Stealing Fire (19 page)

The sleep had given me a clear head, and I just about felt like myself again.

Iris asked Mike if she could use the phone, and Mike took her downstairs to the office—privacy. Harry and I cleared the table. He was receiving notices and reviews from travel magazines, and they were taped on the walls. My grandfather would be jealous if he saw them, but he'd pretend not to be. Me, I was simply happy for Harry. If anyone deserved recognition for bringing our part of the country into the twentieth century, Harry Goulding was it.

Iris came back from the office, and we excused ourselves for a moment to look at the stars. The Gouldings sat in the living room, enjoying a cozy fire. They said there were new books on the shelves, and to feel free to enjoy them.
Later,
I thought.

I looked at the North Star, the center of order in the sky. I thought of the perfect placement of some stars. The dancers who were gods, singing their power to the world. The random placement of the other stars, the ones Coyote mischievously tossed into the sky from a blanket while First Man and First Woman were placing the others so carefully.
We need Coyote,
I thought. Too much order makes the heart and mind feel like they are waging a battle while trying to move through concrete. We need it all.

“Yazzie,” Iris said, “I spoke with Mrs. Wright. She was anxious to know how her husband was doing. I told her just fine, and that he was having a ball hobnobbing with movie stars.”

“She didn't say anything about the death of Payton?”

“No. If she'd known, she would have been a wreck—you saw how close they were.”

“Mention Helen?”

“Didn't come up.”

“What,” I said, “do you make of that?”

“Maybe she thinks Payton and Helen ran off, and she's protecting their tryst.”

“Seems plausible. She knew every inch of Payton's life, according to Wright. What about the fire?”

“She thinks the Fellows just wired us too soon, that they'd found a wallet in the barn, assumed it belonged to Helen, and she went up in smoke with the shed. The wallet was not all the way burned, custom-made, with a Beverly Hills designer label sewn inside, and ID. Then some newspaper reporter picked it up.”

“I wonder why someone planted the wallet.”

“It's so weird, Yazzie,” Iris said. “I wonder if Payton had any family.”

“I wonder when they'll find his body. If they'll find his body.”

“I need to stop thinking about this,” she said.

“I agree.”

We held hands and watched the stars continue their dance. If you don't believe they dance their constellations, then you need to watch them a little longer. It is their job, and they couldn't stop if they tried. Probably their role. Their promise. The way we take care of our close friends and families—it's not a job. It's a dance we do, it is part of the very center of who we are.

We walked back into the Gouldings' home, found our room, and went to bed, dead beat.

Midnight

Knocking on the door, rhythmic and insistent.

“For God's sake, hold your horses,” Harry said. “I'm coming!”

Iris and I went to the bedroom door.

Harry opened the living room door and there were two cops wearing Flagstaff badges and shoulder patches.

One looked at Iris. He said, “Are you Iris Goldman?”

“Who wants to know?” I said.

“We want to ask her a few questions.”

“About what?” Iris said.

“Mrs. Goldman, we have reason to believe you have information about the death of Payton Wood.”

She said nothing.

“Mrs. Goldman, we can answer these questions here or we can make the drive back to Flagstaff.”

She said nothing. My wife knew better than to answer questions without a lawyer.

They cuffed Iris and walked her away. I followed. “Hey, you can't cuff her when she's not under arrest.”

One of them gave me a drop-dead look. Iris shook her head at me—no.

I tried to get in the police car with her. They shoved me aside. Harry said two words, “Yazzie, don't.”

They drove south with her, and I ran as fast as I could to John Ford's tent.

“Mr. Ford?”

“Yazzie, it's the middle of the night!”

“Mr. John, the police have taken Iris down to Flagstaff for questioning.”

He tossed on his clothes. “What the hell about?”

“The death of Payton Wood.”

“Who the hell is that?”

“A guy who worked for Frank Lloyd Wright. A guy who was having an affair with Jake Fine's daughter.”

We were both on the move back to Harry's and the phone.

