“Right. You’re only here to ask about Guthrie. Maybe people will believe that. Maybe word about your tree phobia won’t get out. Why would you take that chance?”
“But—”
“Have you missed the point entirely? I’m here to protect secrets, not dispense them. Guthrie, is he really dead?”
“Murdered.”
“How?”
Not when, but how. “Blunt force trauma to the head and then run over.”
An unmistakable look of relief flashed on her face. It was a moment before she said, “Why both?”
“I don’t know. The truth is I probably know as much about you as I do about Guthrie, and I thought I knew him better than anyone.”
“For instance?”
“He and I were hot to find you. But he never told me he did. He came more than once. He built those cylinders. How come?”
“I don’t talk about—”
“Was he claustrophobic? Could that possibly . . . Is that why you asked how he died? Was he afraid of—How could I not know he had a fear like that? I told him about the tree thing. I
told
him. And he kept this—”
She put a hand on my shoulder. “You came to terms with your phobia. He never did. He’d try and try. He built that low cylinder, the eight-foot one, but it was too easy to get out of. He’d panic and be out before he knew what happened. He built the second one, twice as tall. The first time he climbed out he was sweating so hard I was surprised he could get
any purchase at all. He couldn’t make himself go back for days. When he did, he was out again in thirty seconds.”
“Stunt man all the way. He must have been mapping the escape route in his dreams.” I ached for him. How could I, of all people, have overlooked the signs? I missed him, grieved for him and for me, but now I was overwhelmed by the need to hold him tight to me for every moment of anguish I hadn’t seen. I could barely make myself ask, “What about the third cylinder?”
“The first two are just brick. But that one has a metal tube inside. It’s slick. In the first the sun shone on his head midday. In the second he could see the light. But that third one, it’s like a tomb.”
“Did he—”
“He spent weeks building it, taking it apart, and rebuilding. But he never could climb in.”
“That’s crazy! The whole thing’s crazy! Anyone would be panicked at the bottom of a chute like that with no way out. What was he thinking, that he’d become Superman? Why didn’t you tell him he was crazy?”
“That’s the one thing I never ever say. I offer the place; I don’t give advice.” Her hand was still on my shoulder. She gave it a pat and released. “Now I’ve answered your question and—”
“No, wait. I need to find Ryan Hammond.”
“Another missing boyfriend?” She’d meant a stab of sarcasm, but she’d hesitated too long and her voice quavered a tad.
“So you know him.”
“No.”
“But you know of him, right? I don’t know how he’s connected with Guthrie, but he knew him in San Francisco and his prize possession was in Guthrie’s house in L.A. And now Guthrie’s dead and no one knows where to find Hammond.” Again she hesitated. “Zahra, we were being straight
with each other. You’re right in saying I never will admit I’ve been here. So, what’ve you got to lose?”
As if to reiterate that she didn’t have to tell me anything, she walked over to a three-foot-high ball lying on the floor and jumped up on it, balancing with apparent ease.
“I could smack you off.”
“You could try.”
“Playing for Ryan Hammond?”
She shifted her hips, keeping balance on the ball. It was akin to my lawyer-brother’s balancing on two chair legs. I’d watched him distract people so completely they forgot what it was they were asking. The ball was dead still and Zahra atop it appeared the same until, abruptly, she bent right, sending it left. It took exquisite control for me not to thrust out my hands to catch her as she twisted, leapt, and landed lightly on top once more. “I’m not surprised,” I said, “but I’m definitely impressed.”
She straightened up and smiled.
Then I shoved her off. “So, how is it you know him?”
Her shoulders tightened and I was sure she was going to stonewall, but she said, “Truth, I don’t know Hammond. Only know the story of him.”
“Which is?”
“I’ll walk you back to the truck.”
And make sure I leave.
I followed her outside. The dry heat was searing. It was hard to breathe. But Zahra Raintree moved effortlessly and so fast it was all I could do not to pant. “Hey, slow down, unless you want to tell this tale to Blink Jones. Is Ryan Hammond a stuntman?”
She eased off infinitesimally. “He was a kid on his first location, a gofer there.”
