from it, then spend it. Enjoy it."

"Thank you."

"No, it's me who should be thanking you. You've been a great comfort to me."

"May I ask you why?"

"Why what?"

"Why are you getting rid of all that stuff now?"

"Because everything's changed for me. That woman I used to be has gone. So are all the things she stood for."

"They were just films."

"They were more than that. They were my memories. And now's the time to let go of them. I want to start over with Todd."

Jerry drew a deep breath to reply to this, but then thought better of it and kept his silence. Katya was acutely aware of every nuance in her immediate locality, however; even this.

"Say what's on your mind," she said.

"It's none of my business."

"Say it anyway. Go on."

"Well. I just hope you're not relying too much on Todd Pickett. You know he's not all that reliable. None of them are, these younger guys. They're all talk."

"He's different."

"I hope so."

"We can't ever know why things happen between two people. But when it feels right, you have to go with your instincts."

"If he's so right for you, why did he run out on you?"

"That was my fault, not his. I showed him some things which were more than he was ready to see. I won't make that mistake again. And then he had some woman with him, Tammy Somebody-or-Other, who was just trying to steal him away. Do you know her?"

"Tammy? No. I don't know a Tammy. Oh wait. I do. I had a call from the police in Sacramento. She went missing."

"And they called you. Why?"

"Because I know Todd. Apparently, this Tammy woman runs his fan-club."

Katya started to laugh.

"That's all she is to him?" she said.

"Apparently."

"She runs his fan-club?"

"That's my understanding."

"So there's no romance between them?"

"No. I don't even think they really know one another."

"Well, that solves that."

"It does and it doesn't," Jerry said cautiously. "She still persuaded him to go with her."

"Then it's up to me to persuade him to come home," Katya purred. She pressed her window button, and kept it down until the window was entirely open. Jerry caught a glimpse of her in the mirror. The last of her caution and her fear had evaporated. She was luxuriating in the warm wind against her face; eyes closed, hair shining.

"How much farther?" she asked him, without opening her eyes.

"Another ten minutes."

"I can smell the ocean."

"Well, we're at Fourth Street. Four blocks over, there's the beach."

"I love the sea."

"Todd has a yacht, did you know that? It's docked in San Diego."

"You see. Perfect." She opened her eyes, catching Jerry's gaze in the mirror, demanding a response from him.

"Yes, it's perfect," he said.

She smiled. "Thank you," she said.

"For what?"

"For everything. Bringing me here. Listening to me, indulging me. When things have settled down and Todd and I have made the Canyon a more civilized place, we're going to start inviting people over, just a few special friends, to share the beauty of the place. You never saw the house at its best. But you will. It is magnificent."

"Oh I'm sure."

"And that's how it's going to be again, after tonight."

"Magnificent?"

"Magnificent."

EIGHT

This was Tammy's Cinderella moment: her dream come true. All right, perhaps all the details weren't perfect. She could have looked a little more glamorous, and she would have liked to have lost another twenty-five pounds. And they could have been coming in through the front door instead of slipping in at the side to avoid the photographers. But she was happy to take what fate was giving her: and fate was giving her a chance to walk into an A-list party on the arm of Todd Pickett.

Everywhere she looked there were famous faces, famous smiles, famous gazes, famous figures swathed in gowns by famous designers, famous fools making jokes that had everyone in their circle breathless with laughter, famous power-brokers telling tales of how they'd made a million in a minute, and the less famous wives of these power-brokers listening with their lids half-closed because if they had a buck for every time they'd heard these tired old tales they'd be able to divorce their dead-weights of husbands.

And hanging on the arms of the famous (much as she was hanging on Todd's arm) were younger men and women who watched their companions with the kind of eyes Tammy was reserving for the hors d'oeuvres. There was appetite in those eyes. One day, those gazes seem to say, I will have all that you have. I will own cars and yachts and palaces and houses. I will have a small vineyard in Tuscany and a large ranch in Big Sky Country. There will be no door that will be closed to me; no ear that will not attend to my concerns. When I drop my purse, somebody will pick it up for me. When my car is empty of gas, it will be miraculously filled (and the ashtrays emptied). If the drink in my hand is getting low, it will be replenished without my requesting it. When I am hungry, somebody will make food that will be so exquisitely shaped every mouthful is like a little meal unto itself.

In fact, the food was drawing her attention about as much as the famous faces. She'd never seen such exquisite little confections, and each one had a description, proffered by its server, much of which was so remote from Tammy's experience she didn't understand it. Slices of rare marinated this on slices of smoked that, drizzled with-

Oh what the hell? She'd take two. No make that three. It was only finger-food, for God's sake, and she was hungry.

To wash it all down she'd accepted a Bellini from a dazzling waiter as soon as she'd stepped inside, and it tasted so sweet and harmless she downed two-thirds of her glass before she realized how potent it was. In truth, however, it would scarcely have mattered if she'd downed five Bellinis and fallen flat on her face. She was invisible as far as these people were concerned. The glacial beauties and their handsome swains, the deal-makers and the word-splitters, none of them wanted to concede her ragged presence in their gilded midst: so they simply looked the other way. Once or twice she caught the tail of a mystified glance laid upon her, but these were from amateurs at the game. To the true professionals -- which is to say most of the people in this assembly -- she was simply a non-presence. She could have been standing right in their line of vision and somehow their gaze would have slid off her and around her; anything to avoid seeing her.

She caught tight hold of Todd's hand. So much for the Cinderella fantasy. It was a nightmare.

Much to her delight Todd clutched her hand in return. His palm was pouring sweat.

"They're all looking at me," he said, leaning close to her.

"No, they're not."

"Hi, Todd."

"Hi, Jodie. Good to -- see that? They say hi then they move on. She's gone already. Hi, Steven! When are you -- ? Too late. He's off. It's fucking uncanny."

"Where's Maxine?"

"I haven't seen her yet. She's probably out back. She likes to sit and hold court at these things. She says only hostesses circulate."

"And she's not the hostess?"

