Very Narrow Bridge

By Hillel F. Damron

A reclusive Vietnam War hero, a recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor, falls in love with a young woman, unaware that she is his biological daughter. A loner, wounded both in body and in soul, Ray is attracted to Joy because she reminds him so much of the woman who was once his high school sweetheart, and who wrote him the fateful “Dear John“ letter to Vietnam that sets the wheels of this spellbinding novel in motion.

That woman, Ursula, who dumped Ray during the war (for another man), and never revealed to him that he has fathered a daughter with her, is seeking revenge now. In her way stands a novice private eye, Gideon, a former commander of an elite Israeli paratroops unit and a Mossad secret agent, whose persistent search for Ray (on behalf of Joy) enables the father and daughter to unite. At the end though, Gideon is left alone to deal with the shocking, terrible aftermath, bringing to it a measure of justice.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Hillel F. Damron
• Release date: Nov 6, 2013
• ISBN: 9781310139871

Hillel F. Damron

Hillel F. Damron was born in Israel to parents who survived the Holocaust. He was an officer at an elite paratroops unit and was wounded in battle. He studied films at the London Film School and became a film director of TV documentaries, a feature film, and video shorts. He is the award-winning author of a Sci-fi novel, The War of the Sexes (now titled Sex War One in the English edition), short stories and film reviews. His novel, Very Narrow Bridge, a first in the series of Gideon Gold’s Investigation, was published in 2011. In 2012 he was awarded Moment Magazine’s Prize for winning the Memoir Contest with his entry, The Sweet Life.To read a longer, inclusive version, visit his literarily website: http://hillelbridge.com/

Book preview

On the morning of February 11, 1969, a platoon from Alpha Company was about to cross the Da Krong River, thirteen kilometers from the Laotian border. Hidden in the thick brush on the riverbank were the soldiers of the 3rd Battalion of the 9th Marines, known throughout Vietnam as the Walking Dead. They waited impatiently to begin their sweep of the Southern Quang Tri Province, at the heart of Charlie's backyard, eager to put in motion Phase III of Operation Dewey Canyon.

The air was serene and the water still, when the soldiers of the platoon began negotiating their way on a narrow, bamboo-made bridge. They walked in formation of two columns, on both sides of the bridge, stooped low with their rifles pointing outward. A young Lieutenant, walking ahead in the middle of the bridge, led the way. He moved slowly and carefully for a while, then stopped and knelt down, the platoon following his lead.

The sun was invisible yet, though some light was penetrating through the thick morning fog, enabling the Lieutenant to see a few feet ahead of him. He got up and started walking again, signaling to his soldiers to do the same. All was clear.

He took only three steps forward when a booby trap went off. It threw him up in the air as if he were a rag doll. A barrage of small-arms, machine-gun and mortar-fire burst from the surrounding mist. The bridge became a pitfall, where men fell wounded and dead. At the same time, a savage hail of mortar shells and rockets began to pour down on the battalion, flowing steadily from the other side of the river.

The ambush by the North Vietnamese Army was so surprising, so meticulously executed by its soldiers, so deadly and disarming to the American troops, that in those early morning moments, the success of the Operation Dewey Canyon hung in the balance.

Then a lone soldier managed somehow to escape the inferno on the bridge. He made his way back to the riverbank, miraculously, running low and in zigzags. When he reached his disarrayed battalion, whose soldiers were trying desperately to return fire at the unseen enemy, the lone soldier rushed to an ineffective escort machine-gun carrier. He opened the door of the vehicle, pulled the driver out and threw him to the ground. He jumped in and drove the machine-gun carrier down toward the river, while a few soldiers who were sitting inside jumped out and ran away. One soldier remained, however, sending rapid fire from his heavy machine-gun, fixed on top of the vehicle, at the enemy on the other side of the river.

But the armored vehicle did not stop when it reached the river. The lone soldier found a shallow water pass and drove right through it. And as he was crossing the river with his vehicle, one hand holding the steering wheel, the other returning fire with his M-16 rifle, it was the turn of the army on the other side to be caught by surprise. As a result, all enemy fire was directed suddenly, by command or by reflex, at his vehicle; it was coming from fortified bunkers, hidden behind thick undergrowth and bamboo palms.

