Chapter 19 Words Don’t Pull the Trigger
Words Don’t Pull the Trigger
Everyone braces for the funeral the next day. Last-minute seating charts, flower arrangements plotted on a map, programs with June’s face hot off a printing press. Go to bed early, Nico tells Frankie. Tomorrow’s a big day. But at almost eleven p.m., her phone rings.
“I’m at the Tam O’Shanter,” Nico says. “That’s not far from you, is it?”
Fifteen minutes later, Frankie’s got a long coat tied tight around navy silk pajamas and is parked in front of the storybook-style house.
Stepping inside is like entering a Scottish hunting lodge, with coved timbered ceilings, dark wood walls, and yellow lighting that makes her feel as though she can’t see properly.
Coats of arms hang from the walls, and a diamond-shaped lattice window reflects the room’s warmth.
Actors and producers and directors alike all dine here, with the exception of Jack.
Even when Mary Pickford asked him to join her, he made excuses, claiming he couldn’t meet at the Tam O’Shanter because he wanted an excuse to visit Pickfair, the twenty-five-room mansion where Mary and Douglas Fairbanks famously canoe in their enormous pool.
A bit of a farther drive, Jack told Frankie, but if you can finagle an invite, you go.
You better believe I’ll pass up the Scottish place any day.
When she pressed him on his avoidance of the restaurant, he admitted that one night someone spilled a bottle and the restaurant reeked like the Highlands.
And how would you know? she asked playfully, aware he’d never been to Scotland.
Because my dad was Scottish, and it smelled just like him, and now you know why I don’t drink Scotch or even Irish whiskey.
Or, she understood, dined at a place that brought it all back.
Nico sits at a table by the fireplace, not far from Walt Disney’s usual spot.
Flames crackle and shift orange and yellow, breathing hot beneath a large portrait in a gilded frame, and Frankie imagines the paint bubbling and boiling, and a worker replacing the painting every night when the doors lock.
Nico takes in her navy-blue silk pant legs. “Dressed up for me, I see.”
“You were the one who said to go to bed early. Just because I’m summoned doesn’t mean I’m awake.”
“You want an apple juice or something?”
“Just because I don’t drink doesn’t mean I’m twelve.” She smiles, but there’s a testiness pushing against her that wants out. A waiter stands off to the side. “Canada Dry ginger ale and lime, please,” she says.
The bottom of Nico’s glass flashes with light as he downs the dregs of his cocktail. “Ginger ale’s only good to mask bootleg liquor.” He slides his glass to the edge of the table.
The waiter appears to be waiting for Nico to approve her order. Frankie repeats herself, firmly, and catches Nico smiling. At last, the waiter taps his pencil on a pad of paper, takes Nico’s glass, and disappears.
Sitting back in his chair, Nico says, “Bank holiday’s about to be everywhere, not just here. You got money out in time?”
“A lot’s been happening.”
“Frankie.” But then he nods. “Tell me what’s going on.”
“You asked me to come here. You tell me.”
“I mean, you don’t seem happy.”
“There’s the obvious fact, that—” But she stops, catching the look on his face. She doesn’t need to remind him that someone they cared about is dead. Leaning forward, she says, “Everything we’re doing feels wrong.”
“There’s no being perfect in an imperfect system.”
“I don’t know what that means, but it sounds like an excuse.”
Now he smiles. “You know who was here all the time? Fatty Arbuckle.”
The Keystone Studios turned Paramount star who was so popular and rich he had a twenty-room mansion with gold-leaf bathtubs.
But then, in ’21, he was arrested for rape and murder.
Though he was eventually acquitted, the scandal ruined his career.
The first big celebrity scandal, what he went through was a salacious story that the public lapped up. A moneymaking spectacle.
Nico continues. “I haven’t stopped thinking about him since this started.
He’s the reason the studios came up with morality clauses in the first place.
Universal first, mandating nonpayment to actors who ‘forfeit the respect of the public.’ The respect of the public.
Could mean almost anything, right? But Fatty, he was either an innocent man destroyed, or justice was served, because he lost everything.
Really, I don’t know. What I do know is that the real sentence was determined in the court of public opinion, and that is the court where you and I work. ”
Frankie feels the heat from the fire, and shifts in her seat, uncomfortable.
“Murder or rape, or a crime where somebody gets hurt, of course they should be punished. But human things, like a mistake? Nico, shouldn’t they be able to do that?
Because the public’s standards of what’s respectful—I don’t think they’d hold their best friends to those standards. ”
Nico nods as the waiter sets down their drinks.
