Coldheart Canyon: A Hollywood Ghost Story

THREE

"Jerry."

"Tammy. My dear. Whatever happened to you? I wondered when you were going to call."

"You could have called me."

"Well, to be perfectly honest," he said, "I didn't want to trouble you. Unlike me, you've got a life to live."

"Well, actually, Arnie left me."

"Oh, I am sorry."

"Don't be. It's for the best."

"You mean it?"

"I mean it. We weren't meant for one another. It just took us a long time to find out. What about you?"

"Well, since we made the news I've been invited out to a few more fancy dinners than I used to be. People are curious. So they wine me and dine me and then they casually interrogate me. I don't mind, really. I've met a lot of people, mostly young men, who have a faintly morbid interest in what went on up in the Canyon, which they pass off as an interest in me. I play along. I mean, why not? At my age, you don't argue. Interest is interest."

"And what do you tell them?"

"Oh, bits and pieces. I've got quite adept at figuring out who can take what. You know, the ones who say tell me everything are the ones who go clammy when they're told—"

"Everything?"

"No. Never everything. I don't think anybody I've met is ready for everything."

"So how do people respond?"

"Well, they're usually ready for something fairly wild. If they sought me out in the first place it's because they know something. They've heard some rumor. Some little piece of gossip. So it keeps the conversation interesting. Now: you. What about you? Have you been sharing our adventures with anybody?"

"No."

"Nobody?"

"No. Not really."

"You should, you know. You can't keep it all bottled up. It's not healthy."

"Jerry, I live in Rio Linda, Sacramento, not Hollywood. If I started spouting off about going to the Devil's Country my neighbors would probably never talk to me again."

"Would you care? Be honest."

"Probably not."

"What about Rooney?"

"Who?" Tammy frowned.

"Rooney. The detective who interviewed us, remember? Over and over."

"His name was Rooney? I thought it was Peltzer."

"No, that's one of Maxine's lawyers, Lester Peltzer."

"Okay. So Peltzer's a lawyer, and Rooney's who?"

"You haven't heard from him? He's the Detective at the Beverly Hills Police Department who first talked to us. Have you been checking your messages?"

She hadn't but she said she had.

"Strange," Jerry said. "Because he's called me six or seven times, pressing me for details. Then I called the Department, replying to one of his calls, and you know what? He was fired two weeks ago."

"So why's he calling you?"

"I think the sonofabitch is writing a book."

"About what happened to us?"

"I guess we'll find that out when it's published."

"He can do that?"

"Maybe he'll change the names. I don't know."

"But it's our story. He can't go round telling our story."

"Maybe we should all talk to Peltzer and see if we can stop him."

"Oh God," Tammy said softly. "Life used to be so simple."

"Are you having a hard time?" Jerry said.

"Yeah. I guess. No, what am I saying? I'm having a horrible time. Really bad dreams."

"Is that it? Dreams? Or is there more?"

She thought about her reply for a moment, wondering if she should share the problems she'd been having with him. But what was the point? Though they'd been through hell together she didn't really know him all that well. How did she know he wasn't planning to write a book too? So she said: "You know all things considered, I'm doing just fine."

"Well that's good," Jerry said, sounding genuinely pleased. "Have the reporters stopped bothering you?"

"Oh I still get the occasional journalist on the doorstep, but I had one of those little spy-hole things put in the door, and if I think he looks like a reporter then I just don't open the door."

"Just as long as you're not a prisoner in your own house."

"Oh Lord, no," she lied.

"Good."

"Well... I should let you go. I've got a thousand—"

"One other thing."

"Yes."

"This is going to sound a little wacko."

"Oh. Okay."

"But I wanted to tell you about it. Just... for old times' sake, I suppose."

"I'm listening."

"You know we never really discussed what happened to us in the house."

"No. Well I figured we all knew—"

"I didn't really mean what happened to everybody. I meant you and me, down in that room. You know that there was a lot of power in those tiles. Visiting the Devil's Country kept Katya looking perfect all those years . . ."

"What are you getting at?"

"As I said, it's going to sound wacko, but I guess we're both used to that by now, yes?" He took a deep breath. "You see, I had cancer; inoperable. The doctors gave me nine months to a year to live. That was December of last year. Christmas Eve, actually."

"God, Jerry, I'm so sorry."

"No, Tammy, you're not listening. I said, I had a tumor."

"What?"

"It's gone."

"Completely?"

"Every detectable trace. Gone. The doctors can't believe it. They've done the scan five times to be absolutely sure. And now—finally—they are absolutely sure. Jerry Brahms's tumor has disappeared, and according to them that simply can't happen. Ever."

"But it has."

"It has."

"And you think it's got something to do with us being in the room?"

"Put it this way: I went into that house with a malignant tumor, and when I came out again the tumor had gone. What can you say about a thing like that? It's either a coincidence or it's a miracle."

"And you think it's a miracle?"

"You know what?" He paused. "Now I am going to sound wacko, but I prefer to think of it as Katya's last present to me."

"She didn't seem the gift-giving type."

"You only saw the darkness, Tammy. There was another side to her. I think there always is, don't you? There's always some light in the darkness, somewhere."

"Is there?" Tammy replied. "I guess I'm still looking."