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Dream Town
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It’s the eve of 1953, and Aloysius Archer is in Los Angeles to ring in the New Year with an old friend, aspiring actress Liberty Callahan, when their evening is interrupted by an acquaintance of Callahan’s: Eleanor Lamb, a screenwriter in dire straits.
After a series of increasingly chilling events—mysterious phone calls, the same blue car loitering outside her house, and a bloody knife left in her sink—Eleanor fears that her life is in danger, and she wants to hire Archer to look into the matter. Archer suspects that Eleanor knows more than she’s saying, but before he can officially take on her case, a dead body turns up inside of Eleanor’s home . . . and Eleanor herself disappears.
Missing client or not, Archer is dead set on finding both the murderer and Eleanor. With the help of Callahan and his partner Willie Dash, he launches an investigation that will take him from mob-ridden Las Vegas to the glamorous world of Hollywood to the darkest corners of Los Angeles—a city in which beautiful faces are attached to cutthroat schemers, where the cops can be more corrupt than the criminals . . . and where the powerful people responsible for his client’s disappearance will kill without a moment’s hesitation if they catch Archer on their trail.
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Chapter 1
IT WAS NEW YEARâS EVE, 1952.
Aloysius Archer was thirty years old, once a decorated soldier, and next a humbled inmate. He was currently a private detective with several years of intense experience trolling the darker side of life.
He was riding in a 1939 bloodred Delahaye convertible with the red top in the down position because that was how he liked it. He had bought the car a little over three years before with lucky gambling winnings in Reno. It had also very nearly cost Archer his life. He still loved the car. Any man with a pulse would. And so would any woman who liked a man with a nice car.
He was currently heaving over the roller-coaster humps of Los Angeles. The city was decked out in its finest livery for the coming of the new year. That meant the bums of Skid Row had been goose-stepped off the streets by junior coppers who did what they were told, the hookers had been ordered not to solicit on the main thoroughfares, and most everyone had put the lids on their trash cans and brushed their teeth.
The town had brought in about four million strings of lights, an equal number of balloons, and enough confetti to choke the Pacific. And every actor and actress with a studio contract, and even some without, would be showing their toothy mugs in all the right, and wrong, places. While the town definitely had its seamy side, the City of Angels had all the tools and incentive to do showy and shallow better than any other place on earth.
It could be a wonderful place to live, if you had money, were famous, or both, which Archer didnât and wasnât. Over the years, heâd worked a slew of tough cases, and had come to know the town and its denizens maybe better than he would have liked.
It was a town that took every single dream you had and then merrily ran it right through the worldâs biggest meat grinder. And when the famous were famous no more, the meat grinder treatment was even worse, because those people had tasted what life could be like if enough ink was spilled on you and sufficient butts sat in seats to watch you emote. When that ride was over, it was like being dropped from the top of the Empire State Building to land in a squatterâs shack in Alabama.
Los Angeles had two million souls sprawled over nearly five hundred square miles. Some people were crammed into slums, tract housing, and shadily built tenement death traps, like staples in a stapler, while the wealthy and famous had room to both flex and hide. All this in a city founded on the remnants of a village settled by the Tongva, an indigenous Indian tribe, who called it Yaanga, which translated to âpoison oak place.â
Well, they got that right, thought Archer. But for a private eye, LA could be a fascinating study of human beings, and all their many foibles.
He turned left and then right as he moved from dirty LA to rich LA and then to dirty-and-rich LA. He passed a prowler car and saw two of the LAPDâs âfinestâ sitting inside and sipping on coffee in vending machine cups. They stared at Archer as he passed, probably wondering whether heâd stolen the car or was delivering it to some Hollywood mogul or a desert sheik whoâd bought a piece of the cityâs myth, along with a fancy ride.
Archer eyed the prowler in his mirror, hoping it would stay right where it was. To his mind, the LAPD was one of the largest criminal enterprises in the world. And they did it with a smile, and a gun, where appropriate. Or with beatings that didnât show.
