The Ghost and the Femme Fatale

CHAPTER 2. The Big Drop

NICK BENKO: You wait around long enough and sooner or later everything falls right in your lap. EDDIE WILLIS: Like rotten apples.

– The Harder They Fall, 1956

"KEEP IT DOWN, Jack," I silently warned. "I'm watching a movie."

I can see that, doll. I'm just surprised Hollywood took a turn for the worse. I thought by now they'd be making new pictures, not recycling the same old lamplit celluloid.

" Hollywood 's made plenty of new pictures since you… since you… you know… "

Since I got lead poisoning? Got my ticket punched? My lights put out? What is it with you square Janes? Always tiptoeing around the bare truth. You're completely bughouse about prettying things up-

"Jack, please! Why don't you just settle back and watch the movie?"

Because I've seen it before, doll. And it's a B picture-not that the A pictures were that much better. At least New York was filming on the cheap. In my day, Tinsel Town was spending like drunken sailors-$600,000 for one movie. What a scam job. Leaking that kind of scratch for what? Costume and cardboard? A couple of chippies reciting lines off a pile of papers?

"Jack, we're not in your day anymore. And I'm sorry to tell you that budgets have only gone up. Six hundred thousand won't even cover a Hollywood production's catering bill, which is beside the point anyway. This film isn't being recycled for lack of product. It's part of a retrospective on the film noir genre." The film what genre?

"Film noir. Don't tell me you've never heard of it. I know you were alive when it first emerged." I named some of the genre's titles to jog his memory.

Yeah, Okay… Jack admitted. I remember seeing some of those movies, but I can't believe twenty-first-century eggheads are getting hot and bothered about a bunch of B pictures that couldn't afford color. Fancying them up with a French name's about on the level with your generation's buying water in a bottle.

"Film noir simply means that these films all shared the same dark style and sensibility, especially the black-and-white palette, the morally ambiguous narrative viewpoint, and the realistic locations. All of that was new, revolutionary."

Realistic locations revolutionary? Listen, I knew some of those Poverty Row guys, working out in Queens. They set up in the streets instead of sound stages for one reason-because they were shooting on the cheap.

"Okay, but what about the films that featured anti-hero detectives like The Maltese Falcon or The Big Sleep?"

What about 'em?

"Weren't you a fan of them?"

Sweetheart, I didn't need to see 1,001 frames of Humphrey Bogart to tell me how the world turned. Sure, I watched those pictures-when I was tailing cheating spouses or sniffing out blackmailers and scumbag suspects. The balcony always was a nice, dark place for dirty deeds. And the only thing that made those movies worth my dime were the broads. I can't deny those long-legged starlet types were serious whistle bait.

"You mean like Hedda Geist up there?"

I waited for Jack to answer. He didn't.

"Jack?"

But there was no reply. The ghost had abruptly withdrawn- an annoying habit of Jack's. Shrugging off his sudden departure, I turned my full attention back to the movie screen, where Hedda was playing one of her most famous parts, the femme fatale Sybil Sand.

With her shimmering, torn silver gown, Hedda flagged down the car driven by the haggard salesman "Joe." He pulled his car over and she pulled him into a web of lies about her "abusive" husband. By the time she was done with him, Joe had murdered Sybil's spouse for her, so Sybil could inherit the man's fortune. Unfortunately, the husband's older sister became suspicious, and Sybil once again called on Joe to kill for her.

In the last act, Sybil and Joe were on the run, staying one step ahead of the law until Sybil herself fingered the gullible salesman for the two murders, setting him up for the gas chamber, while she (nearly) walked away-except for that bullet in her back, when Joe finally got wise that he'd been played like a piano then tossed like a used toothpick.

As Wrong Turn's score swelled to a climax and the end credits rolled, I noticed a man moving down the far aisle, then up the side staircase to the theater's stage.

The man wasn't very old, maybe late twenties, with a bulky body and round, baby face. He wore his blond hair in a ponytail and a Hawaiian shirt over baggy jeans.

From the wings, hardware store owner Bud Napp loped back out onto the stage. He nodded at the twenty-something man, set up the standing mike, and returned to the wings.

