The Fourth Wall

by Williams, Walter Jon

  Dagmar shifts herself on the sofa, trying to find a comfortable position. “Five weeks left,” she says. “And after that I’ll be hauling a squalling shit monster around on my hip for months and months.”

  I contemplate this wholesome prospect, and can only fall back on my role as host. “Want anything to drink?”

  She takes a ginger ale. Richard has cranberry juice. I freshen my club soda with more cranberry juice and pull up an armchair.

  “Why did you want to talk to me?” I ask.

  “First,” Dagmar says, “thanks for introducing me to Corrie van Houten. Because I’m all about adopting waifs.”

  “No need to thank me,” I say. “It was my pleasure.”

  She gives me a thoughtful look. “The other problem I need to talk about,” she says, “is what I’m supposed to do with you.”

  I sip my cran-and-club and find the astringent taste pleasing. “That’s easy,” I say. “You cast me in the sequel, as per contract.”

  She nods. “Yes, but why would I?” She points a finger at me. “You’re nothing but trouble. People with knives and big cars follow you around trying to kill you. And just a few hours ago you were waving a pistol in a vomit-spattered bedroom and trying to shoot your own bodyguard.”

  I put on my innocent face. “He startled me.”

  “Insuring future productions may be impossible, especially if you’re in them.”

  I’m beginning to get angry. I’m hiding in a hotel and three friends are dead and I’m hungover, and now Dagmar is using a completion bond as a weapon to threaten my job.

  “Why blame me?” I say. “May I point out that I’m not responsible for any of this?”

  She replies with a skeptical look. I put a hand up to frame my face.

  “Look at this face, Dagmar,” I say. “Who else can play Roheen?”

  She frowns at me. “Why did you have a firearm, and why didn’t you tell anyone about it?”

  I try to project a reasonable façade. “Kung fu won’t stop an SUV. A pistol might.”

  A furrow appears between her brows. She gives me a searching look.

  “Did you kill Joey? Last night you were insisting he was planning to kill you, and now he’s dead.”

  I’m so taken aback that it takes a while for my brain to process a reply. “Don’t trust my answer,” I say. “What does your guy say?”

  Richard speaks for the first time. “Simon said that he didn’t think the gun had been fired in a long time. He said it hadn’t been cleaned in ages, like it had been in someone’s closet for years.”

  “Simon knows his guns, yeah,” I say. “But you know Joey wasn’t shot, right?”

  Dagmar tries to heave herself into a more upright posture in order to fix me with a steely glare, but the sofa and her pregnancy combine to defeat her. She tries glaring from her semi-recumbent position, but the ploy lacks impact.

  “How do you know that?” she asks finally.

  “The detectives asked everyone about access to drugs. I think Joey must have been poisoned or something.”

  Dagmar and Richard exchange looks. Dagmar turns back to me.

  “And you didn’t poison him?”

  I wave a dismissive hand. “With what?”

  “Did you kill Timmi Wilhelm?”

  Again I have to take a few seconds to manage an answer. “Now I’m supposed to have killed the whole family?”

  “Can you just answer the question, please?”

  I compose myself on the chair, hands on my lap, sitting up straight, as if I were Carter-Ann Dixon offering a suggestion to a hostile director. Making sure that my posture and expression are absolutely proper and absolutely unreadable.

  “I haven’t killed anyone,” I say, and then relax. “There. I hope that saves you a bunch more questions.”

  Dagmar sighs and sips her ginger ale. Her kid must be kicking, because I can see the flesh under her tee giving little twitches.

  “Look,” she says. “You’re a good actor, and I’d like to have you in the sequel. But what am I supposed to do in the meantime? Surround you with a platoon of guards twenty-four/seven?”

  “The ‘meantime’ is just when I’ll need them. Because people don’t get killed on this production until their jobs are over.”

  Richard clears his throat. “Joey wasn’t finished,” he says. “The shooting isn’t done.”

  “There’s just Monday, and then maybe pickups here and there,” I say. “Joey isn’t really necessary any more.”

