Sunset Express Read online

  “All morning. They knock on your door and when you don’t answer they come to me or the insurance people and ask about your hours.” The insurance people had the office across the hall. “That was a great picture in the paper.”

  “I’m in the paper?”

  “You haven’t seen it?”

  “Uh-uh.” Mr. With-it. Mr. Hip L.A. Private Eye with his fingers on the pulse.

  “Oh, man, you look so cool. And I saw you on TV, too. I saw you twice.” Even Cindy was excited.

  “Is anyone upstairs now?”

  “Yeah. There’s a guy sitting in the hall. I think he’s from a radio station.”

  I thanked her and handed back Lucy’s phone. Lucy was looking at me. “They’re upstairs?”

  I nodded. “You mind if we don’t go up? I’ll show you guys my office another time.”

  She patted my leg and put away her phone. “Another time is fine, Studly. I want to see my man in the paper.”

  We stopped at a Sav-on drugstore where we bought the Times, the Examiner, and the Daily News, then stood in the parking lot, reading. Elton Richards, Steve Pritzik, and the discovery I’d made in Richards’s duplex were front page news in all three papers. A picture of me with Jonathan Green was on page one of both the Examiner and the Daily News and on page three of the Times. Guess the people at the Times had higher standards. Lucy said, “Oh, Elvis. This is so exciting.”

  I said, “Um.”

  “Aren’t you proud?”

  “It’s kinda neat, I guess.” I held up the paper next to my face and frowned. “Do I look like Moe Howard?”

  Lucy compared me to the picture, then nodded. “Yes. Yes, I think you do.”

  A round man with thick glasses and a nervous tic walked past, staring. He went to a brown Cressida, still staring, then called out, “Hey, are you that guy?”

  I folded the paper and tossed it in the car.

  “I read about what you did. I saw you on the news. That was good work.”

  I gave a little wave. “Thanks.”

  He said, “These cops here in L.A. suck, don’t they?”

  I frowned at him. “Some of my best friends are cops.”

  He made a nasal, braying laugh, then climbed into his car and drove away.

  I opened the door for Lucy and we drove east across West Hollywood and Hollywood, and then up through the Cahuenga Pass to Universal Studios. We parked in one of the big parking structures with about twelve million other tourists, then followed along with what seemed an endless stream of people to the ticket kiosks and then into yet more lines that led to the trams. It made me feel like a lemming.

  We rode the trams around the Universal back lot and took goofy pictures of ourselves posing with giant toothpaste tubes and rode little cars past screeching dinosaurs and gargantuan gorillas, and then Lucy said, “I feel the urge to spend.”

  I looked at her. “Spend?”

  Ben made as if he was horrified. “Not that, Mom! Not that! Try to control it!”

  Lucy’s eyes narrowed in concentration and her gaze went blank. “The shopping gene is beyond all control. Souvenirs. I must have souvenirs!”

  It was horrible to behold. Lucy bought; I carried. Three T-shirts, two sweatshirts, and a snow-shaker paperweight later, we had exhausted the selection in the upper park and trekked down to CityWalk in search of more booty. The CityWalk is a large, open-air mall with shops, bookstores, restaurants, and other fine places to spend your money. Some people have described the CityWalk as an urban version of Disney’s Main Street U.S.A., but I’ve always thought of it as a G-rated take on Blade Runner. Only without the rain.

  It was just before noon when we got there, and, like the park above, the CityWalk was thick with tour groups from Asia and visitors from around the country. We walked the length of the CityWalk, browsing in the shops and watching the people, Lucy and I holding hands while Ben ranged around us. It felt good to be not working and good to be with Lucy. I said, “Do you think you can rein in your spending spree long enough to eat?”

  She looked at me the way the cat does when I take his bowl before he’s finished.

  “I may not be able to carry this stuff much longer without an infusion of calories.”

  “You’ll manage.”

  “We may have to hire porters.”

  “It’s only money.”

  “We may have to stop spending.”

  She made a big sigh and rolled her eyes. “Modern men are such wimps.”

  I leaned close to her ear. “That’s not what you said last night on the deck.”