I’d heard Blink’s version. I was anxious to get hers. “Where?”
“Don’t know. Doesn’t matter. Here’s his claim to fame. He’s a kid—twenty-one, twenty-two—and so excited about being on the set that he brings his girlfriend. Well, you can imagine how well received that was. Second unit director tells Hammond to pack up and take the girlfriend with him. Hammond’s humiliated. And he’s new, so he trots over to the director—”
“
The
director.”
“Mr. Big. In this case, Casimir Goldfarb.”
“Mr. Big indeed.”
“Right. Mr. Big Ego, Mr. Big Womanizer. You can tell where this is going.”
“Goldfarb tells Hammond they can stay and then he makes a play for the girlfriend?”
“You got it. No one’s surprised except Hammond. Girlfriend blows off Hammond before he can open his mouth to whine. She’s moved into Goldfarb’s trailer by day’s end. Hammond, of course, is a mess. I mean, you got to feel for the kid. Here’s this famous director in his trailer showing the girlfriend his Oscar and much much more.”
“And then?”
“There was a predawn call. Goldfarb leaves his trailer. Normally, it’s locked, but of course this morning the girlfriend’s inside. She lets Hammond in. He takes Goldfarb’s Oscar and leaves.”
I couldn’t help laughing.
“That was everyone’s reaction. Goldfarb, as you probably know, was a royal pain and a priss. And, boy, did he value that Oscar. I mean, he carted it with him to a location set! How crazy is that! Locked his trailer religiously. And then, well, it’s perfection.”
“But what about Hammond?”
“No one’s heard of him since. No surprise. It’s not as if he could get on with some other company. Goldfarb was on a tear about him. He was blackballed on every set in this country, this
continent
, and if they’d been making pictures on Mars he wouldn’t have gotten a job there.”
“Damn. Isn’t there anyone who can track him down? What about the girlfriend? What became of her?”
She turned to face me, and for the first time she looked pleased. “This story’s made the rounds for a decade. Everybody’s got opinions. But you are the first person who asked about her. Lots of offhand speculation, none of it flattering. None of it accurate.”
“You know anything?”
“Oh, yes.”
We were twenty yards from Blink’s truck. She stopped.
“The story is that a pissed-off young guy steals Oscar while airhead girlfriend fucks Goldfarb. Truth is, Ryan Hammond stalked off. She took the Oscar, let the blame fall on him.”
“
She
took it? How do you know that?”
“Because”—she was enjoying this—“she told me.”
“The girlfriend came here? How did she even know you existed?”
“She turned up here. Wanted to know what the statuette would go for. When I told her no one can sell the things, she went wild. I thought she was going to bash me over the head with it, she was that out of control. Then she charged off and did the one thing she was apparently quite good at.”
“What?”
“She hot-wired my car.”
22
I HAD A hundred more questions for Zahra, but she had no more answers for me. She never broke into a run, but she strode toward her house at a pace that had me trotting to keep up, firing questions futilely until she shut the door behind her. Amazing woman. You couldn’t exactly call her a role model, but she’d created a world most aging stunt doubles could only dream of.
As put out as Blink had been on this whole trip, I expected he’d be revving up the engine and swinging open the door for me. Instead he rolled down the window and said, as if reading my mind: “You probably want to see those chimneys before you leave, huh?”
“I won’t be long.”
“Check ’em out good; we’re not coming back.” As he spoke, he hoisted himself down from the truck and began to keep pace with me.
I started to wonder just what it was he hoped or feared I’d discover. Of course, he was holding something back; I never expected otherwise. “Now that I’ve met Zahra, I understand about her, just like you said. You’d never have brought me here without her okay, right? So, what’s your connection?”
He didn’t respond for a bit, then surprised me with what sounded like the truth. “I’m a gofer. It’s not easy to get someone who’ll run in groceries, mail, you name it. I respect her, and she pays good. Can’t beat that.”
It was an oddly domestic arrangement for a guy like Blink. And hardly convenient for someone who lived hours away. “How’d you come into this little sinecure?”
