Lone star

was…joyous.”

“The super, Mr. Vega, saw her arguing with an older man on the sidewalk.”

He squinted his eyes. “Good God. Yes, that was me. A few days before my visit. She was coming out of her apartment, and I pulled in front. She got frightened, and we screamed at each other. Or, rather, she screamed at me. I thought she’d hit me. She kept saying that Jimmy sent me.”

“So it wasn’t just one visit, as you’ve said. It was at least two.”

He looked at me. “I don’t consider that street scene a visit.”

“You’re playing games, sir.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Who did you think killed her?”

He shrugged.

I smiled. “You’re a good company man. You want to believe it’s Jimmy, but your job demands that it not be him.” I glanced toward the doorway.

Jimmy stood there, watching, and seemed angry to see me with Jake. Then, hovering a moment near our table, he slid into the seat next to Jake, uninvited, and smiled at me. “In the course of a given day, Miss Edna, you go from the sublime,” he bowed, “to the ridiculous.” He indicated Jake, but didn’t look his way.

“Now, Jimmy,” I began.

Jake fumed. “You know, Jimmy, you may be the studio darling, but your manners are questionable.”

“Oh, my manners are just fine.”

“Boorish, rude…”

“Jake, I don’t like you.” Blunt, heavy duty, flat out.

“And I don’t like you.”

“You have to. Warner ordered you to.”

“I’ll do anything in my earthly power to help you in your career, but that doesn’t mean I have to…”

“Yes, you do.”

“Come on, Jimmy,” I pleaded.

“You know, Warner knows what I think of you,” Jake said. “I’ve told him. He just nods and tells me to do my job. Frankly, a lot of people don’t care for you. I know Miss Ferber thinks you’re,” he paused, searching for a phrase but could only bring up an ancient one, “the bee’s knees, but I think you’re a slovenly, ill-kept brat.”

Jimmy shot back, lamely, “And you’re a hack.”

Fascinated, I sat back now, observing the exchange of pepper-shot vitriol, and realized, suddenly, that both men were enjoying themselves on some atavistic level. Clearly despising each other, they still delighted in some crude ritual. I imagined a schoolyard where, finally, fisticuffs would end this verbal assault. Or an irate teacher would drag the errant boys into the principal’s office. My, my, I thought. Boys will be boys.

They were tiring. “The only comfort I have is knowing that you will be named a murderer by Detective Cotton.”

Jimmy paused, cut to the quick. He recovered. “Interesting. You didn’t say you thought I did it, just that I’d be charged with it.”

“I meant…”

“Which suggests that you know I didn’t do it.” He smiled. “Because, I suppose, you’re running from the truth.”

“And what is that?” Smug, an old British public-school demeanor asserting itself.

“That you’re the real killer.”

Jake, stunned, stood, mumbled something about a meeting, and left. Jimmy yelled after him. “You gonna make Miss Ferber pay for her own lunch?” Jake never looked back.

“Quite the show, Jimmy.”

“Everything is rehearsal for me.”

“You were rude.”

“Yeah, I suppose so. That’s what I do. You know, I’m not the nicest guy, Miss Edna. People tell me that I’m gauche-I love that word-and I gotta agree. Sometimes I wonder how people can actually stay in the same room with me. Frankly, I wouldn’t put up with my antics. I can’t tolerate myself.”

I shook my head. “I can’t tell if you’re serious.”

“I am.”

“Why are you here?” I asked nervously.

“I’m meeting Tommy. He thinks I’ve been avoiding him and Polly.”

“Have you?”

“Yes. Tommy is too…clinging. If I want to see myself, I’ll look in a mirror. I don’t need to see him as me.”

Within minutes Tommy arrived, out of breath, and Jimmy motioned him to sit down. I looked at my watch, stood up, ready to leave, but Jimmy shook his head. “Wait a bit.” I slipped back into my seat.

Tommy was in a tizzy. He’d come from a fight with Polly. He was used to their spitfire battles about his future, their freakish love, his notorious lack of ambition, his life as a shadow, but, he confessed, near tears, this time something was different. Polly seemed to want to leave him. For good. Not the sporadic running away to stay with a girlfriend over night, only to return, penitent, giddy, in love again.

What happened, I learned, since Tommy began talking almost immediately, without so much as a howdy ma’am (he obviously learned his manners at the James Dean academy of social decorum) was that Detective Cotton had told Polly that Tommy’s fingerprints were found in Carisa’s apartment and that angered her.

“Why would Cotton tell her that?” Tommy whined.

“It seems to be his way,” I said. “Tell everyone bits and pieces of evidence and hope someone reacts. He’s tried it with me.”

Tommy frowned.

“You hadn’t told her you were there?” Jimmy said.

“I’d told her I went with you.”

“You didn’t.”

“Oh, I did. Remember. That one time?”

“No, Tommy.”

“You forget. Most of the time I waited in the car but I did stop in…”

“You waited in the car one time, Tommy.”

Tommy seemed annoyed now, petulant. “She thinks I,” he glanced at me, “you know, slept with Carisa. I mean, she’s had suspicions, even accused me of it once or twice. But Cotton’s comments, like, made her nuts.”

Jimmy’s voice was edgy. “But you did sleep with her.”

“No.”

“Of course you did. Carisa told me-couldn’t wait to tell me. Lorded it over me, in fact. ‘Your boy picks up your leftovers like a street Arab plucks coal from train tracks’ was how she put it.”

Tommy blushed and stammered. “One time.”

I interrupted. “Seems to me, if I can judge by what folks are telling me, everyone visited Carisa just once. People in Hollywood seem to do things only once.”

Jimmy grinned. “We’re easily bored here, we box-office wonders.”

“So I accused Polly of sleeping with you,” Tommy said, emphasizing the last word.

I thought Jimmy might react, but he simply sat there, unperturbed, it seemed, relishing the moment. “I don’t need your girlfriends, Tommy.”

I could see that Tommy was testing Jimmy, watching, hoping for something. But then he backed off, saying with a half-hearted giggle, “I knew it was nonsense. Sorry, Jimmy. I shouldn’t have said that.”

I expected Jimmy, the troublemaker, to announce, “Yes, I did. I admit it. And Polly has a crush on me.” But Jimmy, looking a little sad, seemed suddenly to pity the sycophantic boy from his hometown. “Tommy, don’t worry. Polly’ll get over it. She always does. She loves you.” Said, it was a wistful, almost melancholic line, with Jimmy lingering on the word loves as though he’d discovered a new sensation, a wet confection