  Lucy laughed and hugged my arm tight, biting my shoulder through the shirt. “O.K., Studly, your wish is my command. Where would you like to eat?”

  “You said that last night, too.”

  She dug her thumb in my ribs and said, “Shh! Ben!”

  “He didn’t hear. C’mon. There’s a Puck’s ahead. We can eat there.”

  “Puck’s! Oh, goody!”

  We went to Wolfgang Puck’s and stood in line for a table. Everyone around us was from Iowa or Canada or Japan, and no one seemed to have seen the news or read the paper or, if they had, didn’t care. There was plenty of outdoor seating, and the people at the tables were enjoying salads and sandwiches.

  We worked our way up the line to a pretty blonde hostess who told us that it would be just another minute when I caught an overweight guy staring at me. He was sitting at one of the tables, eating shredded chicken salad and reading a Times. He looked from me to the paper, then back to me. He stopped a passing waitress, showed her the paper, then they both looked at me. I turned so that I was facing the opposite direction. Lucy said, “Those people are looking at you.”

  “Great.”

  “I think they recognize you.”

  “I know.”

  “He’s pointing at you.”

  The Korean couple behind us looked at me, too. I guess they saw the pointing. I smiled and nodded at them, and they smiled back.

  Lucy said, “Ohmigod, he’s showing the paper to the people at the next table.”

  I touched the hostess’s arm. “Do you think you could find us a table, please. Inside or out. First available.”

  “Let me check.” She disappeared into the restaurant.

  Lucy said, “Maybe we should run for it.”

  “Very funny.”

  “We could leave. I don’t mind.”

  “No. You want Puck’s, we’re going to eat at Puck’s.”

  An older couple behind the Korean people craned around to see what all the looking and pointing was about. The woman looked from me to the people with the newspaper, then back to me. She said something to her husband and he shrugged. I turned the other way, and now the heavy man with the newspaper was locked in conversation with a table of six people, all of whom were twisted around in their seats to see me. I said, “This is nuts.”

  Lucy was smiling.

  I said, “This isn’t funny.”

  The woman behind the Korean couple said, “Excuse me. Are you somebody?”

  I said, “No.”

  She smiled at me. “You’re an actor, aren’t you? You’re on that show.”

  Lucy began one of those silent laughs where your face goes red and you’re trying not to but can’t help yourself.

  I said, “I’m not. Really.”

  “Then why is everybody looking at you?”

  “It’s a long story.”

  The woman gave me huffy. “Well, it’s not very friendly of you, if you ask me, snubbing your public like this.”

  Lucy leaned toward the woman. “He can be just horrible, can’t he? I talk to him about it all the time.”

  I stared at her.

  The woman said, “Well, you should. It’s so unkind.”

  Lucy gave me a little push. “Why don’t you give her an autograph.”

  I stared harder. “You’re some kind of riot, you know that?”

  Lucy nodded. Brightly.

  The woman said, “Oh, that would be
just so nice.” She gestured to her husband. “Merle, we have a pen, don’t we?” She shoved a pen and a souvenir napkin from Jodi Maroni’s sausage kitchen at me to sign. The Korean couple were talking in Korean to each other, the man searching frantically through a shoulder bag.

  I took the napkin and leaned close to Lucy. “I’m going to get you for this.”

  She turned away so no one could see her breaking up. “Oh, I really, really hope you do.”

  Ben said, “Mom? Why are these people looking at Elvis?”

  The older woman’s eyes grew large. “You’re Elvis?”

  The Korean woman held out an autograph book and the Korean man began taking pictures. Two teenaged girls who were seated behind the party of six saw me signing the Jodi Maroni napkin and came over, and then two younger guys from the table of six followed. A tall, thin man across the restaurant stood up at his table and aimed his video camera at me. His wife stood with him. A Hispanic couple passing on the CityWalk stopped to see what was going on, and then three young women who looked like they’d come up to the CityWalk on their lunch hour stopped, too. A woman with very loose upper arms pointed at me and told her friend, “Oh, I just love his movies, don’t you?” She said it loudly.

