Public Secrets

“It’s daring and defiant. It’s a fist shaken at age. It’s a voice that often screams out questions because the answers are always changing.”

She glanced up to see her father standing behind Johnno, listening. Her smile swept over him. “The very young play it because they’re searching for some way to express their anger or joy, their confusion and their dreams. Once in a while, and only once in a while, someone comes along who truly understands, who has the gift to transfer all those needs and emotions into music.
“When I was three years old, I watched you”—she looked back up at Brian—“all of you, go out onstage. I didn’t know about things like harmony or rhythms or riffs. All I saw was magic. I still see it, Johnno, every time I watch the four of you step onstage.”
He toyed with the copper column at her ear, then sent it spinning. “I knew there was a reason we kept you around. Give us a kiss.”
Her lips were curved as they touched his. “See you tomorrow. You’re going to knock them dead.”
It was dusk when she walked to her car. Sometime during the afternoon it had rained again. The streets were shiny, and the air was cool and misty. She didn’t want to go home to an empty house. Michael was working late, again.
When she started the car, she turned the radio up loud, as she liked it best on aimless drives. She would entertain herself for a couple of hours, look at houses in the glow of street lights, try to decide if she wanted the beach, the hills, or the canyons.
Relaxed, she set the car at a moderate pace and let the music wash over her. She didn’t check her rearview mirror, or notice the car that fell in behind her.

M ICHAEL STOOD IN front of the pegboard in the conference room and studied his lists. He’d made another connection. It was slow work, frustrating, but each link brought him closer to the end of the chain.
Jane Palmer had had many men. Finding them all could be a life’s work, Michael thought. But it was particularly satisfying when he turned one up whose name was on the list.
She had used Brian’s money to move out of her dingy little flat and into bigger, more comfortable quarters in Chelsea, where she’d lived from 1968 to 1971, until she’d bought the house on King’s Road. For the better part of ’70, she’d had a flatmate, a struggling pub singer named Blackpool.

Wasn’t it interesting, Michael thought as he rubbed eyes dead-dry with strain, that while the McAvoys had been living in the hills of Hollywood, Jane Palmer had been playing house with Blackpool? Blackpool who had been at the McAvoys’ party that night in early December?
And odd, wasn’t it just a bit odd, that Jane hadn’t mentioned the connection in her book? She’d dropped every name that could have made the slightest ring, but Blackpool, an established star by the mid-seventies, didn’t rate a footnote. Because, Michael concluded, neither of them wanted the connection remembered.
McCarthy stuck his head in the door. “Christ, Kesselring, you still playing with that thing? I want some dinner.”
“Robert Blackpool was Palmer’s live-in lover from June of 70 to February of 71.”
“Well, call out the wrath of God.”
Michael slapped a file in McCarthy’s hand. “I need everything there is to know about Blackpool.”
“I need red meat.”
“I’ll buy you a steer,” Michael said as he walked back into the squad room.
“You know, partner, this whole business has ruined your sense of humor. And my appetite. Blackpool’s a big star. He does beer commercials, for Christ’s sake. You’re not going to tie him to a twenty-year-old case.”
“Maybe not, but I’m down to eight names.” He sat at his desk and pulled out a cigarette. “Somebody stole my damn Pepsi.”
“I’ll call a cop.” McCarthy leaned over. “Mike, no fooling around, you’re pushing this too hard.”
“Looking out for me, Mac?”
“I’m your goddamn partner. Yeah, I’m looking out for you, and I’m looking out for myself. If we have to go out on the streets while you’re strung out like this, you’re not going to back me up.”
Through a veil of smoke, Michael studied his partner. His voice, when he spoke, was dangerously soft. “I know how to do my job.”
It was a tender area. McCarthy was well aware of the razzing Michael had taken his first years on the force. “I’m also your friend, and I’m telling you, if you don’t ease off for a few hours, you’re not going to do anybody any