"Fuck, no. These aren't her guests. They're her supplicants." Tammy had seen some attractive-looking hors d'oeuvres sailing by.

"I'll have one of those," she said, tapping the waiter on the shoulder, "if you don't ask in this place," she explained, as she took three, "you don't get."

"Are they good?"

"What do I know? They're filling a hole. Very slowly. Doesn't anybody have any appetite around here?"

"Not publicly."

To get to the back of the house he had led her into a larger room -- which, despite the fact that it was packed with guests -- was almost as hushed as a library. A few people looked round at Todd -- a few even attempted tentative smiles -- but nobody made any move to break off their whispered exchanges and approach him, for which Tammy was grateful. The density of famous faces was much the same in here as it had been next door. This really was the cr#232;me de la cr#232;me: the people who could get a studio to spend several million dollars developing a script by simply hinting that they might be in it when it was finished; the names above the tide that audiences knew so well they only used an actor's given name when they were talking about the show: Bruce and Demi and Brad and Tom and all the rest. Next year, some portion of the crowd would have slipped onto the B-list, after a dud or two. But tonight they were at the top of their game; famous amongst the famous. Tonight there wasn't an agency in the city that wouldn't have signed them on the spot; or a late-night talk-show that wouldn't have bumped Einstein, Van Gogh and the Pope to have them on. They were American royalty, the way that Pickford and Fairbanks had been royalty in the early years. Yes, there were more crowns now; more thrones. But there were also more fans, in every corner of the world, men and women ready to fawn and obsess. In short, none of these were people who hurt for want of admiration. They had a surfeit of it, the way the rest of the world had a surfeit of credit-card debt.

It was harder, in this more densely-populated space, for people not to concede the presence of Todd, who took hold of several unoffered hands and grabbed a couple of shoulders as he crossed the room, determined that nobody get away with pretending they hadn't seen him. And when a fragment of conversation did spring up, as it occasionally did, Todd very rapidly (and rather gallantly) made certain that Tammy was introduced into the exchange.

"You don't need to do that," Tammy said, after the third such occasion.

"Yes, I do," Todd replied. "These sonsabitches think they can look the other way and pretend you don't exist. Well fuck 'em. I've starred in movies with some of these assholes. Movies you paid your seven bucks to see. And they were mostly shit pictures. So I figure they owe you a seven-buck-handshake."

She laughed out loud, thoroughly entertained by his heretical talk. Whatever happened after this, she thought, (and no fairy-tale lasted forever) she'd at least have this extraordinary memory to treasure: walking arm-in-arm with the only man she'd ever really loved through a crowd of fools, knowing that even if they didn't look at her they still knew she was there. And when she'd gone she'd be somebody they'd never be able to figure out, which suited her just fine. Let them wonder. It would give them something to do when they were studying their reflections in the morning.

"There's Maxine," Todd said. "Didn't I say she'd be holding court?"

It was a couple of years since Tammy had seen Maxine Frizelle in the flesh. In that time she had projected upon the woman an aura of power which in truth she didn't possess. She was smaller and more fretful-looking than Tammy Remembered: the way she was perched in a high-backed chair, her bare feet off the ground, was presumably designed to give off the aura of childlike vulnerability, but in fact suggested just its opposite. The pose looked awkward and artificial; her gaze was woozy rather than happy, and her smile completely false.

Todd let go of Tammy's hand.

"Are you doing this on your own from here?" she said to him.

"I think I ought to."

Tammy shrugged. "Whatever you want."

"I mean, it's going to be difficult."

"Yeah ... " she said, the observation given credence by the frigid stare they were getting from the patio.

"She's seen you," Tammy said.

She smiled in Maxine's direction. The woman was getting up off her chair, her expression more bemused than angry. She leaned over and whispered something to the young man at her side. He nodded in response, and left the patio, heading indoors and weaving his way through the party-goers towards Tammy and Todd.

Tammy grabbed hold of Todd's hand again. "You know what?" she said.

"What?"

"I was wrong. We're going to do this together."

NINE

Out on the street, Katya let the valet open the car door for her, her eyes fixed on the house into which she was about to make an entrance. A hundred thoughts were crowding into her head at the same time, all demanding attention. Would anybody recognize her? Jerry had told her many times her films remained widely seen and appreciated, so it was inevitable somebody was going to figure out who she was. On the other hand it had been the style in those days to slather your face in makeup, so perhaps nobody would think to associate her with the high style of those movies. Nor, of course, would anybody assume that the Katya Lupi of The Sorrows of Frederick or Nefertiti could possibly resemble the young woman she still seemed to be. So again, perhaps her fears were groundless. And if somebody did recognize her, against all the odds, then she'd swiftly find some witty riposte about the brilliance of modern science, and let them wonder. If she sent a few admirers off shaking their heads, mystified by her untouched beauty, would that be such a bad thing?

She had nothing to fear from these people.

She was beautiful. And beauty was the only certain weapon against a brutal mind or a stupid world. Why should that power have deserted her?

She looked around, subduing a little burst of panic, to find that Jerry was not at her side.

"I'm here," he said, sauntering over from a very handsome and now well-tipped valet. "I've been getting the scoop. Todd arrived a few minutes ago."

Her face blossomed.

"He's here?"

"He's here."

She was suddenly like a little child. "I knew this was going to work!" she said. "I knew! I knew!" Then, just as suddenly, a doubt: "Is that woman with him?"

"Tammy Lauper? Yes she is."

"I want you to separate them."

"Just like that."

"Yes," she said, deadly serious. "Do whatever you have to do. I just want you to part them, so that I can talk to Todd on his own. As soon as I get a chance to do that, the three of us can be out of here."

"Suppose he wants to stay?"

"With her?"

"No. Amongst his friends."

"He can't," she said. "He won't want to, when he sees me. He'll just come. You'll see."