  “I can’t afford to keep everyone in this hotel indefinitely,” Dagmar says. “I’ve got to make some progress in uncovering what’s going on.”

  “I got Trishula,” I say. “And whoever killed Joey has to have been on this floor, on this side of the elevator.”

  Dagmar and Richard adopt identical pained expressions. “Not quite,” Richard says.

  I look at him. “What’s the bad news?”

  “The alarm on the corner stairway failed when it was tested this morning,” he says. “So someone could have come up the stairs, disabled the alarm somehow, and gone after Joey.”

  For a moment I share their disgust.

  “Isn’t there someone monitoring all the alarms at all times?” I say. “Wouldn’t that person have to be an accomplice to whoever did the killing?”

  “They say the alarm was tested yesterday afternoon,” Richard says, “and must have failed in the meantime.”

  I’m beyond astonishment. “So now we’re up against some hella super-ninja who knows how to bypass alarms?”

  “It’s more likely,” Dagmar says, “that the alarm failed on its own, and that Joey was killed by someone on this floor of the hotel.”

  “Have you considered Carter-Ann as a suspect?” I say. “Maybe she couldn’t take Joey any longer. And she’s an MD, she’d have access to drugs.”

  “Carter-Ann is in Boston for a meeting of the American Psychiatric Association,” Richard says. “She’s giving a presentation.”

  Now that I think about it, I don’t recall seeing her at Nataliya’s funeral. “Are you sure she actually went?”

  Richard shrugs. “I can check, I suppose.”

  I look at the drink in my hand. “Can I move back to the NoHo?” I ask. “I think I was safer there.”

  Dagmar takes a deliberate drink of her ginger ale. “After Monday, you can move anywhere you like.”

  “I’ve been thinking Greenland.”

  “You could do worse.”

  “By the way,” Richard says, “I got a report that your father entered the U.S. yesterday. He flew from Vancouver to LAX and came in on his American passport.”

  I think about this. “Tell your guys to keep him away from me,” I say.

  “We’re keeping everybody away from you,” Richard points out. He glances at the overpriced watch on his wrist. “Things are a little murky where your father is concerned,” he says slowly, “so it’s difficult to be certain, but it’s very possible that your dad is broke.”

  “How do you know?” I ask. “I tried for several years to track his money and got nowhere.”

  “We have somewhat better resources than you do,” Dagmar says. “Or rather, Sri does.”

  I nod. “I suppose Sri knows where all the money in the world is.”

  “More or less.”

  I give Dagmar a look. Maybe, I think, I should ask a few questions of my own.

  “Sri’s set up to make a bundle on this project, isn’t he?”

  “Four hundred million subscriptions and counting,” she says. “I’m sure we’re all grateful.”

  “And of course there’s the data you’re getting from the subscribers,” I say. I watch her carefully as I speak, and I see her face harden just a little, the eyes turn just a little more opaque.

  Something hiding in there, I think.

  “That information could be worth a lot,” I probe.

  She shakes her head. “We’re not interested in monetizing it. We’ll collate it and use it to improve cus
tomer service on future projects.”

  “Sri’s down with that?” I ask.

  Dagmar shrugs. “Sri doesn’t need any more cash.”

  “Most rich people don’t. But somehow they keep trying to make more money.”

  Dagmar doesn’t bother to respond. I sip my drink. Cranberry bubbles tickle my nose.

  “You came to Sri with this project, right?” I say. “He didn’t approach you?”

  She flashes a thin smile. “He didn’t know me from Eve.”

  “But he financed it anyway?”

  “Dagmar,” Richard says, “is very persuasive.”

  I don’t know how you persuade a self-made billionaire to do you a favor—not unless you can hand him a huge opportunity, such as the personal data of four hundred million people, all collated in your very own Sri Sphere.

  “Getting back to your father,” Richard says. “I can show you the report I have on him, but it’s incomplete. We’re pretty sure that your father sold his place on the Riviera and his place in Belize to raise money.”