“Why in the world would they think Iris knew about something like that?!”

“Because she was there.”

“There, where?”

“At the motel where he died. She saw the people who were with him. When she left, she had his blood on her blouse.”

“Which is where?”

“We tossed it in the fire at a cousin's on the way here.”

“Thank God. We have to get my attorney on the phone. She say anything to the cops?”

“Nothing.”

“Think she can keep that up until I can get a lawyer for her?”

“Iris has two speeds,” I said. “Jabber or total silence. She could stonewall the pyramids.”

 

Thirty-one

Ford's attorney in L.A. made a few calls but couldn't find anyone he considered top-notch in Flagstaff. He did find someone he thought was more versed in the law than the cops. He said that getting hauled in by the Flagstaff cops was either terrible because they were ignorant, or it was great because they were ignorant.

“I don't like this,” Ford said to his lawyer. “You're my man.”

I couldn't understand the lawyer's words, not yet, but then his volume increased considerably, and he was clear as a bell.

“Hell, Marvin, you're on retainer,” Ford said. “Get your ass out here.”

“I have cases.”

“The world of Hollywood can probably get by with one of your legal stooges for a few days.”

“John, this is too much and not covered in our contract.”

“Tear up the contract. I won't have trouble finding a new lawyer on a hefty retainer in the glittery legal offices on Sunset Boulevard.”

“Okay, okay, I'll be there.”

“I am in the middle of a shoot. I will
not
be there. The woman's husband will be.”

“You're too busy to get to Flagstaff and I'm not?”

“How much money did you make last year? Multiply it by a hundred and that's me,” Ford said. “Get your ass moving.”

Apparently, he fussed and he fumed, but he did not want to lose Ford as a client. And so it came to pass that a high-priced attorney, provided and paid for by Mr. Ford, would get out of his pajamas, leaving his drowsy wife, and get a flight to Flag.

Once the attorney agreed to come, Ford added, as if it was an afterthought, that a gangster might be involved. Then he hung up the phone.

“Hit the road, Yazzie. I'll have security double up, but not in a conspicuous way, on Wright.”

“I don't know how to thank you.”

“I do. I don't want to be involved with any antics that take my mind off filming. You are welcome on my sets any time, and so is Iris. But you are never allowed to be a problem again.”

“I understand.”

“Unless you want to piss in Ward Bond's flask. Wayne owes him a prank, and I get a kick out of their shenanigans.”

Ford was quiet, he rubbed his chin, and he looked at the ceiling. He called his attorney again and told him to climb back into bed.

“I thought of someone even better than Marvin,” he said to me, “and it's absolute genius.”

 

Thirty-two

We each could have used an extra foot or two of leg room. John Wayne had trouble getting into the cab of my truck. I got out and we started all over again. In between, we looked like a couple of contortionists from Barnum and Bailey. I chalked it up to the fact that it was dark. I couldn't even see where my legs were, nor where the stick shift was, and could only see his vague outline. A big outline. We finally made it, and were on our way.

“Locking a nice married lady up. I can't believe it,” he said.

“Seeing your wife in handcuffs stings, I'll tell you that.”

“Pretty woman, too. She a Mexican?”

“No, Jewish,” I said.

“Well, Mexican or Jewish or Irish—we're talking about tough ladies. I'll wager on her to keep them in check until we get there.”

“Ford said he was dragging a half-rate lawyer out of bed in Flagstaff. He'll be there when we arrive.”

“If he's half-rate in Flagstaff, he's probably the best guy within three hundred miles.”

“Ford wanted his lawyer in L.A. to come out, but he decided you'd be a better bet.”

“He's right. A smooth-talking Hollywood hotshot would just tick these country folks off, and they'd make life harder on her.”

“What are you going to say?”

“I'm gonna stand in the corner of the room, arms crossed across my chest, and be John Wayne.”

“That'll throw them for a loop.”

“I figure so.”

