Anna had only ridden in her father’s railcar twice, on pleasure trips to Santa Barbara where they had stayed at the Arlington Hotel. They had visited the old mission and played on the beach, watching the seals and dolphins swim, and getting tar on their feet. Her father mainly used the train for his own business travel. Who knows what Georges used it for, or if he used it at all.
The station master unlocked the door. “If you need anything . . . I guess you ask him.” He tipped his nose toward Joe.
“Thank you, kindly.” Anna inclined her head, then mounted the steps to the private car.
Joe followed, struggling to get through with his heavy load. Once inside, his eyes expanded to wagon wheels. “Holy smoke.” He set the luggage down. The Blanc car resembled the interior of a plush hotel suite, sumptuous and grand. A log burned in a great tile fireplace before a polar bearskin rug with a taxidermy head. There was a tufted velvet settee. An ornate carved table held crystal goblets and decanters, and a phonograph. A large arrangement of fresh calla lilies had been waiting on the off chance that a Blanc would come for a ride. The baskets, which contained an array of foods, chocolates, and wine, graced a small dining table. The bed was large enough for two. Heavy damask drapes hung over the windows. Anna pushed them aside letting in the sunlight. She turned and gave Joe a saccharine smile. “I should be comfortable enough.”
He wandered into the private bath where there were more calla lilies, bath oils, and soaps shaped like flowers. “Holy smoke.”
“You said that.”
“Sherlock, you could fit a baseball team in your bathtub.”
“Don’t be silly. I don’t want to bathe with baseball players.”
He smirked and strolled back into the living area. “Are you going to be okay in here all alone? Are you sure you don’t want a bodyguard? Someone might break in and steal, I don’t know, this.” He picked up a bronze table lamp shaped like a lady. He set it down. “Or this.” He lifted a crystal decanter full of spirits. He replaced it and sauntered to the door leading to the other cars. “Is the lock secure?”
“Yes, it’s secure.” Anna plopped down on the settee and stretched. “We couldn’t have third-class passengers trying to get in.”
He opened the portal, flipped the lock, and tried the handle. It refused to turn with the lock engaged. “All right. I’ll leave you in peace. Don’t feel guilty.”
“Oh, I won’t.”
“We could be discussing the case.”
Anna tilted her head back and forth as she weighed this. “No.”
Joe carried his carpet bag out through the portal, into the next car, and presumably through another car and into third class.
The train began to roll, chugging through the city, down through the center of Chinatown, tooting its horn. Anna watched out the window. The whores on Alameda Street stood in doorways making obscene gestures at the train, lifting their skirts to show off their frillies. Anna waved back, looking closely to see if she knew anyone, but they were girls from the cribs, not the better parlor houses, and looked unfamiliar. The train flew past warehouses, greenhouses, breweries, and tall buildings. They passed fields of strawberries and asparagus where Chinese men in shabby hats tilled the soil to feed the city that oppressed them.
Anna removed her hat and plopped down on the bed. She needed to think about the Griffith Park Executioner, so she could catch him and exonerate Georges. Who was he and why did he kill? Was he an Angeleno, or someone from Grayson’s past, from Oklahoma City? She lay back and stared at the vines and flowers painted on the vaulted ceiling, tracing them with her eyes. She pictured Samuel Grayson lying in the dust, covered in ants. She pictured the Jonquil Café, the girls there, Lester Shepherd. But her mind kept drifting to Oklahoma City.
Anna fell asleep.
Anna awoke in pitch darkness, on top of the coverlet, still wearing her traveling ensemble. She sat up, refreshed, having slept through most of the night. It was unusual for Anna to sleep through dinner when someone else had cooked. She rose and stretched. She flipped on the light. The night was frigid. She heaped more coals into the fireplace and splashed them with brandy. With a match, she set a piece of her father’s fine stationary aflame and tossed it onto the coals, crossing her fingers. They caught.
She moved to the gramophone and put on a recording of Enrique Caruso singing La Donna È Mobile. She took off her shoes and tucked her feet beneath her on the settee, poured herself a goblet of wine, and nibbled on grapes and cheese.