  “He wants me to invest in some kind of resort complex on the Mosquito Coast.”

  “Oh, that.” Richard is dismissive. “It’s called Costa Magnifico, which is not only ungrammatical but bankrupt. Construction halted four months ago after funds were exhausted. Your father’s hoping that if you get the place back on its feet, his own shares will be worth something again.”

  “Or maybe he’s hoping to sell you his shares,” Dagmar says. “You could change the name to Roheen’s Rendezvous.”

  “I’ll send you the report,” Richard says.

  Dagmar takes her swollen feet off the coffee table, jams them back into her shoes, and heaves herself to her feet. “You haven’t helped me make up my mind,” she says.

  “About what?”

  She gives me a look. “About whether it’s worth keeping you alive after the week is over.”

  “I’ll try not to kick the dog,” I say.

  FROM: Parmita

  SUBJECT: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Your “Car”

  Babaji has an ashram in Los Angeles. You could give the check to one of the disciples there, and he could carry it to India to sign.

  FROM: Sean Makin

  SUBJECT: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Your “Car”

  The last disciple from the ashram tried to gut me with a kitchen knife. I’m not letting anyone from that place near me.

  P.S.: It turns out that everyone at the ashram knew that Trishula was making threats and planned to carry them out, but they hid this fact from the authorities. The civil suit sounds open-and-shut to me!

  I expect I’ll end up owning Babaji’s whole stateside operation, and then you can visit and stay in whatever ashram here you want.

  TRACKING SHOTS

  The weekend goes by without any more deaths. I keep my father at bay by letting his phone calls go to voice mail. He keeps asking whether I’ve got the prospectus he sent on Costa Magnifico.

  The police reveal that Joey was poisoned with a Schedule II narcotic, but decline to say which one. I look this up on the Internet, and conclude that it had to be morphine or some lab-engendered version of morphine like Dilaudid or OxyContin.

  At least with an opioid, I think, you feel no pain.

  I spend the weekend trying to work out what’s happening to my life, and what’s happening to my friends. I’m happy and fulfilled for the first time in years, but everything else is falling apart. One of the threats to my life has been dealt with, but there are at least a couple more.

  It’s like I’m Typhoid Mary or something. I have a cloud over my head that rains on everyone near me, and it rains tragedy.

  I decide that since no one else is solving the mystery, I should do it myself. The only problem with this is that I don’t have any information, and I don’t know where to start.

  I’m not a detective. I’m the Watcher.

  It is small consolation to hear that Escape to Earth has picked up another eighty million subscribers, all attracted by the sensational publicity over the murders.

  I report to Makeup on Monday for the last day of shooting, to have dust and blood painted on me for the last time. Tessa Brettel stands in as director. Roheen’s character is as comfortable as an old glove, and I slip it right on and film the last heart-wrenching scene, where Roheen, wounded and in pain, says farewell to his dream of returning home. I nail the big speech in one take, though Tessa insists on a second, just for insurance.

  Even Roger behaves, the little prick.

  That evening there’s a wrap party on the set, with a buffet of Texas barbecue and a DJ and a blooper reel. People walk around with ketchup-red barbecue sauce on their hands, faces, and clothes, and look like ghoulish extras from a brain-eating zombie film.

  Dagmar shows up to give a speech about how we’ve kept on working despite the tragedies that have beset the production, and that she’s proud of us.

  I give a present to everyone on the crew, a gold stickpin topped by their initial.

  It has to be said that I’m consistent. I’m still pathetic in my desire to be liked.

  The party falls flat: too many deaths, too much depression, too much fear. Now we’re all going to have to go home and hope that no one targets us with an SUV, or maybe a syringe.

  People begin trickling out of the Lang Towers as they finish their work. Some are happy to go home. Some would prefer to stay under the guards’ protection. A number decide to visit relatives in other states.

  Jean-Marc flies home to France. He’ll be safer there, at least from American junk food.

  After the party, after Simon has checked my suite to make sure no armed assassins are lurking in the closets, he closes the door, pulls my pistol out of his jacket, and offers it to me butt-first. I look at it in surprise, then take it.

