When people start to talk, somebody tells somebody in the gutter press, and the next thing I know, I’m all over the tabloids, and I have a battalion of paparazzi camped at my front gate. It’s important that I behave as I normally do, no matter what’s happening in my personal life, and it’s important that you understand this.”
“I understand.”
“One other thing: I expect all our conversations on that subject to be conducted under the attorney-client privilege.”
“As you wish.”
“Good, now here’s our dinner; let’s enjoy it, then we’ll talk on the way home.”
Back in the Bentley, Calder finally opened up. “It’s been three days now, and I haven’t heard anything from her.”
“What precipitated this?” Stone asked.
“I don’t know. I came home from the studio, and her car was gone. It was seven in the evening, and it was unusual for her not to be waiting for me. She hadn’t given any instructions to the cook for dinner, and the houseman, who usually has a nap in the afternoon, hadn’t seen her leave the house.”
“Did she take anything with her?”
“I’m not sure. I suppose she could have taken a few clothes-I couldn’t look at her closet and say for sure. She may have taken a suitcase, but there’s a room full of luggage, and I can’t know if one or two pieces are missing.”
“Had you quarreled? Was she angry about anything?”
Calder pulled into the Bel-Air parking lot, stopped, and waved away the attendant. “No, not angry, but she was…different. I don’t know how else to explain it.”
“How was she different?”
“The night before, she had told me about the baby. I was overjoyed; I’ve always wanted a child, and I thought she did, too. She…was not overjoyed.”
“What did she say?”
“It’s not so much what she said as the way she behaved. Then I did some thinking, and it occurred to me that the child…might not be mine.”
Stone said nothing.
“Stone, you and I both know that Arrington and I married after the briefest of courtships and that she was living with you up until a week or ten days before we married.”
Stone still said nothing.
“She didn’t come right out and say that the child was yours, but she was very subdued.”
“Did you ask her?”
“No, but she knew I was thinking that.”
“What about the following morning?”
“She said nothing. I had to be at the studio at seven-I’m in the middle of a picture-and she wasn’t up when I left, so we had no opportunity to talk. I went to work, and I thought about nothing else all day, and I came home prepared to tell her that I didn’t care who the biological father was, I wanted to be the father who brought up the child. But she was gone.”
“She didn’t leave a note?”
“No. Nothing.”
“And you still haven’t called the police?”
“Stone, I just can’t do that; I think I’ve already explained why not.”
“The tabloids.”
“Yes. That, and the fact that I don’t really feel that she’s in any danger.”
“What do you expect me to do, then?”
“I’ve told you about the dinner party tomorrow night.”
“Yes.”
“I’ve done something unusual; I’ve invited a reporter. The following day, there’ll be a story recounting the evening and the guest list. Your name will be mentioned.”
“And you think she might read it?”
“Almost certainly; she follows the trade papers closely.”
“And you think she might try to get in touch with me?”
“I’ll see to it that it’s mentioned that you’re staying at the Bel-Air.”
“And if she doesn’t call me?”
“Then I’ll take your advice on how to proceed. I promise I will.”
Stone shrugged. “It’s your decision, I guess.”
Calder handed him a card. “Here’s my address and all my private numbers. Wear a tie, dinner’s at seven, and people are usually on time. I’m five minutes from the Bel-Air.”
Stone took the card. “I’ll be there.”
“Oh, if you’re not busy tomorrow and you’d like to visit the studio, call my secretary-her number is on the card-and she’ll arrange it.”
“Thanks, I might do that. By the way, Vance, are you aware that two men have been following you all evening?”
“What?”
“They’re in a car parked about thirty yards behind us. They followed us into Spago, too.”
Calder glanced over his shoulder and smiled, revealing astonishingly white and even teeth. “Oh, those are my boys; they watch my back.” He held out his hand. “Thank you for coming out here, Stone. I hope you don’t think I’m too much of a fool for handling it this way.”
“I hope it’s the right way,” Stone said. He got out of the car and watched the Bentley disappear into the scented night, followed by Calder’s backwatchers. He wondered if somebody had been watching Arrington’s back.
5
After breakfast the following morning, Stone called Betty Southard, whose name and number were on Calder’s card, said he’d like to see the studio, and was given the address and was told to be at the main gate at ten-thirty. He was on time.
He gave his name to a guard at the gate and was directed to a parking lot just inside. As he got out of the car a golf cart pulled up, and a tall, slender woman got out and came toward him. She seemed to be in her late thirties and was comfortably but elegantly dressed n a pale Italian suit; her hair was a deep auburn and fell around her shoulders. “Mr. Barrington?” she asked. “I’m Betty Southard.”
“I’m Stone,” he replied, shaking her hand.
“Welcome to Centurion Studios; hop in and we’ll get going.”
Stone got into the golf cart and Betty pulled out of the lot and soon turned left. Stone was suddenly submerged in a wave ofdeja vu; the street was over-whelmingly familiar, as if out of some long-recurring dream. “It’s…I mean, it’s…”
Betty laughed. “A lot of people have that reaction,” she said. “I suppose a couple of hundred movies have featured this street in one or another of its guises. Have you spent much time in L.A.?”
“No, I was out here a few years ago for a couple of days, but the company was not nearly so nice.”
“Why, thank you,” she said, smiling.
“I wasn’t flattering you all that much; I was a cop at the time, and my partner and I came out here to extradite a small-time Mafia hitman. He weighed about three hundred and fifty pounds, and the three of us sat in adjacent seats, in steerage, all the way back to New York.”
She laughed aloud, a pleasing, unexpected reaction. “I’m glad there’s more room on my cart seat,” she said.
He smiled. “I’m not.”
