Chapter 51 1966
As I walk through the airport the next morning, I stop when I see a woman walking beside me.
She’s dressed in a pair of leopard-print velvet trousers and a black knit T-shirt.
Her hair isn’t short anymore, but pulled back into a low ponytail and tied with a scarf.
She has a pair of black sunglasses on her face.
She looks chic and determined and more than one young man’s head turns to follow her.
I smile at her in the glass and she smiles back.
She’s no longer invisible.
On my way past the newsstand, a headline on the international edition of The New York Times jumps out at me like a monster: “Infamous Hollywood Hotel Burns Down.”
Not the Marmont.
I fumble in my purse. Push a few francs over to the proprietor, take a copy. I don’t even move aside before I start to read that the Chateau Marmont has gone up in flames.
No, no, no.
Apparently a fire started at around midnight in the turret of the hotel. Several people saw two ghostly figures on the roof outside the turret.
Sources linked to the hotel tell us that at least one body may have been found in the ashes, the article says. And many high-profile guests are reported to be missing.
An impatient passerby jostles me. I trip and almost fall.
What if I’m too late?
But also: What have I done?
At the end of Helen Burns, the Chateau Marmont goes up in flames. The fire is lit by Helen, aka Calliope.