Jonathan Kellerman - Private Eyes

I said, “I’ll have the bass.”

Milo scanned the menu. “How’s the entrecÔte ?”

“Excellent, sir.”

“That’s what I’ll have. Bloody rare, with double potatoes.”

She stepped behind the partition into the kitchen and began cooking.

We touched glasses and drank beer.

I said, “According to Anger, Chickering said the search for Gina is over.”

“Not surprised. Last time I checked with the Sheriffs was one-thirty this afternoon. They were pretty much winding down- not a trace of her anywhere in the park.”

“Lady in the lake, huh?”

“Looks that way.” He ran his hand over his face. “Okay. Time to share. Who first?”

“Go ahead.”

“Basically,” he said, “it’s been hooray for Hollywood. Spent most of my day talking to movie people and ex-movie people and associated hangers-on.”

“Crotty?”

“No, Crotty’s gone. Died a couple of months ago.”

“Oh,” I said, thinking of the scrawny old vice cop turned gay activist. “I thought the AZT was working.”

“We all did. Unfortunately, he didn’t. Sat on the porch of that little farm he had up in the hills and ate a gun.”

“Sorry.”

“Yeah. In the end, he did it like a cop… Anyway, what I learned in cinemaville: Apparently Gina and Ramp and McCloskey were all pretty chummy back in the good old days. There was this group of contract players at Apex Studios during the mid- to late sixties. McCloskey wasn’t exactly part of it, but he hung out with them, started his modeling agency by getting the others photo gigs- pretty faces, both sexes. From everything I hear, they were a wild bunch, lots of boozing and doping and partying, though no one has anything bad to say about Gina specifically. So if she sinned, she did it quietly. Most of them never went anywhere, career-wise. Gina was the most likely to succeed, but the acid thing kiboshed that. The studio knew it was a buyer’s market, lots of fresh flesh bused in daily from Iowa. So it gave these kids shoestring contracts, used them for walk-ons, various ancillary services, then ditched them when the wrinkles started showing.”

“Ramp never mentioned knowing McCloskey more than casually.”

“He knew him all right, though from what I hear they weren’t good buddies.”

Milo raised his briefcase to his lap, opened it, searched, and came up with a brown marbled-paper folder. Inside was a black-and-white photograph with the Apex Studios snowy-mountain logo on the lower-right margin. The shot had been taken at some kind of nightclub- or maybe it was just a set. Fluted leather booth, mirrored wall, white-linened table, silver service, crystal ashtrays and cigarette boxes. Half a dozen good-looking people in their early twenties wearing stylish evening clothes. Smiling photogenically and smoking and raising glasses in a toast.

Gina Prince nÉe Paddock sat dead center, blond and beautiful, in an off-the-shoulder gown that photographed gray, and a pearl choker that emphasized the length and smoothness of her neck. The resemblance to Melissa was striking.

Don Ramp next to her, husky and tan and healthy-looking, sans mustache. Joel McCloskey on her other side, slick-haired and handsome- almost pretty. His smile was different from those of the others. Outsider’s uncertain grin. A cigarette between his fingers was burned down nearly to the filter.

Two other faces- a man and a woman- that I didn’t recognize. And one, at the far end, that I did.

“This,” I said, pointing to a sharp-featured brunette in a dangerously low-cut black dress, “is Bethel Drucker. Noel’s mother. She’s blond now, but this is her- I just met her today. She works for Ramp as a waitress at his restaurant. She and Noel live upstairs.”

“My, my,” said Milo. “One big happy family.” He pulled another piece of paper out of the briefcase. “Let’s see, she must be Becky Dupont. Nom du cinÉma. ” Leaning forward, he took hold of a corner of the photo. “Good-looking woman. Voluptuous.”

“She still is.”

“Good-looking or voluptuous?”

“Both. Though she shows some wear.”

He looked toward the kitchen, where Joyce was working next to the chef. “Must be the day for voluptuous. Tell you one thing, old Becky/Bethel liked her dope. Downers and Quaaludes, according to my sources. Not that you need sources- look at those eyes.”

I peered closely at the finely wrought face and saw what he meant. Wide, dark eyes half-closed, the lids sagging. The bit of iris visible, dull and dreamy and distant. Unlike McCloskey’s, her smile reflected genuine bliss. But the amusement had nothing to do with the party at hand.

“It fits,” I said, “with something Noel said to me today. About always knowing drugs were bad. He started to explain, then changed his mind and said he’d read about it. He’s a really intense kid, very straitlaced and self-directed- almost too good to be true. If he grew up seeing what wild living did to his mom, that could explain it. Something about him got my antennae buzzing- maybe that was it.”

I gave him back the photo. Before he put it away, he took another look. “So. Looks like everyone knows everyone knows everyone, and Hollywood has sunk its fangs into San Labrador.”

“What about the other two people in the picture?”

“The guy is one of my sources, to remain unnamed. The girl is a would-be starlet named Stacey Brooks. Deceased- car crash, 1971, probable DUI. Like I said, a wild bunch.”

“Those ancillary services they provided to the studio,” I said. “That mean the casting couch?”

“That and related stuff- crowd scenes at various parties, dating potential backers and other pooh-bahs. Basically being available to satisfy a variety of appetites. Ramp was especially versatile- handsome escort for the ladies, sub rosa amusement for the gentlemen. He was a cooperative fellow, did what he was told. The studio rewarded him with a few parts- mostly minor roles in westerns and cop flicks.”

“What about McCloskey?”

“My sources remember him as a swaggering tough-guy type. Bargain-basement Brando, toothpick in the mouth, always hinting at pals in New Joisey, but never really fooling anyone. Also, he hated gays, didn’t hesitate to say so without being asked. Maybe it was real, maybe he was latent and protesting too much. No one seems to have a clear handle on who he went to bed with other than Gina. What they do remember are his obnoxious personality and his heavy doping- speed, coke, grass, pills. For a while, when his business was failing, he got into dealing. Supplying people at the studio. Then trading modeling services for dope- that finished his agency off. The models wanted to get paid in cash and he didn’t have any.”

“Did he ever get busted for dealing?”

“No. Why do you ask?”

“I was just wondering if Gina might have had something to do with getting him in trouble with the law. Or if he thought she had. It would have been a reason to have her burned.”

“Yeah, it sure would, but no dope record- no previous arrests of any kind before the attack.”

Joyce brought bread. When she left, I said, “How about this, then: His homophobia was a cover for his being gay. Gina found out and they had some kind of confrontation over it. Maybe she even threatened to blow his tough-guy cover. It set McCloskey off and he hired Findlay to get her. It would explain why he refused to talk about his motives. It would have humiliated him.”

“Could be,” he said. “But then why wouldn’t she have let the cat out?”

“Good question.”

“Maybe,” he said, “it was something a lot more simple: McCloskey and Gina and Ramp got involved in a triangle and McCloskey eventually freaked out. Remember the way they were sitting in the picture? She’s the meat in the sandwich. In any event, it’s probably ancient history. Probably has nothing to do with her disappearance, other than telling us something about Mr. R.”