The Benefactor

by Sebastian Hampson

  ‘Setting up now. You’ll want to inspect it.’

  ‘First item on the list. Sandy, get the car organised while I freshen up.’

  Henry had scored a personal triumph by negotiating to have the party at the Stahl House, against his team’s advice. Pierre Koenig’s masterpiece case study, perched on a rocky ledge high above the city, had been the site of photo shoots and filming ever since Julius Shulman made it famous. But the access was bad, the square footage insufficient. He’d overriden these objections. It embodies Old Hollywood, he explained. And the tight, winding roads up the hill would help to keep the event exclusive. A few hand-picked guests and reporters were invited—friends, in the loosest sense of the word. No B-listers, no paparazzi. The invitations had pitched it as a genuinely fun alternative to the stuffy old-guard parties. It would be hosted at a private oasis, and every photograph would be taken by Timothy Fogel.

  To nobody’s surprise, Fogel had been the lone supporter of this plan.

  After letting Gloria kiss him effusively and commenting on her new-collection Louboutins (so high in the heel that a gust of wind could have sent her toppling), Henry led Martha upstairs. The room was laid out unpretentiously. Thick lemon-curdcoloured walls, and the view outside obscured by even thicker foliage.

  Martha opened the windows and rearranged the pillows on the bed, as she did in every hotel they visited.

  ‘I can’t believe the liberties this guy took,’ Henry said, pacing the room and re-reading the profile. ‘I didn’t say half of this. At least…not in this exact way. It’s all right, isn’t it? You don’t think I come across as too…I don’t know…arrogant?’

  ‘I have no idea, Henry. It’s not my area of expertise.’

  Yes, it was. She essentially worked in public relations. She usually felt qualified to give advice on any subject, no matter how little experience she had in it. This wasn’t the reassurance Henry had been hoping for.

  ‘Hey,’ he said, removing his shirt, finding the one with the red stripes in the closet where he’d left it. ‘Something the matter? You’ve hardly said a word since we left.’

  ‘I’m exhausted. I’ll try and fit in a nap before tonight.’

  ‘Okay.’ He thought about this. ‘Martha, I have to get worried when you avoid a question like that. Don’t treat me like we’re at work and I’m one of your fucking auditors.’

  ‘All right. I didn’t want to spoil this day for you, but…I’ve been headhunted and offered a position with the World Food Programme. Senior management, overseeing humanitarian missions, five-year term. They spoke to me last week.’

  ‘Are you kidding? That’s great.’

  ‘Their headquarters are in Rome.’

  Henry had been putting on a gold cufflink. He missed the hole and it slipped.

  ‘We don’t have to discuss this now,’ she said. ‘But if I seem distracted, you know why.’

  ‘There’s no need to be so dramatic. We’ll figure something out, you know we will.’

  This was the best he could manage. He felt other words boiling inside him. You want me to throw all this away, follow you to Rome and do what with my life, exactly? Study the classics?

  She’d gone limp, as though invisible hands were pulling at her body, trying to wrestle it to the ground. He’d never seen her so awkward, so lacking in grace. Why did she have to be difficult, at a moment like this?

  ‘I get the feeling you’re not happy to be here,’ Henry said, hoping to get a rise out of her. ‘Is it because I didn’t go with you on that trip to Ethiopia?’

  ‘No, not at all. It was an invitation, not a directive. But I’m here to tell you it was eye-opening. A one-off experience. It was… life-changing.’

  ‘This is a one-off experience too. And I didn’t force you to come here.’

  She gave a knowing smile, not entirely friendly. ‘You anticipated I would, though.’

  ‘I hoped you would, of course. Just like you’re hoping I’ll go to Rome with you.’

  ‘Well, then we have to talk. Because there is no chance I’m going ahead with this decision if I’m going to be crucified for it. And that’s a problem. You don’t get to take my work away.’

  ‘You want the challenge. I understand.’ Henry pulled his suspenders up and thrust his arm into the linen blazer, ripping one of the smaller seams in the shoulder. ‘The car should be ready. Rest up while I’m out. Pool’s always nice. Or get a massage. Clear your head.’