Her confidence was beguiling, whether it was fake or not. She took his arm, and they headed into the house. If Jerry had been expecting some grotesque echo of Sunset Boulevard he was pleasantly disappointed. Katya met the cameras at the door with an expression of familiarity on her face, as though she were saying to the world: oh, there you are. She let go of his hand at the threshold and like a ship that suddenly finds the wind again, and remembers what it has to do effortlessly. She turned and the cameramen got greedy for her: the flashes a blinding barrage, and she bathing in me light as it glazed her bones and filled her eyes.

Of course none of them knew who the hell she was, so they were reduced to snapping their fingers and calling 'Miss uh -- ?! 'Over here, Miss -- ?' But she knew her job. She gave them all something wonderful, something miraculous, and just as the frenzy was approaching its height, abruptly refused to continue, thanking them all and sweeping away into the house, leaving them begging for more.

This sudden burst of activity had attracted attention, of course. Half the faces in the room were turned towards the door when Katya entered, wondering who the hell could have just arrived. When it turned out to be a woman they did not even know the house became a gallery of whispers. Jerry stayed two or three steps behind Katya as she crossed the room, so he was able to see the range of responses her presence created. Envy, more than anything: particularly on the faces of women who assumed they were Katya's contemporaries. Who was this woman who was as young or younger than they were, prettier than they were, getting all the attention they should have been getting?

On the faces of the young men, there was similar questions being silently asked. Why is this damn woman more perfect than I am? Why does she have more eyes undressing her than I do? Then there was that other contingent of young men who were simply calculating their chances of getting across the room to her side with a drink or a witty pickup line before the opposition.

Katya played it perfectly. She was careful not to lock eyes with anyone, so that she didn't get caught up in a conversation she wanted no part of. She looked back at Jerry, who pointed on across the room towards Todd.

And there he was, standing on the patio with Maxine. They were in the midst of what looked to be a very unpleasant exchange. She was shaking her head, turning away from him; he was following her, poking her in the shoulder like a kid who's not getting his mother's full attention.

She ignored his importuning, and headed down a flight of stairs, which led off the other side of the patio, down onto the beach.

The argument between Todd and Maxine had not gone unnoticed by the other occupants of the room. Ever since Todd's appearance at the party, all other subjects of whispered conversation had fallen by the wayside. It was Pickett the guests were talking about. They were chiefly debating his wounded appearance, of course, but now they were also discussing the way he stumbled in angry pursuit of Maxine, and the subject of their exchange, which had unfortunately now been taken out of ear-shot. There were plenty of people in the room who would have liked to have gone out onto the patio and followed Todd and Maxine down onto the sand, but the only one who did so was Tammy. She pushed through a group standing between her and the patio door, maneuvered her way around a waiter and a sofa, and headed outside.

The wind had got up a little since she and Todd had arrived. It blew off the ocean, bringing with it the sound of raised voices. Tammy heard Maxine's voice first. She was demanding to know how Todd dared show his face --

Tammy crossed the patio to see if she could get a look at Todd. Did he need her help or not? As she approached the wooden railing an officious little man, with the improbable face of an ill-tempered troll, got in her way. "Excuse me, but who the hell are you?"

"I'm a friend of Todd's. Are you the maitre d'?"

There was a barely-suppressed guffaw from one corner of the patio. Tammy glanced round to see a young man, almost as well dressed as the troll, composing his face.

"My name's Gary Eppstadt. I'm the Head of Paramount."

"Oh." Tammy said. "So?"

"So, you obviously don't belong on this patio."

"In point of fact, I think she did come with Todd," said another onlooker, a woman in black, who was lounging against the railing as she sipped her cocktail.

Eppstadt looked Tammy up and down as though he was assessing a particularly unappealing heifer. The nakedness of his look so infuriated her that she simply shoved him out of her way, and went to the railing.

"Get security," Eppstadt said. "I want this bitch thrown out or I shall lodge charges for assault."

"Oh, for God's sake, Gary," the woman said, "you're making a fool of yourself."

Only now did Tammy recognize the woman's soft drawl. It was Faye Dunaway. Her weary glance fell momentarily on Tammy. "She's not doing any harm." Faye went on, "Go inside and get yourself a drink." Tammy glanced back over her shoulder. Eppstadt was obviously uncertain how to respond. He first threw a fiery glance at Dunaway, who promptly threw it straight back. Then he snapped at one of the three younger men doomed to be out here on the patio at the same time.

"Christian?"

"Yes, sir?"

"What did I just say?"

"That ... you wanted security, sir?"

"And what are you doing?"

"Going to get them," the man said, hurrying away.

"Christ!" Dunaway murmured. "Didn't you hear what I said? She came in with Todd."

"Well she doesn't belong in here," Eppstadt said. "With him or without him. She's up to no good. Mind you, so's he. He wasn't invited either. I should have security cart him away too."

Tammy turned from her spot at the railings.

"What is your problem?" she said. "This is nothing to do with you."

"Where the fuck did you come from?" he asked. "You look like a street-person. Is this Todd's idea of a joke? Bringing a street-person in here?"

"Who are you, honey?"

"My name's Tammy Lauper, and I'm a friend of Todd's."

Eppstadt cut in here. "Friend in the sense of -- ?"

"Friend as in friend," Tammy said. "Todd's been going through some hard times recently."

"No? Do tell."

"I'm afraid I'm not at liberty -- "

"He's working you, honey," Faye said. "He knows all about the bad surgery. The whole town does."

"As it happens I suggested the surgeon," Eppstadt said. "Bruce Burrows. He normally does first-rate work. Didn't he do some for you, Faye?"

"No," said Ms. Dunaway. "I don't need it yet."

"My mistake."

"But when I do I'll be sure to avoid him, judging him by what he did to Todd. That boy used to be damn-near perfect. The way Warren was perfect fifty years ago. I mean, they were uncanny, both of them."

Tammy didn't bother to listen to the rest of the conversation. Instead she slipped down the creaking wooden steps that led off the patio and down onto the sand. The wash of light from the house lit the beach as far as the surf, which was breaking quite boisterously. The beach, as far as she could see, was immaculately dean. No doubt the residents hired somebody to vacuum every morning, so that nothing unpredictable-a whiskey bottle, a stray condom, a dead fish-be allowed to disfigure the perfection of their stretch of coastline.

