*
In fact, I had nothing to do for the rest of the evening except get through the night without taking a drink.
I picked up some chicken chow mein on the way home and opened
Sexual Predator
when I got there, leaving Mei-Ling down at the house, where she’d get more attention. Capri’s writing was competent if mediocre, given to hyperbolic statements, florid language, and a breathless style that the customers for this kind of book apparently appreciated; I hadn’t seen so many exclamation points since reading Andre Gide’s
The Counterfeiters
for a college lit class. Yet there was also a wealth of fascinating detail and a personal passion in Capri’s writing that surprised me; I’d expected a routine clip job, with information culled from old newspaper and magazine pieces, spiced up with seamy innuendo and purported revelations that Rod Preston could never deny from the grave. As an author, Capri still qualified as a Hollywood bottom feeder—he clearly traded on sordid gossip—yet there was a disturbing ring of truth to much of what he wrote.
From the early pages to the end of the book, covering Rod Preston’s life from his early thirties to his death at age seventy, Capri portrayed the actor as a compulsive chickenhawk who secretly and endlessly preyed on young boys, preferring them in the age range of ten to twelve. According to Capri, during stretches of Preston’s life, he needed several boys a week to satisfy his compulsions. By Capri’s account, Preston didn’t care whether they were white, Asian, or Hispanic, as long as they were slim, dark-haired, and reasonably fair-skinned. The book claimed that Preston’s marriage to the starlet Vivian Grant had been nothing but a sham arranged by their studio to protect Preston’s career, although Capri gave Preston credit for being a doting father once his only child, Charlotte, had been born.
The book ended with an indelible scene of Rod Preston’s last alleged sexual encounter that would be stomach-churning for many: According to Capri, only weeks before Preston had died, the one-time movie idol had an eleven-year-old boy brought to his bedside and his oxygen mask removed so he could fellate the child with what would be his final, natural breaths before the machines took over. The stunning anecdote, along with many of the other narrative elements, would certainly be talked about and would no doubt sell many books. How much, if any of it, was actually true remained open to question—there was virtually no documentation for the most scurrilous claims, and the only sources and supporting characters who were named had died years ago, unable now to prove or disprove so much as a single point. If Capri had made up most of it, Charlotte Preston was right—he was possessed of a vivid imagination, the most lurid fantasies.
Aside from the startling claims, two things about the book struck me as odd: While much of the material had a firsthand feel, as if witnessed by the proverbial fly on the wall, Capri had chosen to write the book from the third-person viewpoint, distancing himself from the material. He had also managed to compile it quickly enough to be published and in the stores only a few months after Rod Preston’s death.
Sexual Predator
didn’t have the hurried, superficial feel of the usual “instant” book; I’d read a few of those years ago, quickie compilations that exploited some tragic event, and this one was considerably more detailed and substantial.
It was half past midnight when I finally closed the book. My stomach was in turmoil. I wasn’t sure if the cause was the usual intestinal upheaval I experienced before my bowels suddenly opened up, or Randall Capri’s account of Rod Preston’s private life. When it came to sexual variety and freedom, I generally stood strong and spoke loudly in their defense. Yet sex with children was a quite different matter, notwithstanding the arguments about a young person’s natural sexual drives or the problem of defining just when he or she became old enough to engage with adults in consensual sex. My little sister, Elizabeth Jane, had been eleven when I’d caught my drunken father forcing himself on her; I’d killed him for it, an act that had helped to further wreck all our lives—Elizabeth Jane’s, my mother’s, certainly my own. Templeton had written about it sympathetically in the profile she’d put together for
GQ
the previous year, so it was no big secret; yet it haunted me every day of my life, like a lot of things, but maybe most of all. If only a fraction of what Randall Capri had written about Rod Preston’s pedophilia was true, it was still enough to make the actor a monster in my eyes. It’s one thing to experience sexual fantasies and desires, quite another to act on them, when they harm the innocent.
I hadn’t touched the Chinese food, which was by now cold and congealed. I rinsed my face at the kitchen sink, drank some water from the tap. Then I opened the accordion file that lay on the table by the window, where Charlotte Preston had left it Saturday morning.