  Martha spread her documents across the bedspread, each pile fanning into a blur of type and handwritten mark-up, and turned the television to CNN. Civil war in Somalia—peace talks between the leaders of two rival factions collapsing. Further skirmishes and UNOSOM intervention expected.

  Henry left her tapping at her laptop.

  Preparations for the party were underway when Henry arrived at the Stahl House with Fogel. They didn’t usually rent this venue out for parties, but Fogel had booked several photo shoots here and cultivated the required contacts. Henry wasn’t certain how much they’d finally paid, but he didn’t care. The photographs would pay for themselves.

  He walked over to the full-length front windows and felt ill as he looked out over the sheer drop of the precipice. It was a long way to fall.

  ’I keep having a dream,’ he said to Fogel, ‘that nobody turns up. I’m standing here alone in this empty house, waiting.’

  ‘Won’t happen, trust me. Everyone’s confirmed.’

  Henry wouldn’t have felt comfortable confiding this fear to many people. Timothy’s words reassured him.

  ‘How’s Martha doing?’ Fogel continued. ‘Hardly got to say hi.’

  ‘I’m not sure…she seems a bit flat, to tell you the truth. Just got home from Ethiopia.’

  ‘I can’t believe she’s going through with those field trips,’ Fogel said, shaking his head.

  ‘I know. She worked herself half to death, poor thing. But she didn’t have to. She volunteered—and she knew it would have been easy for them to send someone else.’

  ‘What a trooper.’

  Henry felt he should have been the one saying this.

  ‘I want this house,’ he said.

  ‘Same here, my man.’

  ‘I’ve always seen myself living in a place like this.’

  ‘So let’s go halves on a summer house. But not here—Palm Springs. One of those Neutra pavilions you’re so crazy about.’

  Henry searched Fogel’s face for some sign that he was kidding, finding him to be as opaque as ever.

  ‘Yeah?’ Henry said.

  ‘Of course. Take the day off tomorrow and we’ll go out there.’

  Henry knew he couldn’t take the day off, though he appreciated the simplicity of wherever that sentiment had come from. He knocked another couple of cigarettes out of their pack and gave one to Timothy.

  They spent a while sound-checking the live band, beating down Sandy’s objections to their desire for higher volume and more champagne, ganging up on her when she claimed it would break both the budget and the noise restrictions. Then Henry allowed himself to be dragged away to a restaurant down the hill, where they would meet about twenty of tonight’s key guests—media mogul friends of Fogel’s who always moved around as an inseparable group—and he wouldn’t be bothered by anything so trivial, as Fogel put it.

  Martinis. Beluga caviar. Bluefin tuna tartare. Discussion of the newest acquisitions and investments, both appreciating in value and dead-on-arrival. Properties in Saint-Tropez and Malibu. Benefits of renting a Cessna over a Gulfstream. Cristal or Dom Pérignon, Keith Haring or John Fekner. Professional gossip. The ritual lampooning of everyone whose status had slipped in the last year or so, the petty disagreements heating up as they became looser with their opinions. Enough cocaine floating around to keep an army on its feet for weeks.

  Henry got the strangest thrill from being here, with the top tier of Timothy’s Hollywood contacts, all of whom hung at a certain distance, able to shrink away at will. He’d always wanted thei
r elusive company, ever since he and Timothy had first spent time together in New York and the Hamptons in the seventies, with Kurt Wilder and the rest of them. They talked only about things, these people, not ideas—but they were savage, too, and completely unyielding. He constantly had to check himself in their presence, but still, somehow, felt more aware of himself than he did anywhere else.

  And now they were bankrolling him. Though Henry was nominally their host, it was Timothy who naturally commanded a greater share of their attention.

  Henry left them after the barely touched plates had been cleared. He tried calling Martha from the restroom. She didn’t pick up.

  As he returned to the table, Timothy and Sandy came over and cornered him.

  ‘I just sounded them out,’ Timothy said. ‘Bad news. They’re not coming to the party.’

  ‘What, all of them? Why the hell not?’