The lone soldier was undeterred, and managed to cross the river somehow, alive with his vehicle. But the soldier at the top, who kept delivering a steady stream of machine-gun fire at the enemy, was not so lucky. Just as they reached the other side and pulled out of the water, he suffered a direct hit and died slumping on his heavy machine-gun, as if trying to protect it.

This setback did not stop the lone soldier’s advance. He kept driving along the riverbank, just in front of the still invisible enemy line, diverting most of the attention and fire toward himself and his vehicle. And in spite the constant automatic-weapons fire and the rocket-propelled grenades, the lone soldier with his armored vehicle had managed to reach the bridge on the other side of the river.

At that time, a rescue operation was well underway on the bridge. Alpha Company, officers and soldiers, were busy helping the wounded and pulling the dead off the burning bridge. Free from direct fire for just a few minutes, they all had a chance to regroup. Enough time to regain their composure and reclaim their pride and courage, in order to try and save the lives of their fellow-soldiers.

Behind them on the riverbank, meanwhile, the whole battalion had received a temporary reprieve as well. Its commanders were in control once more, directing the return of fire and radioing for help. At the same time, some of the soldiers saw in disbelief how the armored vehicle turned somehow, upon reaching the bridge, and drove back the same way it came; under the nose of the enemy, and in total disregard of the enemy's firepower and deadly threat.

But the driver and his vehicle paid a heavy price this time. A bazooka rocket-shell hit the armored vehicle directly, and the force of the explosion-upon-impact threw the burning vehicle into the river, where it slowly sank under the water in a blaze of fire, until the heavy machine-gun carrier and its driver were no longer visible.

By that time the fog had abated somewhat, chased away by the rising sun, appearing over the top of the jungle trees. In the background, overcoming the noise of the battle, the humming of the flying gun-ships was getting closer. And with it relief: a feeling among the soldiers that not all was lost. And a realization, too, that a singular act of bravery, by a fearless lone soldier, not only had saved the lives of so many of his buddies, trapped on the burning bridge; not only had saved the whole battalion on the riverbank from a complete collapse and devastated defeat; but probably had saved the entire Operation Dewey Canyon by the U.S. Marine Corps.

Part One: Gideon Gold

1

The message recorded on Gideon Gold's answering machine, on that unusually hot and dry November afternoon, was not meant for him at all. It was a mistake from beginning to end. But that was the case here in America anyhow, he figured, with Columbus – like himself – setting sail to find one thing and finding out another. Unaware of his error. Unaware, also, of the consequences his mistake may unleash.

He didn't hit the playback button until later, in fact, but first fixed a snack for his starving 4-year-old son. Still bothered by what Daniel had said when he came to pick him up from the Nursery School, at Burbank's Temple Emanu-El. Standing in the middle of the room – his hand still warm from the soft touch of Alma Lopez, who had just handed him Daniel's lunch-box – Gideon overheard his son conversing with another child.

My mom and dad are divorced, said Daniel. Yours too?

The other kid shook his head.

Why not? asked Daniel.

The kid hesitated, confused, then shrugged his shoulders. Don't know, he said and ran away.

Embarrassed, though it seemed no one else had heard this mature chat, Gideon took Daniel by the hand and led him to the car. He was troubled by his son's easy tongue (blaming it on his mother), and by his way of thinking (blaming himself for that). And tried to explain to him that first, not all parents are divorced, even if it is quite common nowadays. And second, that Daniel's mom and dad are not yet divorced either. Just separated.

What's the difference? asked Daniel.

A tough one. Even more so because both Gideon and his wife-in-separation, Evelyne Hoffman-Gold, did not see eye to eye on that question, quite naturally, and would've answered it differently. A temporary step in order to try to save the marriage and prevent an imminent divorce, according to her; a long-term prospect that will just aggravate the wounds and escalate the possibility of divorce, according to him. Her version being the official one.

Which he opted to explain to Daniel, and was mildly relieved when Daniel understood and accepted it right away. Probably because he had heard it all before. And therefore, so peacefully, concentrated on eating the peanut butter crackers Gideon had fixed for him. Not a worry in the world.

