Joseph Kanon - Stardust

Ben watched, fascinated, as this rolled out in what seemed to be one breath, effortless.

“Congressman-”

“I take my hat off to you. What’s Winchell say? Orchids? An orchid for that one. You know Dennis, I think. My friend Ben Collier here? He’s still in the service, come to think of it. Still working for Uncle Sam. Making one of those great pictures the WAC’s been putting out this year. It’s not over for them.”

“Yes, at Continental. Of course. Good to see you again,” she said, her eyes almost doing a double take. Someone she hadn’t quite got the measure of before, a friend of Minot’s. “I hear Sol Lasner thinks the world of you.”

Ben shrugged, not knowing how to respond.

“Awful about Fay’s cousin, isn’t it? I heard you were there.”

“Terrible,” he agreed, noncommittal, avoiding her eyes.

“You’d think they could’ve met at Sol’s, not have her drive way out there. Road like that. Probably feels terrible about it now.”

“Who?”

“Whoever she was meeting. The one who called.”

“What?” he said, everything stopping for a second, his whole body rooted.

“Somebody called her, that afternoon. They think that’s why she went out.”

“I hadn’t heard that.”

How had she? Fay? Lorna? The Hollywood switchboard.

“And in the rain. You’d think-but you never know about people, do you?”

“Well, you do,” Minot said, “that’s for sure. There’s not much Polly misses, or so they tell me.” A wrapping-up voice, ready to leave. Riordan, hearing it, handed a stub to the parking attendant.

“I get paid not to miss anything,” Polly said, smiling again, flattered.

“Well, you keep writing pieces like Sunday’s, they’d better give you a raise. You can tell them I said so, too,” he said, a verbal wink. “That was fine work. Nice to run into you.” Moving her through the door before she could say anything else.

Ben stood still, only vaguely aware of them. Who would she have been meeting? Not Feuchtwanger. Had she been peering through the rain, looking for house numbers? But the houses stopped and she had gone on. But not necessarily lost, or alone.

“That’s a powerful lady,” Minot was saying. “Do you know how many people-first thing they do in the morning, turn to Polly? Millions.”

“One hundred twenty-three newspapers,” Ben said dully, still preoccupied.

Minot looked at him, surprised, then let it pass. “And the radio,” he said. “A good friend to have.” His car was being brought up. “I’m glad we could do this,” he said to Ben. “I think we can do some good work. You know the MPC?”

Ben shook his head.

“Motion Picture Council. For the First Amendment.”

“Pinks,” Riordan said.

“But not a front group. Legitimate. You might think about joining it. Show them where your heart is. What you might be ready for. Let them approach you.” He paused, an interior debate. “How well do you know Kaltenbach?”

“I’ve met him. He’s close to Ostermann. I thought you weren’t interested in the Germans.”

“Only if they’re in the industry.”

“He had a lifesaver contract at Warners in ’forty-one. One year. He hasn’t worked since.”

“At a hundred dollars a week. That still sounds like a lot of money to some people. Hollywood money.”

“He’s nobody.”

“The Germans don’t seem to think so. The East Germans.”

“He’s a famous writer there. Nobody’s heard of him here.”

“Maybe he’ll be better known.”

Ben watched him hand some money to the attendant.

“How?” he said, apprehensive.

“Be a help to us if you could let us know what his plans are.”

“I thought you said-”

“The State Department’s unreliable. People write them-influential people-and they do things they shouldn’t. If it were me, there wouldn’t be a hope in hell he could go anywhere, but it’s not up to me. So we need to keep an eye on him. I don’t want him taking any trips. Not before the hearings.”

“You’re going to call him? He’s a Communist?”

Minot shook his head. “No, just two meetings. A little window shopping. But we can put him at the meetings. That means he can tell us who else was there.”

“I don’t think he’ll do that.”

“He’ll have a lot of incentive under oath.”

“Who put him at the meetings?” Ben said, queasy, already knowing.

Minot looked at him, not saying anything.

“Danny saved his life, in France.”

“I’m trying to save this country,” Minot said. He put his hand on Ben’s shoulder, about to move to his car. “Nice to have you with us.”

Fay assumed it was a condolence call and insisted they have coffee on the back patio. The day was mild but overcast, fall on Summit Drive, and she put a light cardigan over her shoulders as they went out. After Lorna brought the tray, Fay poured from the silver pot, fluttering like Billie Burke, then sat back and lit a cigarette, crossing her still-good Goldwyn Girl legs.

“It was nice of you to come. There’s no one to talk to-who knew her, I mean.”

“It was only the once. But I liked her.”

“The language was a problem. People don’t make the effort.”

“The friend who called-he was German?”

“Well, Lorna didn’t think so at first. She thought it was Bunny, somebody from the studio, you know. But then Genia spoke German to him, so it must have been.”

“A man, then?”

“Mm hmm. Why?”

“I just wondered. He never called again?”

“No, isn’t it the strangest thing? Maybe he doesn’t know. Thinks he was stood up or something. The notice in the papers-if you blinked, you missed it. I can’t imagine who it was. She never talked to anybody.”

“Maybe someone she knew before. Over there.”

“But she never went out. Where would she-?”

“At the party, maybe. She met people then.”

“You, mostly. Of course, Bunny can talk to a stone, so she knew him. Maybe somebody through the Red Cross. I don’t know. None of it makes sense to me. I mean, you call to meet somebody, it’s usually a hotel, a bar, someplace like that.”

“Maybe she was going to his house.”

“And never got there. Or maybe she did. I never thought of that. Maybe it was after.” She frowned, turning this over. “Well, he has the number.”

“Let me know if he calls, will you?”

She looked at him, surprised, her cigarette in midair.

“Just curious. It’s like a mystery.”

“Everything about her was a mystery.” She inhaled some smoke. “Look, we don’t have to pretend. She didn’t slide off the road, did she?”

Ben said nothing.

“I thought it would help, all this,” she said, stretching her hand toward the sloping lawn. “Well, you do what you can. She liked the garden. So that’s one thing.”

“You’ve put a lot of work into it,” he said, taking in the lush rose beds, the perennial borders.

“Me? I wouldn’t know a weed from-well, whatever the opposite is. Miguel does everything. Filipino, but with a Mex name, don’t ask me why.”

“It was a Spanish colony. So lots of Spanish names.”

“Is that right? Ha. Wait till I tell Sol.” She looked over at him. “That’s something everybody knows, right? About it being a colony?”

“No. It was a while ago.”

“But people know.” She laughed. “Who am I kidding? Sitting here with a teapot, la-di-da, like I ever made it past ninth grade. Bunny likes me with all this high-tone stuff, and fine, I like it, too, because Sol likes it, but I know. I like the roses, though, to look at. Sometimes I look at this place and I think, who would have imagined? All those years on the road, washing out things in the sink, and now you’ve got your own roses, not just what some guy brings backstage. A gardener with a fancy name.” She stopped and looked away. “But I guess she didn’t see it that way.”