"Testing, one, two… " murmured Ponytail Man, tapping the mike. The noise came out of the speaker high above his head. The man greeted the audience, and a spotlight shined down from the projectionist's booth, making his gold loop earring sparkle.

"Who's the clown with the earring?" Seymour asked, leaning forward to stick his head between me and Brainert.

"That's no clown," Brainert replied. "That's Barry Yello, and he's been a big help organizing this weekend's events-he and

Dr. Lilly."

"Oh, right," I murmured, "Barry Yello. I should have recognized him from his book cover photo."

After dropping out of film school, Yello had founded the influential Internet site FylmGeek.com

, now read by film students and professionals in Hollywood who routinely left insider comments and opinions in the highly trafficked forum.

He'd recently published his first book, which-he announced to the crowd-he'd be signing at Buy the Book over the weekend.

"Good plug," Seymour whispered in my ear.

I gave a thumbs-up, even though his book-Bad Barry: My Love Affair with B, C, and D Movies-was only trade paper. Unit for unit, the store made better profit on the hardcovers.

"Yello's got a loyal following," Brainert assured me. "You'll be moving a lot of them."

"And now," Barry concluded, "to discuss Wrong Turn better than I ever could, I'd like to introduce a first-rate film historian, Dr. Irene Lilly."

I glanced through my program to refresh myself on Dr. Lilly's bio. A San Fernando University professor, she was best known as the author of Cities in Shadow, an award-winning study of film noir (in hardcover). But in our e-mail exchanges over the past few weeks, she was quite adamant that her appearance at the festival would be devoted entirely to promoting her brand- new hardcover, Murdered in Plain Sight.

There was nothing unusual about Dr. Lilly's wanting to promote her front-list title. Traditional author tours and appearances were geared toward exactly that. But I did find it strangely dismissive of Dr. Lilly not to care about her backlist sales, too.

"Please, Mrs. McClure," she had written, "do not bother stocking my backlist. The new title is the one I wish to promote and sell-and I'll personally handle the order and delivery. Leave everything to me "

When she took the stage, the slender, fortyish Dr. Lilly appeared relaxed and confident-and very Californian with straight, dark blonde hair tied back into a ponytail. Even Dr. Lilly's attire was California relaxed: Her sundress was a loose shift of pale flowers, her necklace was hemp and natural beads, and her flat leather footwear had more in common with beach flip-flops than evening shoes.

With Dr. Lilly's laid-back style, however, came no lack of energy. Her voice was strong, and her spirits obviously high as she addressed the crowd.

"What a treat it is to see Wrong Turn on a big screen, the way it was first shown in 1948! Don't you all agree?"

The crowd applauded.

"Wrong Turn is a classic example of film noir… but what is film noir? And why is this American cinematic style described with the French words meaning black film? To explain, I'll have to take you back to the summer of 1946. For years, the French had been cut off from American cinema. Now that the war was over, ten American films were brought over to Paris and released in one six-week period: The Maltese Falcon; Laura; Murder, My Sweet; Double Indemnity; The Woman in the Window; This Gun for Hire; The Killers; Lady in the Lake; Gilda; and The Big Sleep."

Dr. Lilly gestured to the screen behind her where a slide show of old movie posters was being projected. "The release of these movies in a concentrated time period caused a sensation. The French critics immediately recognized that a new style of film had begun to be made before and during the war. These were darker-themed pictures that dealt with crime, detectives, and middle-class murder. The films were sometimes based on, or similar to, the novels of Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, and James M. Cain-novels that the French already had labeled serie noire or 'black series.' "

I knew all of this already, but I listened patiently.

"As part of that movement," Dr. Lilly continued, "Wrong Turn was produced in the late 1940s by Irving Vreen's Gotham Features-a Poverty Row studio, operating out of Queens, New York. The film's leading lady, Sybil Sand, played by Hedda Geist, shows us one of the genre's most powerful archetypes, the femme fatale. Tonight, in Sybil, you've seen the same kind of 'sexy but dangerous woman' that you'll also be seeing in other films scheduled this weekend."