The only items she could see on the beach were two human figures.

If either Todd or Maxine had realized that Tammy was there they gave no sign of it. They simply kept up what they'd been doing for the last ten minutes: arguing.

The wind carried most of their words away, but every now and again a phrase would reach Tammy's eyes. Maxine called him a 'waste of time' at one point, 'all ego and no brains' at another. He called her 'a talentless bitch' and 'a parasite'. She mentioned, by way of response to one of his assaults that 'the whole town knows you got a face-lift, and that it went to hell.'

"I don't care," Todd replied.

"Then you're even more of a fool than I thought you were," Maxine yelled back, "because that's your fucking reputation out the window."

"Watch my lips," Todd said, pointing to his mouth. "I don't care."

Several exchanges followed of which Tammy did not catch a single word. She continued to approach the pair slowly, expecting at any moment to be seen by one or the other. But they were too deeply involved in expressing their rage at one another to take notice of her.

The conversation had definitely changed direction, however, because now, when the wind brought fresh words in Tammy's direction, the subject of the Canyon was under debate. And Todd was shouting.

"You set me up! You knew something weird was going on up there and you set me up!"

It was time to make this into a three-way conversation, Tammy decided, stepping into Maxine's line of sight. But Maxine wasn't going to be distracted from the subject at hand by Tammy.

"All right," she said to Todd. "So the house has a history. Is that such a big deal?"

"I don't like messing with that stuff, Maxine. It's not safe."

"By that 'stuff' you mean what exactly?"

Todd dropped his voice to a near-whisper, but Tammy was close enough to hear it. "The Canyon's full of dead people."

Maxine's response was to laugh; her laughter unfeigned. "Are you high?"

"No."

"Drunk?"

"No." Todd wasn't about to be laughed off. "I've seen them, Maxine. I've touched them."

"Well then you should file a report to the National Enquirer, not come whining to me about it. As far as I'm concerned, this is our last conversation."

"I want an explanation!"

"I'll give you one," Maxine said: "You're crazy."

"Jerry?"

Katya was at Jerry's side, her expression troubled. "Is there a way down onto the beach along the side of the house?"

"I don't know. Maybe. Why?"

"Todd's down on the beach, being abused by that bitch of a manager."

"I'm sure he can stand up for himself."

"I just want to take him away, and I don't want to have to come back through the crowd when I bring him back."

"Well let's see," Jerry said. He took hold of Katya's arm and together they went back to the front door.

"I hate these people," Katya said, when they reached the foyer.

"You don't know any of them," Jerry said. "With respect."

"Oh believe, me I do. They're the same old whores, fakes and fools. Only the names have changed."

"Will you be leaving?" the valet wanted to know as they emerged from the house.

"No," Jerry said. "I was just showing my friend around the house. Do you know if there's a way down onto the beach?"

"Yes, of course. Just go back through the house -- "

"We'd prefer not to go through the house."

"Well. I guess there's a pathway which runs down the side of the house, which takes you to the beach. But it's much easier -- "

"Thank you," Katya said, catching hold of the man's gaze and smiling at him. "I'd just like to get away from the crowd."

If the man had any objections they faded away on the spot. He blushed at the directness of Katya's look, and stood aside. "It's all yours," he said.

TEN

On the beach Todd looked up towards the house. The patio was now so crowded with spectators that people had gone into the kitchen and up to the bedrooms so they could look out at the beach and watch the exchange between himself and Maxine. A few of the partiers had wandered down the patio, and were watching intently from there. The general level of hubbub from inside had also dropped considerably. Word had got around that a war of words was being fought on the sand, and if everyone would just shut up for a minute or two, it would be more audible.

"You wish you'd never started this, now, don't you?" Maxine said.

"All I want is some answers."

"No, you don't. You want to embarrass me in front of my friends because I let you go. Well, Todd, I'd had enough of you. It's as simple as that. I was tired. I wanted to be free of you and your endless demands." Maxine closed her eyes as she spoke, and for the first time in her life Tammy had a morsel of sympathy for the woman. Despite her makeup and her immaculate coiffure, nothing could disguise her genuine exhaustion. When she said she wanted to be free of Todd, Tammy believed her.

"When I arranged for you to move into that house it was because it seemed to serve your comforts. That was all I cared about. Now, you come here yelling and swearing, and I think, to hell with your comforts. It's about time they all heard the truth."

"Don't go there, Maxine."

"Why not? Why the hell not? You came here to cause trouble. Well you're going to get trouble." She had raised her voice, so that she was now plainly audible to the audience assembled on the patio and gathered at the windows.

Todd had nowhere to run. The closer she got to him, the more he was forced to retreat towards the house, and the more audible her words became.

"Just tell the damn woman you're sorry, Todd," Tammy said. "And let's get the hell out of here. This isn't the time or the place."

Maxine glanced at Tammy, conceding her existence here with them for the first time. "You think he's going to apologize? To me? He doesn't understand the word sorry. You know why? He's never been wrong. At least the way he tells it."

"Well, he can make an exception, right, Todd?"

"Keep out of this," Todd snapped.

"I hid you away in that house because you asked me to hide you away -- " Maxine went on, her recollections delivered in the direction of the spectators. "You needed time to heal."

"I'm warning you," Todd said.

Maxine went on, unintimidated. "As I recall," she said, "your face looked like a piece of hammered steak, thanks to Doctor Burrows."

"All right, you win," Todd said, "Just stop right there."

"Why? They already know the truth, Todd. The whole town's been gossiping about your Phantom of the Opera act for weeks."

"Shut up, Maxine."

"No, Todd, I will not shut up. I've kept your fucking secrets for years, and I'm not going to do it any longer."

"Perhaps we should just go, Todd," Tammy said.

"Don't waste your breath on him," Maxine said. "He's not going to sleep with you. That's what you're hoping for, isn't it?"

"God," Tammy said. "You people."

"Don't deny it," Maxine snapped.

"Well, I am denying it. You think the world revolves around sex. It's pathetic."