  The heavy man with the newspaper who had started it got up and walked away. Lucy and Ben were walking away, too. Quickly. Off to ruin someone else’s life, no doubt.

  The crowd grew. I signed twenty-two autographs in four minutes, and they were the longest four minutes of my life. I finally begged off by announcing that as much as I enjoyed meeting them, the President required my counsel and so I must leave. When I said it the woman with the loose arms said, “I didn’t know he was in politics, too!”

  When I finally found Lucy and Ben they were well along the CityWalk, grinning and walking fast away from me.

  I said, “Lucille Chenier, you can run but you can’t hide.” I said it loud enough for them to hear.

  Lucy and Ben laughed, and then they ran.

  16

  After another $182.64 in souvenirs, postcards, and gifts, Lucy called Baton Rouge to check her messages. I was hoping that there might be word on Pritzik or Richards, so I phoned my office, also. Sixteen messages were waiting for me. Of the sixteen, seven were from newspeople asking for interviews and five were from friends who had seen me on the news. Of the remaining four calls, two were hang-ups and two were from Elliot Truly. On the first hang-up a woman’s voice said, “Oh, shit,” and on the second the same voice said, “Just eat me!” The voice was muffled and irritated. Truly’s secretary left the first message from his office, asking me to return the call. Truly himself left the second message, saying, “Cole? Cole, if you’re there, pick up. This is important.” I guess Truly was irritated, too. Maybe I bring it out in people.

  I returned Truly’s call. When he came on the line he said, “Thank Christ! I’ve been trying to reach you all day. Where have you been?” He sounded frantic.

  “You told me to take the day off, remember?”

  “Yeah, well, we don’t want you to do that anymore. Channel Eight wants to interview you on the evening news and Jonathan thinks it would be a good idea.”

  I said, “Go on television?”

  “It’s maybe three minutes on the four o’clock newscast, and Jonathan wants you to do it.”

  “Truly, I made plans. I’ve got guests from out of town.”

  “Look, the team talked about this today and we want the press to have access to you. Either we’re going to control the media or the district attorney’s office will, and we’d rather it be us. Openness is important. Honesty is everything. That’s all we have going for us.”

  I was sorry that I had returned his call.

  “They want to know how some guy all by himself beat the entire LAPD at their own game.”

  “I didn’t beat anybody. I followed a tip and got lucky.” Lucy had finished her call and was looking at me.

  “Right. That’s why you scored the breakthrough while eight thousand blue suits were sopping up coffee and donuts.”

  “I didn’t beat anyone, Truly.” He was getting on my nerves with that.

  “All you have to do is sit there and be likable. People like you; you’re a likable guy. That’s all they care about. It’s TV.”

  I cupped the receiver and told Lucy, “They want me to give a television interview this afternoon, and it’ll interfere with going to Beverly Hills.”

  Lucy smiled and rubbed my arm. “If you have to you have to. We’ll do Beverly Hills after.”

  “It’ll cut into your shopping time. Are you sure?”

  She smiled again. “We’ll come watch you get interviewed. It’ll be fun.”

  Truly said, “What did you say?”

  “Relax, Elliot. I’ll do it.”

  Truly said, “It’s almost three now and they want you at Channel Eight by four-thirty. Grab a pencil and let me tell you where to go.”

  Truly gave me the directions. Lucy, Ben, and I drove home, changed, then made our way back down the mountain to Channel Eight’s broadcast studio just east of Western in Hollywood. KROK-TV. Personal News from Us to You—We take it personally!

  We parked in the lot beside the building, then walked in the front entrance to a receptionist seated in a bullet-proof glass booth. The lobby was walled off from the rest of the building with more heavy glass, and there was a big door next to the receptionist that she would have to buzz open to let you enter. I wondered if anyone had ever tried to shoot their way in. Put me on the news or die! You never know.

  I told her who I was and why I was there, and a few minutes later a woman in her early forties appeared and opened the door from the inside. She said, “Hi. I’m Kara Sykes, the news director. Are you Mr. Cole?”

  “That’s right. This is Lucy Chenier and her son, Ben. They’re with me.” I was holding Lucy’s hand.

