I Don't Know How the Story Ends Read Online Free Page B

side at a time?
    â€œWe’re here,” said our guide. “Follow me and keep quiet.”
    â€œWhere’re we going, Ranger?” Sylvie cried, her voice sticky with adoration.
    He just put a finger to his lips, with a half smile to show he accepted her worship. Then he turned and led us into the wreckage.
    I couldn’t see the need for silence; the place was as noisy as Pike Street Market on Saturday morning. The lot itself looked like a cyclone had passed through. Two crews were building things, but another crew was just as busily tearing things down. We picked our way past floors without walls and walls without floors, whole sections of buildings standing or leaning or flat on the ground. Hammers thudded, saws rasped, voices called, and over it all I thought I heard the tinkly tones of a piano.
    â€œWhat is this place?” I finally burst out.
    Ranger had stopped at a high wooden fence and tapped his lips again in that secretive way that was beginning to aggravate me. On the other side of the fence, a blast of jaunty piano music began, silenced abruptly when a sharp voice shouted, “ Cut ! ” A murmur of voices, then a pause. The piano changed its tune to ominous rippling chords.
    Ranger motioned us closer and pointed to a crack between the planks where I could peep through. He chose his own peephole, and Sylvie squeezed herself in front of him. While squinting through the crack, I noticed him watching me again, lips moving as though he were describing me to companions unseen.
    â€œ What are you—” I whispered as he whirled back around and peered through the crack. Sighing, I turned my attention to whatever was behind the fence. The sight unfolded in pieces as I shifted my position.
    There was a platform built up about a foot from the ground. It was shaded by a roof made of bleached muslin. Soft light fell on two men in buckskin and Stetson hats who were shouting at each other. The music grew in intensity. From their clothes and makeup and the way they stood, it looked like a play. That would make the platform a stage, but where was the audience? The fence cut off my view, but the area it surrounded seemed much too small to hold an audience of any size. And voices chattered continually in the background—theater patrons wouldn’t be so rude. I began to notice a sound that had been going on for some time, a whir and a click, and I was wondering what it was when one of the cowboys punched the other— smack!
    He received a hard shove in return, which sent him staggering against the bar. Then he launched himself on his rival’s neck, and next thing, the two of them were rolling on the floor. There was a woman standing by—not a very nice one, by the way she was dressed—and she recoiled in horror when one of the men rolled on top of the other and raised a very large knife—
    â€œ Stop ! ” I screamed. I’m not the kind who screams for show, but what came out of me was showy and loud enough to stop the fight. The cowboys glanced around, startled. A voice came from the other side of the fence, alarming and close: “What the—”
    Ranger shot a poisonous look my way before grabbing my arm and pulling me away so fast I nearly fell over. I was speechless until we were back on the street: “Unhand me, you—villain!”
    â€œDidn’t you know what that was? Didn’t you hear the camera?” he hissed. “It wasn’t a real fight—they were just making a picture.”
    â€œOf course I knew that!” And indeed, I was beginning to recall hearing somewhere how Southern California was fast becoming the nation’s motion-picture capital. But that was a bit of information like Akron, Ohio, being the rubber-tire capital—it had nothing to do with me. That is, until I’d made a fool of myself.
    â€œI knew it was some kind of performance. It looked like a play. But then it happened so fast—and we saw a