"Anyway, I didn't," Todd said, as though he wanted to be sure that Maxine was not misled on the subject.

Something about his eagerness to have this particular fact set straight distressed Tammy. She knew why. He was ashamed of her. Damn him! Still concerned about his stupid reputation.

Maxine must have seen the anger and disappointment on Tammy's face, because the rage in her own voice mellowed. "Don't let him hurt you," she said. "He's not worth it. Really he's not. It's just that he doesn't want them up there -- " she jabbed her finger in the direction of the house " -- thinking he'd ever sink so low as to sleep with the likes of you. Isn't that right, Todd? You don't want people thinking you fucked the fat girl!"

The knife turned a second time in Tammy. She wished the beach would just open up beneath her and swallow her, so she'd never have to see any of these people ever again.

But there was still enough self-esteem left in her to challenge the sonofabitch. What had she got to lose?

"Is that right, Todd?" she said. "Are you ashamed of me?"

"Oh Jesus ... " Todd shook his head, then made a furtive glance at the house. There were probably sixty people on the patio and balconies now, enjoying the spectacle below.

"You know what?" he said. "Fuck both of you."

With that he turned his back on Tammy and Maxine and started to walk off down the beach. But Maxine wasn't going to let him get away so easily. "We didn't finish talking about your healing, Todd."

"Leave it, Maxine -- "

"The operation? The one to make you look a few years younger? The face-lift."

He swung around at her "I said: leave it or I will sue your fucking ass."

"On what grounds? I'm just telling the truth. You're an arrogant, spoiled, talentless -- "

Todd stopped his retreat. His face looked blotchy in the light thrown from the house; there was a tic beneath the left side of his mouth. The expression of empty despair on his mismade face silenced Maxine. Todd looked past both the women at the crowd that was watching all this unfold.

Then he started to yell.

"Have you had enough! Well? Have you? She's right! It's all true! I did get a fucking face-lift. You know why? That cunt! Eppstadt! Yes, you, you fucking Quasimodo! You!"

Eppstadt had found a prime grandstand position to watch the encounter between Todd and Maxine, so there were plenty of eyes turned in his direction now. He didn't like the scrutiny any more than Todd had. He shook his head and waved Todd's accusations away, then turned his back and tried to disappear into the crowd.

But Todd kept on haranguing him, "You're the freak here, you know that?" Todd yelled. "You fuck with our lives, you fuck with our heads. Well, you're not going to fuck with me any more, because I'm not playing your game anymore. Hear me? I'm not playing!"

Todd suddenly ran at the patio and reached up through the railing to catch hold of Eppstadt's pants leg. Eppstadt turned on him.

"Get your hands off me!" he shouted, kicking at Todd as though he were a crazed dog.

Todd simply pulled harder on his leg, so that Eppstadt had to grab hold of somebody beside him to stop himself falling over. His face was white with fury. The assault went to the very heart of his dignity; this was a living nightmare for him, the mad dog actor, the audience of people who despised him, all drinking his embarrassment down like a fine champagne.

"You ain't getting away so easy, ugly-boy!" Todd said, "We're all in this together."

"Pickett! Let go of me!" Eppstadt demanded. His voice had become shrill with rage, beads of sweat popping out all over his face. "You hear me? Let me go!"

"When I'm done," Todd said. He pulled on Eppstadt again, dragging him a few inches closer. "You miserable fucking shit. How many people have you told to get their faces fixed, huh?"

"You were looking old," Eppstadt said.

"I was looking old? Ha! Look at you!"

"I'm not a movie-star."

"No, and neither am I. I'm over all that. You know why? I've seen where they go, Eppstadt. All the beautiful people, the stars. I've seen where they end up."

"Forest Lawn?"

"Oh no. They're not in graves, Eppstadt. That's too easy. They're still out there. The ghosts. Still thinking some fuck like you will give them another chance."

"Will somebody get this crazy sonofabitch off me?" Eppstadt shrieked.

One of the waiters went down on his haunches in front of the railing, took hold of Todd's hands and started pulling off his fingers one by one. "You better let go, man," the waiter quietly warned, "or I'm going to start hurtin' you. And I don't want to do that."

Todd ignored him. He simply hauled on Eppstadt, which threw the older man off-balance. The woman Eppstadt had been holding onto also toppled, and would have come down hard had the crowd around her not been so thick. Eppstadt was not so lucky, however. The people in his immediate vicinity had moved away as soon as Todd had caught hold of his leg. Down he went, catching the waiter a blow with his knee as he fell, so that the other man was also sent sprawling.

Todd dragged Eppstadt towards the edge of the patio. There wasn't a single witness to all of this who, knowing Eppstadt, didn't take pleasure in the indignity they saw being visited on the man. People he'd scorned and made to look like fools, were now all silently hoping this farce would escalate.

But Eppstadt was made of sterner stuff. He kicked at his attacker, the first blow striking Todd's shoulder, the second hitting his nose and mouth, a brutal blow. Todd let go of Eppstadt and fell back on the sand, blood pouring from both nostrils, like two faucets switched on full power.

Eppstadt scrambled to his feet, yelling: "I want that man arrested! Right now! Right! Now!"

Todd looked up from his sprawl, his hand going to his face, coming away red. A hundred faces now stared down at him. There wasn't a person at the party-whether bartender, guest, waiter, toilet attendant or valet-who had not forsaken the house to come out and see what all the hubbub was about. They were all staring down at the famous, bloody face on the sand, and the sprawled Eppstadt on the patio. Scandal didn't get much better than this; this was a story to dine out on for years.

A few people had come down onto the sand, on the pretext of helping Todd perhaps but actually, of course, to see better what was going on and so have a clearer account for later. Nobody lent Todd a hand; not even Tammy. She had retreated some distance, unwilling to provide these witless fools with something else to laugh at.

Todd scrambled to his feet without help, and instinctively turned his back on his audience. They'd already seen and heard far more than he wanted them to see or hear. All he wanted now was to get away from their snickering assessments.

"Fuck you all ... " he muttered to himself, wondering which way he should go along the beach, left or right?