Archer had had a police baton or two land on his head, and heâd also spent time in the tank on bogus charges merely for asking questions deemed impertinent, meaning ones directed at finding the truth, because the truth often found LAPD badges mixed in with the other crooks.
These coppers were probably taking a coffee break before heading to a string of ghetto street corners with their dozen-block-deep slums in the rear, to make their quota of busted heads for the week like the good little foot soldiers they were. They were just one crew in a pitched battle for the soul of the city. And there was no doubt in Archerâs mind which faction was winning. If LA were a human body, the criminal elements were the capillaries: small, everywhere, not often seen, but absolutely vital to overall life.
His destination was Universal Studios. He only knew one person there, but it was an important person, at least to him. Liberty Callahan had left Bay Town more than two years ago. That was where Archer lived and worked with Willie Dashâs âvery privateâ detective agency. Callahan had gone to Hollywood to make her dream come true in the land of make-believe. As far as he knew, she was still working on making the town believe in her.
Heâd met Callahan in Reno, where she was a dancer and hoofer at a dinner club. Theyâd traveled to Bay Town together and nearly gotten killed several times along the way. There was nothing like confronting death to cement a friendship.
There was a great deal of private detecting to do in LA. People here seemed to keep killing and robbing and cheating and blackmailing one another to an astounding degree. But when you had a lot of money in one place, some folks were always tempted to take it from both their lawful and unlawful owners.
He passed buildings that were intricately cut into the cityâs steep grade and looked lopsided and unrooted as a result. The roots here were always shallow, never deep. Deep required commitment, and there was none to be had here, at least that Archer could see.
Tall, double-stemmed streetlights in the shape of goalposts, which made them look like they were being held up at gunpoint, illuminated the LA night. The NBC sign blinked back at him from Sunset and Vine, while a few blocks south stood the swaggering arch of Paramount Studios. A block over the other way on Hollywood Boulevard, tourists from all over were lined up in front of Graumanâs Chinese Theater to stare at handprints set forever in cold, unforgiving concrete.
He kept steering his ride east and glanced at the Hollywood sign ablaze in the hills. A disconsolate actress had climbed up on the signâs letter H back in 1932, when it still spelled out HOLLYWOODLAND. When she got to the top, she jumped to her death. Archer imagined the meat grinder had gotten to her. Sheâd probably chosen H because that was the first letter in hell.
He pulled up to the main gate at the studio and presented his driverâs license to the guard there, a beefy type who looked hot and bothered, although the temps were in the chilly fifties at this time of night. The manâs hair was thin and grizzled, his face was fat and wide, and his body matched the face and not the hair. He looked like heâd end up with a coronary if he actually had to hoof it after a gate runner. His holstered .45 slapped against his meaty thigh as he walked around the car, eyeing it like a pretty girl in a swimsuit contest.
âSteering wheelâs on the wrong side, bub,â was his final judgment.
Delahaye was a French company, but this particular Delahaye, a Model 165 cabriolet, had been built for an Englishman, and the wheel had, of necessity, been shifted to the right.
âNot from where Iâm sitting,â Archer replied.
Beefy looked at his clipboard. âWho you visiting again?â
âLiberty Callahan. Sheâs a friend.â
The man grinned. âLucky man.â
âI take it you know her?â
âGalâs got what you call personality.â
âAmong other things.â
âSheâs on Stage Three, just follow the signs. You can park right down there,â he added, pointing the way after handing Archer back his license. âSheâs shooting a Roman gladiator picture.â He gave Archer a look that guys give each other when theyâre thinking about what women could do for them that nothing else can. âShe wears one of them to-gas.â
âIâm sure she wears it better than anyone else.â
The man gazed at Archer, his brown button eyes greedy and hopeful in their lust. âWhen the sun catches it just right, you can see right through the damn thing.â
âAs Iâm sure she can you,â Archer said, driving off.