Unlike his father. Who was about to press the playback button on his answering machine, watching hypnotically the flashing red light, when he decided to take five himself and drink something cold first. Or maybe there was another reason for his hesitation: the thought that, most probably, it was a message from his semi-wife, calling long-distance from Washington, D.C., where she was currently vigorously pursuing her political career. Her image was so vivid in his mind: punching the button right away upon entering the house. Free of his kind of hesitations and eager to hear all the urgent messages, from all the important people. While at the same time kicking her high-heel shoes in all directions and throwing her briefcase and handbag on the dining room table. Sometimes while getting undressed. Business as usual.

Not for him, however. As for him, every call was a matter of life and death. A matter of his dying career as a screenwriter being resurrected; of getting another shot at climbing up to the mountaintop. Or getting another kick down the slope and toward the abyss. Where he was stuck at the moment, as a matter of fact: a part-time manager of this apartment complex, who could and should have expected to receive many phone calls, regarding the two vacant apartments. Only in his mind he was still the filmmaker and writer he once was, in Israel, and every call was meant to change his life forever.

And that actually what happened. Though it was a curve ball, as the Americans like to say, if ever there was one. And it came from a totally unexpected direction. Not from his mother in Tel-Aviv, announcing her prompt arrival in order to help him raise his son, and maybe help him salvage his marriage. Not from his old father either, still living in the small kibbutz where Gideon was born and grew up, telling him how hard life is, as if he hadn't learn that already. Or a worse case scenario, even: his sister calling him with a Job's message, as the Israelis like to say, informing him of his father's sudden death.

Not so, thankfully. Instead, this was simply a case of someone dialing the wrong number. And so, when Gideon finally pushed the playback button, a strange, worried, and hesitating voice of a woman came on: Hello. I'm... is this is the Gold Investigations Inc? I sure hope so, as I need your help finding my daughter. I’m calling from Chicago, 312, 642-5242. My name is Susan Plummer, please call me back. Thank you.

Click, click, and click. End of message; end of story. Don't mess with a number with so many twos. Erase it, Gideon told himself. And almost did so. But then he paused and listened to it once more, and again at night, when his son was already deep asleep. After he had read him the story about the revolt of the Maccabees against the Syrian and Greek armies. Even though Hanukkah would not be celebrated until the middle of December. But this was his son's favorite story, and his own favorite Jewish holiday. So he had read it to him, why not, and then sang him a goodnight song. No longer disturbed, as before at dusk, by potential new residents.

First among them, a Latino family of six. Second to come, an old woman with a poodle. In both cases, he had politely showed them the vacant apartments: a two-bedroom and a three-bedroom. He did all he could to encourage them to move in. Disregarding the clear instructions of Dolores Rubens, the bitch who owned the place.

No Mexicans and no dogs, were the words of warning she frequently used. Although he knew, as he had learned from her daughter, that she was an immigrant herself, from Brazil, who had married an old, rich American, then proceeded right on course and gave him a heart-attack.

In bed, he imagined, when he later had heard her voice on the phone, complaining about these two vacancies. Demanding an explanation. So he gave her two: One, the rent she was asking was too high; second, she had too many demands and restrictions.

Tough job, she had said in return. He could quit any day. Her daughter, who lived downstairs, would take over right away.

Yes, ma'am, he had answered nonchalantly. Knowing otherwise. Knowing that Gloria, her mulatto daughter, was pursuing a career as a ballet dancer. A good-natured girl she was, unlike her mother. And very hot, too.

Maybe she would put on her microscopic bikini later, he imagined, and would come out for a dip in the pink swimming pool; strategically situated at the center of the building, where Gideon could easily see her. And free to join her. Maybe something would happen: a union of two lonely souls. He could certainly see it materializing in his mind, while sitting still at his writing desk in his study, holding a piece of paper with the phone number of the erroneous message in his hand, thinking about a union of two other souls.

A reunion, in fact. A probability, which made him deliberate long and hard whether to help accelerate by calling that woman, Susan Plummer, and let her know of the mistake she had made. A missing daughter, after all, was a serious matter. And a good enough reason to lift the receiver of his old rotary telephone (he was a sucker for anything old, junk as well) and dial her number. Which he finally did.

