Dream Town

Chapter 24

Archer ducked down another corridor as the footsteps behind him picked up momentum. He had a strong feeling now that if he were discovered he would not be around to see the sun rise. LA had an abundance of lonely roads, shallow rivers, and empty concrete aqueducts in which to dump bodies. It was actually a thriving industry and created lots of jobs, but he didn’t want to contribute to that particular economy. He stopped and listened, imagining himself to be a scout once more with the Army in Europe. The only trouble was that was a long time ago, and a slender corridor didn’t provide nearly as much room to hide as a continent. In any event, after nearly eight years away from the Army, Archer wasn’t sure he was up to the task any longer.

He looked quickly around and saw a door with a porthole window at eye level. He raced to it and was through the opening and closed the door behind him before the men appeared in the hall. Archer found a storage room down here, and he hid behind some boxes for a good half hour, desperately wishing he had his gun.

After that he peered out into the hall and spied another door that might be a way out. He reached it, found it opened to a stairwell, and was about to head down when he heard someone coming up. He went the other way on the stairs, reached the top floor, opened the door, and gazed quickly around. This part of the building looked unused, with crates, old draperies and beds, furniture, and discarded metal equipment of various sizes and functions. Their disuse was represented by the smells of mildew, mold, and rot. He couldn’t hide here, but he did spot a way out: a window. He went over to it and finally saw something in his favor. The window was difficult to raise, but he managed it.

He stepped out onto the wrought iron fire escape and looked down. He figured he was gazing onto the alley at the rear of the building. He made his way down each set of fire escape steps and platforms until he reached the last one. As he slid the ladder down and dropped to the ground he looked up in time to see a man peering down at him from the top window. A moment later a gun was pointing at him. A second after that it was firing at him, but Archer had already fled around the corner toward the front of the building.

He could hear shouts from all over now and knew his odds of escaping were slim to zero, and his final resting place might be in a hole in Chinatown, or the silty bottom of the Pacific. Neither one appealed to him.

The next second Archer ran headlong into someone and he felt the man’s fingers close around his throat. It was the struggle on the beach all over again. Although this time his opponent was the doorman. And his empty knife holder apparently hadn’t really been empty, because the curved blade was in his hand.

Archer didn’t waste a second because he didn’t have one to waste. He grabbed the knife hand and held it away from him. Next, he planted an elbow in the man’s face, breaking his nose. Then he kicked his foot out and bent the man’s knee the wrong way. The man went down screaming in pain, and then Archer laid him out with a crushing hook to the jaw. He had to keep thanking the Army for teaching him so thoroughly how to fight, win, and stay alive to fight again. As he kept running he looked down at his hand: It was wet.

The guy’s knife hadn’t entirely missed. Archer had a two-inch-long gash in his left palm. He took out his handkerchief, wound it around his hand, and kept running.

Just as he got to the front entrance the silver Rolls pulled up, and the same actress staggered down the steps and into it. Archer followed right behind the lady, pushing her into the far seat and closing the door after him. The Rolls sped off, the driver apparently not even aware that he had a spare passenger.

Archer looked out the window in time to see the man in the gray suit hustle out of the front entrance and look around. He had obviously not seen Archer slide into the Rolls. But Archer did get a good look at him. He was in his forties, trim and hard, standing about five-ten. There was nothing particularly memorable about him, except for the sets of ugly intersecting scars across his face. Archer had been unable to see these marks when he had first arrived here, because the man had ducked away too quickly.

As the Rolls turned the corner and sped up, Archer looked at the woman next to him. He wasn’t sure she was aware he was there until she turned to him and said, “Who the hell are you?”

The words were not uttered in anger or fear. She just seemed curious.

“Just hitching a ride to where I parked my car, if you don’t mind. You like the Jade?”

“I go there for kicks.”

“I’m sure you do. You’re in pictures, right?”

Her lovely face now showed alarm. She sat up and said, “You’re not some dirty reporter, are you? So help me God if you’re with—” She tried to hit him but he caught her wrist an inch from his face.

Archer looked toward the driver, but he was old and maybe a little hard of hearing, or he was used to arguments in the back seat of this car. Whatever the reason, he just kept looking out the windscreen and driving while the car’s radio played Nat King Cole.

“Relax, lady, I don’t work for any rag. I was at the Jade on my own business.”

“What sort of business?” she snapped.

Archer could see why she was a star. The camera would love the angles of her face, the way her eyes widened and then brightened like precious stones before they tapered back to a dull glow that was even more interesting and perhaps telling of what she was thinking, and of a possible vulnerability. And the way her full lips quivered just so.

“I’m a detective.”

“What were you doing in there, then?”

“Detecting.”

“Says you. I don’t believe a word of it.”

