The Fourth Wall by Walter Jon Williams

Author:Walter Jon Williams [Williams, Walter Jon]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Speculative Fiction, C429, Extratorrents, Kat
ISBN: 9780316133395
Publisher: Orbit
Published: 2012-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

FROM: Helmuth

SUBJECT: Getting a clue

Sean, I’d like to plant a comment in your blog that will serve as a clue to some of our online gamers. It will be signed “Tempest Royal.” I hope that’s okay.

Please don’t erase the comment when it appears.

FROM: Sean Makin

SUBJECT: Re: Getting a clue

Okay by me.

EXT. HOLLYWOOD FOREVER CEMETERY—EVENING

Los Angeles boasts what is probably the only cemetery with a film program. The Hollywood Forever cemetery, off Santa Monica Boulevard, shows vintage films projected on the wall of a large crypt. They have DJs before and after, and viewers bring picnics and blankets and watch from the lawn next to the single sarcophagus shared by the senior and junior Douglas Fairbanks.

I’ve gone to the shows myself. There aren’t very many places left where you can see old movies as intended, amid an audience of happy enthusiasts, rather than on the small, lonely screen at home.

I’ve also made a kind of pilgrimage to the child stars interred there: Carl “Alfalfa” Switzer, Our Gang star, murdered at the age of thirty-one. Mildred Harris, who starred as Dorothy in a series of Oz films, got knocked up by Charlie Chaplin at the age of sixteen, gave birth to a son who lived three days, and died young. Sharing a crypt with Mildred is another Our Gang alum, Darla Hood, who retired at fourteen and died mysteriously at forty-seven. In another crypt is Bebe Daniels, who first toddled onstage at the age of four and never left the business—unlike the other child stars buried here, she had a long, happy, successful career.

Judging by the evidence offered within the cemetery gates, I have only one chance in four of living a natural life span.

Determined to beat the odds, I drive into the cemetery with two bodyguards—Simon brought along a backup, a young man with a goatee, shoulder-length dark hair, and an embroidered vest under his yoked Western jacket. His name is Albert, though I’m sure he’d rather be called Wild Bill.

I’ve left my pistol in my shoulder bag, which I’ve left in my closet. Packing a pistol at my premiere might be viewed as a little odd by my peers.

Besides, the place is as secure as a cemetery will ever get. There’s security at the gate, and guards in blue blazers and tan trousers wander through the crowds, chatting to one another on their radios. This would clearly be a bad place to murder me.

It’s as far removed from a standard Hollywood premiere as possible. It’s Hollywood 2.0—or maybe 5.0, or 8.1, or 12.5, since a lot of Hollywoods have gone down the 101 since DeMille made The Squaw Man here in 1914.

The scene is set up to remain in keeping with the New Delhi setting for the first episode of the film. There’s a bhangra band playing in the Iberian-Moorish Masonic Lodge, the beats of the double-ended drums echoing from the arabesques on the ceiling, the huge wooden thrones, and the ominous inverted pentagram that hangs over the heads of the guests.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.