I took out the individual file on Randall Capri, which was marked with his name in faded handwriting I at first didn’t recognize—it was certainly not Charlotte Preston’s. When I went through the file item by item, I found dozens of papers and documents that meant little or nothing to me, along with the canceled checks Charlotte had mentioned, dated over a period of years and made out for thousands of dollars each, all signed personally by Rod Preston, with the memo lines signifying payments for “Public Relations Work.” The printing matched the handwriting on the outside of the file, which seemed to indicate that this was Rod Preston’s personal document holder for matters pertaining to Capri, rather than one compiled by Charlotte for my benefit.
Then I found a photograph, tucked inside an operation manual for a Nintendo game that had grown musty over the years. It was an attractive, professional black-and-white portrait of a slim, dark-haired boy of perhaps eleven or twelve, pretty enough to be a beautiful little girl, bare chested, in shorts, with his belly button showing. It was stamped on the back with the words “Horace Hyatt Studio,” and a hand-printed date that put the picture at roughly twenty-five years ago. After studying the face a moment, I retrieved my signed copy of
Sexual Predator
from the bed and opened it to the back flap, which featured a current photo of the author.
I lay the book on the table, and placed the vintage photo of the young boy next to it. There was no doubt in my mind that the boy was Randall Capri.
It was ten when I woke from a fitful sleep to the sound of knocking on my door. The night had been cool, but I was feverish and sweaty. The sheets were faintly damp.
I opened the door in my underwear to find Maurice on the other side of the screen, holding a tray with breakfast and the Monday morning edition of the
Los Angeles Times
. Mei-Ling sat at his feet, bug-eyed and expectant. Just behind them, Fred stood with a broom, dustpan, and cleaning supplies.
Maurice, as usual, did the talking.
“Mei-Ling wanted to come up and see you.”
“I guess the breakfast tray and cleaning supplies were her idea, too.”
He shrugged sheepishly.
“We thought, you know, as long as we were dropping in—”
“You’d feed the recluse and tidy up his neglected apartment.”
Maurice indicated the copy of the
Times.
“Alexandra rang us up—she wanted you to see her piece on the Charlotte Preston matter.”
I sighed heavily, unlatched the screen door. “Come in. You too, Fred.”
Mei-Ling scampered inside and hopped on the bed, where she dug around in the blankets before settling down, causing Maurice to venture a cautious comment.
“She seems right at home up here.”
“Not a chance, Maurice.”
He set the tray on my writing table in the kitchen.
“Honestly, Benjamin, we don’t mind if you keep a dog.”
“She’s on her way out, as soon as the detectives on the Preston case figure out where she’s supposed to go.”
“They might send her to the pound—she could be put to sleep!”
“They’ll see that she goes where she belongs.”
“What if they don’t?”
“Then you can have her.”
A mix of peevishness and pain crossed Maurice’s face.
“I’m afraid Fred isn’t terribly fond of her.”
Maurice glanced across the room, where Fred swept a corner, then shielded his mouth with one hand and lowered his voice.
“I think she challenges his masculinity—makes him worry that he might look less manly if he shows affection to such a darling little animal. That’s not your problem, is it, Benjamin—male insecurity?”
“Nice try, Maurice.”
I took him by the shoulders, turned him toward the door.
“Thanks for the breakfast. It was very sweet of you.”
“But we came to give you a hand with the apartment.”
I crossed the room, took the broom from Fred.
“I’ll take it from here.”
Fred shrugged and shuffled heavily toward the door, scratching his large behind. He continued out past Maurice, who lingered.
“At least let me do the windows.”
“Out, Maurice. Go!”
*
I boiled water for coffee and sat down with a cup, along with Maurice’s buttered toast, scrambled eggs, fresh-squeezed orange juice, and the
Times.