The car grew toasty warm. She decided to remove her wool travel ensemble so as to be even more comfortable. She drew the drapes, unbuttoned her skirt and jacket, and slipped out of them. She shed her corset cover and unhooked her corset. She peeled off her chemise and dropped her petticoats and drawers. She rolled down her stockings and slid her garters down her legs.
She liked being naked.
She lay down on the white bear-skin rug in front of the fireplace, her head on the bear’s head like a pillow. The fur felt delicious on her naked skin, silky and soft. Caruso crooned. She thought of Joe. She pictured him in his underwear.
She thought of moving into the railcar permanently and just traveling up and down the state naked. She thought of Joe’s cock stand. She massaged her aching muscles.
Someone knocked on the door.
Anna froze. “Who is it?”
“It’s your estranged fiancé. I’m really sorry to wake you.”
“What could you possibly want at this hour?”
“There’s no food in third class, the guy next to me is whistling, and I’m right by the toilets. I haven’t slept a wink.”
“I’ll bet there’s no wine, either, and no gramophone.”
“And it’s cold.”
Anna rolled over onto her belly and ate a grape. “That’s too bad. My fire is toasty warm.”
“Anna.” Joe rattled the doorknob. “Please, let me in.”
“You should be nicer to my—”
The lock clicked, and the door flew open. Joe stood in his derby hat, shivering in the space between cars.
Anna froze, grape halfway to her mouth, naked on the bearskin rug.
CHAPTER 32
Joe’s perfect mouth dropped open. “I . . . I . . . Oh Lord.” He turned his back. He turned around again. “Oh Lord.” He turned his back again and stepped outside, closing the door.
Anna heard him making strangled, anguished, animal sounds in the space between cars.
She wasn’t sure what to do. On the one hand, Joe was what she wanted. On the very important other hand . . .
Anna couldn’t remember the other hand. She wanted him back. “Help! Police!”
The door opened. Joe stepped inside and closed it behind him. He was breathing hard.
Anna was now wrapped in the rug like an Eskimo, the polar bear’s head beside her own, her heart thumping. “We’re fine now, thank you.”
“What?”
She cleared her throat. “I was in the bath, you see . . . but . . . I tripped and rolled across the floor, and then . . . I flipped over the chair onto the rug and—”
“I’m trying to picture that.”
“It happens all the time.”
“Oh God, I hope that’s true.” Joe tossed his derby hat and stripped out of his coat while crossing the railcar in two long strides. He leaned down and kissed Anna on the mouth. He kissed her again. His kiss was melting fiery and burned with all the intensity of their situation, and all the passion required to overcome it—his threat to her kin, her familial fidelity, the fierce gaze of a taxidermied bear, and a door that did not lock.
He kissed her like he was starving and she was a very delicious liverwurst sandwich.
She liked it intensely.
With great effort, Anna turned her head away. “You and I are fighting, and you can’t fight naked.”
“I don’t know. The Greeks used to do it.” He moved his kisses lower, thrilling her skin.
She gasped. “You’ll get a cock stand, and ever
yone in third class will realize—”
“I have a plan for that.”
It was too late, anyway. He already had a cock stand.
Joe’s logic made perfect sense, and his body was exceedingly interesting. So, Anna did what any girl would do in her situation, being covered in kisses by a delicious policeman while wearing only polar bear fur. She arched up against him, letting her head fall back.
“Oh, cutie,” Joe whispered passionately.
There was a bang, and a man’s loud voice. “You villain!”
Joe whirled about, dropping Anna on her bottom. She clutched the rug to her chest. A sleepy, disheveled conductor loomed with two blackened railroad men who very likely should have been shoveling coal but were now staring at Anna with googly eyes. The conductor swooped up the bronze lamp shaped like a lady and clobbered Joe over the head, denting the velum shade. Joe’s blue eyes lost focus and he fell backward, collapsing flat on his spine, though everything was not flat.
Anna shrieked. The conductor threw his arm toward the door. “Go on. Get him out of here!”
