“Where? Did she say where it was?”
“No, ma’am. Not to me, she didn’t, and I’ll tell you this, she knew about as much about puppets as I know about King Tut. But that’s where I lost touch. I got a hand puppet that’s my buddy. Whenever we get enough people around, Andy and I pass the hat. It’s a living. I guess you could call it a living.”
“What else about Juanita?”
He shrugged. “One minute they were there, gone the next. That’s how it is when you’re playing the street.”
The police pressed him for a description of the redheaded woman. Then Julie asked him if he thought the theater she spoke about might be a real place.
“Could be.”
“Nearby?”
Again he shrugged. Then: “I don’t think that kid would go with her anyplace she couldn’t walk to.”
A buzzer signaled Danny’s return. While the elevator groaned its way up, Juanita glanced toward the heavily draped window at the front of the loft. Dee clamped her fingers around the girl’s wrist. “Don’t you even think of it! Do you want to get killed?”
Juanita, still in the silken robe, gathered it tighter in front of her. It didn’t have any buttons. She tried not to see herself in the mirror because it wasn’t really her. Dee had made her up to look oriental. But she watched in the mirror for the elevator’s arrival. When it stopped, Dee had to unlock the door to let Danny in. He took the key from her and locked it again.
“So?” Dee wanted to know.
He didn’t answer. He came near and stared at Juanita in the mirror. He made a face like he was going to throw up. “What’ve you done to her? And what in hell is she doing out of the studio?”
“We needed a bath.”
“Then we need another bath. She looks like a midget’s whore.”
“Fun-nee. Did you get what you went for?”
“No. The answer is no. Dee, she’s supposed to look like an angel. That’s why you fell in love with her.”
“Oh, shut up.”
“I got a contact. That’s all I got and I’m going to go see him as soon as you and I straighten some things out.”
“Danny, how much time do you think we have?”
“Maybe we don’t have any. This town ought to be the best. But it’s the worst yet. Get her inside there so we can talk.”
Confined again in the studio, Juanita put her ear to the frame of the door, then to the keyhole. Then she lay down on the floor and tried to hear from under the door, but only the sound of their voices reached her, going away as though to the front of the building. A new sound startled her until she realized it was her stomach growling. She’d promised Dee she would eat. She knew Dee liked her. That’s what made Danny mad. But there wasn’t any food. Dee looked in the cupboards and the fridge. How could they live someplace with no food in the house? They didn’t live here. It was like a hotel, only it was a loft they rented. Their suitcases were on the floor, open, with clothes falling out of them. They’d rented from an artist, which was why Danny wasn’t supposed to touch anything in the studio.
She sat on the edge of a chair and wound her feet around its legs. The dressing gown smelled of perfume and sweat. She wished they’d start fighting again so she could hear them. If they didn’t have any time, would they go away and leave her locked in this room with the bucket and the big bed? She hated beds more than most things. Her mother and father fought a lot about beds, and her mother had boyfriends she didn’t think Juanita or Papa knew about. Papa didn’t. She did. She knew that was why her mother let her go when she said she was going to Elena’s. She had a date with a boyfriend. Juanita thought of the kids getting on her about the flyers-“What’s pornography, Juanita? how come you know so much about it?” She knew it was dirty pictures, but she wasn’t going to say it to them. She felt herself going sick again, scared. She tried to think of Julie. Julie would really try to find her. Maybe she’d find the puppet man. He could tell her about Dee. But what else? She hadn’t seen Danny before she walked into the old building with the hand-painted sign on the door: PUPPET SHOW INSIDE. Julie walked a lot and she might find it.
Juanita began to walk then, too. Round and round the room she went, barefoot, the silk gown dragging the floor. Finally she entered the alcove where the statues stood around like people at a funeral. There were other things, half-finished bodies, heads. She recognized the smell of clay. Tools and brushes and tubes of paint lay on a table. There was a painting on a three-legged stand, and other paintings were stacked in racks. This was where Danny wasn’t supposed to touch anything. She came on several camera cases then, and something rolled up with metal legs sticking out. There were two flat boxes with straps that were marked FILM. These things belonged to Danny, she felt sure, not to the artist. Danny said the light wasn’t any good. He was going to take her picture, and he wanted her to look like an angel. That didn’t sound like Danny. She’d have thought he would want her to look like a whore.
Julie was in luck when she reached the Actors Forum. A session had just ended. Nobody there knew much about pup-pets, but when she’d given the actors and apprentices the story, most of them volunteered to organize a street-by-street search of old West Side buildings in which a puppet theater might now be playing or where appropriate renovation might be under way. They would all go first to precinct headquarters and coordinate with the police. “Mind you,” Julie cautioned, “the real puppeteer said the woman didn’t know anything about puppets. It was probably a story made up to lure the youngster. She’s eleven years old and she’s pretty. What else can I tell you?”
“We’ll find her, sister,” Nuba Bradley, a tall, black actor who seemed to have grown three inches with the current hair style, bent almost in two to kiss her cheek.
Reggie Bauer hung back to talk to Julie while the others got under way. Slight, blond, and brittle, Reggie knew New York society from the Bowery to the bridge tables; these were where, it was said, he made enough money to support himself as an actor. “You don’t think for a minute it’s got anything to do with puppets, do you?”
Julie waited,
“Do you want my scenario?”
“Not if it’s too far out. Of course, I want it.”
“Kid porn.”
“What does that mean?” She knew well enough. Or thought she did, but she hoped it wasn’t so.
“Child pornography. The lady was shopping for innocence, the real thing. In the meantime, either she’s got a partner for her or somebody’s out there looking for an experienced young dude to match her up with.”
Julie didn’t question him on his expertise. She thought she knew how he came by it. Except that Reggie was gay. The thought must have shone through her eyes. He said, “A lot of it’s faked, you know, especially the pleasure.”
“How would they find a boy like that? Where?”
“Through somebody in the business, Somebody knows somebody who likes boys. A certain amount of trust is involved in the transaction.”
“Oh, my God,” Julie said. “Maybe I know someone myself.”
Juanita stood beneath the skylight and turned around slowly. On tiptoe she could see what looked like the top of a barrel. Bringing one of the chairs to stand on, she could see that it was a water tower. She could see other buildings and a lot of sky. She could also see where water leaked in around the skylight. If she could get up there, she might be able to push the window out.
She went back to the door and listened. She couldn’t hear anything except faraway car horns and the rumble of the city much as it sounded when she was home alone in the daytime. Maybe they’d both gone out. Maybe they’d already gone and left her. And left the camera and everything? She didn’t think so. She wasn’t going to let them photograph her without her clothes on. Not unless he used the needle again. This time she’d kick it out of his hand or kick him where she knew it would hurt most. “Over my dead body,” Dee had said. But Dee was afraid of him too.