Chapter 2
ARCHER PARKED THE CAR and followed the signs to Stage 3. Along the way he passed the casting office, where hopefuls would spend their lives sitting in intentionally uncomfortable chairs waiting for something that would never happen. The red light was on outside the soundstage, so he leaned against the weathered parchment-colored stucco walls and waited. He spent the time looking down at his brown wingtips and wondering whether he should have chosen the midnight-blue serge suit over this brown pinstriped woolen one. He commenced to twirl his fedora between his fingers, an indication of nerves. He hadnât seen Callahan in months. Every time he came to visit the lady, he expected her to have changed somehow. She clearly had the Hollywood bug, which was a virus no medicine could cure. But she had always been the same woman, at least to him. Even so, there was always tomorrow.
Or tonight.
A buzzer rang and the light went off, and soon the foot-thick door popped open, and the Roman legionnaires started trooping out.
Callahan was among the stragglers, and Archerâs face lit up when he saw her. Sometimes it seemed that the only redeeming quality in this whole city came down to this woman, at least for him.
She was tall, in her bare feet only four inches under Archerâs six-one. Curves in all the right places, naturally blond hair that danced liberally over her bare shoulders and made his blood race with each bounce. Her face had all the finishing touches that could make men leer for years at a time. Her smile was immediate when she saw Archer, her hug tight and sincere. The kiss she planted on his lips alone made the trip worth it.
They were not a couple. They had slept together exactly once; this was back in Bay Town more than three years ago. But then, mostly by silent agreement and a few mumbled words over too much alcohol that had, surprisingly, given them sufficient clarity, they had decided that their friendship was worth more than occasional sack time with no clear runway ahead. She was the most beautiful woman of his acquaintance, and she often intimidated the hell out of him, which only heightened the attraction. Shrinking wallflowers had never rocked Archerâs boat or heart.
He had begun to feel things for her that every man hoped to feel about a woman one day. But maybe those feelings had been there for a long time, only their weight had compressed him into silence. He was thinking of maybe one day soon breaking that silence.
âYou made it,â she said, as though he had braved mighty seas to reach her instead of driving eighty miles due south on smooth roads.
âI canât say no to a pretty girl. Itâs a weakness.â
He offered her a Lucky Strike and lit her and himself up, and they walked down the concrete alley toward the dressing rooms. Cowboys and Indians, and two Martians reading the next dayâs call sheets, passed by them.
âHowâs Willie?â she asked.
âHeâs Willie. And Connie is Connie. And Bay Town hasnât fallen into the Pacific yet, though it may be only a matter of time.â
Connie Morrison was Willie Dashâs ex-wife and current secretary. They needed each other far more now than when they were married. Willie was a first-rate investigator and had taught Archer more in three years than a man had any right to expect.
âHowâs the movie career coming?â he asked because she would want him to.
âThe production Iâm on now is strictly B-movie stuff. I mean, the budget is so low we only have twelve legionnaires; they have to shoot them at really tight angles, and then over and over again to make them look like twelve hundred. And we donât even have any real lions on set. They just use stock footage of them pawing the air and roaring to edit in, and then shoot the gladiators reacting. The MGM lion is scarier. I mean, itâs pathetic.â
âGotten any good parts lately?â he asked, again because he felt he had to.
âWell, you know that last year I did have a decent role in High Noon with Coop. But you donât know I did a screen test for The Quiet Man last year but didnât make the cut. I wouldâve loved to meet Duke Wayne, but they filmed it in Ireland. And if youâre gone from this town too long they forget about you.â
âAnything cooking right now, other than gladiators?â
âHitchcock is going to be filming Dial M for Murder in the summer. Itâs based on a play. My agent is arranging an audition. But if that doesnât work out, word is that after Hitchcock finishes Dial M he might direct another picture called Rear Window. Itâs supposed to start shooting in November.â She looked at him inquisitively. âYou heard of it?â
Archer puffed on his Lucky and shook his head. âI donât read the trades. I have a hard enough time reading my mail and my own mind.â
âItâs sort of a voyeuristic mystery story. Anyway, thereâs a nifty female lead character, described as tall, blond, and assertiveâyou know, professional with her own career, but still looking for the right man to give her a ring and babies.â
âSounds like the part was written for you, except for the ring and the babies.â
He gave her a look that perhaps hoped to compel a deeper answer to his statement than was warranted under the circumstances, only the lady didnât bite.