  “I didn’t think I’d see this again,” I tell him.

  “Joey wasn’t shot,” Simon tells me. “I don’t have to hold it in case it’s evidence.”

  I leer at him. “I could have held the pistol to Joey’s head and told him to swallow pills,” I say.

  He looks shocked. He clearly hasn’t considered this. I relax my expression.

  “I’ll try not to point it at you again,” I say.

  “ ’Preciate it,” he says, in his Okie accent.

  I put the pistol in my bedside table.

  The next few days I’m in a sound studio, looping dialogue. Sometimes when you’re making a movie the sound gear doesn’t pick up the words properly, or you mumble without meaning to, or there’s too much background noise, or the dialogue gets changed. When that happens you have to rerecord the dialogue in the studio so that the crew can have clean sound.

  It’s tedious work, just a couple of engineers and me with a pair of headphones on, lip-synching to my own image on a small screen.

  In my free time I’m planning my future. I have Bruce Kravitz recommend a good civil lawyer, so I can sue Babaji’s organization for sheltering Trishula. The fact that his confession to the police admitted this should make the case much easier.

  Maybe I’ll get my money back, either as a reward or as a settlement.

  I also weigh some of Simon’s Paranoia Options, and decide to replace my mom’s car with a less flammable vehicle. Since the Mercedes brand has worked well for me, I get a Mercedes crossover with all-wheel drive and a big diesel engine that takes fuel much less likely than gasoline to explode. I then turn the vehicle over to a mechanic of Simon’s acquaintance who will pimp it out with steel skid plates, bullet-resistant heavy-duty suspension, four-point safety harnesses, secret compartments for weapons, run-flat tires, and bullbars so I can run someone down without denting the chrome. The whole thing will be armored with lightweight ceramics and laminates.

  I also start to think about a new place to live. My condo is a dreary place, and I decide it’s time to upgrade. My problem is that I’m not yet Hollywood rich—though I have every expectation of living in luxury eventually, state and federal taxes and the Screen
Actors’ Guild have each taken a slice out of what Dagmar’s paid me so far, and I’m not exactly living in Uncle Scrooge territory right now.

  Plus, I’m in the process of becoming an industry. I’m getting calls from people who want to put my image on posters, on T-shirts, on mouse pads, and—my favorite—bobblehead dolls. I don’t have time to deal with this stuff, so I’m in need of an entourage—a personal assistant, a publicist who isn’t a real Sidney Falco, an accountant, a business manager, and a lawyer, people to smooth my way and investigate these offers and take my checks to the bank without any part of them disappearing.

  The only reason I’m not interviewing is that I’m afraid a candidate might show up with a knife, a gun, or a syringe.

  They can bring listening devices if they want. I’m way past caring about that.

  I end up renting a small two-bedroom house off Mulholland in the Hollywood Hills, frame and plaster with a red tile roof. It was built in the fifties and runs about eighteen hundred square feet, built on a hillside with a basement garage. There’s no tennis court, no swimming pool, and only one bathroom. If I bought the place outright I’d spend a million and a half at least.

  I can drive off the road right into the garage, and not have to worry about anyone trying to run me down as I walk from the car to the front door. The house already has a burglar alarm, and Simon figures he can upgrade the security system without difficulty. I think he’s a little disappointed that I’m not excavating for a panic room.

  I make plans to move my belongings to the new place, and to rent the condo once it’s empty.

  By Friday my work on Escape to Earth is done, and I join Cleve and Bruce Kravitz for lunch, to discuss my future.

  INT. SALO RESTAURANT—DAY

  Ironically Bruce wants to dine at Salo, the restaurant where I first met Dagmar. It’s only a couple blocks from his office tower. I amuse him with information about the Provençal/Turkish fish soup. Bruce tells me about some scripts that might be adapted for me, in which I play cops or reformed hit men or spies.

  Imagine someone who looks like me being a spy or a hit man. He’d be at large for all of twenty minutes before someone recognized him.