“Someone?” Lancaster draws himself up and puffs out his chest. “The only other person outside of props who handled that gun is you.”
It’s what Angela expects him to say. “You know as well as I do, this isn’t the gun we used in rehearsal.” She wonders why the prop assistant didn’t flag it. “Couldn’t you feel the difference?” she asks Ruby.
Ruby’s mouth opens but at first no words come out. “Actually, I did. It felt cold and heavier.”
“It’s a different gun,” Angela says. She peers closely at a bit of what looks like a nugget of hard plastic stuck inside the exploded barrel. “And it looks as if someone jammed it with—”
“Probably latex,” Lancaster says. Now everyone turns and stares at him. Because how could he know that from twenty feet away? Latex hadn’t even occurred to Angela and she’s looking right at it.
Lancaster continues, “A gun loaded with blanks can kill you if it’s been jammed with—”
“Aging makeup?” Angela finishes the thought. “The stuff that makes me look old?”
“Older.” Lancaster nods, but it’s an uneasy nod. Maybe he’s starting to realize he’s overplayed his hand. Tipped over into caricature.
Angela says, “There’s only one person who behaved as if he knew something was about to go wrong before it did. Just one person who moved well out of the way before Ruby fired the gun.” Angela scans the faces of the actors and camera operators and crew. “Surely I’m not the only one who noticed.”
No one steps forward. And why would they? All eyes had been on Ruby. A herd of orangutans could have sauntered across the soundstage and no one would have noticed when Lancaster crept away.
“Bastard!” Ruby screams. She’s a red blur as she throws herself at Lancaster, clawing at his face. It takes both of the burglars and an electrician to pull her off. She struggles and finally shakes them loose. In a cold, clear voice, she says, “My father trusted you and you betrayed him. Again.”
In the uneasy silence that follows, Angela can feel the polarity in the room reverse. Lancaster has become the focal point.
“Who’s your father?” Angela asks.
Before Ruby can answer, Lancaster raises both arms and says, “That’s enough. Clear the set.” When no one moves, he bellows, “Now!”
Moments later, it’s just Ruby and Angela and Lancaster on the soundstage.
“My father was Ralph Lago,” Ruby says, her soft voice echoing in the vast empty space. “He”—Ruby tips her head in Lancaster’s direction—“and my father were long-time business partners.”
Of course Angela’s heard the name. Seen Lago’s picture in the paper, a Hollywood accountant who committed suicide a few months ago after he was convicted of embezzling studio funds. Now she realizes that Lago must have been the man she saw years ago, working surrounded by computer printouts in the small office next to Lancaster’s. Angela had assumed he was Lancaster’s bookkeeper.
“You were best friends.” As Ruby spits out the words, Lancaster recoils. “Dad padded production charges so you could skim profits. When you realized you were being investigated, you got my dad to take the rap. God forbid the great director should face charges.”
Lancaster doesn’t contradict her.
Ruby takes a deep breath and wipes away a tear. “Just hours before he killed himself, Dad told me you’d promised to give me this part. But you couldn’t even do that for him, could you? You’ve got someone else you’ve promised the part, haven’t you? I can only imagine what she’s got on you.”
Lancaster just hangs there, staring at the floor and looking deflated. No wonder he needed Angela. Not only to play Mrs. Hudson and stand in for Irene Adler and mentor an inexperienced performer, but also to play an aging actress desperate enough to kill off her rival. How convenient it would have been for him, disposing of both Ruby and Angela with a single blank.
Eight months later, the new Scandal in Bohemia opens in Westwood Village at the Fox Theatre. Strobes light up the crowd gathered beneath its phallic Art Deco tower and a searchlight arcs across the sky. Ruby and Angela arrive together in a black limo.
Ruby steps out, resplendent in a red, off-the-shoulders gown with a flowing cape. Angela follows in a black-silk tuxedo jacket over a long skirt slit up to her thigh. She looks down, trying to slow time as the pointy toes of her black stilettos hit the red carpet. She lifts her gaze to the marquee.
WORLD PREMIERE TONIGHT
Yes! She gives a mental fist pump.
Anthony Fox, starring in the film as Sherlock Holmes, comes over to them. He’s every inch the dashing elder statesman in his tux. He and Angela pose for photographs, standing on either side of Ruby.