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while makeup and hair hovered over her.
    â€œPlaces,” the director said. Without his earflaps he was a thin-faced man with short reddish hair.
    An assistant director said, “Quiet, everybody.” Then he said, “Rolling for picture.”
    The director said, “Action.”
    And they did the scene again. The sound man with his earphones, hovering over the sound console, said “Cut” after the demented guest star said his first line.
    â€œWe’re picking up a whir, Rich.”
    Somebody went around the corner of the set and said something I couldn’t hear and came back.
    â€œOkay?” he said.
    The director looked at the sound man.
    â€œOkay,” the sound man said.
    And the scene rolled again, and then again.
    â€œFirst one was the cover shot,” Salzman whispered between takes. “Others are for close-ups, so when they get it back in L.A. in the editing room, Milo and the film editor can cross-cut, you know?”
    â€œUn huh,” I said.
    â€œWhat do you think?” Salzman said.
    â€œI think you’re hiring me for the wrong job,” I said. “I think you should hire me to go beat up the writers.”
    Salzman shrugged. “Hard cranking out a script a week,” he said.
    â€œObviously,” I said.

6
    â€œW ELL, well,” Jill Joyce said as she came off the set. “The cutie-pie cop with the big muscles.”
    â€œI didn’t think you’d noticed,” I said.
    â€œYou here to take care of me?” she said. Her on-camera makeup was a little heavy, but standing there in front of me she was fresh-faced and beautiful. Her cheeks dimpled as she spoke. Her skin was clear and smooth, her eyes sparkled with life and a hint of innocent sexuality. She looked like orange juice and fresh laundry, the perfect date for the Williams-Amherst game, in a plaid skirt, picnicking beforehand on a blanket. Her lips would taste like apples. Her hair would smell like honey. Fresh-scrubbed, spunky, compliant, brave, beautiful, decent, cute. With a TVQ that made your breath come short.
    â€œI’m here to discuss it,” I said.
    â€œYour place or mine?” Jill said and dimpled at me.
    â€œYour place,” I said, “but remember, I’m armed.”
    Jill giggled deep in her throat.
    â€œI hope so,” she said. She looked at the director. “Half an hour, Rich?”
    â€œSure, Jilly,” the director said. “No more, though, I’m trying to bring this thing in under, for once.”
    â€œMaybe you could make your mind up where to put the fucking camera, Rich,” Jill said. She spoke without heat, almost absently, as she walked away.
    I followed her, watching her hips sway as she walked. Her back was perfectly straight. Her hair was glossy and thick. The skirt fit smoothly over her elegant backside. We went out a side door into the cold, walked twenty feet to Jill’s mobile home and went in. Jill was all business today. She sat in the driver’s seat sideways, crossed her legs, rested her left arm on the steering wheel.
    â€œOkay, cutie,” she said. “Talk.”
    I didn’t answer. I was looking down the length of the mobile home toward the bed. Above the bed, suspended from a ceiling fixture, was a plastic doll, dressed in a gold lamé evening gown, hanging with a miniature slipknot around her neck. Jill saw me looking and shifted her glance, and saw the swaying doll.
    â€œWhat’s that?” she said.
    I walked down the length of the mobile home and looked more closely at the doll without touching it. I could hear Jill’s footsteps behind me. The doll gazed at me from a face that looked a little like Jill Joyce, its happy smile entirely incongruous above the hangman’s knot around its throat. The knot caused the doll to cant at an angle. I could feel Jill press against me. Her hand was on my arm just above the elbow. She squeezed.
    â€œWhat is that?” she