I waited for an answer, but he only sighed.
“People have written screenplays in less time than you’re taking to create an answer.”
“Are you suggesting—”
“No, I’m saying definitely, what I want is the truth. How’d you meet Zahra? How come she picked you to be her errand boy?”
“Why does it matter?”
“I’m going to find out what was going on with Guthrie and how that connects to the ranch. You’re going to want to know before word gets out, right?”
He could have protested, but he just nodded.
“So, either we’re in this together or we’re not. Your choice.”
He seemed to be considering.
“All I need is the short version.”
“Shortest one is this: I hit a rough patch a few years back. Landed me in the middle of nowhere headed the wrong way, toward more serious nowhere. I needed a place to crash. Stuff was bad with me, real bad. But then I remembered two things, the first was Zahra Raintree. She’d been on a set five years before that, bitching up a storm about her divorce—that her ex ended up with the stock and she got some miserable hole in the desert outside a town that used to be a resort and wasn’t even that anymore. ‘A hole outside a has-been,’ she called it.”
“29 Palms isn’t going to be including her in their brochures.”
“Later, I heard rumors she’d had a bad screwup and got a gonzo settlement. It was a real long shot she’d be at the ranch, much as she’d
bad-mouthed it. But, either way, it’d work for me, or so I thought. If I’d known how remote it was, I’d have thought twice, believe me.”
What I’d viewed as the “small” chimney now thrust up in front of me a couple of feet above my head. Had it had a broiler, it could have been on a patio in Encinitas. The whole thing was brick—bricks Zahra had to have hauled in. This entire business—the chimneys, Guthrie’s connection to them, the place itself—was hard to get my mind around.
Climbing the brick sides was a snap. I peered into the chute. I could have lowered myself down and had enough room to bend over—not easily or comfortably, but still I could do it. But there was no need to. The sun was high enough now to show it empty. Here in the desert, not even a couple of leaves had blown in. How could Guthrie have been unnerved by it? But fear is fear; the object’s secondary. Who was I to judge? I just felt bad for him.
I jumped back down next to Blink. The guy was a caricature of disinterest. It made me wonder just what he suspected—or feared—might be hidden in one of these chutes. I let him talk on about finding the ranch as we headed to the middle one.
“So, I’d had a real spate of bad luck and I was due. The first guy I caught a ride with bought my story about heading to a job to help me get on the wagon. I must’ve looked totally wasted, quick as he was to believe that. He dropped me at the top of the road down.”
“What was the second thing?”
“That almost anyone will be glad to see you if you’re willing to pull your own weight.”
“So, what happened then?”
“My luck turned. Okay, I was stuck back of beyond, but I’d come at just the right time. The only guys here were deadbeats. There’d been good people before—I learned that later—but right then there were just three
lowlifes living off her. She’d built the barn, but there was nothing in it. The road for car gags was mud. She was too down to deal with it. She’d had this great, decent idea to help out people who needed it and the whole thing had come to nothing but a rest stop for hangers-on. If I hadn’t come, she’d have died. Literally. She was that depressed.”
“Blink to the rescue! Nick of time and all that?”
The man actually flushed. Thick-skinned as he was, I’d never have guessed a bit of sarcasm could turn him pink. “Hey, the loafers
did
pack up and I
did
impress upon them that it would not be to their benefit to come back or publicize the location. Then I dynamited the road and spent weeks creating the one that’s there now. Not long after that I headed back to town, but I made a deal with Zahra to keep helping from the outside.”
That deal, just what was in it for you?
I couldn’t decide how much of his tale was true.
Being around these weird remnants of Guthrie was distracting. It was hard to switch my focus away from them. There couldn’t be anything worthwhile inside these chimneys. They’d sat here, open to the weather and the curiosity of stunt double after stunt double dealing with fears other than claustrophobia. Surely they’d all peered down, and some had climbed in. Hang a rope over the top, it’d be no problem. Only torture for Guthrie—Guthrie, whom I couldn’t remember ever being afraid. Wary, careful, yes. But never afraid. Why this?
“What would you say it is? Twelve feet?”