Coldheart Canyon: A Hollywood Ghost Story

ELEVEN

Along the beach a hundred and fifty yards from where Tammy was standing all eyes were also directed seaward, and, like Tammy's eyes, saw nothing but the uncanny, almost beatific, light from the hovering helicopter as it passed back and forth over the surface of the water.

Eppstadt had his lawyer, Jacob Lazlov, on the line while he watched the water. At his side, Maxine.

"I want this sonofabitch Pickett prosecuted to the full extent of the law, Jacob. What do you mean: what did he do? He practically tore off my leg, that's what he did. In public. Jesus, Jacob, it was an attack, a physical attack. And now the bastard's trying to drown himself."

"Isn't this all a little premature?" Maxine remarked dryly. "He's probably drowned by now."

"Then I'll sue his fucking estate. I can sue the estate, can't I, Jacob? Speak up, I can't hear you. The helicopter—"

"You are a piece of work, you know that," Maxine said.

"I'll call you back, Jacob." Eppstadt snapped his phone closed and followed Maxine back across the beach to the house. On the way they encountered the waiter who'd come to Eppstadt's aid during Todd's attack.

"What's your name, son?"

"Joseph Finlay, sir."

"Well, Joe, I'd like you to do me a favor and stay within ten yards of me till I tell you otherwise. Will you do that? I'll pay you very well for your services. And if you see anything you don't like, son—"

"I'm there, sir."

"Good. Good. But you can start by getting me a brandy. Be quick." Joe hurried away. "Didn't you have any security at this damn party, Maxine?"

"Of course!"

"Well where the fuck was it when I was having my leg torn off? Jacob's going to be asking some questions, Maxine, and you'd better have some damn good answers."

"Todd wasn't some trespasser—" Maxine said. She had reached the patio, and now turned to face Eppstadt, tears filling her eyes. "I've known him ten years. Everyone knows him."

"Well apparently none of us knew him well enough. He was ready to kill me."

"He was nowhere near killing you," Maxine said, weary of Eppstadt's self-dramatization. She sank down into the chair where she'd been sitting when Todd had arrived, turning it round so she could watch the beach.

"Your brandy, sir."

Eppstadt took his brandy. Joe pulled a chair up, and Eppstadt sat down in it. "Ten yards," he said to Joe.

"I'm here."

Joe stepped back a little distance to give Eppstadt and Maxine a measure of privacy. Eppstadt took out a pack of cigarettes; offered one to Maxine, who took it with trembling fingers. He lit both, and leaned back in his chair.

"Sonofabitch," he said. "Who'd ever have thought he'd pull a stunt like this?"

"I think it all got too much for him," Maxine said. "He cracked."

"No doubt. What was he talking about: some house you put him in?"

"Oh yes, that house," Maxine said. "It all began with that fucking house. Where's Jerry Brahms?"

"Who?"

Maxine couldn't see Jerry, but she spotted Sawyer, her assistant, who was inside the house, eating. He came at her summons, mouth stuffed with canapés. She told him to find Jerry, pronto.

"I think we have to assume the current took them," Eppstadt said, directing Maxine's attention at the helicopter, which had steadily moved further and further out from the beach in its search. There were now two Coast Guard boats bobbing around in the water, mounted with searchlights.

"Have people no taste?" Maxine said, surveying the condo on the beach. To make matters worse, something of the party atmosphere had returned to the gathering. The waiters were weaving among the guests, refreshing drinks or offering finger food. It was not being refused. People seemed to be of the opinion that the evening's drama was best viewed as part of the fun.

A waiter brought a platter to Maxine's side. "Sushi?" he said. She looked at the array of raw fish with almost superstitious disgust.

"Oh God, why not?" Eppstadt said, a little too heartily. "In fact you can leave the platter."

"How can you eat?"

"I'm hungry. And if I were you, I'd keep me happy. Treat me very delicately." He examined the piece of yellow-tail in his fingers. "I suppose at this point I could get all stirred up wondering what the fish was eating before it was caught. . . but why wonder?"

Maxine got up from her chair and walked over to the railing. "I always thought you liked Todd."

"I thought he was acceptable company up to a point. But then he got full of himself, and he became impossible. Your handiwork, of course."

"What?"

"Telling him he was the next best thing to sliced bread, when all along he was just another pretty face. And now not even that, thanks to Doctor Burrows." He picked up a second piece of sushi. "I tell you, if Todd is dead, then he's done the best thing he could do for his reputation. I know how that sounds, but it's the truth. Now he's got a crack at being a legend. If he'd lived, grown old, everyone would have realized he couldn't act his way out of a damp paper bag. And it would have made us all look like fools. You for representing him, me for spending all that money on him over the years."

"Maxine?"

Sawyer was leading a stricken Jerry up onto the patio. At some point in the recent past his rug had become partially unglued and now sat off-center on his head.

"Todd's gone," he said.

"We can't be sure yet, Jerry. Sawyer, get Mister Brahms a scotch and soda. Light on the scotch. Jerry, this is Mister Eppstadt, from Paramount."