“A painting is good or not good, and it has nothing to do with the artist going to church or cheating on his wife. That’s the truth.
But then the person behind it gets famous enough that the public takes credit for that fame. We made them, we can unmake them.”
“Doesn’t mean it’s right.”
“Right or wrong, the public is necessary. That’s why they get a say. Does it matter if you’re talented in a room by yourself? No? Then you need the public. Simple.”
The nature of celebrity centers on the stars’ lives, Nico’s said. Frankie takes a sip of her drink. “But it still might go too far.”
Nico nods. “It still might go too far. And you and I are the ones who try to protect them from that.”
“Them, or the studio?”
“You tell me.”
With her finger, Frankie traces the edge of her glass. “Jack said the tide is going to turn.”
“Already has.”
She looks up sharply.
“That neighbor lady, Darlene Cleary. She went to the police and said Jack was there that night, in the second bungalow.”
Somewhere, a glass spills. There is a tumble and rush of water, ice cubes hitting the ground as voices rise. “But Mickey puts a stop to that, right?”
“Usually he would, but she didn’t give him a chance. She already called Dottie.”
“So we get Dottie to bury it. What can we give her?”
“Frankie, we’re having this conversation because it’s too late for that.
Dottie’s got it in print tomorrow. First thing.
” He takes a sip of his drink and winces from the cold.
“Been a busy night. Bottom line: Dottie wants to be in our good graces, but this is too big. You remember the night of the premiere, I made some stupid joke about how I swore Jack wanted to kill June?”
“Sure. A joke.”
“And ill-timed, because Dottie heard. Combine that with Darlene saying Jack was there, and voilà, the story’s got legs. At least as far as Dottie’s concerned.”
This is it. The words streak through her mind. All at once, she feels the shift, that Jack’s been pushed straight into the path they wished to avoid. “But Darlene has no proof. She only suspected he was there.”
“If she had proof, he’d be arrested by now. But does it matter? We know what an accusation can do.”
Perception takes more casualties than truth ever saves.
Nico continues. “There’s more. And this complicates things.
I needed to know what Tank’s alibis were gonna say so I know what the cops are gonna know.
So my guys tracked them down. Every one of them.
They’re solid. They all corroborate Tank’s story that he went to visit a friend at Loyola Marymount University after the premiere. ”
“They could be lying.”
“Of course they could. But he’s got several people saying this, including ‘esteemed’ professors, so it’s a bit uphill from here. But they were drinking. All night.” A pause, and he explains: “Jesuits.”
“And Mickey doesn’t know this yet?”
“Well, unfortunately for Mickey, we had some VIP passes at Agua Caliente—that casino and spa in Tijuana. They got a nice racetrack too. So, you know, those folks might be hard to reach. We’ve got a day, two maybe.”
A loud snap from the fireplace. Both of them turn. A tendril of smoke curls into the air and disappears.
“They’re burning wet wood,” Nico says.
“Do we tell Mickey about the baby?”
His eyes widen. “So what, someone can make a pretty penny selling the story that she was knocked up? So we destroy her reputation needlessly?” He pauses as if to give her time to answer, though clearly he spoke rhetorically.
“Just so you know, I had my guys look into the man to be sure, and they said it too; the father was harmless. Why drag her reputation through the mud?”
“Because they’re going to look at Jack.”
“Not with a little luck.” A pause, and he says, “One of the main working theories is that someone overheard the bit about no security and followed her home.”
The way he says it—clearly, concisely—is so logical that it seems impossible that’s not it. This is really what happened. “The bit that I said, you mean. I did this.”
“No. Come on. That’s why I almost didn’t tell you.
But look at me, look at me—it’s one theory of many.
And it’s the start of a theory. And ultimately it doesn’t matter—you could say anything you want, words don’t pull the trigger.
But, Frankie, we want them to go that route, because it doesn’t involve Jack.
You understand? At this very moment, they’re still thinking it’s Tank, but when they check everything out, like my guys did, they’ll decide it’s not Tank, and we’re going to want them to focus on the theory that someone in that crowd heard what you said—even if that wasn’t it.
All right? This is a good thing. I promise. ”
The room dims. A couple has stopped before the fireplace, warming their hands.
She’d assured Jack that the police were trying to solve this when he worried that nothing was truly being done.
But he was right. In fixating on what’s very possibly a dead end, or on the dangled carrots only meant to distract, the only thing no one’s looking at just might be the truth.