"Hear that Jack?" I silently whispered, still wondering if the ghost was with me. "You're not the only one who remembers your filmmaking friends in Queens." I waited for Jack to reply.

"Jack?"

The ghost still wasn't answering me, and I wondered if maybe he couldn't. I grabbed my purse off the seat's armrest, shoved my hand inside, and searched the tiny soft pocket sewn into the lining. The moment I felt the hard, smooth coin, I breathed a sigh of relief. Jack's nickel was there. I hadn't lost it.

What's the matter, baby? Miss me that much?

When the ghost first started haunting me, he couldn't seem to travel beyond the four walls of my bookshop. Then I got hold of his case files and found an old buffalo nickel inside one of the dusty folders. Jack had carried that nickel around with him in life. And, now, whenever I carried it with me, he seemed to be able to travel in death.

"Jack." I swallowed my nerves. "I thought I'd lost the nickel. Why didn't you answer me?"

Dames, he said in a disgusted tone. Didn't you tell me to button my gabber?

"Yes, but… I changed my mind. I mean, the movie's over. So it's okay if you want to talk."

The broad on stage is that boring, huh?

"It's not that she's boring. It's just that I already know what she's telling me. There are dozens of books in my store that say as much."

Okay, baby, I've got an idea. Let's blow this joint.

"What?"

I keep telling you, sweetheart, I can take you out on the town, if you let me. How about it? Dinner at the Copa? A room at the Plaza, just you and me…

I felt a thin, cool column of air swirl around me, tickle the back of my neck, brush past my cheek.

"Stop it, Jack," I whispered. "You're being silly now."

Am I? When you thought I'd beat it, you couldn't reach for that nickel fast enough.

"I was simply worried about purse snatchers." I folded my arms and rubbed them, trying to ward off Jack's little chill. "I hear it happens in movie theaters, you know? And there's a lot of people here tonight from out of town."

The exasperating sound of decidedly smug male laughter rolled through my head as Dr. Lilly continued her lecture. Now she was explaining exactly why those noirs shot by Gotham Features studio were such a hit.

"While there were many films being produced at that time on the East and West coasts, the cluster produced by Gotham had made a small fortune because they had something the others didn't: the blonde bombshell Hedda Geist."

Dr. Lilly lifted her arm and gave a little wave toward the projectionist's booth. Suddenly, a new slide appeared on the screen, the 1948 movie poster for Wrong Turn, which featured the arresting image of Hedda Geist's beautiful face and form. Her hourglass figure was draped in the same shimmering, silver gown that she'd worn in the first scene of the picture, only it wasn't yet torn. And her big green eyes appeared wide, startled, and a little bit desperate.

Dr. Lilly fixed a smile on a section of college kids in the audience-the group was mostly young and mostly male, many of them wearing fraternity jackets.

"So what was it about this type of story and theme that appealed to audiences back in the 1940s and '50s, and continues to appeal to twenty-first-century film enthusiasts today?"

"Sex appeal," one of the young men shouted.

"Hedda's killer body," yelled another.

"Sadomasochism!" someone else called out, and the audience fell apart.

"Maybe a bit of that," Dr. Lilly said with a raised eyebrow. "But the truth is much simpler. The most subversive noir films-Touch of Evil, Pickup on South Street, This Gun for Hire-depict a world that is so morally bankrupt that it's lost its way. Good languishes and evil dominates, the bad guy has money and power and status and the good guys are lowlifes, social pariahs who live on the raw edge of society."

If that's what this broad thinks, she hasn't lived on the "raw edge of society" much. Someone should inform her there's not a helluva lot of "good guys" there.

"She's speaking relatively, Jack," I told the ghost. "You lived on the edge, and you weren't a bad guy Were you?"

No comment.

"Although the film movement began in the forties, filmmakers who came after, in the sixties and seventies, embraced its tenets. Movies like Taxi Driver and Chinatown may not have used the same stark, black-and-white palette of the early noir entries, but their cynical narratives were most definitely steeped in the same kettle. By the way, you'll also find the poster of Wrong Turn on the cover of my brand-new book, Murdered in Plain Sight."

