Joseph Kanon - Stardust

Ben heard them cross the room and then the light went out and the door slammed. He breathed out, the blood coming back, and realized he was sweating. He nudged the screen back, trying to do it silently. Give them a few minutes. He looked around the dark office. He’d have to use the window after all.

He leaned against the wall, waiting, thinking about the conversation. Their jobs. He was going to get the studios to do it for him. And they would. Buying time, feeding him one piece at a time, staying 100 percent American. Even Bunny, who understood, would have to give him somebody, a face to start with. He thought suddenly of Bunny’s face as it had been, guileless, a Freddie Bartholomew tear running down his cheek. An orphan. If you were fired at one studio, you’d never work at another. It would be understood, the way Minot wanted it.

Some headlights went by outside the window. Minot’s or just another car? Not yet. He looked at the files. Any one of them. And then he knew who it would be, the pragmatic choice. The file was right here, easy for him to take. Would it make any difference? You could reconstruct a file. If you remembered the sources, knew the cross references, had the time. And Minot now was in a rush. Danny had tried to help her once, never reported a thing. She must have meant something to him. Ben glanced at the file drawer again. Right here. Be Danny one more time.

He went over to the files and flicked through the tabs. Miliken, Millard, Miller. He took it out, bulky, and put it in his jacket, feeling his blood rush again. He glanced around, a thief’s involuntary gesture, then closed the drawer and went over to the window, trying to estimate the drop. Not far, the first floor, but you’d have to dangle a second before you dropped or risk your ankles, just the second a car might be passing. But everything seemed quiet. Wilshire was always busy, but the side street mostly took the outflow of the parking lot. He waited another minute, listening, then opened the window and swung out. When he was over, still hanging from the lintel, he tried to reach up with one hand to bring the window back down, but it jammed and putting his weight on one hand made it begin to slip, so he brought the other back and let himself down, dropping slowly until he was a few feet from the ground. Now. He hit the ground just as a pair of headlights swung around from Wilshire. He was wincing from the dull shock of the jump, but forced himself up before the light could reach him. A crouch would be suspicious. Your body told the story. Somebody walking, heading for the lot. The car passed.

Liesl was still down the street.

“I didn’t know what to do. It was Bunny, wasn’t it? What was he doing?”

“Fixing things. He thinks. Drop me at the studio. I told him I’d be there.”

“He saw you? What did he say?”

“Nothing. He was more upset that I saw him. Kind of thing you like to do by yourself.”

“What?”

“Make deals.”

She was quiet for a minute, moving them into traffic. “What’s going to happen?”

“I don’t know.”

She fixed on the windshield, shivering a little. “It’s like before. Today, at the studio, I felt it. The way it was before the war. The quiet. Nobody talks. Everybody knows and nobody talks. So it’s like that again.”

There were a few lights on in the Admin building, but Bunny’s office was dark so Ben headed over to the screening room. He touched the letter in his jacket, aware suddenly of the shadows and the deserted alleys between the sound stages, a perfect place to wait. No shots, another crack on the head, fatal this time, Carl oblivious at the gate while someone went through Ben’s pockets.

Bunny was alone in the screening room, running a picture.

“Just a minute,” he said, motioning Ben to sit. “Watch this.” Not rushes, an old feature, Claudette Colbert in a gold lame evening dress, clearly gold even in black and white. “Watch her wiggle in the seat.” A society party, people listening to a classical singer. “She got in with a pawn ticket and now they’re onto her. Barrymore knows. Look at the way they size each other up.”

But Ben was watching Bunny, his face soft with pleasure, living in the picture even as he talked.

“Now Hedda makes the announcement. See the one with her back to us? That’s Polly.”

“Polly?”

“Mm. Her greatest performance. Hedda gave her her start, with the column. Watch Barrymore’s eyebrows. Nobody could ham like that. The way they play off each other. Her eyes. It’s perfect, isn’t it?”

Claudette was getting up, summoned by a butler, and Bunny picked up the phone.

“Stop it there, Jerry. Thanks.” His eyes were still on the screen as the lights came up. “One week at the Paramount and it’s gone. But it was perfect. That look, like a grace note. That’s what we’re supposed to be doing here, putting in grace notes. Making things better.”

“What’s the picture?”

“ Midnight. Before the war.” He got up. “There’s a sequence I wanted to see, a bit with taxis. But I don’t think we can use it.” He turned to Ben. “What were you doing there?”

“If you don’t know, you’ll never have to answer that,” Ben said, feeling the weight in his pocket.

Bunny looked at him, then moved away, running his hand over the back of his seat. “I suppose you heard everything, behind your little arras.”

“Faint mumblings.”

“I should have had a sword. Run you through. But I find I never do have one, when I need it.” He stopped. “Don’t interfere in this.”

Ben nodded, noncommittal.

“I mean it. Just put it out of your mind. We’ll both do that. What were you doing, though?”

“Catching up on my filing. They make interesting reading.”

“Not anymore. Stay out of it.”

“Don’t give him anybody.”

“You think I’m enjoying this?” He walked down the aisle, away from Ben. “It’s business, that’s all.”

“No. It’s going to get worse.”

“Not for us,” Bunny said quickly. “Look, I’m walking a tightrope here.” He lifted his arms from his sides a little, a balancing mime. “Don’t shake it. Don’t huff. Don’t puff.” He looked at Ben. “Don’t anything. Or you’re off the lot. Mr. L or no.”

The back door to the Cherokee was kept locked now, so he went through the front, past the new night clerk, attentive, maybe a Bureau man, planted too late. Upstairs he flicked on the light before going in and flung the door open, in case another Ray was waiting. He opened the French windows to let in some air, then went back to the door and wedged a desk chair under the knob. Would he really try here again? Dropping somehow onto the balcony?

Ben sat on the bed and pulled out the sheet of names. Wallace. Gilbert. No more recognizable than before. Not here, not in San Francisco. Friedman. He stopped. A name he had heard. Literally heard. A voice saying it. But whose? He tried putting it in people’s mouths to see how it would sound-Liesl, Bunny, anyone he knew, but nothing came. Still, he’d heard it somewhere. On the lot? Lasner’s party? Let it go. If you tried to force it, nothing came. You had to let it pop into your head.

He looked at the door again, barricaded, what his life was going to be like now. What if he never came? But he’d want the list. Unless he’d decided to write it off as a bad risk, move on. Still, he’d tried once, a man dead. A day, two. Or he’d have to use more bait.

Minot presented the hearings as a preliminary fact-finding inquiry, something local, but he was staging them like a full Washington investigation. The press had its own section in the hearing room, behind the newsreel cameras, but half were still outside covering the witnesses arriving, a premiere without the broad smiles. The public seats filled almost immediately, with a few front rows reserved for the witnesses, studio VIPs, and anyone with a friend on Minot’s staff. Ostermann, surprisingly, was in the press section, near Polly, who kept leaping up and down to talk to people, then scribble notes, a blur of eager restlessness. The committee sat at a long table, not a raised judge’s bench, but the arrangement, looking across at the witnesses and their lawyers, still had a courtroom effect.