Night Film

53

When I arrived in the city, it was after noon. There was still no word from Hopper or Nora. I took a cab back to Perry Street. Nora had a spare set of keys, so I wondered if she’d somehow been unable to get in touch and had beaten me home. But the apartment was empty, no messages on my home phone.

I took a shower, considered going back to bed, but felt too strung out, too uneasy—too annoyed.

They’d left the general for dead on the battlefield. Or had something happened? I didn’t have time to worry about it, because my cell buzzed, reminding me that Peg Martin, one of the actors in Isolate 3, would be in the Washington Square Park dog run tonight at 6 P.M. It was the lead Beckman had given me almost a week ago.

I headed into my office, feeding Septimus some birdseed, and pulled Peg Martin’s 1995 Sneak interview out of my box of notes. After Cordova’s 1977 Rolling Stone piece, it was the only time anyone who’d worked with him had spoken candidly about the experience.