Alchemy of Secrets, page 4
Finally, you see a dozen other classmates just beyond the entrance. Each week there are fewer students. Week by week the classes have gotten more difficult to find, as the Professor’s clues have become more complicated. You feel proud of yourself for piecing together the clues and making it here.
The mausoleum doors are already open, but you notice there are heavy chains for when they’re closed. One of your classmates rattles the chains as you walk past. You say you don’t believe in ghosts, yet you can’t help briefly wondering if the chains are there to keep people out or to lock the spirits in.
The first thing you see inside is a dusty piano. Though you probably shouldn’t, you can’t resist tapping a yellowed key. It’s soundless. Dead, like all the people laid to rest here.
To your right and to your left are halls of marble squares with bronze name plaques and matching vase sconces on both sides. Most of the vases are empty, but you pause at one that holds fresh gerbera daisies, with a number of lipstick kisses lining the marble around it.
It’s the grave of Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel.
This isn’t the Benjamin you’re looking for, but you’re not the only one of your classmates who takes note of the famous gangster. One of them leaves a penny at the grave, while another adds to the collection of lipstick kisses.
You move on toward the back.
There’s a large fan embedded in the wall, but it slows to an unfortunate stop as you reach the end and find the names you’re looking for: Isla Saint and Benjamin James Tierney.
The graves are side by side. Isla doesn’t have any vases or an epitaph, but Benjamin does.
Loving Father, brilliant mind, gone too soon.
You’re familiar with his story, so you don’t expect to feel choked up, but you do.
“Usually, I take students to the hotel where Isla and Ben both died, but those ghosts are not as friendly.” The Professor sighs loudly, as you turn to see her now sitting on the dusty piano bench.
She’s dressed in heavy black; she even has a hat with a little net veil. At first you think it’s theatrical, but then you wonder if maybe she knew Isla Saint and Benjamin J. Tierney. They died more recently than most of the cemetery’s inhabitants—almost fifteen years ago—and they are far more famous as well.
The Professor gives you all a minute to come closer before she continues.
Benjamin J. Tierney and Isla Saint were once the Hollywood royals. Their fame and their love story began in 1996, when twenty-five-year-old Tierney’s time-bending masterpiece, Mirrorland, which starred Saint, became the top-grossing film of the year. It outsold the second-highest-grossing film of that year, Independence Day, by over $250 million.
You know this because you read the Wonderpage before coming to class—and you’ve seen the movies.
During the filming of the Mirrorland sequel, Puppet Kingdom, Tierney and Saint cemented their fame by leaving their significant others (Victoria Monroe and Sebastian Friday) and eloping halfway through production. It was all anyone talked about, until Puppet Kingdom was released in late 1997 and became an even greater success than its predecessor. In 1999, the third film in the trilogy, Lostland, broke every box office record and spawned a universe of spinoffs. Although, in your opinion, none of the spinoffs are as good.
Benjamin J. Tierney was a genius. There has never been another like him.
After the original Mirrorland films, he signed on to write and direct another trilogy for Jericho Monroe Entertainment. The first two films, Price of Magic and Symphony of Death, were financially on par with the Mirrorland films. However, the productions were so fraught with misfortune, many believed the franchise was cursed. There were fires on set, multiple car accidents involving cast and crew members, several reports of amnesia, and one day, during outdoor filming, an entire flock of doves died midflight and fell from the sky.
The third film, which was supposed to be released in early 2007, was initially delayed for a year. Tierney said he needed more time to research the script and finish writing, but no one has ever seen a single page. It has long been suspected that Tierney’s true reason for the delay was that he believed the Price of Magic trilogy was cursed, and he was afraid to finish it.
Around this time, Saint, who had taken a break from acting to spend time with her and Benjamin’s twin daughters, made her grand return to Hollywood by starring in the gritty 2010 drama Conclavity. This film earned Isla Saint her first Academy Award. It’s said she cried during her entire acceptance speech.
You tried to find the speech online, but there are no recordings of it. When you looked for it, you found videos of everyone else who won an Oscar. But all that came up for Isla Saint were articles about how, that same night—February 27, 2011—she murdered her husband.
Even before reading the Wonderpage, you knew this. You might have just been a kid when it happened, but everyone knows how their love story ended.
“The official crime report says that Isla shot Benjamin with a gun just like this,” says the Professor as she stands, opens the lid of the piano, and pulls out a dull black revolver. “Don’t worry, this weapon is merely a prop.” She smiles her Mona Lisa smile, and you’re not sure you believe her. “Isla shot her husband twice—once in the heart and once in the head—before turning the gun on herself.” The Professor points the gun at her head, making you flinch. “The tabloids said it was all because of another woman. A young unknown actress named Jessica Travers, who Benjamin was having an affair with. Of course, Jessica never confirmed these rumors because she died by suicide the same night.”
There’s a click. The Professor has pulled the trigger.
Your heart stutters and stops before starting again.
The gun is just a prop after all. The Professor’s head is intact, or at least it looks that way on the outside.