But then he put the receiver down quickly, before it even rang at the other end, and remained motionless. Surrounded by pictures and documents that reflected his achievements – and partly his life – since he had left the kibbutz seventeen years ago, at the age of twenty-three. He looked at the picture of London under a layer of fog: a still that closed the first film he had ever made, at the London Film School. He felt surrounded by fog himself; a melancholy fog. He loved London, and the small, old school near Covent Garden Market in West End. But those were hard days for him as well. He was always short on money then (as he was now, too, so nothing much had changed), working at nights as a security guard in the Israeli Embassy, and going to film school in the mornings straight from there. He remembered, also, his first wife. With agony he remembered her – though he tried to forget her. And he thought about his first son, Nimrod, who still lived with her in Tel-Aviv.

He felt guilty: him being here and his son, a teenager, growing up there. Without a father. He figured that a search for a missing teenage daughter, at this point in time, would be almost like a search for his own son.

So he picked up the receiver and dialed the number. But it rang only once before he put it down again. He was still a Kibbutznik at heart, Gideon Gold. He still believed – despite all the evidences to the contrary, and his experiences in the big cities of the world showing otherwise – that two plus two equals four. Pure and simple. As he had been taught to believe. Even if later, step by step, he had learned his lesson.

Learned that two plus two equals five. Or six or seven, depend on the circumstances. Rarely four, though. But his education and therefore transformation, from an idealistic youth raised on sublime universal principles of goodness and integrity and honesty and morality; to a savvy, cynical, amoral Machiavellian citizen of the world – was never completed. He was dying to be a hard-boiled, been there done that private detective. Like the one he was writing about in his current screenplay: an erotic-thriller, dealing with sex, crime and the pursuit of happiness. American style.

He was a Captain in the Israeli Army, after all, in an elite unit of the paratroops. He was an Air Marshal, too, on El-Al Israeli airplanes, in the heyday of hijacking and all that terror. And, to top it all – a memory he dared not remember too often – a brief stint as a secret agent of the Mossad, the Israeli secret service. He did his training, therefore, he couldn't let an opportunity such as this one slip by him, the way he did so many times in the past. He must dial the number.

And so he did. But this time he had failed to hang up in time. As a woman's voice, exceedingly worried, answered the phone immediately. Forcing him to introduce himself as Gideon Gold, a private investigator, telling her of her mistake, reaching him instead of the Gold Investigations Inc.

Pure Gold, he named his business off the top of his head. At your service.

Sounds good to me, she responded. As long as you can do the job, Mr. Gold.

He assured her that he could, sensing from her voice that she was a woman past her prime, and that this conversation was very hard – painful, even – on her to conduct.

What's the job? he asked.

So she told him that her only daughter, Joy Plummer, had run away from home more than a year ago, in the summer of 1986. She was seventeen then, and didn't even finish high school. Maybe he could look for her out there, she suggested. She was willing to pay him, of course.

Whatever it takes, a sign flashed in front of Gideon's eyes. So he asked her (he still spoke with some accent in his voice, which worried him mostly when he spoke on the phone), why did she think her daughter was here in L.A.?

Her good friend, June, thinks so.

That’s all?

There always was a bit of an actress in her, sir.

I see.

That’s why I thought, you know… they all run there to Hollywood, don’t they?

Himself included, he had to admit. And said yes, they sure do. And of course he could look for her here. Where else but here? He wasn’t going anywhere, anyway, he had a son here to take care of. He didn't even hesitate when he agreed to do the job. His education therefore completed: two plus two equals five.

She asked him to name his price. A request he was glad to fulfill: Ten thousand dollars, he said, his voice steady and business-like, half of it to launch the investigation, the second half when – no if about it – he found her daughter.

To his surprise, astonishment even, she agreed. So he asked her to send him a letter, as soon as she could, containing as many details as possible about her daughter. Including a close-up picture and a full-body shot as well. And a personal letter from mother to daughter, if possible. And the check, of course.

Of course, Mr. Gold.

He gave her his address, before they hung up. And that was that.