She screamed again and kept screaming as the men yanked Joe Singer up by his armpits. He struggled and kicked as they dragged him out of the car.
After the railroad workers had tossed Joe off the train, Anna sat on the couch wrapped in a robe, sipping a brandy.
She furrowed her brow. “Are we almost in Yuma? I mean, you left Detective Singer alone in the desert. He could have broken his . . . something.”
“He deserved it, the cad. And anyway, we were summiting the hill. The train wasn’t going very fast.”
“Yes, but he hasn’t any water.” Anna stood, crossed to the liquor cabinet, rummaged for a sterling silver flask and filled it from the sink. She went out the car door and peered down into the gap between cars, the cold wind whipping her hair. She carefully dropped the flask onto the tracks. It disappeared with a clank, sucked into darkness.
“Do you think he’d like some grapes?” Anna strode to the picnic basket, retrieved a bunch of grapes, and dropped them down, too.
The conductor shook his head with feeling. “You truly are an angel.”
“Yes, I know.” She tossed Joe some cheese.
“Please. I know it’s delicate, but if you could just tell me exactly what happened.
Anna did. That is to say, she relayed as much truth as she could possibly spare, because women were judged more harshly than men.
She cleared her throat. “I had just gotten out of the bath . . . I sometimes bathe without my clothes . . . and then . . . “ She tapped her lips and looked heavenward. “I slipped on a banana peel. Then the door flew open. It was the wind because my robe blew off. Detective Singer was guarding my car. I wrapped myself up in the rug . . . I must have swooned because I don’t remember anything else until, well, right now.
It wasn’t a good story, but kissing Joe Singer always made Anna feel a little undone.
The conductor made a growling sound and proclaimed grandly. “He was guarding you? Who was guarding him?”
“Did he misbehave? I don’t recall.”
“You are fortunate the other passengers heard your cries for help and summoned me.”
Anna nodded yes and no at the same time, moving her head in a circle. In truth, she wasn’t sure whether it had been a good thing or not. Could Joe and Anna fight naked? Anna wasn’t Greek.
The man puffed out his chest and lifted his wattle. “You realize that if I hadn’t rescued you, things would have been dire indeed.”
Anna weighed this, as well. Would it have been dire to fight Joe in the Grecian style? Or had Anna missed something wonderful, an opportunity she would never get back? She cursed the conductor. And blessed him. Then she cursed him again.
Principles were important. But principles weren’t everything. In principle, Joe was her enemy. But his behavior had been friendly and pleasant in the extreme.
CHAPTER 33
Half an hour after the conductor had Joe tossed from the train, the locomotive rolled into Yuma station. Darkness still clung to the desert. Anna quickly dressed. She stripped a fine linen pillowcase from her pillow and filled it with supplies from the picnic basket—chocolate, pate and crackers, and two bottles of champagne. She added the decanter of brandy, though it was crystal, thus heavy and easy to break.
Anna donned an enormous new hat decorated with artificial fruit and wrapped herself in a cloak. She collected Joe’s discarded coat, put his hat into her pillowcase, and joined the flood of rumpled passengers disembarking from the train. On the platform, she perched on a bench, staring down the tracks, waiting for Joe. He would be walking for hours. She felt a pang of guilt. The winter desert was frigid in the wee hours, and he was unprepared. He could be hurt, having been tossed from a moving train. For all she knew, he was now being eaten by a Gila monster.
So, Anna did what any girl would do in her position, with her estranged love in danger. She headed down the moonlit tracks, past railcar after railcar filled with produce, in the direction from which the train had come, the pillowcase and Joe’s coat slung over her shoulder.
The conductor called after Anna. “Miss Blanc! Where are you going? Where do we take your things?”
“Please leave them on board. I’ve decided to go on to Oklahoma City. Do hold the train for me.” She hollered back without turning around. “I’m just stretching my legs.”
“You can’t walk out into the desert alone. It’s still dark. Come back!”
Anna broke into an awkward run, leaping from railroad tie to railroad tie, which spread out before her like an endless ladder. For all his heroic posturing, the conductor wasn’t very persistent. When she cast a glance behind her, he wasn’t following.