“Don’t worry, my dears. I have no wish to die, and I don’t think that Isla Saint did, either.” The Professor sets her gun on the bench. “How many of you have heard the Hollywood Rule of Three—that if one celebrity dies, two are certain to follow? I’m not sure when it began, but I can tell you it’s a lie. All three of these deaths are part of a cover-up, a bit of misdirection, to hide the real reason Isla and Ben were killed.”
The Professor lowers her voice to a whisper that makes all of you move closer. “By now, I’m sure many of you have tried to find the devil at a hotel bar, and I probably should have said this before: Be very careful. Hollywood was not built on dreams, it was built on favors from the devil, and the devil does not handle it well when those favors aren’t paid back.”
CHAPTER FOUR
Visiting the Hollywood Roosevelt always made Holland feel as if she was stepping back into the 1920s. She didn’t know if it was the ocher light, the tawny Spanish tiles, the potted palm trees, the etched champagne coupes, or something else entirely. If maybe time was more alive than anyone realized, and a piece of it was trapped inside the lobby of the Hollywood Roosevelt.
Her love affair with the Roosevelt began the year she took Folklore 517.
There had been a small group of students who had decided they would visit every hotel bar in Los Angeles in an attempt to buy the devil a drink. They went to three hotels before they tried the Roosevelt.
Holland had fallen a little in love with the iconic building even before she’d visited, when she’d read up on its history. The Roosevelt was built in 1927. Its architecture was Spanish colonial revival. Its ballroom had hosted the first-ever Academy Awards. There was an old-timey gaming parlor with a bowling alley. And it was rumored to be the home of a number of ghosts. A man in a white tuxedo was said to haunt the mezzanine level. And Marilyn Monroe—who lived in the hotel for two years—supposedly appeared from time to time.
Holland believed this had to be the place the devil would frequent, if the devil actually existed.
Her friends weren’t immediately convinced. After their first trip to the Roosevelt, they’d wanted to visit other hotels, ones with trendy rooftop bars and outlandish cocktails that came with batteries on the side. But eventually they’d realized what Holland had known right away: The Roosevelt was special—and it didn’t need electric cocktails to prove it.
Now they met in the Roosevelt lobby on the final Thursday of each month.
Over the last few years, Holland’s friends had all bought drinks for various men and women who they thought might be the devil—or who they had just wanted to flirt with. Holland was the only one who had never bought anyone a sidecar. She planned to only buy one once, and when she did, she wanted to be certain.
Every month, she arrived at the Roosevelt a little early in case she finally saw him. Tonight, she was earlier than usual. And, after her meeting with Adam, she was in the mood to buy a stranger a drink. She wanted to prove that her faith in the Professor wasn’t misplaced, and more than ever, she wanted to prove the stories about the devil were real.
If she could prove the devil made deals with people that led to their deaths, then she could prove her mother had never murdered her father. She could rewrite their story, change the ending. She could turn Isla Saint from Hollywood villain back to leading lady. And maybe Holland could save someone else from making the same mistake as her parents and countless others.
Holland couldn’t be absolutely certain as to which former stars had made deals with the devil and then failed to pay him back. But she had very strong ideas about it. While working on her thesis, Holland had been unsettled to discover that there seemed to be a similar tragic pattern to a number of Hollywood deaths: awards, fame, the kind of success that made people rich and powerful and adored, until it all came crashing down in a devastating turn of mysterious events no one could ever fully explain.
Holland felt a familiar stab of sadness as she grabbed the first open table she could find. It was covered in flyers for tomorrow’s Halloween party and was right next to the fireplace. It was far too hot a day to sit next to a fire, but half of the lobby was closed off with covered-up installations for the party, and the rest of it was already buzzing with people.
The music of clinking glasses mingled with tipsy laughter that floated up toward the mezzanine. Usually, the sound made her think of rising champagne bubbles, and Holland would try to picture how the Roosevelt must have looked once upon a time, full of gentlemen in hats and ladies in gloves with rows of iridescent pearl buttons.
Tonight, though, she wasn’t feeling the magic of the Roosevelt the way she usually did. As she sat in the lobby, she felt antsy, unsettled. Her heart was racing as if it knew something she didn’t.
Holland checked her phone to see if the Professor had returned her call.
No new notifications. Not from the Professor and not from Jake. Although by now Holland had given up on hearing from Jake.
She shoved her phone back into her messenger bag and tried to take a proper look around to see if anyone resembling the devil had arrived.
She had been raised by her Aunt Beth, who believed in God and Jesus, and usually Holland did, too. She wasn’t a biblical expert, but she’d looked into the name Lucifer. Bringer of light. That’s what the name meant, which made Holland think the devil would look golden. Skin that ranged from tan to bronze. Hair that could be either gold or blond. Light eyes—she wasn’t certain of the color, but she knew they would be beautiful.
Suddenly she had a picture of Adam Bishop, smirking at her over a cocktail glass.
She tried to shake it from her head. Adam wasn’t that hot, except … he really was. He had that lean tall build, the kind that made her think he’d look young and healthy forever. If she’d first met him at the Roosevelt, she would have considered buying him a drink.