And then, straight ahead of him, he had his answer. Standing there at the water-line, watching him, was Katya.

At first he didn't believe it was really her. What was she doing so far from her sanctuary? But if it wasn't her, then who?

He didn't wait for his senses to catch up with what his instinct already knew. Without looking back at the ridiculous circus behind him he stumbled down the beach towards her.

Despite all that Katya had done, all that she was associated with in Todd's mind, her smile was welcome to him now: her madness infinitely preferable to that of Eppstadt and the mob behind him. He was done with them. Forever. This last humiliation was simply the final proof that he did not belong at this party any longer. For better or worse, he belonged in the Canyon, with the woman standing at the water's edge, beckoning to him.

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

She smiled. Oh that smile; still an astonishment!

"What do you think? I came to find you."

"I thought you'd never leave the Canyon."

"Sometimes I surprise myself."

He put his arm around her. An ambitious wave came up around their legs and filled his shoes with cold saltwater. He laughed, snorting through the blood. It spattered her.

"God, I'm sorry. That's gross."

He went down on his haunches and brought a handful of water up to wash his face, inhaling to cleanse his nostrils. The saltwater stung.

Katya came down to crouch in the surf beside him, her gaze going over his shoulder.

"They're coming down from the house to get you," she warned.

"Fuck." He didn't need to glance back to confirm what she was saying. Eppstadt would enjoy what came next, of course: having Todd arrested for assault, hauled up before a judge. It would be headlines tomorrow; and attached to it every detail of what Maxine had proclaimed to her guests. Burrows would be shooed out of hiding, wherever he was, to tell his half of the story; or -- if he chose to stand by his Hippocratic oath and remain silent -- then somebody would invent the details, or a nurse would spill them. However it was verified (as though anything needed verification) the secret was out.

But his story was only part of this. Katya? What about her secret? If they got her into the spotlight as well as Todd, then the mystery of would become part of tomorrow's headlines. The sanctuary would be violated by police and press; and when they'd gone, by the public.

"I can't bear this," he said. He was ready to weep, for them both.

She took hold of his hand. "Then don't," she said.

She stood up, facing the sea, pulling on his hand so that he stood with her. There were a few lights out there in the ocean, very remote. Otherwise it was completely dark.

"Walk with me," she said.

She couldn't mean: into the water?

Yes she did.

She was already walking, and he was following, not because he liked the idea of striding off into the icy, roaring Pacific, but because the alternative -- the mockery of the audience on the shore; all the interrogations that awaited him -- was too much to contemplate. He wanted to be away from all that, and if the only direction he could take led him into the ocean, then so be it. He had her hand in his. That was all he needed. For the first time in his life, that was all he needed.

"There are currents ... " he said.

"I know."

"And sharks."

"I'm sure."

He almost looked back but stopped himself.

"Don't bother," she said. "You know what they're doing."

"Yes ... "

"Staring at us. Pointing at us."

"Coming after us?"

"Yes. But not where we're going."

The water was up to Todd's waist now; and higher still on Katya, who was a good six inches shorter than he. Though the waves weren't large tonight as they'd been at the height of the storm, they still had sufficient power to throw them backwards when they broke against their bodies. The force of one wave separated them, and Katya was carried back to shore a few yards. Todd turned and went back to get her, glancing up at the beach as he did so. Though they were probably less then twenty-five yards out, the land already seemed very distant: a line of sand scattered with people who'd come down to the water's edge to get a better view of whatever was going on. And beyond them, the houses, all bright with lights; Maxine's in particular. Down the path between the houses he could see the flashing yellow and blue of a police-car. It would only be a matter of time, he thought, before they sent a helicopter after them, with a searchlight.

He reached Katya and caught hold of her hand. The glimpse of land had filled him with new determination.

"Come on," he said. "I'll carry you."

She didn't protest this; rather let him gather her up in his arms so that they could continue their escape. He had become, he thought, a monster in an old horror movie: grabbing the girl and carrying her off into the night. Except that it was she who'd led him thus far. So that made them both monsters, didn't it?

She slipped her arms around his neck, and lay her head against his chest. The water was so deep now that when the waves came and rifted them up, his toes no longer touched the bottom. Curiously, he wasn't afraid. They were going to drown, most probably, but what the hell? The water was so cold his body was already becoming numb, and his eyelids felt heavy.

"Keep ... hold ... of me ... " he said to her.

She pressed her mouth to his neck. She was warmer than he was, which for some inexplicable reason he found amusing. She, who was so old, was the one with the fever. The thought of that, of her body's heat, made him voice his one regret.

"We ... never did it properly ... in a bed, I mean."

"We will," she said, kissing him on the mouth.

Another wave came, larger than most that had preceded it, and picked them both up.

They did not break their kiss, though the water closed over their heads.

On the shore, there was plenty of commotion, but Tammy kept away from the heart of it, moving off down the beach. She had watched Todd and Katya getting smaller and smaller, her panic growing. Now they were gone. Perhaps she just couldn't make them out any longer, and they'd reappear in a moment, but she didn't have very high hopes of that. There had been such determination in the way they'd headed out into the darkness; plainly they weren't going out to enjoy a little swim, then turn round and head back to shore. They were escaping together, in the only direction left for them.

She had a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach: part horror at what she'd just witnessed, part envy. He had made his choice, finally. And now, he was gone.

She heard the throb of rotor-blades, and she looked up to see a police helicopter coming from the south, following the line of the surf as it approached the place where the lovers had disappeared. Its powerful spotlight illuminated the water with uncanny brightness.

Tammy looked back at the people assembled along the shoreline. Almost all the guests had vacated the house and were milling around on the sand. She couldn't see Maxine, but she could name a few famous folks, mainly from the color of their clothes. Glenn Close was in white; Brad Pitt in a powder blue suit; Madonna was in red. They were briefly illuminated by the flood of the search-light, then the helicopter veered off seaward, and Tammy followed its progress as it swooped down close to the water. Surely Todd and Katya couldn't have gone that far out. Even if the current had caught them, they couldn't have been swept more than a few hundred yards in the short time since they'd entered the water.

