Near the Hollywood Bowl, I exited the freeway on Barham, then drove down onto Highland. Tour buses clogged the right lane, and Japanese tourists hurried through the crosswalk with their cameras already out and snapping away at the white fountain at the entrance to the Bowl. Traffic slowed even more as it funneled toward the Boulevard, a long line of cars fighting to make the turn west toward the Chinese Theater and its famous courtyard full of the concrete handprints and footprints of the stars. Al Jolson’s knees, Betty Grable’s legs, Trigger’s hoof and Jimmy Durante’s nose. Even I went there when I first moved here. Even I have a snapshot of me placing my hand in Marilyn’s handprint.

I stayed to the left to avoid the Boulevard and swung onto Franklin. My back was sweating against the old vinyl upholstery of the car although the sun was broken by a canopy of tall magnolia trees. Greasy-looking white blossoms littered the road. Red-and-yellow Spanish-revival apartments loomed above the street. From an open window came the sound of a guitarist and his drummer racing a beat ahead of him through their own speed-induced version of “Purple Haze.”

The yellow legal pad on which I had written the addresses of the theaters I was going to check out fluttered slightly on the seat next to me. I decided to go to the one on Las Palmas first. It was hard to find a place to park, I got panhandled three times and there was nobody at the theatre. Exasperated, I pulled my damp tank top away from my back. I thought of having a glass of iced tea and waiting to see if anyone appeared at the theatre who might be able to answer my questions, but the fast-food place nearby was full of junkies and a peculiar deep-fat-and-vomit smell. Checking the next address on the list, I climbed back into the car.

A picture of the dead woman was in a window at the second theater.

It was a standard head shot. Her hair was longer. Someone semiprofessional had done her makeup, and there was a heavy line of black above her eyes. The Galaxy Theater was on a side street in east Hollywood, squeezed between an Arab bakery and a tabernacle church. It was less than fourteen blocks from my office. The photo was in a very large glass display case to the left of the entrance, as though the theater itself had once been a store. The door was open, and a man in a plaid shirt was sweeping the floor. I went in. It was hot and stuffy. On the other side of the red velvet curtain that hung in the doorway I could hear voices.

“Nice ficus,” I said to the man sweeping the floor.

He smiled in reply and stopped pushing the broom. “You come to get tickets for the show tonight?”