Charlie updated his friends in the car: An FBI tipster had heard about a party being thrown at Disneyland, the theme park that had opened seven years earlier and was now a full-on international tourist attraction. White had said there were a number of underage girls being brought in for the party. The tipster had previously been shown a photo of Violet at the FBI Los Angeles field office and believed she was one of the girls who would be there.
“You ever make a Disney picture, Peter?” Davis asked, clearly trying to lighten the load of the conversation.
“Nope. You?”
“Nope,” Davis said.
“I assume Walt wouldn’t, like, officially permit this kind of party at his Magic Kingdom,” Charlie said. “How would these creeps get the keys to the castle?”
“I’m sure Uncle Walt doesn’t know,” Lawford said. “Do you have any idea how many layers of bureaucracy exist between him and the guys who watch the park at night?”
Lawford made a right on Harbor Boulevard, and soon enough he was pulling his sports car into a parking lot with plenty of other shiny, exotic vehicles: Jags, Aston Martins, Caddys, and a Rolls or two.
“Someone’s going to make some bank off this shindig,” Charlie said.
“This is Hollywood, mate,” Lawford said. “Everything is for sale.” Davis mimicked the sound of a cash register as Lawford put the car in park.
The three men got out and began walking toward the empty ticket booths; the American flag fluttered in a light wind, and music emanated from somewhere in the darkened theme park.
Charlie’s drunken clattering around in the bathroom on his way out the door had, in fact, woken up Margaret. After he left, she checked the time, then rolled over in a huff. She was surprised when, not thirty seconds later, the phone rang again.
“It’s Charlotte,” said the shaky voice on the other end of the line.
“Are you okay?” asked Margaret, sitting up.
“Listen,” she said. “I pinched the keys and opened the files.”
“Holy crap,” Margaret said as her pulse quickened. As a favor to Margaret, Goode had been trying to track down anyone who might have any details of Lola’s life. They needed to find out what enemies she had, who might have preyed on her.
“I found some stuff on your girl,” Goode reported. “Most of it in Tarantula’s chicken-scratch handwriting, which is almost as repulsive as he is.”
“Are you at the paper right now?”
“No,” Goode said. “I’m home. I can’t risk being caught with these documents. I snuck them out and hid them someplace nobody will ever find them.”
“I don’t understand,” Margaret said. “You’re a journalist. You have files of information, of research. Of dirt. What’s all that research good for if you and your paper don’t use it?”
There was silence on the line. Finally, Goode said: “Leverage.”
“For what?”
“For anything they want,” Goode said. “Money. Sex. Real estate. Power. Favors. Whatever they want.”
“Who’s they?” Margaret asked.
“We can talk about that later,” Goode said. “Let me tell you what I have about your girl.”
“Tell me,” Margaret said. She’d agreed to come back to Los Angeles to help Charlie, to figure out who this Lola was and maybe save her husband’s hide. She’d reached out to Manny Fontaine, to John Frankenheimer, to George Jacobs, but everyone pleaded ignorance about where Lola had come from or who her friends were. Fontaine said he’d seen her at the Daisy and at Puccini, but the maître d’ only faintly recalled her. Her demise seemed to have caused everyone in LA to forget she had existed.
“These girls, they come to town like moths to a flame,” Goode said, “all of them told since they could walk that they oughta be in pictures, they’re as pretty as any movie star.” Margaret heard Goode light a cigarette and take a drag. “They spot ’em at the Greyhound station or at a casting call or walking down Santa Monica Boulevard. Some end up at those parties and become known for providing a good time. Your girl might have a dope habit too, sad to say.”
“She might have—” Margaret was confused. What was with the present tense?
“Yeah, I think I may have an idea of where she’s currently crashing,” Goode said. “You can’t go alone, though, if you try to go. Bring a friend.”
“Wait,” Margaret said. “I thought you were telling me about Lola Bridgewater.”
“No, this is your niece I’m talking about,” Goode said. “Violet.”
Charlie jumped when he noticed that in the shadow of the ticket booth was a tall, broad man in a dark suit. The man waved Charlie and Lawford through the turnstile. Charlie didn’t know what he was walking into, nor did he know how much he could rely on his Rat Pack pals. The constant boozing and the estrangement from Margaret had destabilized him; it was like removing ballast from a ship.
Charlie, Lawford, and Davis proceeded under the Santa Fe and Disneyland Railroad locomotive, which circled the perimeter of the park, and onto Main Street. Even in the dim streetlamps around the town square, the shiny red of the horse-drawn Disneyland Fire Department wagon popped out from the grays and blacks of the night. Down the faux avenue they strolled, passing the Wurlitzer Music Shop and the Main Street Cinema.
“Why here?” Charlie asked. “Why not at some Xanadu at the Hearst Castle? Behind locked and guarded gates, far from the street, away from any chance of discovery.”
“Getting away with it is part of the rush,” Lawford said.
Davis pointed to a giant cartoon image of Mickey Mouse hanging in a storefront, illuminated by an old-time streetlamp. “Always amazes me how minstrel Mickey is,” Davis said.
“What?” asked Charlie.
“Look at that mouse, man!” Davis said. “The elastic black arms and legs, the white mouth, the gloves—the whole thing is a classic coon character. Oh, man, this
