A wistful smile. “I suppose not, but I’m…scattered. It makes sense, but I don’t see how you can prove…”
I let go of her and she toppled into a chair. I sat down. “I think I can now. I need one more conversation. Well, maybe two. Maybe Larry Calhoun. But I need to talk to Ethan now. Can you reach him here?”
She picked up the phone. I listened as she chatted with someone in accounting, who at first refused to believe he was talking with Ava Gardner. Irritated, she hung up the phone. “He’s on break in the commissary, Edna. But he’s with Tony, who’s looking for a job here. Ethan is trying to get him some work. God knows what he can do!”
I frowned. “This is not good. I want to talk to Ethan alone, without Tony. This is a wrinkle I didn’t anticipate.”
“You want to wait until Tony leaves?”
I shook my head vigorously. “No. Not this time. I seem to deal with the brothers Pannis together all the time. The whole world does. This time will be no different, though unwelcome.” I stood. “Having Tony there is not good.”
“Edna, I don’t think it’s a good idea…”
I raised my voice. “I never said it was, Ava. But it’s the only thing I can do now.”
She fidgeted. “I’ll come with you.”
“No.”
“Edna!”
“No, Ava. If I’m wrong, I don’t want you there.”
“And if you’re right?”
“Then the game is over.”
Chapter Seventeen
Ava gave me directions to the commissary, one building over, and I headed there, though my steps dragged. Ethan and Tony. Tony/Tiny. He wasn’t supposed to be there. Falstaff in sequins, begging for pennies from a miserly brother. But then, I thought wryly, neither should I be strolling the hallways, the wandering novelist shuffling through Metro with an I.D. badge and a purpose.
My progress was interrupted by an aide to Dore Schary who’d heard I’d invaded the hostile territory. She waylaid me as I turned a corner, standing in my path with a clipboard and pencil, her face grim. Trying to smile but failing at the simple human act, she questioned whether my being there had to do with tomorrow’s premiere of Show Boat at the Egyptian Theatre.
“No,” I said quickly, “I’ve already been accosted by Desmond Peake.”
I tried to move around her.
“Did you see Miss Gardner? Where are you headed now?”
“To the commissary.”
Suddenly chatty and bubbly, she confided that Dore Schary was out of town-“a man who respects you”-and would be unable to see me.
“I don’t expect to see him.” I raised my voice. “I’m leaving L.A. You will not see me tomorrow.”
She looked relieved, jotted something on the clipboard-what? confirmation of my travel schedule? — and scurried off. Out of the corner of my eye I spotted Peake waiting for her. My, my, such clandestine intrigue: Edna Ferber, the Show Boat herself, lumbering through the sanctified Metro hallways. Alone, adrift, and doubtless a danger in this celluloid canyon.
But I was stopped again. At the doors of the commissary, a voice shouted my name. “Edna, wait.” Frank Sinatra, his face flushed and that Adam’s apple bobbing, came hurrying up to me.
“Frank.” I was confused.
“Wait.” He stopped next to me, swung around so that his back was to the commissary door. He was out of breath, his face too close to mine. Those awful scars, those blue eyes so bright now. “Edna, Ava just told me what you said about…Max.”
Another wrinkle, this. Why would she do that? I tried to step around him. “She shouldn’t have done that. I asked her for secrecy.”
For a second he closed his eyes. “Look, I don’t want you to do this alone.”
“I do everything alone.”
“Not this.” He softened his voice. “Not this.”
“I do not need a protector, Frank.”
He stammered, “I’m not here to…to protect you, Edna.” He smiled broadly. “Hey, I’ve heard enough about you to know you can win your own battles. But I think you need to have a friend with you.” He reflected on his words. “Yeah, a friend.”
“A friend?”
He nodded. “I can be a friend, you know. I’m not always an ass.”
Now I smiled, staring at the jumpy man, this short, scrawny scrapper with the red bow tie and the cowlick. Ludicrous, perhaps, but staring into those blue eyes I saw something I didn’t associate with him-had refused to see: real concern. And despite what he said, that look also communicated something else-fear. He looked nervous, his fingers opening and closing quickly. All right, then. My rogue companion, though uninvited. The wisecracking man with the sarcastic tongue and the flippant attitude-the brazen brawler-the nasty man-all eclipsed for the moment by a young man who wanted to come out on the side of justice. I looked at this crooner with a kind of wonder, not certain if I trusted this gangly Galahad. An intriguing soul, this Francis Albert Sinatra, Ava’s lover. A man who could surprise me. Even old ladies welcomed surprises.
Ethan and Tony looked up as Frank and I, side by side, approached the table. Tony rose, plopped back down, confused. “What the…” Frowning, Ethan kept his eyes on Frank.
“Boys.” Frank addressed them warmly. “Miss Ferber would like to visit with you.”
Ethan laughed in a high, unnatural cackle, while Tony folded his arms onto the table, hunched over, head bobbing as though he would drop his head down for a nap.
“We were just leaving,” Ethan said. “I have to get back to work. Tony filled out an application…” He stopped. “What?” The word was almost shouted out, addressed to Frank. “Frankie, I only got a minute.”
I pulled up a chair directly across from him. “Then my timing is perfect. Remember what you told me about timing, Ethan? You said everybody in Hollywood depends on timing. It’s the key to everything out here. Bam bam, hit your mark.”
A baffled look, first at Frank, then at me. “So what? You came here to remind me of things I said at a cocktail party?”
“Partly.”
Tony roused himself. “I gotta leave.”
Frank reached out and touched his sleeve. “Sit, Tony. We’re friends here. Miss Ferber has something she wants to say.” He spoke in a calm assuring voice. For a second, I thought he’d sung the words, so smooth and lilting were his syllables. The crooner, easing the way.
Tony darted a frightened glance at Ethan, who refused to look his way.
“Timing,” I repeated.
In a clipped, hard voice, with a sharp glance at Tony, Ethan demanded, “What are you trying to say, Miss Ferber?”
Tony was fidgeting, rocking back and forth, but another look from Frank quieted him. It struck me as uncharacteristic of Frank, this wistful and hypnotic smile. The seasoned keener at your funeral. Tony stopped moving and closed his eyes.
I had trouble focusing on Ethan, suddenly forgetting the questions I’d planned to put to him. Distracted by Frank’s suave maneuver with Tony, I considered how little I really knew about him, this smooth balladeer, how quick I’d been to condemn him, to draw him as a facile caricature. Yet Ava loved him, and I respected her. Indeed, so many parts of Frank failed colossally. Ethan’s word: failure. Frank nodded at me because I’d not answered Ethan, intent as I was on watching this pacific ballet with Tony.
Now, spine erect and hands gripping the edge of the table, I announced ferociously, “Ethan, you murdered Max.”
Tony squealed, flew back in his chair, nearly toppling it over, a gurgling sound escaping his lungs. Beads of sweat glistened on his face, in the creases of his neck. His eyes darted first to his brother, then to Frank, but not to me. Breathing heavily, he swayed toward Frank who put his palm on Tony’s shoulder. The effect was immediate: Tony looked at him, pleading in his eyes.
I was staring at Ethan, who watched me carefully, unblinking. I waited a long time. He sat back, his body at attention, eyes narrowed, and seemed to be sifting through his thoughts, planning his sentences…or maybe judging the value of mine. Then, finally, speaking in a low, gravelly voice from the back of his throat, he spat out, “Preposterous.”