Or so he thought, at first. His hand was still clutching the receiver, yet he was smiling like a kid who pulled off a trick. But by the second he took his hand off the telephone, he already felt bad about the whole thing. He hated telephones, all his life, and blamed the impersonal instrument for his brewing guilt trip. He grew up without telephones and was sixteen, he remembered, when he first used one. He called his mother, who had left the kibbutz and moved to the city by then. She was a city-type person, while his father was a simple farmer. And Gideon himself was half and half: not here not there. He was a product of the Holocaust. Which his parents, somehow, survived. And of course, never forgot.

He remembered too much, Gideon. It made him feel lousy. So he considered smoking his pipe, to reflect on it all; or play his harmonica, to forget it all. But he did neither. Instead, he read "Youth," a poem by Czelaw Milosz, enlarged and framed on his wall. It always made him feel a little bit better about himself. As if he were not alone in this chaotic world. Especially one short stanza, which he kept reading again and again:

Your wishes will be fulfilled, you will gape then

At the essence of time, woven of smoke and mist.

With that in mind he left his room. And with that in mind he entered Daniel's room, and quietly watched his son asleep. He and his old teddy bear; both lending Gideon some tranquility. Making it possible for him to leave the room, put on his swim-trunks and step outside and down the stairs. Where he stopped on the edge of the pink swimming pool. Alone.

Gloria with her glorious body, nature-made in mahogany brown but gym-sculptured, was not around. The Armenian family, on the other hand, was around. Members and ever-present guests alike, with their constant commotion: people coming and going, singing and eating. Always eating. And the maddening noise of the backgammon pieces, day and night, hitting the board.

It's a free country, man, they had told him some weeks ago, when he had reproached them about it.

No doubt, he reflected now, staring at his own distorted reflection in the dimly lit pool. And then, after taking a deep breath, he jumped into the colder than he expected water and swam underneath the surface to the other side. Seeing – as always, whenever he jumped like that into a pool – a single lucid image establishing itself in his mind: the crystal clear water of his childhood stream. His fountain of youth. Where he and his friends, on hot summer days, had experienced the time of their lives. Under the watchful eyes of Mount Gilboa, where King Saul and his son Jonathan fought the Philistines. And where they died.

A place where, in those hot days, there were no parents. No teachers either. Just kids and nature, in an endless wild summer dance. So liberating a dance it was, that he remembered it all in a flash. A flash and then a vision, which made him yearn to go back home. Made him sad, too. Because when he finally emerged from under the water, dying for a breath of fresh air, it all evaporated. Vanished like a sudden wind. And left him empty. Left him with the knowledge, plain and cruel, that his small childhood stream – like his childhood – no longer existed. Diverted into a bigger canal for agricultural purposes. A rock quarry, digging and eating at the biblical mountain, was operating beside it. In the name of a new god: Profit. Spoiling the lucidity of the water with dust.

It made him shiver. As he remembered not only what Thomas Wolfe wrote, but what his father had written as well, about his disillusions with the place he had helped built.

The place you left behind, son, is no longer the place you left behind, his father had remarked in his last letter. Maybe he had read it somewhere, and maybe not. It didn't matter.

What mattered was, that sitting on the edge of the pool with one foot still in the water, illuminated by a brilliant Southern California moon, and surrounded by birds-of-paradise and palm trees, made Gideon Gold feel a little bit better about himself. And about things as a whole. He was reassured in his belief that he could not go back home. And that, as the saying goes here in America, home is where the heart is. Right here in beautiful Burbank, where the future still held a lot of promise for him. Whether as a screenwriter or as a private investigator he could not yet tell.

2

Gideon received a partial and temporary answer to that dilemma about a week later. When he got, somewhat to his surprise, the letter from Susan Plummer containing everything he had asked her to send him.

First, there were the two pictures of Joy, the runaway daughter. The close-up revealed a shy, pretty face, peeking through a mane of long, straight falling honey-colored hair. As if, he thought, a darker shade had penetrated her original blond. Her blue eyes, a far-off look reflected in them, contained a shade of darkness as well. Her nose was slightly prominent (like his own, he involuntarily touched it), and pointed south not north. But her cheekbones were high and her lips full and sensuous. He would've guessed her ancestors were Dutch. Or German.

