She’d already imagined and rehearsed that conversation.
Max would call on schedule and he’d ask,Is he any better?
And she would say something like,Actually, I think he might be. I mailed his script for him on Christmas Eve. It’s done, Max. Just like he promised. And then he had me take him out to his place in Palm Springs.He said he was ready to at last finish the journey he’d begun with Ruthie and then move on.
There would likely be a slight pause. And then,You’re kidding.
No. I’m not,she’d say.I think he might be turning a corner. I stayed with him through Christmas afternoon but by dusk he said he wanted to have the place to himself to figure some things out. He asked me to head back home and come back for him on New Year’s Eve.
Max would be incredulous.You’re telling me Elwood left the house after being holed up inside it for nearly a decade? And went to Palm Springs? In acar? Just like that?
No, not just like that,she’d say.It was a big step for El and not an easy one. He took one of his sleeping pills and lay down in the back seat of the car. I waited until he was out before I opened the garage door. He slept for the whole drive. And when we got to Palm Springs, I waited for him to rouse before I helped him inside. And to tell you the truth, he didn’t need that much help. He walked from the carport to the front door pretty much all by himself. He started to get nervous just once. Then he was okay.
And you left him there? Alone?
He asked me very nicely to leave. It’s his place, Max. I couldn’t insist on staying. And anyway, I’ll have you know we spent much of Christmas Day sitting outside under that big red umbrella you bought in Mexico. The one with the—
I know what the umbrella looks like, June.
Well, he sat under it. Outside. And then we went for a little walk around the property just before I left. Yes, he leaned on me a little, but he was outside. I’d call that getting better, wouldn’t you?
Another slight pause would likely occur before Max would speak again.
Perhaps. Have you heard from him since you came home?
Of course not. You know there isn’t a telephone there.
Max might then say,Well, can’t a neighbor check on him?
June would need an answer for that.
That’s a good idea,she could say.I’ll see. It’s the holidays, though. It might not be that easy to find one at home. And I don’t know all the other homeowners in that neighborhood.
At this point she was sure Max would offer to go check on Elwood himself. He was chomping at the bit to talk to him anyway.
He would probably leave right after they hung up. He’d get to the bungalow, and then he’d dash back out to his car and drive to the convenience store two miles away and ask to use the phone to call the police since Elwood didn’t have one at his desert hideaway. Or he might bang on a neighbor’s door and use their phone if he could find one at home. He’d probably phone her then, too.
She’d have to sound distraught when Max called and appear doubly so when she met up with him later that day in Palm Springs.
How long would the police search for Elwood?
A couple months? Longer?
That script had to be in MGM’s mailbox before Elwood’s disappearance was reported: missing men don’t finish scripts.
Unless…
Unless she turned it in to MGM herself a few days into the New Year when it was looking more and more unlikely that Elwood would be found. That would give her more time. Perhaps she could tell the studio she’d just found the completed script in a desk drawer. That would give her another week, maybe two.
MGM would still be obligated to pay him. The work would have been delivered. She’d tell Max when they gave the check to him that she would deposit it into Elwood’s account as usual—Max knew she did Elwood’s banking—but she’d actually endorse the check to herself and deposit it into her own account and cross her fingers no one would notice.
And down the road, if Elwood’s accountant did notice, she’d inform him Elwood had promised her that money because of all the help she’d given him with that script. He’d left a note stating that. Yes, a note. Easy enough to forge.
It was the most money Elwood had ever been contracted to write a screenplay—ten thousand dollars. And it had to be enough for a down payment to buy back the Malibu house from Ruthie Brink’s sons. But she still needed to see about getting her old job back at Warner Brothers. Any bank that loaned her the rest of the money to buy the house was going to insist on assurance that she could make the monthly mortgage payment.
Everything still left to do was all too much to consider at the moment. Too much. She liked far, far better imagining herself Christmas shopping with the Elwood she had loved—the Elwood who should have married her and left her this house. Having a nice dinner with him. Coming home to his bed…
Eva touched her shoulder then and June’s eyes snapped open.