She did a little twirl in her toga and almost collided with a Viking coming the other way. Archer pulled her safely out of the range of both his ax and lecherous glare.
âAnyway, when the time is right my agent will try and get me an audition for that one, too, and then maybe a screen test if the role they want me for is big enough. And if I land that part and one in Dial M, it could really be a springboard. I mean, being in not one but two Hitchcock films in the same year!â The next moment her hopeful look faded.
âWhatâs the matter?â he asked, noticing this.
She glanced at him, and in that look he saw something in the woman Archer had thought heâd never see: resignation.
âNothing,â she said. âItâs justâŠhard sometimes. You work your guts out and get rejected a hundred times to land one lousy part. ItâŠgets to you after a while. But I guess thereâs always tomorrow.â
He nipped a piece of tobacco off his tongue as he felt the Hollywood bug inserting itself between them like a border wall. âFingers crossed,â he said encouragingly. He didnât think Hollywood was a good place for her, but he also knew how much she wanted to be a star here.
âBut Iâve been working steadily. Iâm not a star under contract, so I got three pictures going at two different studios, including this gladiator pic for Universal. Iâm at Warner Brothers next in a spy flick involving atomic secrets. Then I go on location in Arizona in a romantic comedy, again for Warners. And my name is getting around and the money is really good, and Iâm not even a midlevel actress yet. They can pull in three grand a week. I only make half that.â She paused and glanced at him, excitement once more dancing in her eyes. âAnd Archer, I just bought a nice two-bedroom bungalow off Melrose near the country club, and I have my own car.â
Archer perked up at this. âWhat kind of car?â
âA Volkswagen. Itâs green with a split-screen rear window. You ever seen one?â
âNot since I was fighting my way through to Berlin.â
Her features turned somber and he didnât think it was his comment about battling Nazis.
âBut I turned thirty last month and the clock is ticking. Iâm not Kate Hepburn. My face wonât look good playing spinster aunts or being a mom with grown kids. Iâll just look old. And I donât want to end up a small-lot dust-off with a baby spotlight on me for my one line in a lousy picture thatâll probably never make it out of the editing room. Or spend my remaining pennies on studio coaches and no-class agents to get me back in the door, while people talk crap about me right in front of my face.â She looked at him. âIf you see that happening, shoot me, Archer.â
He took all this in and said, âWell, if it makes you feel better, I pull in a fraction of what you make when crime is really good, but I do get most Sundays and Christmas off.â
âI know I should appreciate what I have, but I worked my rear end off for it. And the story of the casting couch is no myth, let me tell you.â
He looked at her sharply. âYou didnâtââ
âWhat I did, Archer, is between me, myself, and I.â She looked wistful, which she almost never did. âBut I hear TV is really taking off,â she said. âMaybe I should think about trying that.â
âI saw an episode of Dragnet the other night at Willieâs place. It wasnât bad.â
âI heard they work with the police department to make it authentic.â She glanced sharply at him. âHey, Archer, youâre a real gumshoe. You could be Joe Fridayâs new sidekick. Youâd make a lot more money. And weâd both be actors.â
The way she said it was a bit sad, thought Archer. It was as though she just wanted a friend to be out there fighting for a career right alongside her.
