Maddie Ellis and the Malibu Movie Colony is an old-fashioned mystery serial set during the end of the silent movie era. In chapter 9, our heroine and her colleague, director Milo Devlin, have rescued a young woman off the rocks in the bay only to find that she is the beautiful young ingenue cast in the film they are in Hollywood to salvage. How did she get there and what does it mean?Join us as we travel back in time to January 1928.
“Sorry,” Milo gasped, sitting down on the sand beside the girl they had just rescued and struggling to catch his breath. “I didn’t trust my bad leg on the rocks. I was afraid you would both drown. What do we do now?”
“Let’s get her to my place,” Maddie said. “I don’t know how she ended up on that rock, but she’s half drowned and probably in shock, and we’ll all end up with pneumonia at this rate.”
The girl was shivering so hard they could hear her teeth chattering. Maddie retrieved her jacket from the sand and rummaged for the key, her own hands shaking. She was relieved to find that it was still in the pocket. She wrapped the garment around the girl’s shoulders. They got her to her feet but had to half carry her down the beach to the Harrington house. Maddie was exhausted by the time they reached the house.
“I don’t think we can get her upstairs,” Milo muttered, as she struggled to get the door unlocked. The girl was barely conscious and he struggled to keep her from falling over and pulling him with her. Maddie pushed open the door and hurried to take the girl’s other arm again. “There’s a bedroom and a bathroom down here,” she said, indicating the door at the far side of the room. Between the two of them they pushed and pulled the girl through the living room and kitchen and into the small back bedroom.
“Milo, could you put the kettle on?” Maddie asked, once they maneuvered the girl onto the bed. There are towels in that linen cupboard. Help yourself. I’m going to try to get her out of these wet things.”
Maddie helped the semi-conscious girl remove her sodden and by now ragged dress and wrapped her in a warm blanket. One look at her hands and legs sent Maddie in search of first aid supplies. By the time she had applied iodine to numerous scratches and cuts from the reef, the girl was conscious.
“Here, get into bed,” Maddie ordered her patient. “I’ll bring you something hot to drink. You’re safe.”
Milo had filled the teapot and had set out sugar and milk. Maddie brought a cup of strong, sweet tea to the girl and helped her to drink it.
When she emerged from their patient’s room she found Milo in the living room tending a fire on the big hearth.
“She’s asleep now,” Maddie told Milo. “You may not have realized it, but I seem to have got my wish to meet Clarice Auclair.”
“I didn’t recognize her,” Milo said, astonished. “I thought she was a child. How is she?”
“Sleeping the sleep of the, well, not the just, but the drunk and mostly drowned,” Maddie told him. “And likely to wake with the mother of all hangovers, if I’m any judge of it.”
“Oh Lord,” Milo groaned. “Hoffmann’s going to have kittens if he finds out.”
Maddie was inclined to agree but was too cold and wet to care much about the producer’s sensibilities at that moment.
“I’m going to change, I’ll be right back, and I’ll bring you something warm, too. You must be frozen, too.
“Don’t worry about me,” he said. “I didn’t get as wet as you did.”
Maddie hurried up the stairs. Her clothes were unpleasantly cold and clingy, and rough with sand and salt. Her dress wasn’t in much better shape than the girl’s, and her arm had a nasty abrasion that was already swollen and bleeding, but at least her sand shoes had protected her feet from the sharp rocks.
She quickly dried off and put on clean warm clothes. Then she found a robe and nightgown for the girl and grabbed a dressing gown from the master bedroom for Milo. It was one of Daniel’s, and was every bit as theatrical as the one worn by Leon Verlaine, but at least the quilted velvet would be warm.
She found Milo sitting by the fire warming his bloody and battered feet. She handed him the robe.
“Red velvet!” he exclaimed. “I feel like Sherlock Holmes. Thank you Mrs. Hudson, but where is my pipe and violin?”
“You’ll have to settle for Dr. Watson and the first aid kit,” Maddie said. “You’d better let me mop up those cuts on your feet.”
“It was the tidepool rocks,” he said, examining the damage. “And the barnacles. Those things are sharp. I didn’t make it out to the reef, Milo added, awkwardly, as Maddie dabbed iodine on his scrapes. “I’m sorry I couldn’t climb out there with you. I was…I got shot during the war. I’m lucky to have the leg, but it doesn’t always cooperate the way it used to. I’m sorry.”
“Sorry for what? For being alive? For helping to save a life tonight? Don’t be sorry, Milo.” Maddie paused with bandages as sticking plaster in her hands. “My brother was killed in France,” she said, softly. “He was shot and didn’t survive. I’m glad you made it back. Clarice Auclair ought to be glad too, because if you hadn’t been here tonight I don’t know what would have happened.”