Templeton’s account of Charlotte Preston’s passing was on the front page of the Metro section, relying mostly on information provided by the detectives, who termed the death a probable suicide. Lab tests performed on residue in the vial and the syringe itself indicated she’d been killed by curare, a poison extracted from a vine found in the jungles of Central and South America. According to Templeton’s report, curare, when injected, goes to work so fast there is literally no antidote or treatment to counter its lethal effects. She’d interviewed the county’s chief medical examiner, who outlined how the drug works:
Once the poison hits the bloodstream, he explained, paralysis in the facial muscles begins almost immediately. Within seconds, the victim is unable to swallow or lift his head, the pulse rate plummets, and paralysis of the lungs sets in, causing irreversible respiratory failure. In short, the victim suffocates in rapid but terrifying fashion.
Curare was once known as an exotic poison used by native hunters to tip their arrows for killing game, but is now in widespread use under different trade names in hospitals and medical offices, where it is injected in carefully calibrated doses to stop normal breathing during surgery involving the lungs, enabling the patient to be connected to a respirator. Curare is also used by many doctors as a muscle relaxant prior to a variety of surgeries in order to reduce the amount of anesthesia required.
The article went on to point out that Charlotte Preston, a licensed anesthesiologist, would have had easy access to the drug. Templeton again mentioned Charlotte’s recent loss of her father, and the publication of an unauthorized biography portraying Rod Preston as a sexual deviate. According to an anonymous source, whom I presumed was me, the deceased had been distraught by the content and lurid claims of the book. Templeton had included the title and the name of the author, Randall Capri. Like all staff-written articles of national interest published in the
Times,
Templeton’s piece would already have moved on the
Los Angeles Times–Washington Post
wire, picked up by hundreds of subscribing newspapers across the country. Bookers on the TV talk shows were no doubt scrambling to schedule Randall Capri as a guest. By week’s end, I suspected,
Sexual Predator
might be headed for a place on the bestseller lists, thanks to the timing of Charlotte Preston’s newsworthy death.
As I set the Metro section aside and picked up my fork to stab at the scrambled eggs, another article caught my eye. This one was on the front page of section A, lower half, left column, under a three-tier headline:
‘A
IDS
C
OCKTAIL
’
N
OT
M
IRACLE
C
URE
A
S
D
OCTORS
O
NCE
H
OPED
The article summed up what a lot of us had known for a long time: While the combination therapy introduced in the mid-nineties had saved countless lives and restored health to many patients, the drugs didn’t work for everybody. Sometimes the side effects were intolerable, even life-threatening in themselves. Even in cases where they were well tolerated and effective, the HIV often developed a resistance to the antiretrovirals and protease inhibitors, as they were known, and the virus came roaring back, stronger than ever. With more than forty million people infected worldwide, most of them in Third World countries, AIDS was still a voracious, deadly plague with no end in sight.
I shoved the newspaper aside, feeling overwhelmed again by doom, part of a catastrophe that seemed too big and all-consuming to escape. I knew I wasn’t supposed to feel that way now. I was supposed to be buoyed by all the advances and opportunities for treatment, all the support groups and caring organizations, all the healthy, happy, HIV-infected people walking around, going to work, staying out of the hospital. But all I could think about was how Jacques had died a decade earlier, his body wasted away by a dozen agonizing ailments, gasping desperately for his final breaths, the way most of my other sick friends had gone. I was obsessing on the negative, and I was aware that I was obsessing, but knowing that didn’t seem to help.
Mei-Ling whined at my feet, fixing me with her bulging eyes while performing a rapid two-step with her front paws. I gave her a taste of Maurice’s eggs, then started in on the rest, forcing them down. The phone rang. It was Templeton, calling from Times-Mirror Square.
“Did you read my piece?”
“Just finished it.”
“Well?”
“A solid, workmanlike job.”
A pregnant pause, which gave birth to exasperation.
“That’s it? Solid and workmanlike?”
“Relax, Templeton. That was a compliment.”
“Coming from you, I guess it is.”
“You want me to tell you the article’s brilliant?”
“I thought I did a pretty good job.”
“That’s what I just said.”
“Never mind, Justice. I’m a pro, I don’t need your validation.”
“I’m glad we got that resolved.”