"I'm familiar . . ." Jerry said, his gaze going from Eppstadt as soon as he'd laid eyes on him, and drifting off again toward the water. "It's useless. I don't know why they keep searching. They've been swept away by now."

"The house, Jerry."

"What?"

"In the Canyon," Eppstadt said. "I've been hearing about it from Maxine."

"Oh. I see. Well... there's not a lot I can tell you. I just used to go there as a child. I was an actor, you see, when I was much younger."

"And were there other children there?"

"No. Not that I remember, at least. Just a woman called Katya Lupi— who took me under her wing. She's the one . . ." he pointed out toward the waterline ". . . who took Todd."

"No, Jerry," Maxine said. "Whoever that woman was, she was young."

"Katya was young."

"This girl looked twenty-five."

"Katya looked twenty-five." He accepted his scotch and soda from Sawyer. "She wasn't, of course. She was probably a hundred."

"Then how the hell can she have looked twenty-five?" Eppstadt demanded.

Jerry had two words by way of reply.

"Coldheart Canyon."

Eppstadt had no reply to this. He just stared at Brahms, bewildered.

"She looks young," Jerry said. "But she isn't. That was her out there, no doubt about it. Personally, I think it was some kind of a suicide pact between them."

"That's ridiculous!" Maxine snorted. "Todd's got his whole life in front of him."

"I think he may have been more desperate than you realized," Jerry said. "Perhaps if you'd been a little better as friends, he'd still be with us."

"I don't think it's very useful to toss that kind of accusation around," Eppstadt said. "Especially when we don't know the facts."

"I think the facts are very plain," Jerry said. "I still read Variety." He pointed at Maxine. "You decided to give up on representing him when he was having difficulties with his career. And you"—now the accusatory finger went in Eppstadt's direction—"canceled a movie which he had his heart set on. Not to mention the fact that you"—the finger returned to Maxine—"just made a public display of humiliating him. Is it any wonder he decided to put an end to his life?"

Neither accusee attempted a defense. What was the use? What Jerry had said was a matter of public record.

"I want to see this Canyon," Eppstadt said. "And the house."

"The house has nothing to do with any of this," Jerry said. "Frankly, I suggest you keep your distance from it. You've already—"

Eppstadt ignored him. "Where is it?" he demanded of Maxine.

"Well I've never been able to find it on a map but the Canyon runs parallel with Laurel Canyon. I don't think it's even got a proper name."

"Coldheart Canyon," Brahms said again. "That's what they used to call it in the Silent Era. Because she was supposed to have such a cold heart, you see."

"You know your way there?" Eppstadt asked Maxine.

"I... suppose I could find my way . . . but I'd prefer somebody to drive me."

"You," Eppstadt said. It was his turn to point.

Jerry shook his head.

"It's either you taking me, or the police."

"Why'd you want to call the police?"

"Because I think there's some kind of conspiracy going on. You.

Pickett. The woman who went into the sea with him. You're all in this together."

"To do what, for God's sake?"

"I don't know: promote that asshole's career?"

"I assure you—"

"I don't care to hear your assurances," Eppstadt said. "I just need you to take me to this Canyon of yours."

"It's not mine. It's hers. Katya's. If we went there we'd be trespassing on her property. "

"I'll take that risk."

"Well I won't."

"Maxine, tell him he's coming."

"I don't see why you want to go," Jerry pleaded.

"Let's just make Mister Eppstadt happy right now, shall we?"

"I just don't want to trespass," Jerry said again.

"Well you can blame me," Eppstadt said. "Tell this Lupi woman—if she ever surfaces again—that I forced you to take me. Where's the waiter? Joe!"

Eppstadt's makeshift bodyguard came over. "We're going to make a little field-trip. I'd like you to come with us."

"Oh? Okay."

"Maxine, do you have a gun?"

"I'm not going with you."

"Yes you are, m'dear. A gun. Do you have one?"

"Several. But I'm not going. I've had enough excitement for one night. I need some sleep."

"Well here's your choices. Come now and let's find out what the hell's going on up there, together. Or sit tight and wait for my lawyer to call you in the morning."

Maxine looked at him blankly.

"Do I take that as a yes?" he said.

There were five in the expedition party. Maxine's assistant, Sawyer, armed with one of Maxine's guns, drove Maxine. And in a second car, driven by Jerry, went Eppstadt and Joe. The larger of Maxine's guns, a .45, was in Eppstadt's possession. He claimed he knew how to use it.

By the time they had left, many of the party-goers had already drifted away, leaving a hard core of perhaps thirty-five people, many of them still on the beach, waiting to see if anything noteworthy was going to happen. About fifteen minutes after Eppstadt's expedition had departed for the hills the Coast Guard called off the helicopter. There had been a boating accident up the coast—nine people in the water—and air support was urgently needed. One of the two search boats was also called off, leaving the other to make wider and wider circles as any hope that the lost souls were still alive and close to the shore steadily grew more remote, and finally, faded entirely.