âBut I wouldnât have nearly as much fun. So, whatâs the plan for tonight?â
âDinner at Chasenâs, then drinks at the Cocoanut Grove, then we head upstairs to the penthouse suite and ring in 1953 with the bubbly and some VIPs.â
âHowâd you score the penthouse at the Ambassador Hotel?â
âThe director on this garbage movie, Danny Mars, thatâs how, Archer. Itâs his wife, Gloriaâs, pad. His third wifeâs. Gloria has her own money, inherited from back east. And, in case youâre wondering, no, I am not going to be wife number four.â
âGlad to hear it because four is definitely not your lucky number.â
The thought of her marrying another man had made Archerâs heart skip a beat.
They walked along arm in arm. They passed what Archer thought looked like Rin Tin Tin taking a piss on a poor bum trapped in a cheap suit of studio armor.
He and Callahan kept right on marching to 1953.
Chapter 3
ARCHER DROVE THEM OVER to West Hollywood and valeted the Delahaye. The slender uniformed man who took the key and gave him a ticket in return scratched his head when he saw the positioning of the steering wheel.
âI can park it myself,â Archer said off this look. âOnly questions are, how much do I charge, and are you a good tipper?â
âAinât a problem, sir. Mr. Cary Grantâs got him a right-hand-drive Rolls. Jimmy over there knows how to handle the thing.â
âGood for âOver There Jimmy.â Now, except for the bullet hole on the windscreen post, thereâs not a scratch on her now, and youâll make sure there wonât be another scratch when I get her back, right?â
âBullet hole?â the man said, his jaw going slack.
âJust a misunderstanding. But not another scratch. Capiche?â
âYouâre the boss.â
Archer passed him a buck to seal the deal.
They walked in under the long awning to find the place in full swing. A lot of the big stars had their own booths here, and many of them had turned out in the tuxedoed-and-gowned flesh to welcome in 1953 with steak and asparagus dripping with hollandaise sauce, coconut cream pie, and the best cocktails on Beverly Boulevard.
When they got inside he watched as Callahan looked around at all the legendary stars partying there. Her manner at first became subdued, as though she was as overwhelmed by this as any out-of-towner would have been. But then her expression changed to one of sheer excitement to be in their company.
âDonât look now, but omigosh thereâs Frank Sinatra, and Groucho Marx,â whispered Callahan.
Archer eyed those two gents and their substantial entourages along with Bob Hope, Milton Berle, and James Cagney, all in various states of sobriety. In a back booth surrounded by male admirers was the woman who was just beginning to take the town by storm. Archer thought if there was a lady to give Callahan a run for her money in the come-hither department it was Marilyn Monroe. An old-looking Clark Gable outfitted in a tailored sharkskin suit and loosened burgundy tie was downing shots at the bar like a man who had been thirsty his whole life. Word was heâd never recovered from his wife Carole Lombardâs going down in that plane a decade before.
They were escorted to a table by a guy in a striped linen suit that was far nicer than Archerâs, with a fresh gardenia in his buttonhole, expensive shoes on his wide feet, and a quarter-size rock on his finger. Archer had always heard the tips at Chasenâs were the best in town. He was very happy that Callahan had insisted on paying.
They sat and had their menus delivered by a gal in a tight blue skirt, with a yellow rose pinned to her white blouse. They ordered drinks from her, a whiskey highball for Archer and a sidecar for Callahan.
While they waited for their cocktails, Callahan looked around. âI still canât believe Iâm part of this world, Archer.â
âDonât you come here for dinner all the time?â he said, smiling.
âIâm just a working girl. In fact, Iâve only been to Chasenâs with you, mister!â
A few moments after their drinks came and they tapped glasses, a voice called out, âLC? Is that you? Is that really you?â
Archer looked up to see a slip of a woman around forty, all sharp angles and energetic intensity and with straight black hair, approach their table. Through tortoise-shell specs, her green eyes looked like round frogâs eggs. Her skin seemed like it had never finished forming, leaving bare the bony emotional edges underneath. Archer figured if she was an actress, that would be one nifty element for the camera to capture.