Her full-body shot confirmed this, he believed, showing an athletic, thin body, naked but for a tiny American flag bikini. A wide smile on her face here, unlike her tight lips in the close-up picture. Maybe she was more confident of her body than of her face. Her young, flawless milk-white skin – not exposed much to the sun at the beach, he figured – made her very appealing.

As was the third item he searched for and found quickly and satisfactorily: the five thousand check. Nothing much for most people here, in the movie capital of the world, but a lot for Gideon Gold. More than he had made the whole past year from writing.

Writing was the manner, also, of the fourth item: Mrs. Plummer's letter to him. It was not long, but provided all the necessary information for him to conduct his investigation. He learned from it that Joy was the Plummers' only child, barely seventeen when she had run away from home, following an argument with her parents. The nature of the argument was Joy's pregnancy, and her stubborn refusal to name the young man who caused it. She took full responsibility for her actions, and for the results of her actions. Insisting on having an abortion.

But her father, mainly – her mother too, to a degree – refused to listen to any of it, because they were both Catholic, and very devoutly so. Therefore the father suggested giving the baby up for adoption. A suggestion Joy objected to. Vehemently objected to; so much so that she ran away from home. And that was that. A sad, Gideon concluded, if not entirely uncommon story.

To which Mrs. Plummer added a P.S.: Joy's dad, Martin, had a stroke shortly after Joy's disappearance. It nearly killed him. She would like Joy to come home before his death. She was ready, Mrs. Plummer wrote, to forgive and forget. That was also the essence of her letter to her daughter, she added. The fifth and last item she enclosed.

In the Israeli army, where Gideon Gold had both the privilege and misfortune of serving, everything was divided into three equally important parts: the butt, main body, and barrel. Indeed, from the basic rifle to the most elaborate plan of attack, these three were always present. Even in the Jewish tradition it is said that the world stands on three things: On the Torah, on the work, and on charitable acts. Although as a secular Jew, or rather a Jew by heritage and culture only – as opposed to religion – Gideon decided to stick to his army experience.

And that meant preparation, first and foremost. Setting up the groundwork for the whole operation. It demanded, of course, a financial base. So Gideon deposited the check in the bank and waited for it to clear. Then took Daniel out for dinner at the Wild Side in downtown Burbank. Good restaurants such as this one (not good enough for the studios' crowd, probably, over there at the Media District), were out of his range since his wife had left for Washington D.C. Had left on a mission of her own: To establish Jews for Bush, as part of George Bush's upcoming presidential campaign. And while it was certainly a cliché, Napoleon was right when he said that "an army marches on its stomach." And Gideon, who was a lousy cook, was fed up with TV dinners.

With his stomach full, the next thing on his agenda was to ambush Gloria. And in order to do that, he first spied (integral part of any reconnaissance mission) on her from behind his closed curtains, making sure she was alone, without her boyfriend or her mother. He then knocked on her door and she opened it still partly wet, drying her short brown hair with a towel. She was barefooted and wore the shortest shorts he had ever seen. He thought she had the legs of a soccer player, not a dancer. So strong they were, so full of muscles. Highlighted by her white shorts and purple tank top. Belly button exposed, no rings attached though. Silly love song, to top it all, was playing on the radio.

No chances of any silly love for Gideon, however. She was in a hurry, Gloria, as was usually the case whenever he had met her. Still, she invited him in, and he told her that he was quitting his job as the manager and gave her a check for a full three months rent. She was genuinely sad to hear that, he felt. And no wonder. She was the manager before he came into the picture, and now she'd have to go back and do it herself for a while. He knew that her mother would raise hell about it, but at the same time, he was sure his check would calm her down pretty fast. She was a real slave owner, Dolores, and treated even her daughter – who had to pay rent too – the same way.

Gideon, on the other hand, was treated nicely. And was surprised to find himself at the receiving end of a genuine, friendly hug, and a soft kiss on his cheek. It made him feel good. And when he was walking upstairs, the touch of her hard nipples – which he had once observed, strawberry-like, when they had cleaned the swimming pool together – stayed with him awhile. Glued to his skin and memory.

Not for long, though. He had to move on fast and secure the cooperation of Alma Lopez, Daniel's teacher helper at the Nursery School. He was a single parent now and needed help. Much more help than what Evelyne, who flew back home every other weekend, and for two days took care of Daniel, had offered him.