Dr. Lilly paused a moment. "While I've given overviews of noir in my past publications, this new book of mine is much more specific-and I believe it will be of great interest to all of you, as well as your local media. It's the first book ever to delve into the details of Hedda Geist's personal life and career."

Dr. Lilly frowned. "I must apologize for the mistake that prevented the publisher from getting my hardcover copies here in time for me to sign for you tonight in the lobby, as the festival's event planners wished-an unfortunate postal delay, I'm told."

In the next seat, Brainert turned to me and whispered, "You're kidding. That's very disappointing. We were all expecting a signing to take place in the lobby."

"I know," I said with a sigh. "Dr. Lilly made it very clear that she was handling the delivery of her new release, but Buy the Book never received a thing. We've already rescheduled her

signing."

Brainert spun around to glare at Seymour in the row behind us. "What do you know about a postal delay?"

Seymour raised his hands. "Don't look at me, Parker. I only lose deliveries when somebody pisses me off, and I never even met that woman!"

"Shhh!" someone hissed.

On stage, Dr. Lilly continued: "I spoke to the people at San Fernando University Press, and they promised me that another shipment of my new book will arrive by private service tomorrow morning. The stock will be available at the Buy the Book store, where I'll be signing at twelve noon sharp!"

Applause greeted the news. Dr. Lilly smiled, and then she glanced over her shoulder at the poster featuring Hedda Geist.

"Ms. Geist, now Mrs. Geist-Middleton, has lived such a quiet life for the last two decades, few people were even aware that she was still alive. But she is! And she's here this weekend, as you all know, if you've reviewed your program schedule. She'll be on this very stage tomorrow, doing a Q &A session with Barry Yello. She might even be here in the audience tonight. Ms. Geist-Middleton, are you here? If you are, I'd love you to stand up and take a brief bow "

Like everyone else, I twisted around in my theater seat, scanning the crowd, dying with curiosity to see what the famous femme fatale looked like sixty years after Wrong Turn.

In the very back row of the house, an attractive young blonde rose from her velvet-lined seat. She stood and began to clap. Then people around her began to clap. The clapping grew louder, moving down the theater, row after row, until finally I saw what they were clapping about.

Hedda Geist-Middleton had stood up-but she did much more than simply take a "brief bow" as Dr. Lilly suggested. The elderly woman moved into the center aisle and began to stroll down the deep blue carpet. She walked with sure footing, her head regally high, on a slender but sturdy frame. She wore a gorgeously tailored white pantsuit dripping with silver embroidery. Large diamond earrings sparkled beneath white hair, which was pulled into a smooth French twist and held in place by a diamond-studded comb.

Applause followed the woman, thundering down from the back of the theater. The woman blew kisses at members of the audience, who began to rise from their seats for a standing ovation.

Once a diva, always a diva, Jack quipped.

"Is that really her?" I silently wondered.

Time's a witch, ain't she? Jack replied.

"You're not giving her much credit, Jack. For an eighty-five-year-old woman, she looks pretty darn good to me."

Though sixty years had passed since her stardom, I still recognized the same radiant beauty that lit up the screen in a half-dozen dark-crime dramas. Despite the wrinkles and age spots, Hedda Geist still possessed those incredibly high cheekbones and famous catlike eyes that had made her a star.

I'll give the old broad this: She managed to stay out of the skull orchard a whole lot longer than yours truly.

On stage, Dr. Lilly squinted against the spotlight, shading her eyes as she peered into the theater's aisle. "Is that her? Oh, yes. There she is, ladies and gentleman, Mrs. Hedda Geist-Middleton!"

Next to me, Brainert was having a fit. "She came! Oh, my goodness!" He sprang from his seat and rushed up the aisle to greet the woman. "Ms. Geist-Middleton! I'm honored. We all are! Please, won't you come on stage and say a few words?"

"That was my intention, Mr. Parker," the former actress imperially replied.

"Why didn't you sit in our reserved section?" Brainert asked.

She waved her hand. "I didn't need to sit through Wrong Turn again. My goodness, I've seen it enough times, you know. I just popped in at the end."

"Allow me." Brainert offered his arm. She took it, and they moved down the aisle toward the stage.

