“I could help you,” Dorothy said. “You are strangers here and I know my way around LA. I could be very useful to you.”

“It’s too dangerous,” said Jack. “You could get hurt, badly.”

“I know how to handle myself.”

“Yes,” said Jack, “of course you do.”

“Stand up,” said Dorothy. “Try to attack me, see what happens.”

“Don’t be silly,” said Jack.

“I’m serious. Try.”

“Some other time,” said Jack. “Sit down.”

“Chicken,” said Dorothy.

“Hardly a well-chosen word, considering the circumstances.”

“You’re still a chicken. Cluck! Cluck! Cluck!” And Dorothy made chicken sounds and did that elbow thing that people do when they impersonate chickens. As they so often do in passionate bedroom situations.[25]

“You’re making an exhibition of yourself,” said Jack. “You’ll get us thrown out.”

“She’s a stone bonker, this one,” said Eddie. “Give her a little smack, Jack, and make her sit down again.”

“I can’t smack a woman.”

“Let me bite her, then.”

Dorothy began what is called in theatrical terms a “dance improvisation”. Diners looked on briefly, then continued with their chowing down of chicken burgers. Because, after all, this was California.

“Just one little smack then,” said Jack, “and we’ll stop all this nonsense.”

Jack rose from his chair.

Dorothy ceased her dance improvisation, extended an arm and with her fingers beckoned Jack nearer.

Jack sighed, took a step forward and swung a gentle slap in Dorothy’s direction.

And what happened next seemed to Eddie to happen in slow motion. Dorothy leapt into the air and somersaulted over Jack’s head, turning as she did so to boot him right in the side of the gob.

It may have seemed like slow motion to Eddie.

It seemed very fast to Jack.

And as Jack hit the floor with a thunderous blow …

Dorothy landed several yards away, right on her feet, light as thistledown.

Eddie buried his face in his paws. “That’s going to hurt in the morning,” he said. “And as this is morning, it will probably be hurting now.”

“Ow, my face.” And Jack did flounderings about. “That wasn’t fair … my face.”

“I’ll get some ice,” said Dorothy.

“Eddie,” groaned Jack from his floor-bound repose, “Eddie, bite her, please.”

“Not my battle,” said Eddie.

“But Eddie.”

“Sorry,” said Eddie. “Count Otto kicked me over the big top. That really hurt. This woman could kick me all the way to England, wherever that is.”

Dorothy went and fetched some ice and then she helped Jack up.

“I can get up by myself.” Jack patted her away.

“I told you I could handle myself.”

“I wasn’t ready,” said Jack.

“Well, if you’re ready now you can take another shot. I’ll close my eyes if you want.”

“Go on,” said Eddie. “You might strike lucky.”

Jack sat down in a right old huff. Dorothy offered him ice in a serviette. Jack took this and held it to his jaw.

“It’s call Dimac,” Dorothy explained. “The deadliest martial art on Earth. My hands and feet are registered with the police as lethal weapons – I have to have a special licence for them.”

“Dimac?” said Jack.

“I sent away for a course. A dollar ninety-eight a lesson, from Count Dante – he’s the Deadliest Man on Earth, obviously.”

“Obviously,” said Jack. And he clicked his jaw.

“So do I get the job?”

Jack sighed and almost shook his head.

“I know my way around,” said Dorothy. “And I could come in very useful if anyone menaces you or Eddie.”

“Well,” said Jack. And then he said, “Why? Why would you want to help us?”

“Why?” said Dorothy. “Why? You have to be joking.”

“Jack’s not very good on jokes,” said Eddie. “Actually, as a comedy sidekick he’s pretty useless. But it is a valid question. You want to be an actress, don’t you? Why would you want to get involved with us?”

“How can you ask me that? You are a talking toy bear. Jack says that you and he came here from somewhere over the rainbow. I believe in fate. Our paths haven’t crossed by accident – destiny led you to me.”

“Oh dear,” said Eddie, and if he had been able to roll his eyes he would have done so.

“And there’s definitely a movie in this,” said Dorothy. “I might eschew acting in favour of a role as producer.”

“Hm,” went Jack.

“Hm?” went Dorothy.

“Ignore him,” said Eddie. “He’s had woman trouble. The love of his life left him. I suspect that his ‘hm’ represented something along the lines that your unexpected evolution from the wide-eyed innocent on Hollywood Boulevard to lean, mean killing machine with pretensions to movie moguldom within the space of a short half-hour is somewhat disconcerting for him.”

“You’re a most articulate little bear,” said Dorothy.

“And most democratic,” said Eddie. “I hold no prejudice. I bite man or woman alike if I consider that they are patronising me.”

“That flight of yours over the big top,” said Dorothy. Suggestively. “I overheard that.”

“I’ll get you when you’re sleeping,” said Eddie.

“Stop it, please,” said Jack. “All right, Dorothy, I am impressed. If you want to help us, it would be appreciated.”

“Not by me,” said Eddie. “We’re a team, Jack. A partnership, you and me, Jack and Eddie, bestest friends through thick and thin.”

“This won’t affect our partnership.”

“Yes it will. It will lead to a romantic involvement and then there’ll be all the drippy smoochy stuff and that will interfere with the action and the car chases.”

“Rubbish,” said Jack, although unconvincingly. The thought of indulging in some drippy smoochy stuff with Dorothy had indeed crossed his mind. As indeed had some of that get down, get naked and get dirty kind of stuff. “She can help us, Eddie,” said Jack. “And we need all the help we can get.”

“We were doing fine on our own. What happened to your inspired calculating stuff? It was you who calculated that the murderers would strike next at the Opera House, remember?”

“Ah,” said Jack, who in all the excitement and everything else had quite forgotten about Wallah the calculating pocket. “About that.”

“We’ll manage on our own,” said Eddie. “Thank you for your offer, Dorothy, but you’ll only get Jack all confused and he won’t be able to keep his mind on the job.”

“Listen,” said Jack, wringing out his serviette ice pack into his empty coffee cup and shaking his fingers about, “I’m up for you helping us, Dorothy, but I have to go to the toilet now. Eddie and I are a partnership, and it’s a fifty-fifty partnership. If Eddie says no then I have to respect his decision, even if I don’t agree with it. But I am going to the toilet, so please speak to him. I’m sure you can win him over.” And Jack winked at Dorothy.

It was an intimate kind of a wink and if Eddie had seen it he would have recognised it to be the kind of wink that meant, “I would love you to help us and I’m certain that a beautiful, intelligent woman such as yourself can soon win over a stroppy toy bear.” And if Eddie had seen it and had recognised it, Jack would have received such a biting from Eddie that if Jack had owned a bicycle he would not have been able to ride it again for at least a week.

“I’ll be back in a minute,” Jack said. “Which way is the toilet?”

“Over there,” said Dorothy.

And Jack went off to the toilet.

And went into one of the stalls and locked the stall door behind him. And Jack withdrew Wallah from his trenchcoat and gave her a little stroke.

Wallah gave a little yawn and made a sensual purring sound.

“I’m sorry not to have spoken with you for a while,” said Jack. “As you are probably aware, things have been a little hectic of late.”

“Naturally I am aware. That horrid woman hurt your face – it’s all bruised. Hold me against it, I’ll make it better.”