the series, her family's kitchen, the big bedroom where all four of her tiny blond children lived. Welcome to Oz, the Land of Make Believe where the nation's favorite family drama comes to life.
I came out at the roadhouse set where Jodi Taylor sang every week in Songbird, chasing her character's dream of becoming a star. Maybe forty people were setting up for a shot: the camera crew positioning the camera on its dolly and gaffers rigging lights and stand-ins and extras waiting for their call to the set. A woman in an L.A. Raiders cap and baggy bush pants was with Jodi and the actor who played Jodi's husband, framing a shot with her hands. She would be the director. A guy with a walkie-talkie and a guy with long gray hair were watching, the guy with the hair suggesting something every once in a while and whispering to the camera crew. The guy with the hair would be the director of photography. Sid Markowitz was talking to a woman in a business suit by a coffee machine in the shadows to the side of the set. I went over and said, "Hi, Sid."
Sid Markowitz's face turned the color of fresh clams. "It's you."
I held up two fingers. "Two words, Sid. Leon Williams."
The fresh clam color went fishbelly white and Sid Markowitz pulled me away from the woman in the business suit. "Jesus Christ, keep your voice down. Whattaya doin' here, f'christ's sake? All this is confidential."
"That was before I found out you lied to me, Sid."
I stepped away from him into Jodi Taylor's line of sight and crooked my finger at her. She looked at me as if she wasn't quite sure who I was, and then she recognized me and her race shut down into a grim chalk mask. Now you're smiling, now you're not. Sid hurried up behind me and took my arm again. "C'mon, Cole, don't make a scene here, okay?"
I said, "If you don't stop touching me, I'm going to break off your hand and stuff it up your ass."
Jodi Taylor left the woman in the Raiders cap and came up to me as if we were the only two people in the soundstage, as if everyone else were only shadows flickering on the wall, cast by a tree through an unseen window. She said, "Leon Williams is my father, isn't he?"
"Yes."
Sid Markowitz had Jodi by the arm now, trying to move her away from me. "Jesus, would the two of you keep it down? Let's go outside." Then he was back with me again. "We had our reasons for not coming clean, all right? What's the big deal?"
"Jimmie Ray Rebenack is dead. A human being died, and now it's time to tell the truth because I have to decide what to tell the police."
Neither Jodi Taylor nor Sid Markowitz said anything for several heartbeats, and then Sid Markowitz said, "I'm gonna call Bel, kid. Bel needs to know." Beldon Stone was the president of General-Everett Television.
I said, "Other people know about this?"
"About this, but not about you. We hired you without telling anybody."
We went out to the motor home, Jodi moving as if she were numb and Sid Markowitz fluttering like a moth around a Bug-Zapper. The motor home was the full-size luxury model, with a bedroom and a bath and a kitchenette with a dining table. Last week's Nielsen ratings had been push-pinned to a little corkboard in the kitchenette, along with a couple of clippings from the Hollywood Reporter and Daily Variety: HIT SERIES!!, SONGBIRD SCORES AGAIN! A teamster was sitting in the driver's seat, listening to the afternoon race report and reading the paper. Sid said, "Eddie, we need a little privacy here, okay?"
The teamster left without a word. Jodi Taylor curled up on the motor home's couch, and folded her hands in her lap while Sid went to the phone. Jodi looked small and frightened.
A few minutes later a studio limo double-parked next to the motor home, and two men in suits and a woman in a short skirt got out. One of the men was in his fifties, and the other was in his thirties. The woman was in her twenties, but she looked older. Sid Markowitz saw them and said, "Oh, Christ, Beldon's gonna be pissed." He shook his head and chewed at his lip and went into the Bug-Zapper routine again. "I told you, Jodi. Didn't I tell you?"
Jodi pulled herself tighter and nodded without looking