“Speaking of which, I got on the phone this morning. I learned some things about Charlotte Preston that might interest you.”
“I’ll eat while you talk. My eggs are getting cold.”
“I spoke with Charlotte’s lawyer. It seems she died without leaving a will. No living trust, not even a quickly scrawled note about who should have her beloved dog.”
“Seems reasonable. She was in good health, not yet forty. More than half her life ahead of her.”
“But she was highly organized, dotted every
i
and crossed every
t.
You said so yourself. If she intended to take her own life—”
“I get your point.”
“Without a will, her mother inherits everything.”
“Vivian Grant Preston, the former starlet who spent time in the loony bin.”
“She was institutionalized?”
“According to Charlotte.”
“She’s about to come into some serious wealth—Charlotte’s house in Nichols Canyon, her father’s estate in Montecito, the entire inheritance he left to Charlotte. Quite a few million, I imagine.”
“The dog.”
“What?”
“The mother gets the damn dog, as soon as I can find her. I knew you were useful for something, Templeton.”
“I’m talking about a motive for murder, musclehead.”
“Motive isn’t everything.”
“It’s a start.”
“Then how about starting with Randall Capri?”
“What’s Capri’s motive?”
“The news coverage of Charlotte’s death and the resulting publicity for his book should translate into some nice royalties down the line. Maybe a whole new career on the bestseller lists.”
“I hadn’t thought of that.”
“That’s what I’m here for.”
“Stuff it, Justice.”
“Anything else, before I finish my breakfast?”
Her tone suddenly lightened, becoming more personal.
“One or two things, actually.”
“Let’s start with one, see how that goes.”
“You never told me how it went with Oree on Sunday, after I left the two of you alone.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Are you going to see him again?”
“I don’t know, Templeton. Don’t you have a story to write or something?”
“Don’t be so mean, Justice.”
She didn’t sound so coy now; I heard real vulnerability in her voice.
“OK, what’s the matter?”
“I needed somebody to talk to, that’s all.”
“If you’d needed somebody to talk to, you would have called Oree.”
“Oree didn’t know Harry. You did.”
I had no response for that.
“I miss him, Benjamin.”
Her words sliced like a fine blade.
“Ben, are you still there?”
“Yeah, I’m here.”
“I was thinking about him this morning, sitting here in the newsroom, realizing this is where you worked with him all those years ago, when you were my age. I remembered how he introduced us after he moved over to the
Sun,
how he got us to work together, the things he taught us.”
“How I pretty much destroyed the man.”
“No, Justice, that’s not it. I just miss him, that’s all.”
“Understandable.”
“I never lost anybody before Harry. Not even my grandparents.”
“You get used to it after a while.”
“So you really thought my piece was solid and workmanlike?”
“Cross my heart, hope to die.”
“On that same note, how do you feel about attending a funeral?”
“I’d rather chew glass if it’s all the same.”
“Charlotte’s service is set for Saturday. The autopsy’s slowing things down, and they may do more tests. I’d like to be at the funeral, but not alone.”
“I guess I could make it then.”
“I’ll pick you up at half past twelve.”
She hung up, and I was left with the remaining scrambled eggs and a few scrambled memories of Harry Brofsky. I didn’t want to go there, so I turned to the accordion file sitting on the table between my plate and the window. I pushed the plate aside, pulled the file closer, started working my way through it, section by section.
*
Not quite two hours later, I’d scanned close to a hundred documents, the most intriguing of which was a handwritten list of names and phone numbers. The ink had faded slightly with age but was still clear, and the handwriting matched Randall Capri’s signature in the copy of
Sexual Predator
I’d asked him to autograph. Most of the names were unfamiliar to me, but at least two were quite well known—Mandeville Slayton, a popular singer of soulful romantic ballads, and Edward T. Felton, Junior, a multimedia mogul who operated at the highest levels of Hollywood power. By midafternoon, I’d called all the numbers on the list, and learned that only two were still in service, one for a Dr. Stanley Miller, a name I also recognized, and the other for someone named Freddie Fuentes, which meant nothing to me.