She was not such a bad mother after all, he tried to put a nice spin on a bad predicament. Though it certainly looked that way, in light of the present situation. She called almost every evening, in order to talk with her son and wish him goodnight. And promised Daniel to come back for good once the elections were over. She took a great deal of time to explain to him how important it was what she was doing: democracy and all that stuff.

Sure thing, baby. Democracy. Give me a break, will you. And give me back my wife. Give Daniel his mother back, too. Take democracy and shove it.

Luckily though, a mutual admiration existed between Alma and Daniel. She (black hair, brown eyes) and he (blond hair, blue eyes) fell in love with each other at first sight. Which was a good thing, but also not so good as well. Since Gideon, deprived of sex lately, entertained his very own aspirations toward the sensual, buxom Alma. Who readily agreed, without any reservations, to help him by baby-sitting Daniel whenever she'll be needed.

His groundwork secure, Gideon felt that he was ready for the second phase of his operation: the search itself, the main body in his battle plane. He couldn’t wait for the weekend to be over, and on Monday morning, after dropping Daniel off at the Nursery School, he drove down Olive Avenue, crossed the Media District with its billboard walls hyping up the various products of the movie studios, then took the nice uphill climb of Barham Boulevard and joined the slow morning rush-hour traffic, making its way down Cahuenga Boulevard toward Hollywood. A move that, as it happened, proved to be his first mistake.

His search belonged, he would realize later, to the realm of the night. Not the realm of the day. Certainly not to that of the morning. He had seen plenty of films on the subject (Hardcore appearing first on his private screen), and should've known better. The morning, even here at the heart of dreamland, belonged to working people. To their brand of businesses. And along the Hollywood Boulevard to the first, with many more to come, group of tourists.

The creatures of the night – runaway kids among them – were still asleep. Still in hiding. Still licking the wounds of the night. Hunger, he suspected, will bring them out later, and will expose them to adventure and danger on the sidewalks of this most famous of boulevards.

So unglamorous, decadent and dirty. Especially now in the morning. Naked like a cabaret performer without his costume and makeup; stripped of his disguise and artistry, deprived of his dignity. The sun illuminating brightly the sad reality of his bare, neglected, and scarred body.

Forcing Gideon – a classic case of fish out of water, a favorite Hollywood theme – to find shelter in the Roosevelt Hotel. Where the tall stonewalls shielded the world of the past, and Gideon as well, from the world of the present. Creating a museum of sorts to Hollywood that was, where the first Oscars were given, here at the Ball Room. Close by to where Gideon was sitting in the hall, on a bench, beside the figure of Charlie Chaplin; asking himself what he was doing here, and how come he was born so late, in such a faraway country.

Later on he would many times think about this moment. How pivotal a moment it was in launching his new career. How desperate he was for a reason; a reason to believe that he was doing the right thing, before his search had even begun. Before he left behind the walls of the Roosevelt Hotel, leaving there also, most probably, his own Hollywood dreams.

No wonder his next step – his first real attempt at being a private investigator – was so pathetic. So amateurish. He approached two teenage boys in front of the Egyptian Theater, whom he thought fitted the description of runaway kids: shaved heads, tattoos all over, rings pierced into strategic places, thin and half naked. And smoking, of course. He showed them Joy's close-up picture and asked them if they had seen her around. Instead of an answer, or rather by way of an answer, they asked for money: twenty bucks each. An amount he didn't have on him –another mistake. Yet after their traditional Fuck off, man, which he guessed was their way of saying goodbye, one of them turned and shouted: Try flowers of the night.

He was mad at himself for not thinking about it earlier. He had read in the Los Angeles Times about these women and their organization, how they gather runaway kids from the streets of Hollywood, especially girls who drifted into prostitution, and gave them food and shelter.

So he stopped by a public phone booth, filthy and broken and full of unwanted information – including a swastika – and dialed 411. And received Flowers of the Night's telephone number. But over there, the woman who answered his call, made it clear to him that they were there to help the girls, not help their parents locate them. If they so desire, the girls, they would do so themselves.

It made perfectly good sense to Gideon, who accepted it as such, realizing – as any novice private eye must realize, sooner or later – that he was on his own. No