John Wayne to the rescue of the damsel in distress, a movie cliché and, yes, a doozy of an idea. When he walked in, they'd see the hero they knew, up on the screen, the person you want on your side. The white hat.

I had a sudden thought. “You must not have a shot tomorrow.”

“If I did, John Ford would hold up the second coming of Christ until we got to cut and print.”

We got into Flagstaff just before dawn. The jail, sheriff's office, and sheriff's house were all in one building. Iris was in the sheriff's kitchen, still cuffed. They might have broken the rules even more and put her in a cell without cause, but they only had two cells in the building, and both were taken by guys arrested for being drunk and disorderly.

The half-rate lawyer came in. One glance and he said, “Is she under arrest?”

“Not yet,” said the sheriff.

“Then take those cuffs off.”

Slowly, with a frown, the sheriff did.

His wife almost swooned when she saw Wayne, but she was able to pour us coffee. The lawyer offered Wayne his chair. He said, “No thanks.” The sheriff wasn't big on movies, he said, but he did know of Mr. Wayne and said he was a fan. “Thanks” was all Wayne said. Then he did just like he said he would. He stood back in the corner of the kitchen, crossed one leg over the other at the ankle, and folded his arms across his chest.

The sheriff read Iris her rights and got on with the questioning. Iris, and this was a miracle, had not said one word since she'd been hauled off.

Wayne tipped his hat at her, and she smiled at him, kind of a cool, haughty smile. I had to hand it to Iris. She had class.

“When,” the sheriff said, “did you last see Payton Wood?”

“You don't have to answer that.” That was her lawyer.

She didn't.

Her attorney said, “Tell me why you think my client should have known anyone by that name or at the scene.”

“Because we have a witness that places her there around the time of the murder.”

“The murder of … whose murder, Sheriff?”

“Payton Wood.”

“And who placed her at the scene?”

“The desk clerk.”

Iris whispered in the lawyer's ear. “Everybody knows that the desk clerk at the Red Stone Motel is a drunk and sleeps at his desk most of the time.”

“Sure, we know Chuck. If he didn't own the place, he would have gotten canned a long time ago. It was the morning clerk. She says she remembers an Iris Goldman checking in.”

“Any record of that?”

“No, sir. Hard name to forget around this part of the country, though. And not that many women who check into a motel alone, unless, you know … they're looking to do business.”

“But you have no record that she was there.”

“No.”

“Have anything else?”

“Yes. We have the testimony of one Helen Fine that Iris Goldman was present at Mr. Wood's death.”

Iris whispered to her lawyer again. He said, “Is this the Helen Fine reported as dead in a fire?”

“We don't know anything about that.”

“Check the files at your newspaper. If you don't have the story, we do.”

“One other thing,” the sheriff said. “We have it on good authority that—”

“What good authority?”

“No names. We could be compromising a witness.”

“Your witness says what?”

“She says that Payton Wood and Iris Goldman were having an affair. That Mrs. Goldman was jealous of Miss Fine and killed Payton Wood.”

I was about to leap over the table and throttle the sheriff. Wayne put his hand across my chest.

“Excuse me,” said Mr. Wayne, “but I'm missing something here.”

“You're not allowed to speak,” the sheriff said.

His wife eyed daggers at him. Tell John Wayne not to speak? In her house?

“Well,” he said, “I can do that thing of whispering to Mrs. Goldman's lawyer, and he can pass it along, but it seems like we could just cut straight to the chase.”

The sheriff's wife talked with him, and he agreed to let Wayne speak.

“You've got a woman's husband in here,” he said, “and you accuse her of infidelity. That's pretty raw. Plus, as far as I know infidelity is not a crime. I would have been in jail a few times if it were.”

Mrs. Sheriff tittered.

“Obviously, you're looking to get Mr. Goldman worked up so you can throw him in jail.”

“Most important is this, Sheriff,” said the lawyer, “and tell me so I understand real clear. Why would a woman kill a guy she was having a fling with instead of killing the other woman?”

“We can't get into this here. That's information the judge would go over.”