She slowed to a walk when she could no longer hear him calling her, carefully watching each footfall to avoid the dangerous desert creatures she had been warned about. Away from the noise of the station, she could hear coyotes yipping in the darkness—the darkness into which she was venturing. It raised her hackles. She thought she could fight a single coyote if she kicked it or came at it with windmill arms, but it sounded like a whole pack singing. If Joe were being eaten by a pack of coyotes, he would certainly need her. Anna doubled her resolve.
Her enormous hat weighed on her neck, shifting with every stride, tugging on her scalp. From time to time, she tilted back her head to see past the brim to the glowing horizon. She became aware of a coyote that periodically moved in the scrub ahead or behind her. She could see his silhouette. Anna knew how coyotes worked. Joe had told her. A single coyote lured their prey while the rest of the pack hid. Then the whole pack attacked. They attacked dogs sometimes, or children, or a small woman crawling on hands and knees through the desert.
Her neck began to ache. She ripped the heavy artificial fruits off her lovely new hat and threw them at the coyote, apple by pear, angry at yet another chapeau ruined. She hit the coyote on the nose with a pomegranate. It yelped and ran away, only to double back and resume its slinking.
She watched the sun rise on the Sonora desert. Dawn revealed a severe landscape and an orange sky. Saguaro cacti stood like men, waving their arms at her as if warning her to turn back. There were twisting Joshua trees and spiky yucca with pale flowers on towering stalks that loomed like ghosts.
The sun chased away the coyote, who was no doubt now seeking out his den. But other creatures were about—scorpions likely, snakes to be sure, colonies of fire ants, and whatever a Gila monster was. She heard rattling in the brush—an insect, or maybe a snake.
Anna would have to keep to the tracks and watch her step.
She worried for Joe, who had no large hat to protect his complexion from the rising sun. Also, he had no pate and no champagne, but she would soon remedy that. She could only hope he had found the flask, grapes, and cheese.
The day quickly grew warm unlocking the scents of sand and heat. The pillowcase became heavier with each step. She shed the coat she wore and the one she carried, tossing them over t
he low arm of an exceptionally tall saguaro cactus beside the tracks. They fell slack in the windless day. She would have to remember to pick them up on the way back.
The cold night had succumbed to the March sun. It shone down with a tepid brilliance. Anna had tired of walking and despaired of ever saving Joe Singer when, to her relief, she encountered a miracle—a handcar on a turnout from the main track. It had a teeter-totter handle—the kind you pumped with. A dirt road ended where the handcar rested. It must be someone’s personal handcar. God obviously wouldn’t mind if she borrowed it, or He would not have provided it. With both hands she pulled the switch so that the little car could access the main track. She set her pillowcase on the platform and hoisted herself up, which wasn’t easy in a corset and skirts. From her new vantage point, she could see farther. Her spirit sank. She could see dirt, cacti, rocks, and yucca. She saw false water like mercury sparkling in the sun. She saw tracks disappearing over the horizon. She could not see Joe Singer. Anna pushed the teeter-totter lever down, leaning with her whole desperate body, causing the handcar to lurch forward. She was thrust off balance and fell onto her backside, pricking her hand on a nail. She picked herself up, sucked the blood from her finger, and pulled the lever back up. She forced it down again, propelling the handcar onto the track.
Slowly, she developed a rhythm—up and down, up and down, pushing forward with each cycle. Periodically, she stopped to drink champagne.
It was gone noon when Anna finally spied a lone figure limping down the tracks in the distance amid the watery illusion of a mirage. For the first time in hours, she could breathe again. She felt grimy, tipsy, had blisters on her hands and feet, and her arms burned with exercise, but she didn’t care. Joe Singer was alive, upright, and walking. She let the push car coast up to Joe, then pulled on the brake. His pants were ripped, his white shirt had dirt stains. He carried his carpetbag hoisted over one shoulder. He was singing under his breath, “She’s my little Eskimo.”
The Body in Griffith Park Page 21