âEllie?â said Callahan, looking as surprised as the other woman. âIs that you?â
She fingered her dark, slack hair. âGot tired of being a bottle blonde who slept on curler rolls. Too many blondes in this town. I donât mean you, LC.â
âSure, I know. Itâs a swell look on you. Pull up a seat and have a drink. This is my friend, Archer. Archer, Ellie, well, Eleanor Lamb.â
They shook hands. As she gave the waitress her drink order he ran his eye over her again. She was barely five-two, and the scales would never get to three figures with her. Everything about her, from the cheekbones to the chin to the elbows to the knees, was knifelike. It appeared you could cut yourself in innumerable ways on this lady.
Her dress was a fluffy crimson number with a line of ruffles at odd places; the sleeves ended before the elbows and the hemline before the bony knees. The stockings were black silk that made her skinny legs look more robust. It somehow all sort of worked.
For her part, Callahan was housed in a simple, form-fitting red dress that plugged every curve she had like a four-inch headline in the LA Times. Around her shoulders was a fringy black wrap, and down below long, stockinged legs that constantly drew menâs attention.
âLC?â Archer said.
âSome people refer to me by my initials,â explained Callahan. âEllie is a screenwriter. The first movie I worked on here was one of her scripts. It was a United Artists film. Where are you now?â
âSame independent production company as before. We were hired to do the UA screenplay.â She took a moment to light up a Chesterfield from a silver cigarette case she slid from her handbag. Archer noticed her hand shook a bit as she took a drag on the Chesterfield, propelling out the smoke from both barrels of her nose. She shot him a glance before looking away. âIâm working on a script for Columbia as a comeback vehicle for Bette Davis.â She tapped her smoke into the glass ashtray at their table.
Archer gave her a puzzled look. âWait, Bette Davis needs a comeback film?â
Callahan said, âYou stay in this town long enough, everybody needs a comeback film.â
Genre:
- "Baldacci paints a vivid picture of the not-so-distant era . . . The 1950s weren’t the fabled good old days, but they’re fodder for gritty crime stories of high ideals and lowlifes, of longing and disappointment, and all the trouble a PI can handle. Well-done crime fiction. Baldacci nails the noir."âKirkus, Starred Review
- “This was already my favorite of Baldacci's recurring series, and Dream Town only reinforces that, in large part because of Baldacci's brilliance in stitching his story across a tapestry of a bygone era of movie magic with a dark side. Nostalgia aside, this is storytelling of the highest order, rich in character and bursting with story.”âProvidence Journal
- "[A] welcome third outing for PI Aloysius Archer . . . Solid prose nicely evokes the traditional hard-boiled whodunit."âPublishers Weekly
- "In the Archer series, [Baldacci] proves to be a natural at handling the postwar setting. Baldacci’s fans should be lining up for [Dream Town].”âBooklist
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“David Baldacci never fails to create an exciting story . . . the action is exhilarating. Fans of Baldacci will love this one from cover to cover.”
âSeattle Book Review -
“Baldacci keeps piling on the tension until the last chapters . . . Electrifying.”
âNew York Journal of Books - “Like his protagonist, Baldacci has a passion for details, especially those of the social variety. After a few pages you will feel as if you have time-traveled back to that era.”âFlorida Times-Union
- "If you like a whodunit with a complex plot and characters, you are going to love Dream Town. Baldacci’s take on Hollywood in the fifties is quite refreshing and a great part of this mystery novel’s charm."âTheMysterySite.com
- "One of [Baldacci's] finest books. Great character, great story, great portrait of an era."âBill Clinton (praise for One Good Deed)
- "David Baldacci is one of the all-time best thriller authors."âLisa Gardner, #1 New York Times bestselling author
- "A master storyteller."âPeople
- "Baldacci delivers, every time!"âLisa Scottoline, New York Times bestselling author
- "David Baldacci is a master storyteller."âAssociated Press
- On Sale
- Feb 21, 2023
- Page Count
- 464 pages
- Publisher
- Grand Central Publishing
- ISBN-13
- 9781538719756
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