Blood and Oranges, James Goldsborough [spicy books to read txt] 📗

Someone with a camera made her think of Luis Ortega and their trip to Baja in search of Uncle Willie. The Times had a plaque for Luis in its rotunda, as it did for all its people killed in action. There might be a Times reporter here as well, though she’d scheduled an interview later in the week. She scarcely recognized the Times anymore, which had returned to the bad old days. She still had some friends there, but rarely saw them. Poor Otis turned into a recluse grinding his teeth up the coast at Ojai. The revenge of the family coupon-clippers. He’d put it to them for a while, cut into their dividends and interest to build a newspaper worthy of the city.

“What makes your family different from any other?” a man asked. “Lots of families arrived with the aqueduct. That’s why they built it.”

Long mustache and longer bolo tie, made her think of Henry Callender. No aggression in the question, just curiosity. She didn’t see a book in his hand. Potential customer. Be nice. He was seated near Rosie and friends from her Ballona group. “That is for you to judge, sir. You’re here for a reason. Must be something about the Mulls that interests you.”

“Yes, there is,” he said, quickly, before the girl could get the microphone back. “The Reverend Willie Mull. Goodness gracious, could we use him today in this godless place!” Some embarrassed tittering, but clapping as well, the god-fearing against the godless. “He wasn’t your pa, that would be Eddie, but maybe you could tell me this: Why did he do it, Ms. Mull? Why did he run off to Mexico with that little tramp?”

He sat down amid a few hisses. Don’t speak ill of the dead, she thought, especially when she’s been murdered. Cal would hate that. She glanced toward him. Cal and Angie. He just couldn’t do it, not after his father, though who knows what might have happened had she lived. More people remembered Angie these days than Willie. The strange young blond man with long hair appeared in the door and was gone again. Like he was reconnoitering.

“Last time I heard, the Temple of the Angels was filled every Sunday and still doing its broadcasts,” she said. “People remember the good that Sister Angie did for Los Angeles and for its people.”

A man stood up who bore every mark of a reporter except the fedora with a press pass in the brim. Couldn’t be the Times. Maybe the Herald-Examiner. He held up a copy of the book.

“You’ve made enemies with this book, ma’am, just like you did with the Pitts book. You must know that. Trevor Bonfeld: he’s big in Hollywood. Kids love his movies. Provides lots of jobs. Fred Goering is one of our foremost architects. You dismiss them as misguided narcissists. Are you being fair to them?”

He sat down, and she stared at him for some time. Doing his job, she supposed, just as she’d done in her time. No, not just as she’d done. This man’s snarky comments were not meant to elicit information but to provoke her into saying things she’d regret, make her sound like she was settling scores rather than laying out a well-documented history of events.

“Am I being fair? Once you’ve seen Playa Vista it’s pretty hard to be fair. The studios own the mountains all around Hollywood. Plenty of room up there. No lagoons and wildlife to destroy in the mountains. Up there they like things like that, which make movies more authentic. I used to go up there on shoots with my husband.” She paused to put on her reading glasses and glance through the book’s index, finding what she wanted and turning to the page. “You want to know Bonfeld’s attitude toward nature? This is what he said at the Wonderworld press conference with Summa. She read from the book:

“‘All those people worried about the frogs at Playa Vista can rest easy. I’ll put frogs in my movies.’”

She looked up and saw heads shaking.

“No other single comment, in my opinion, played a greater role in Summa’s defeat than that one. It was so . . . so arrogant, so incredibly supercilious. My hope is that Bonfeld withdraws from this project before he does himself more damage.”

The reporter wasn’t done. “And Fred Goering?”

The blond with long hair was back. What was he up to? She’d lost her thread. Fred Goering, yes. The architect. She was no public speaker, but the reporter had challenged her.

“Let me tell you about the ordeal we went through—the ordeal of taking on the rich and powerful in this city—and we took them all on, developers, lobbyists, Hollywood, everyone who saw in the beauty of Ballona personal fortunes to be made. All through this battle, which we were given no chance of winning, the one name I kept hearing was Ayn Rand—Ayn Rand the patron saint of capitalism, Ayn Rand the sworn enemy of government, Ayn Rand the purist who prefers death to compromise. In one of her novels, Rand’s protagonist is an architect named Howard Roark. When Roark’s drawings are altered, Roark dynamites the buildings.” She paused to look out at the audience. Rand’s reputation had faded badly in recent years except among fanatics, but these library people would remember. “Like Roark, Goering thought he could do it his way. He was wrong. He lost. We won. We used no dynamite.”

Some in the audience started to clap, but she held up her hand. “We proved that the people, not money, still rule this country. The Coastal Commission, established by the people of this state, was crucial in stopping Summa. This building we sit in today, this beautiful library, was built and paid for by the people of this city, not by some corporation selling shares, acting in its own interest. It is up to us to be stewards of what we’ve inherited—both of natural treasures like the lands of Ballona, and manmade