  Kara Sykes held the door. “That’s fine. You’ll go on in a few minutes, so we don’t have much time. Please come this way.”

  We followed her down a long hall, then through a newsroom filled with desks and production people and onto the news set. A man and a woman were seated at the anchor desk, facing cameras fitted with TelePrompTers. A floor director was standing between the cameras with his hand touching the TelePrompTer that the man was reading from. There were places at the anchor desk for a sportscaster and a weatherperson, but those seats were empty. The set was built so that the anchors were seated with their backs to the newsroom so the audience could see that the Channel Eight news team was bringing them personal news personally. Kara whispered, “Lyle Stodge and Marcy Bernside are the five o’clock anchors. Lyle is going to interview you.”

  “Okay.” Lyle Stodge was a rugged-looking guy in his early fifties, just going gray at the temples. Marcy Bernside was a profoundly attractive woman in her late thirties with dark hair, expressive eyes, and a wholesome, girl-next-door smile.

  Kara said, “Have you done a live interview before?”

  “No.”

  “It’s no big deal. Just speak directly to Lyle. Don’t look at the camera.”

  “Okay.”

  “I spoke with Jonathan, so I know how important this is. Everyone here is on your side.”

  “My side?”

  “Just relax and enjoy it. You’re the man of the hour.”

  Lucy squeezed my hand and whispered, “I guess they heard how you were mobbed at Universal.”

  Lucy’s a riot, isn’t she?

  Lyle finished reading a story about illegal Taiwanese aliens found working in a sweatshop in Gardena, and Marcy began reading a story about Pritzik and Richards. She said that the police and the FBI had expanded their search into seven states, and that there was a growing though unofficial belief that Pritzik was, in fact, James X.

  The floor director raised his hand, made a circling gesture, and Marcy Bernside said that Channel Eight’s Personal News Team would return in just one minute. The director raised both hands, then announced, “In commercia
l. We’re clear.”

  Marcy Bernside shouted, “Fuck! Who blew the feed to my fucking ear phone?” She twisted around to glare at the newsroom. “Come on, Stuart. What’re you assholes doing back there? Jesus Christ!” So much for wholesome.

  Kara pulled my arm and said, “Showtime.”

  She hustled me to the anchor desk and had me sit in the sportscaster’s vacant seat while the camera operators repositioned for a two-shot of me and Lyle. I could see Lyle’s lines frozen on the TelePrompTer, waiting for the commercial to end. The floor director clipped a tiny microphone inside the lapel of my sport coat, then ran the wire under my jacket and plugged it into a larger cable that had been lying on the floor. Kara introduced me to Lyle Stodge who said, “I’m glad that you could join us. You’re quite a guy.”

  I said, “Will anyone notice if I make faces at the camera?”

  Lyle Stodge shuffled loose yellow legal sheets. “Don’t worry about anything. I’ve done this ten thousand times, and I can make anyone look good. Even you.” I looked at Lucy and Lucy laughed. I looked back at Lyle Stodge and he winked. Another comedian.

  A makeup person was adjusting Marcy Bernside’s hair. Marcy was singing to herself and moving to the song as if she were alone in her home. She was singing the Z.Z. Topp song, Legs. Nervous energy.

  The floor director said, “Ten seconds.” He raised his hand above Lyle’s camera. Lyle straightened his jacket and leaned toward the camera. The makeup person left the set. Lyle said, “Would you stop with the goddamned singing, for Christ’s sake?”

  Marcy Bernside gave him the finger and kept singing.

  “Three, two, one—” The floor director touched the TelePrompTer and Lyle’s script scrolled upward. Lyle made his patented crinkly-eyed smile at the camera. “As we reported at the top of the hour, a private investigator working for the Big Green Defense Machine has made a startling discovery that may shed new light on the Theodore Martin murder investigation. He joins us now in a Channel Eight Personal News exclusive, bringing you the people who make the news.” Lyle turned the pleased smile toward me. “Mr. Elvis Cole, thank you for joining us in a Channel Eight Personal News exclusive.”

  “Thanks, Lyle. It’s good to be here.” Mr. Sincerity.