Street motioned to the documents, photographs, and film Margaret had uncovered at the Hollywood sign and brought with her. After ensuring no one in the restaurant had any interest in who they were or what they were doing, Charlie and Margaret lined up the bills from costume designers beside checks from studios made out to Marie Antoinette. The amounts being charged matched. Street noted that the Disneyland costume department sent an internal invoice for $87.54 for squaw costumes, presumably the ones Charlie had seen the night before. The same amount, $87.54, was on a Disney Studios invoice to Marie Antoinette.

“So it’s a shell corporation that funds it all?” Street said.

“Not the most sophisticated way of hiding it,” observed Margaret.

“No, but you wouldn’t give it a second thought, would you?” said Street. “It only makes sense as a conspiracy when you see all of these bills at once showing all the studios doing the same thing. Otherwise, who would even notice?”

“I gotta believe there are other charges hidden in the books of the studios for much more than just costumes,” Charlie said. “This is just the one that someone leaked to the tabloid.”

They grabbed the stack of photographs and tried to make sense of them.

The red-carpet paparazzi snapshot suggested Powell and Lola Bridgewater had dated, as did other photos: Powell and Lola out for lunch at Taylor’s Steakhouse, frolicking in the surf, laughing and drinking at the Daisy.

“This one is a much younger Lola,” Charlie said, turning the photo to show the other two. In the picture Lola was attempting to imitate a grown woman’s flirty glance. She was in bed, likely naked under the covers, her breasts partly exposed.

“Jeez, she can’t be more than fourteen,” Margaret said.

“You think this means she was caught up with the same folks from last night?” Street asked Charlie.

“Could be,” Charlie said. “I don’t know. I mean, it seems likely, but…”

Margaret frowned. “I appreciate my husband’s healthy skepticism,” she said, “truly I do, and let me add it’s about time. But that said, let’s at least concede that these groups are so secretive, it’s highly unlikely the two of us would independently and separately stumble on two different grand conspiracies, right?”

“I so concede,” Charlie said.

“So it’s the same gang, the same bad guys from Disneyland,” Street said, grabbing the invoices in the pile in front of them. “These receipts are for the costumes for these poor young girls, for these sick parties.”

“And people at the studios are footing the bills,” Charlie said. “And hiding the costs.”

“And that would mean the guy who killed Charlotte and tried to kill me and who snatched Sheryl Ann is also part of this,” Margaret said.

“And theoretically,” added Street, lifting up the red-carpet photograph, “so is whoever killed Lola and Powell.”