  ‘A few reasons.’ Timothy couldn’t look him in the eye. ‘They’ve got invitations to the Governor’s Ball, among others. What the fuck are we going to do?’

  This little coterie of influential directors and producers and fashion designers had been the core group, in Henry’s mind, around which the other guests would orbit. Their absence would be noticed—if anyone showed up at all, once word got out.

  ‘We have to get them to the house,’ he said, thinking on his feet. ‘Harder to leave once they’re up there. We have nominees confirmed to join us after the ceremony, and if we get a few televisions hooked up we can watch it at the location.’

  ‘Sure, but the location won’t be ready.’

  ‘Sandy, how long would it take you to get a couple of stretch limos over here?’

  ‘On Oscar night?’

  ‘Call in a favour with someone. I don’t care how much it costs. But first, order more champagne. We’ll take them to the Marmont bar. Timothy, pull in some other guests to meet us there. You, Martha and Gloria can keep them entertained while I go up to the house ahead of you and make sure it’s ready. Don’t let them out of your sight. Both of you, on the phone—now.’

  Trying not to think of the many thousands of dollars he’d suddenly added to tonight’s bill, Henry went and stood at the head of the table.

  ‘All right, my friends,’ he said. ‘You’re all coming with me to the Chateau Marmont, where we’ll be making a tremendously exciting announcement ahead of tonight’s party. I think you’ll want to hear it. In the meantime, I’m getting a few more bottles of Cristal over here. Enjoy.’

  While Henry fielded curious questions about this announcement, and why he couldn’t make it now, he watched Timothy and Sandy, through the window, shouting into their cell phones, brows crazily furrowed, out on the street. Surprisingly, this pleased him more than any tangible result of their efforts possibly could.

  Martha admired in the mirror the haircut she’d had that afternoon. Shorter than she’d ever worn it, dyed auburn. The sharp angles made her face somehow plainer—more of a child’s face, even though the spirit of youth was dulled by incipient wrinkles.

  She dreaded this party, as much as she needed to be there. Henry thought she was attending reluctantly, for him, when in fact her boss had more or less insisted that she go. Senior management had already hinted at the usefulness of Henry’s connections. The organisation needed high-profile ambassadors.

  Last year’s efforts to push through a funding handshake with Blackstone had achieved resounding success in every circle except the one closest to her. She’d gone to Ethiopia against management’s wishes, determined to ensure the funds she’d raised were being distributed appropriately. She became wistful as she thought of the frenzied energy that had propelled her while she was there, feeling more control than she ever had in New York, as she studied the systems, learned how things operated.

  She didn’t miss it—that was the wrong word—but coming home to the apartment on Bleecker Street, with the Eames chair by the windows and a glass of wine and good old Henry waiting for her with one of his elaborate Italian stews—that was like crawling back from another dimension. At once recognisable and otherworldly.

  Nobody in Africa asked for more than what they could have. She entertained a vision of Henry with her in the Addis Ababa slums, sprouting a beard, dressed in a sweat-soaked T-shirt and shorts. Making faces at the children.

  The phone by the bed rang.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Martha, I’m in the lobby. Why aren’t you answering your cell?’

  ‘I must have forgotten to charge it.’

  He paused. ‘Come down. Change of plans—we’re starting the party at the bar, now.’

  Martha considered not fixing her make-up, taking it off instead. She began rubbing at her cheeks with a pad. Then she stopped.

  She found the group outside on the terrace. Fogel was mingling with the guests, making small talk with his camera in one hand, framing shots and snapping them off without breaking conversation. Henry, in a high state of agitation, greeted her in a rush and failed to comment on either her haircut or anything else.

  Martha allowed herself to be introduced as some fascinating creature with a humanitarian job (the details weren’t important), recently returned from a mission to Africa, don’t you know?

  Some pretended to be interested, but most indulged it as the sideshow they knew it to be. Soon Martha found herself alone. She watched Henry as he squeezed himself into tense mannerisms and tight handshakes. Shouldn’t she have felt more involved? Treating his successes as her own, like any good wife?