But then the current wasn't the only variable here, was it? There was also their own ambition. They had gone out intending to be lost. And lost they were.

Suddenly, she was crying. Standing outside the wedge of light thrown by the house, and beyond the presence of anyone who could possible comfort her; dirty and cold and alone, she sobbed like a baby. She made no attempt to stop the flood. 'Better out than in,' her mother had always said; and it was true. She could never think straight when she had a bout of tears waiting in the wings. It was wiser to just weep them out, and be done with them.

At last her grief began to subside, and she cleared the tears from her cheeks with her hands. The helicopter was now some distance from the shore, and had dropped even closer to the water, hovering over one particular place. She tried to make sense of the waterscape. Had the men in the helicopter located the bodies? She stared at the spotlit water until her eyes started to ache, but she could make no sense of what she was seeing. Just the spume, being whipped up off the water, so that it looked like snow in the column of white light.

After a few minutes the helicopter moved away from that position, turning off its search-light for a while as it headed down the beach. When the light was turned on again and the brightness struck the water the search had moved much further out to sea. Still Tammy kept watching, desperately trying to make sense of the sight. But at last it simply became too frustrating, and turning her back on the water, she walked back up the side of the house to the street, where many of the same people she'd seen down by the water earlier, enjoying the spectacle along with their champagne, were now waiting to pick up their cars. They were quiet, eyes downcast, as though they felt just a tiny prick of guilt at having treated the death of one of their number as a spectator sport.

Whatever interest Tammy might once have had in these people was gone. The fact that she was practically rubbing shoulders with Brad and Julia and half-a-dozen other luminaries was a matter of complete indifference to her. Her thoughts were still out there in the dark waters of the Pacific.

Finally somebody spoke; some imbecilic remark about how valets were getting slower every day. It was all this air-headed company needed to throw off their show of introspection. Chatter sprang up, and on its heels, laughter. By the time Tammy's car had arrived the group was in a fine mood, exchanging jokes and telephone numbers; the scene on the beach-the tragedy they'd all just witnessed together-already a thing of the past.

ELEVEN

Along the beach a hundred and fifty yards from where Tammy was standing all eyes were also directed seaward, and, like Tammy's eyes, saw nothing but the uncanny, almost beatific, light from the hovering helicopter as it passed back and forth over the surface of the water.

Eppstadt had his lawyer, Jacob Lazlov, on the line while he watched the water. At his side, Maxine.

"I want this sonofabitch Pickett prosecuted to the full extent of the law, Jacob. What do you mean: what did he do? He practically tore off my leg, that's what he did. In public. Jesus, Jacob, it was an attack, a physical attack. And now the bastard's trying to drown himself."

"Isn't this all a little premature?" Maxine remarked dryly. "He's probably drowned by now."

"Then I'll sue his fucking estate. I can sue the estate can't I, Jacob? Speak up, I can't hear you. The helicopter -- "

"You are a piece of work, you know that," Maxine said.

"I'll call you back, Jacob." Eppstadt snapped his phone closed and followed Maxine back across the beach to the house. On the way they encountered the waiter who'd come to Eppstadt's aid during Todd's attack.

"What's your name, son?"

"Joseph Finlay, sir."

"Well, Joe, I'd like you to do me a favor and stay within ten yards of me till I tell you otherwise. Will you do that? I'll pay you very well for your services. And if you see anything you don't like, son -- "

"I'm there, sir."

"Good. Good. But you can start by getting me a brandy. Be quick." Joe hurried away. "Didn't you have any security at this damn party, Maxine?"

"Of course!"

"Well where the fuck was it when I was having my leg torn off? Jacob's going to be asking some questions, Maxine, and you'd better have some damn good answers."

"Todd wasn't some trespasser -- " Maxine said. She had reached the patio, and now turned to face Eppstadt, tears filling her eyes. "I've known him ten years. Everyone knows him."

"Well apparently none of us knew him well enough. He was ready to kill me."

"He was nowhere near killing you," Maxine said, weary of Eppstadt's self-dramatization. She sank down into the chair where she'd been sitting when Todd had first arrived, turning it round so she could watch the beach.

"Your brandy, sir."

Eppstadt took his brandy. Joe pulled a chair up, and Eppstadt sat down in it. "Ten yards," he said to Joe.

"I'm here."

Joe stepped back a little distance to give Eppstadt and Maxine a measure of privacy. Eppstadt took out a pack of cigarettes; offered one to Maxine, who took it with trembling fingers. He lit both, and leaned back in his chair.

"Sonofabitch," he said. "Who'd ever have thought he'd pull a stunt like this?"

"I think it all got too much for him," Maxine said. "He cracked."

"No doubt. What was he talking about: some house you put him in?"

"Oh yes, that house," Maxine said. "It all began with that fucking house. Where's Jerry Brahms?"

"Who?"

Maxine couldn't see Jerry, but she spotted Sawyer, her assistant, who was inside the house, eating. He came at her summons, mouth stuffed with canapes. She told him to find Jerry, pronto.

"I think we have to assume the current took them," Eppstadt said, directing Maxine's attention at the helicopter, which had steadily moved further and further out from the beach in its search. There were now two Coast Guard boats bobbing around in the water, mounted with searchlights.

"Have people no taste?" Maxine said, surveying the condo on the beach. To make matters worse, something of the party atmosphere had returned to the gathering. The waiters were weaving amongst the guests, refreshing drinks or offering finger food. It was not being refused. People seemed to be of the opinion that the evening's drama was best viewed as part of the fun.

A waiter brought a platter to Maxine's side. "Sushi?" he said. She looked at the array of raw fish with almost superstitious disgust.

"Oh God, why not?" Eppstadt said, a little too heartily. "In fact you can leave the platter."

"How can you eat?"

"I'm hungry. And if I were you, I'd keep me happy. Treat me very delicately." He examined the piece of yellow-tail in his fingers. "I suppose at this point I could get all stirred up wondering what the fish was eating before it was caught ... but why wonder?"