“Yeah, I probably wouldn’t either if I were you.” He looked out the window to see where they were. “Hey, Pops, right at the next street and then two blocks down, you can drop me.”

The old man eyed him in the mirror, suddenly aware that he was there. “Miss—”

“It’s all right, Alan, just do as he says.” She looked at Archer and then her gaze dropped to his hand. “My God, you’re bleeding.”

“It’s nothing. Fell on a knife back there that a guy was holding.”

“What happened to him?”

“When he wakes up, I’m sure he’ll try to figure it out.”

“Did you figure out anything back there, Mister Detective?” she said.

“Yeah, but the Jade’s not a good place if you ask questions, or want a drink that doesn’t incinerate your throat. How long you been going there for kicks?”

“Ever since I got famous, hell, didn’t you know?”

“No, I didn’t. Which begs the question of why you need that kind of place now.”

Archer didn’t need an answer to his question. She had to go back because she couldn’t not go back. But she could get her fix from anywhere, including her own studio, so what was the draw of the Jade?

She seemed to know what he was thinking. She turned away from him and curled up in her furry fox stole. “Just leave me alone.” Her voice was no longer breathless; it sounded normal, and upset.

“You got a good thing going, why mess it up?”

She looked back at him. “If I had a choice, maybe.”

“And you don’t?”

“Who in this town really does, Mister Detective?”

Archer was about to reply with something pithy and mildly scolding, but then he thought about Callahan and the casting couch. If a person like Liberty...

“I see what you mean.”

She looked back at him, her full lips parted in pleasant surprise. “Do you really?”

“I got friends in the business. It’s got this public side with the pictures of good-looking people doing wonderful things, all the glam, the money, the homes, the yachts. Then you got the other side, which is about ninety percent of the pie, like the part of the iceberg no one sees until it’s too late. That part isn’t pretty at all. But you know that better than I ever will. It’s a high price to pay, but people pay it. Lots of them.”

She was nodding before he stopped. “You’re cute. And smarter than you look.”

“Cute men often are.”

“Did you happen to see me back there?”

His grin faded. “Back where?”

“You know where. And why else would you be advising me to quit that joint unless you saw something?”

“I saw more than maybe I needed to see. But it goes no farther. I promise.”

“Hell, people make promises in this town every minute of every day with no intention of ever keeping them.” She turned away. “I came here from a little place in Minnesota. I don’t want anyone to know about... the Jade.”

“I’m not telling anybody. And what studio owns you, by the way?”

“MGM. Why?”

“They have a pretty decent fixer group. I know one of them. You shouldn’t have to go this alone. Where are they on all this?”

“Nowhere, because they don’t know.”

“And you think that’s smart?”

“I’m actually happy about it. If they knew, the studio would make me sign a new deal, and I’d have to go to bed with the asshole who runs it, again. I don’t want to. I’m sick and tired of it. And he’s old and married.”

“Who is the clown?”

“Never mind. There’re a million just like him, so what does it matter?”

“You want me to talk to him for you? Lay down the law?”

She laughed. “What are you, a Boy Scout or a choirboy, or both?”

“I have my moments. But while I have you here...” He pulled out the photo of Lamb. “You ever seen her at the Jade?”

The woman looked at the photo. “Sure, a few times.”

Archer looked surprised, because he was. He tapped Lamb’s image. “You’re sure? Take a closer look.”

“No, not her, the other one.”

Archer gazed down at the beaming Alice Jacoby. “Her? You’re certain?”

“Didn’t I just say I was?”

The car slowed and Alan said, “Right here, sir?”

Archer looked out the window and saw the Delahaye parked across the street. “That’ll do, thanks, pal.” He opened the door, but then looked back at her. “For what it’s worth, if you never go back to that place, it’ll be the best thing you could ever do.”

“For my career?” she said with lovely, hiked dark eyebrows. The feeble illumination in the car seemed to make her platinum hair shimmer like descending sunlight on rippling water.

“No, for your life.”

She leaned over, nuzzled his neck, and then kissed him on the lips, running her soft hand down his jaw. “I’ve never had a man jump into my car before. I kind of like it.”

“I have to do it more often then.”

“Maybe our paths will cross again.”

She sounded like she was delivering a line from a bad script, but was believing every word. Not wanting to pop her drugged-up bubble, Archer finished the lousy scene by kissing her cheek and saying, “You can cross my path anytime, lady.”

He got out, and the Rolls drove on.

Archer knew if the woman were lucky her career would last until this time next year. If she were unlucky, she’d be dead by the end of the month. And they’d find a hundred just as lovely and breathless to take her place, no problem. The Midwest alone was turning them out like GM did cars.

Archer left Chinatown behind with a lot to think about and make sense of. He needed some more peroxide and a bandage and, most critically, a drink, a real one. And Archer knew exactly the lady he wanted to have that drink with.