  That wasn’t so easy. Not when she resented his tendency to throw everything else out of focus.

  A shutter went off next to her.

  ‘Tim,’ she said. ‘Didn’t think I was your subject matter tonight.’

  ‘That was an intense expression,’ Fogel said. ‘Would’ve been a crime not to capture it.’

  ‘How flattering. Perhaps you could tell me what Henry’s plan is right now.’

  ‘I would, if I knew what was going on inside his head. You know what he’s like…between us, that interview was a disaster. Alienated my friends from him, and I’ve spent the whole day trying to get them on our side again. There are some things he just can’t do on his own. But I don’t need to tell you that.’

  ‘Maybe you should save your critique for him.’ She had more than a suspicion that Fogel was high.

  ‘Come out to Palm Springs tomorrow,’ he said. ‘Help me find a property. Give yourself a break from him.’

  Fogel directed her into a corner, so that they were barely concealed behind an ornamental fern. He reached an arm around her waist and pulled her towards him, the camera hanging limp in his other hand.

  ‘Gets hot out in the desert,’ he said, right into her ear, so she could smell the chemicals on his breath.

  Martha didn’t flinch. She removed his hand and touched his shoulder, forcing herself to laugh. ‘Sounds like a nice idea, Tim. Let’s make sure Henry and Gloria come too. Now, come on—I think it’s time you found someone else to photograph.’

  As Martha tried to redirect her attention towards the group of people around her, and to hide how shaken she’d become, she thought she caught Henry’s eye from across the room. He must have seen them. He was preparing to say something to the whole group. If he’d been certain of what that something was a minute ago, certainty was no longer the impression he cast.

  HENRY studied a leather jacket in the window of Intermix; it was so concisely Martha that he wanted to go in and buy it, to replace the cracked and faded one in her wardrobe with a tighter, sleeker, more modern fit. Her face would always replace those of the white mannequins in the warped old cast-iron window frames, the same Elie Tahari and A.P.C. and Opening Ceremony displays they’d watched popping up in SoHo over the years, walking past them together every weekend or so.

  Those shopping excursions had always left him with an appetite for more, a craving for new discoveries, as their dilapidated neighbourhood slowly changed. Around the corner on Greene Street, the Tasc
hen store was where he’d once indulged in pornography of the architectural sort. Fondling copies of Neutra: Complete Works and Julius Shulman: Modernism Rediscovered the same way he’d fondled Penthouse centrefolds as a precocious pre-adolescent. These names signposted and road-mapped so many good memories.

  Picking through them today, drifting along the SoHo streets with no object, no mission except to remind himself of their significance, he soon took one too many wrong turns and became lost in a corn maze of attractive logotypes. No point in appreciating these things if nobody could appreciate his connoisseurship, if the people whose opinions mattered most weren’t watching or listening. No point in wasting his stockpile of money on them.

  Further up Greene Street, Henry noticed a copy of Her sticking out of a trash bag. The masthead, the new design he’d picked only last year, called out to him. He debated rescuing the rumpled magazine from the trash, to see what Michelle Darrow had done with it—how wildly she’d veered from his vision—but he couldn’t face it.

  He’d spent the morning trying to write about 1994: the thrill of the Oscars party, the slick little announcement he’d dashed off at the last minute about the magazine’s commitment to a bi-annual Hollywood issue promoting Fogel’s friends and their projects, their talent, in unprecedented detail (a promise on which he delivered, expensively). He’d skipped over everything else: the unease he’d been saddled with after putting on such a show, the sense that he’d already laid down his best hand, and now it was somebody else’s turn. Great game, they might as well have said. Now move on.

  He’d written about Timothy’s friends as though they were his own, dropping in references to exclusive dinners at Lespinasse, Le Bernardin, Gramercy Tavern, Bouley, Mondrian and wherever else happened to be attracting the tastefully minded power set at the time. That left no space for him to dwell on matters that didn’t fit a delicate, specific shape. He’d found himself wanting to call Martha and cross-check details with her—he’d almost picked up the phone as if she were at work. She would have told him where he’d gone wrong. Maybe.