Although Holland was convinced the devil would wear a suit. He wouldn’t look like a grad student. And he definitely wouldn’t be a tourist, which the lobby was full of that night. There were lots of people taking pictures of their drinks and themselves—something the devil would never do.
Her eyes drifted up toward the mezzanine level. The area was empty. There was nothing to see that she hadn’t seen before, but her skin felt suddenly hot. Her unsettled feeling was back with a vengeance. Sweat beaded on the back of her neck.
“Hey you!”
Holland turned to find her friend Cat, sauntering toward the table, all long dark legs and long black braids swishing behind her.
Holland’s anxious feeling dissipated at the sight of her dear friend’s smile.
“How was your date last night?” Cat asked excitedly, because Cat pursued love the same way Holland chased after myths and legends.
For Cat—whose full name was Charlotte Elizabeth Davis—searching for the devil had always been purely an excuse to buy cute strangers drinks. During undergrad, she had taken Folklore 517 because of her girlfriend at the time. Holland didn’t think that Cat believed in any of the Professor’s myths, including the one about the devil. Cat simply believed in love, and in doing whatever it took to find it. And Holland adored her for it.
“I think I’m destined to be a spinster,” Holland said, joking but also a little bit serious. “I’ve decided my new goal is to get over my cat allergy, since I don’t think there are going to be any men in my future. Or maybe I’m just not meant to date nice, normal guys.”
Cat’s eyes immediately filled with pity and a flare of anger because Cat was the sort of friend who couldn’t imagine anything being wrong with Holland.
“Nice and normal are both such boring words,” Cat said heatedly, full of that wonderful good-friend righteous fury. “I’m not sure why you’re trying so hard to make that your type.”
“It is my type. I’m nice.”
“Yes, you’re an absolute sweetheart. But—” Cat’s expression softened. “Nice just isn’t the first word I’d use to describe you. You are so much more than nice. You’re like a sunbeam with all your boho skirts and your smiles and your long blond hair and your corny jokes. But you don’t have a soft sweet center. The first time I met you, the way you believed in the Professor’s myths made me wonder if you were a little insane.”
Holland’s eyebrows shot up.
“Only for a second!” Cat clarified. “Then I immediately wanted to be your friend.”
But all Holland could think was that this was her problem: her endless chasing after the Professor’s myths and legends. It was what had botched things up last night. It was what always did, because she wanted to chase them more than she wanted anything else.
“Hey, please don’t feel bad,” Cat said. “You know I think you’re amazing. The way you see the world is so different and surprising, and it makes you a far more interesting person. I just wonder…” Cat paused and pursed her scarlet lips, as if she thought she should stop there.
“It’s all right,” Holland said. “I probably need to hear this.”
Cat reached out and put a hand over Holland’s. “I feel like you’re going after the wrong type of guy. I don’t think you actually want someone safe and nice. I think you want someone who scares you a little, like the Professor’s myths. And I think you need someone who won’t make you feel as if you have to hide those dark and twisty parts of you.”
And this was the other reason Holland loved Cat. Even though Holland kept secrets from her friend, Cat could still see so much of what was going on inside of her.
For a second, Holland wondered what it would be like if she told Cat the reason why. If she spilled her guts about her parents, if she confessed her real last name and told Cat the actual reason she’d taken the Professor’s class.
She imagined Cat would hold her in the world’s tightest hug and then make it her new crusade to find the devil as well. Holland could almost hear Cat yelling, “I’m buying everyone in here a sidecar!”
And for a moment, the ever-present ache inside of Holland would vanish. For a moment she’d feel like she might not spend the rest of her life alone, haunted by questions she couldn’t quite answer.
But one of the great joys of Cat was also one of the reasons Holland could never tell her. Cat didn’t have any secrets, which made her tragically bad at keeping other people’s. And this wasn’t just Holland’s secret. It was January’s, too.
“I love that you see me this way,” Holland said. “But I really don’t want to be scared.”
Cat raised a disbelieving brow. “Then why do you get here early every week to look for the devil?”
“I’m the only one who’s never bought him a drink.”
“Let’s change that tonight!” Cat declared.
Just then a burst of giggles erupted from a table at the other end of the lobby. Holland and Cat both turned their heads. Chance Garcia had arrived.
Yes—that Chance Garcia.
Chance, of course, already had a drink in his hand. Servers always brought Chance drinks almost as soon as he entered the lobby.
Chance had never explicitly stated why he’d taken Folklore 517, but Holland always imagined it had something to do with The Magic Attic. Not that Chance ever talked about The Magic Attic. It was the one subject he never touched.
But he was always kind and generous to any fans who recognized him from the show. And, even after all these years, he was still easily recognizable. More so now that he was making an unexpected return to acting in the newest Vic VanVleet film, which was premiering on Thanksgiving.
The giggling girls had clearly been excited to spot him, and now they were all taking pictures near a potted palm tree.
“I don’t know how he deals with it,” Eileen huffed, as she took a seat at the table.
Holland hadn’t even seen her enter, but suddenly Eileen was there, dressed as if she’d come straight from work, in a pair of tailored slacks and a smart, long-sleeve cream blouse, with a navy ribbon threaded under her collar and tied into a neat bow.
