Voodoo, Ltd.

Thirty-four

At shortly after midnight, Booth Stallings lay propped up in bed, reading copies of documents given him that afternoon by Mary Jo something, the brunette legal secretary who worked for Howard Mott.

The first document he read was a Los Angeles Police Department report on the semiautomatic 9mm Beretta that had been stolen February 2, 1982, from the set of the television pilot, The Keepers, while it was being filmed at Paramount Studios.

Written in what Stallings judged to be standard copese, the report said the TV pilot’s property man put the gun down somewhere on the set when summoned by the director just after the day’s shooting ended. When the property man returned for the gun it was gone, as were the cast and crew. The theft was reported immediately, investigated and eventually forgotten until the Beretta resurfaced as the gun that killed William A. C. Rice IV.

The next item Stallings read was a list of the cast and crew’s names. None of the crew’s names caught his eye, but three other names jumped out at him. The first two jumping names belonged to Rick Cleveland and Phil Quill. Cleveland was the old actor who’d had a bit role in Gone With the Wind and who, in The Keepers pilot, played “Father Tim Murray, an aged priest.” Phil Quill, the Malibu real estate man arid former Arkansas quarterback, played “Joe Lambert, a compulsive gambler.” Both lived in Malibu in 1982 and listed their agent as Jack Broach & Co., which was the other name that had caught Stallings’s eye.

The L.A. County Sheriffs investigators had questioned all three men after Rice’s death. Someone had boiled the interviews down to three summary paragraphs. Broach came first, either because of alphabetical order or, more likely, Stallings thought, because of his position in the industry’s pecking order.

“Broach says his agency no longer represents either Cleveland or Quill,” the report read. “Broach also says he has only ‘a dim recollection’ of the TV pilot, The Keepers, and never visited the set. Broach says he doesn’t know if his former clients, Quill and Cleveland, are friends but doubts it because of their age difference. Broach also denies any knowledge of how his present client, Ione Gamble, came into possession of the murder weapon.”

Richard Cleveland — or Rick, as he’d introduced himself to Stallings — was next. “Cleveland gives his age as 75,” the report read. “He was arrested for DWI 3-5-72 and 8-2-84. No other priors. Alcohol noted on his breath during interviews 1-3-91 and 2-9-91. Cleveland says he played ‘a dumb old priest’ in The Keepers pilot and ‘carried a cross, not a pistol.’ He admits knowing Phil Quill and describes him as ‘a better ball player than actor and a better real estate salesman than either.’ Cleveland called Malibu Sheriffs substation on 1-3-91 to report seeing Ione Gamble’s black Mercedes 500SL parked in William Rice’s driveway at around 2300 on 12-31-90 and again at approximately 0513 on 1-1-91. Cleveland admits suing Rice for blocking his (Cleveland’s) ocean view. He says he met Rice only once, didn’t like him and isn’t sorry he’s dead. Questioned about his drinking, Rice says he is a charter member of the Malibu AA chapter and volunteered his opinion that Gamble murdered Rice ‘because he jilted her.’ He also volunteered an opinion that Gamble is a fine actress, but a mediocre director.”

Phil Quill received less space. “Quill,” the report read, “says he played the heavy in the TV pilot, The Keepers. He says the 9mm Beretta semiautomatic was used only by Jerry Tinder, who played the film’s lead role (Tinder died, New York, 3-15-88, of AIDS, according to NYPD). Quill says he is not a close friend of Richard Cleveland but sometimes sees him in the Hughes supermarket, Malibu, ‘to say hello.’ Quill is a licensed real estate broker in Malibu and says he never met William A. C. Rice IV although Rice’s attorneys retained his real estate company to provide maintenance of the Rice property in Malibu until probate is completed.”

After Stallings stuffed the reports back into the manila envelope and placed it in a nightstand drawer, he heard the soft knock at the bedroom door. He looked at his watch. It was 12:43. Stallings rose, went to the door and opened it. Georgia Blue entered the bedroom, wearing her new raincoat as a bathrobe and carrying two glasses and a bottle of J&B Scotch.

“I thought we’d have a nightcap,” she said, placing the glasses and bottle on the dresser. “Water?”

“In the bathroom.”

She poured two generous measures of whisky, carried the glasses into the bathroom, added a little cold water, then returned to the bedroom and handed Stallings one of the drinks. He sat down on the bed. She sat next to him and said, “It’s started.”

“What?”

“The ground war.”

“Huh.”

“You don’t sound surprised.”

“Well, they’ve been building up to it for what — six months — and they’ve bombed the shit out of Iraq and’ve got all the troops and tanks and planes and artillery and ships they can use. It’ll probably end pretty soon — like I said.”

“You don’t sound very interested.”

“If there was any danger of losing, I might get interested. To me it’s just another dumb war with a foreordained outcome being fought by some young mercenaries or professionals we call volunteers. This country’ll never lose another conventional war. If it looks like we might lose, we won’t fight.”

“Especially if they’re white folks,” Georgia Blue said.

Stallings grinned. “Haven’t fought any of them since forty-five.”

“What happens next?” she said.

“You still talking about the gulf war?”

“No.”

“L’Affaire Gamble?”

She nodded. “When it’s over.”

“I expect we’ll all wander off again.”

“Wu with Durant, you with Otherguy?”

Stallings shook his head slightly, smiling at what might have been fond memories. “After five years, I think Otherguy’s ready to dissolve the old firm. I know I am.”

“He likes you.”

“Otherguy was — is—” Stallings paused to search for the right words. “—a postdoctoral education.”

“What’ll you do?”

He looked at her. It was a look of cool examination. “What d’you suggest?”

“We could team up,” she said.

“And do what? Run variations of the Lagos Bank Draft on rich old marks in Palm Springs?”

“I’m not talking about forever,” she said. “I’m talking about six months — a year at the most.”

“Living in fancy hotels, drinking fine wines?”

“Why not?”

Stallings rose, went to the dresser, poured more Scotch into his glass, sipped it, turned back to her and asked, “What would I have to do?”

“I’m not sure yet,” she said. “Maybe nothing.”

“But probably something.”

“Probably.”

“Just because I’m stuck on you, Georgia, doesn’t mean I’m simple.”

“I know.”

“What if Durant finds out?” he asked.

“He won’t.”

“But if he does?”

She shrugged slightly, put her drink down on the bedside table and began loosening the belt of her raincoat. “Durant won’t care,” she said.

“I won’t cross him,” Stallings said. “Or Artie.”

“We won’t cross them,” she said as she undid the raincoat’s buttons.

“Otherguy?”

“Not Otherguy either.”

“So who do we cross?”

“Jack Broach and Company.”

“Jesus, you’re not back on that ‘dead blackmailers can’t blackmail’ pitch again, are you?”

Georgia Blue undid the last of the raincoat’s buttons as she rose, let the raincoat slip to the floor and said, “You still don’t quite get it, do you?”

Stallings paid no attention to the question as he stared at the perfect body, remembering it, rediscovering it and refusing to analyze his nearly adolescent surge of eroticism. Instead, he set his drink down and hurried to her. There was a brief stare of either accommodation or understanding before the kiss began — a very long and nearly savage kiss that featured clicking teeth and what Stallings thought of as dueling tongues.

When the kiss ended, both were gasping, but Georgia Blue managed to ask a question. “Well, is it?”

“Is it what?”

“Like a real date?”

“Exactly,” Booth Stallings said.