The young woman who began the applause followed them. When she moved past my row, I froze in surprise. The woman's hair was styled differently than the Hedda of the 1940s-it was shorter and cut in layers-but otherwise she was the spitting image of the young Hedda Geist, with a stunning, hourglass figure, big green, catlike eyes and finely sculptured features. Even Jack was affected, and given his state, understandably confused.

Wait a second, he said in my head. Which one's Hedda?

"You're in the twenty-first-century now," I silently reminded the ghost. "Hedda was in her twenties when she made Wrong Turn. Now she's well over eighty. This young woman is obviously a relative, probably a granddaughter."

To sustained applause, Brainert led the elegant woman up the short flight of stairs and onto the stage. The young blonde followed, eliciting some whistles of her own from the male contingent.

Brainert and the blonde moved to the side of the stage as Hedda stepped up to the standing microphone. A smiling Dr. Lilly greeted the living legend, and the pair shook hands. Camera phones were held aloft to capture the moment.

Dr. Lilly stepped back and Hedda began to speak.

"Thank you all for such a warm welcome! I am ever so grateful for this opportunity to come forward again and greet my fans. You know, my screen career ended long ago. But this festival is truly a gift to me, showing my films, making me a star again." She smiled. "Or at least feel like a star again…"

The crowd laughed and applauded.

"Indeed, tonight truly is like yesteryear. You've made it all come back to me-"

An intense flash suddenly illuminated the stage. The silent burst of light was followed by a shower of sparks that rained down around the standing mike, where Hedda was speaking.

Another flash came from above, and the startled elderly woman looked up.

"Oh, my god!" someone cried from the first row.

"The speaker!"

"Look out!"

Screams came from all over the theater as the massive black audio speaker dropped from above, trailing sparking wires.

Brainert lunged for Hedda and pulled her away. The object struck the heavy microphone stand, smashing the metal flat. More screams filled the theater as the speaker bounced across the stage, then came apart. People in the front row leaped up as the debris scattered.

"Oh, my God, Jack," I silently cried. "That speaker could have hurt Hedda!"

You mean killed, don't you? Look at that steel microphone stand, baby. It's smashed beyond recognition.

Now I was on my feet along with everyone else, and another figure dashed onto the stage-Bud Napp. As sparks continued to flutter down like sizzling snow, Bud raised his arms and signaled for calm. "All right, people, settle down now," he declared in the same tone he used when presiding over our Quindicott Business Owners Association meetings. "No one was hurt, and there's no cause for alarm!"

"What happened?" someone cried.

"Looks like our public address speaker fell, that's all," Bud continued. "There's no danger to anyone, so don't panic. But as you can tell from my shouting, we lost our audio system…"

Behind Bud, the young, blonde Hedda lookalike darted across the stage to put an arm around the elder Hedda. Appearing shaken, the actress quickly recovered, and the young woman led her off stage.

Brainert stepped forward, careful to avoid the sparking wires, as he loudly addressed the crowd. "I'm sure Dr. Lilly will be happy to finish her lecture tomorrow morning, at the Buy the Book store on Cranberry Street."

Dr. Lilly nodded. "I'm sure to have my new book delivered by then!" she shouted. "I hope to see you all there!"

"And we'll hear from the great Hedda Geist-Middleton later this weekend, too!" Brainert added, forcing a stiff grin across his still chalk-white face. "Meanwhile, I have an idea. Let's forget about this little mishap and proceed to the lawn party at the Finch Inn!"

Spotty applause followed, and then the crowd began to buzz with excitement as it moved up the aisles. The electric reaction didn't surprise me. Witnessing a shocking accident was a gossip gold mine in this little town. Not only had these folks scored a story to tell for weeks to come, they could start rehashing it right now at a party with food and drink.

I remained in my seat, waiting for the mob to disperse. Then I approached the stage, one eye on the shattered speaker and the hot, sparking wires still flashing overhead.

That Hedda Geist… Jack remarked.

"What about her?"

She's one accident-prone dame.

"What do you mean by that?" I demanded.

But the ghost didn't answer.

"Jack? Are you there?"

He wasn't. For whatever his reason this time, the ghost of Jack Shepard had once again faded to black.