“Thanks,” Milo said gruffly. “I try not to think about it. Being here at the beach has been good. All that walking on the sand has helped, and I get by most days. Here, have some tea,” he said. “And let me doctor your arm for you.”
Maddie gladly accepted a cup of tea, and handed him the first aid box.
“Did Clarice say anything to you, Maddie?” he asked.
“She said that Johnny Roberts is a beast and she never wants to see him again, and that the green fairy doesn’t really make you fly,” Maddie told him. “Ouch!”
“Sorry! Didn’t mean to poke you. I had a lot of practice with bandages during the war. It ought to stay on fairly well, I think.”
“Thank you,” she said, examining the bandage. “Neat and professional.”
Milo packed the first aid supplied back in their box. “‘Green fairy’ sounds like absinthe doesn’t it?” he said. “That’s what they call it in France, la Fée Verte, because it’s green, and if you drink enough of it it’s supposed to make you see visions.”
“That would definitely account for much of what happened tonight,” Maddie said dryly. “It’s supposed to make men run mad.”
“Any strong spirit might make one do crazy things, but it does have a reputation,” Milo replied.
“Where did she get it?” Maddie wondered. “It’s been illegal here for a long time, since long before Prohibition, hasn’t it? It’s even illegal now in most of Europe.”
“I suspect one could obtain almost anything one desired here in Los Angeles, legal or not, if one had enough money,” Milo said.
Maddie thought that was almost certainly true. The two of them sat in front of the fire in silence.
“Well, life is never dull here in Malibu, is it?” Maddie said at last. “Go home Milo, get some sleep, truly the sleep of the just. I couldn’t have hauled her off the rocks without you. Thank you.”
“I wager you still would have rushed in and tried,” Milo said. “There’s nothing like a crisis to give one the full measure of a person.”
“Headstrong and pigheaded,” Maddie said, with a grin. “Or so I’ve been told.”
“That makes two of us,” Milo replied. “Get some rest. I’ll see you in the morning,”
Maddie smiled back at him. “Bless you, Milo. Thanks!”
Maddie dragged her blankets downstairs, planning to spend the night on the sofa in the living room so she could be on hand if her half-drowned houseguest needed anything. The sofa, with its ridiculous gilded lion’s paws and overstuffed cushions, was surprisingly comfortable, but she didn’t have a chance to fall asleep. The moment she shut her eyes she was roused by a fusillade of knocking at the door.
Johnny Roberts was there, looking even more like a pirate than before. His hair was curling wildly from the salt water, his jacket was missing and his shirt was open, revealing an expanse of muscular chest. He radiated energy and a sort of raw magnetism that was mesmerizing.
“Is she here? Is she safe? I must see her!” It was a demand, not a request.
“If you are referring to Miss Auclair, yes, she is here, yes she is safe, and no, you cannot see her,” Maddie told him, blocking the doorway. “It’s the middle of the night. She almost drowned, and she needs rest.”
Instead of replying, Roberts uttered a muted roar and rushed towards the door. Before a scuffle could ensue, Milo arrived. He grabbed Roberts from behind and restrained him.
“Sorry, Maddie,” he panted. “He runs a lot faster than I do. I told you Miss Auclair was safe, Roberts. There’s no need to disturb the lady.”
“You don’t understand!” Roberts cried, with an expression of anguish. Instead of trying to push Maddie out of the way again, he turned the full force of her personality on her. It felt like being caught in a spotlight, Maddie thought. Here was a flame to draw in the moths.
“I need to explain,” he beseeched. “I didn’t know she was missing—that ass Worthington capsized the dinghy and tipped everyone into the water. No one realized Clarice wasn’t there until we were on the beach again. I was sure she had drowned! Have mercy, let me see her!”
It was a very affecting performance, Maddie thought, admiring the actor’s impassioned tones, but it was a performance, and she was not a moth. Roberts’ expression was now one of entreaty, his beautiful blue eyes beseeching but also unfocused.
“Go away, Mr Roberts,” Maddie said. “Miss Auclair is resting. She doesn’t want to see you. We’ll take care of her. You should tend to your other guests, and yourself. You don’t want to catch pneumonia. The tabloids would love that. ‘Sands of Afar curse strikes again.’”
That got his attention. He took a step back.
“Come along, Roberts,” Milo said. “I’ll see you safely back to your boat. He guided the actor back towards the beach with a firm hand. Roberts went. Maddie sighed, and then went to check on her patient. The girl was asleep, breathing heavily.
Maddie returned to her own bed on the sofa in the living room but she couldn’t sleep. She lay away for a long time.