Maxine got up from her chair and walked over to the railing. "I always thought you liked Todd."

"I thought he was acceptable company up to a point. But then he got full of himself, and he became impossible. Your handiwork, of course."

"What?"

"Telling him he was the next best thing to sliced bread, when all along he was just another pretty face. And now not even that, thanks to Doctor Burrows." He picked up a second piece of sushi. "I tell you, if Todd is dead, then he's done the best thing he could do for his reputation. I know how that sounds, but it's the truth. Now he's got a crack at being a legend. If he'd lived, grown old, everyone would have realized he couldn't act his way out of a damp paper bag. And it would have made us all look like fools. You for representing him, me for spending all that money on him over the years."

"Maxine?"

Sawyer was leading a stricken Jerry up onto the patio. At some point in the recent past his rug had become partially unglued and now sat off-center on his head.

"Todd's gone," he said.

"We can't be sure yet, Jerry. Sawyer, get Mr. Brahms a scotch and soda. Light on the scotch. Jerry, this is Mr. Eppstadt, from Paramount."

"I'm familiar ... " Jerry said, his gaze going from Eppstadt as soon as he'd laid eyes on him, and drifting off again towards the water. "It's useless. I don't know why they keep searching. They've been swept away by now."

"The house, Jerry."

"What?"

"In the Canyon," Eppstadt said. "I've been hearing about it from Maxine."

"Oh. I see. Well ... there's not a lot I can tell you. I just used to go there as a child. I was an actor, you see, when I was much younger."

"And were there other children there?"

"No. Not that I remember, at least. Just a woman called Katya Lupi -- who took me under her wing. She's the one ... " he pointed out towards the waterline " ... who took Todd."

"No, Jerry," Maxine said. "Whoever that woman was, she was young."

"Katya was young."

"This girl looked twenty-five."

"Katya looked twenty-five." He accepted his scotch and soda from Sawyer. "She wasn't, of course. She was probably a hundred."

"Then how the hell can she have looked twenty-five?" Eppstadt demanded.

Jerry had two words by way of reply.

"Coldheart Canyon."

Eppstadt had no reply to this. He just stared at Brahms, bewildered.

"She looks young," Jerry said. "But she isn't. That was her out there, no doubt about it. Personally, I think it was some kind of a suicide pact between them."

"That's ridiculous!" Maxine snorted. "Todd's got his whole life in front of him."

"I think he may have been more desperate than you realized," Jerry said. "Perhaps if you'd been a little better as friends, he'd still be with us."

"I don't think it's very useful to toss that kind of accusation around," Eppstadt said. "Especially when we don't know the facts."

"I think the facts are very plain," Jerry said. "I still read Variety." He pointed at Maxine. "You decided to give up on representing him, when he was having difficulties with his career. And you -- " now the accusatory finger went in Eppstadt's direction " -- cancelled a movie which he had his heart set on. Not to mention the fact that you -- " the finger returned to Maxine " -- just made a public display of humiliating him. Is it any wonder he decided to put an end to his life?"

Neither accusee attempted a defense. What was the use? What Jerry had said was a matter of public record.

"I want to see this Canyon," Eppstadt said. "And the house."

"The house has nothing to do with any of this," Jerry said. "Frankly, I suggest you keep your distance from it. You've already -- "

Eppstadt ignored him. "Where is it?" he demanded of Maxine.

"Well I've never been able to find it on a map but the Canyon runs parallel with Laurel Canyon. I don't think it's even got a proper name."

"Coldheart Canyon," Brahms said again. "That's what they used to call it in the Silent Era. Because she was supposed to have such a cold heart, you see."

"You know your way there?" Eppstadt asked Maxine.

"I ... suppose I could find my way ... but I'd prefer somebody to drive me."

"You," Eppstadt said. It was his turn to point.

Jerry shook his head.

"It's either you taking me, or the police."

"Why'd you want to call the police?"

"Because I think there's some kind of conspiracy going on. You. Pickett. The woman who went into the sea with him. You're all in this together."

"To do what, for God's sake?"

"I don't know: promote that asshole's career?

"I assure you -- "

"I don't care to hear your assurances," Eppstadt said. "I just need you to take me to this Canyon of yours."

"It's not mine. It's hers. Katya's. If we went there we'd be trespassing on her property."

"I'll take that risk."

"Well I won't."

"Maxine, tell him he's coming."

"I don't see why you want to go," Jerry pleaded.

"Let's just make Mr. Eppstadt happy right now, shall we?"

"I just don't want to trespass." Jerry said again.

"Well you can blame me," Eppstadt said. "Tell this Lupi woman-if she ever surfaces again-that I forced you to take me. Where's the waiter? Joe!"

Eppstadt's makeshift bodyguard came over. "We're going to make a little field-trip. I'd like you to come with us."

"Oh? Okay."

"Maxine, do you have a gun?"

"I'm not going with you."

"Yes you are, m'dear. A gun. Do you have one?"

"Several. But I'm not going. I've had enough excitement for one night. I need some sleep."

"Well here's your choices. Come now and let's find out what the hell's going on up there, together. Or sit tight and wait for my lawyer to call you in the morning."

Maxine looked at him blankly.

"Do I take that as a yes?" he said.

There were five in the expedition party. Maxine's assistant Sawyer, armed with one of Maxine's guns, drove Maxine. And in a second car, driven by Jerry, went Eppstadt and Joe. The larger of Maxine's guns, a .45, was in Eppstadt's possession. He claimed he knew how to use it.

By the time they had left many of the party-goers had already drifted away, leaving a hard core of perhaps thirty-five people, many of them still on the beach, waiting to see if anything noteworthy was going to happen. About fifteen minutes after Eppstadt's expedition had departed for the hills the Coast Guard called off the helicopter. There had been a boating accident up the coast -- nine people in the water -- and air support was urgently needed. One of the two search boats was also called off, leaving the other to make wider and wider circles as any hope that the lost souls were still alive and close to the shore steadily grew more remote, and finally, faded entirely.