‘Are you saying,’ I asked him, ‘that Blue Star Falling is based on the truth?’
‘Got it in one, Oz,’ he replied, with a beam that broke the local smugness record by a mile, and that takes some doing in Monaco. ‘It’s all tricked up, of course. The locations are changed, the names are changed, and of course the ending was nothing like that.’
‘How did it really end, then?’
‘I found the diamond with a fence, I got it back off him. . I threatened him with the police and he believed me. . and I told Chuck who had stolen it. I didn’t want to know any more.’
‘What if Chuck reads the book, and recognises the story?’
‘Chuck’s never read a book in his life, nor has his wife. But even if he did, it’s well disguised. I have this really talented editor. She’s bloody lovely too; I think I may have some standing there.’ He smiled. ‘So that’s how Benedict Luker, novelist, came to be, and how we all came to be sitting round this table.’
I looked at him with a degree of grudging admiration, something I’d never done in my life before. ‘You’re a grade-A fucking nutter, Michael.’
He nodded his silver-streaked head. ‘Anyone who read my CV would be justified in thinking that. And if they were in any doubt, I can always get you to give them a reference.’
‘And me,’ Susie exclaimed.
‘Don’t leave me out,’ said Primavera.
3
No question about it, that was the most bizarre and embarrassing lunch of my life. I actually found it necessary to go across to the archbishop’s table and apologise for any offence that my friends’ unguarded tongues might have caused. Untypical behaviour for Oz, you may think, but my family and I live in the damn place: the last thing I need is to be denounced from the high altar.
Nobody wanted dessert. . well, Prim and Dylan might have, but I wasn’t going to offer it. I knew I had to get Susie out of there and back home, away from the contrived, artificially civilised atmosphere, so that she could sit down on her own and come to terms with the sudden storm that had turned the smooth waters of her life into a white-capped sea.
I called Conrad as soon as I could and summoned him to the hotel to pick up Susie; then, in one of those changes of plan which are my trademark, I summoned a taxi to take Prim, Dylan and me to the Columbus. In the hotel, I waited by the desk as he checked in. The receptionist looked more than a little surprised that he had no luggage, but she didn’t query it, maybe because he was with me. I guess that must have been it, otherwise she’d have taken one look at that shirt and turned him away. As soon as he had completed the formalities I walked him the short distance to the hotel shop and made him buy a couple of polos with the Columbus logo and its slogan, ‘Live Life, Love Life’, some boxers, white socks, a pair of tailored shorts, and a baseball cap. Cowboy hat, indeed!
‘This trip’s costing me a fortune,’ he grumbled, as he signed the card slip. ‘You’d bloody better be prepared to deal.’
‘I won’t even sit down with you till you look respectable,’ I told him cheerfully. ‘I’ve got an image to protect: I can’t be seen around town with a fucking tramp.’
He stared at me. ‘Is this the same guy who used to chum me to the Horseshoe Bar in Glasgow for a pie and a pint?’
‘No, it isn’t,’ I replied, ‘so get used to it.’
Prim was waiting in Reception when we returned: the green number had gone, to be replaced by a sleeveless white shirt, loafers and pedal-pushers. As it always was with her, she managed to look a hell of a lot tastier than in more formal get-up. As Dylan went off to his room to transform himself into something more acceptable, I called Conrad to come and pick her up, then walked her down the steps to the front door to wait for him.
‘You all right?’ I asked her.
She smiled up at me, almost shyly. ‘I’m better now,’ she said.
‘Have you got over being in the nick?’
A shadow crossed her face. ‘You never get over a spell in Cornton Vale. It’s not that it’s a menacing place, it’s just that there’s so much sadness there, so much hopelessness. There were no suicides when I was in, but you can understand why there have been.’
‘There are suicides everywhere, love, even here.’
‘What, as in lose the lot in the Casino then throw yourself in the harbour?’
‘I wasn’t thinking of that, but it’s a possible scenario, I’ll grant you.’
‘Do you ever go there, you and Susie?’
I laughed. ‘That’s a good one. In all the time we were together, did you ever know me to gamble on anything other than the lottery?’
‘No, but we won the lottery. Didn’t that encourage you to risk some more?’
‘Hell, no! It encouraged me to quit while I was ahead. Anyway, there are other risks in life than money, and I take plenty of them. Accepting a script that might send your career on to a new level, or set it on irreversible decline: that’s a risk. Boarding a plane: that’s a risk. Spending ten minutes alone with you: that’s a risk.’ Hell, where did that one come from, and what did I mean by it?
She didn’t ask me either of those questions, though. Instead she smiled, looking at me slightly askance through her Versace shades. . I always wear Vuarnet myself. . with the sun glinting off her hair. ‘Meeting Mike’s a risk too, I suppose.’
I considered that one for a moment. ‘No,’ I told her, decision made. ‘I’m in control there.’
‘You think?’
‘Sure. As always, Dylan hasn’t thought everything through. If I walk away, I lose nothing more than the cost of one posh lunch. He winds up with major financial indigestion.’
‘And will you walk away?’
‘That won’t be my decision, not entirely.’
‘You’re not going to kick him when he’s down, are you?’
I stared at her. ‘And if I did? Jesus, you’ve got a short memory.’
‘What? Are you still carrying a grudge because I had a fling with him? I thought you didn’t care about that, or about me, any more.’
‘I. .’ She’d misunderstood me, but I let it lie. ‘Never mind. I’m not going to put the boot in, don’t worry.’
‘Your choice.’ She shrugged, then frowned suddenly. ‘Does Tom miss me?’
‘I’m sure he does. But he’s happy, Prim. He doesn’t cry for you, if that’s what you mean. Still, I’d like you to see as much of him as you can, within the context of his wider family.’
She wrinkled her nose, and gave me that look again. ‘Why don’t I just move in with you? Make Ethel redundant and I’ll be the nanny.’ She laughed as she said it. That made it even more unsettling: over the years I’d found that Prim never said anything casually. Sometimes she’d look me in the eye and tell a flat-out lie, like, ‘I don’t care about you any more.’ Other times she’d say something incredibly flip, like the line about Ethel, but underneath it she’d be saying exactly what was in her mind.
I brushed it off with a laugh of my own, then changed the subject completely. ‘Where are you living?’ I asked her.
‘With Dad, in Auchterarder. I sold my place in London and moved in with him. For the moment at least he needs me: he’s been a lost soul since Mum died.’
‘I’m not surprised. Elanore left a big space behind her. Is he still working?’
‘He is now. He did nothing for a while, but I’ve managed to nag him into going back to his model-making.’
‘So you’ve got no social life to speak of?’
‘In Auchterarder?’
‘Okay, it was a daft question. Stay here for a few days, and I’ll see if we can introduce you about town.’
She gave me the gauche look again. ‘Thanks, but I don’t know if I’m ready for that yet. All I really want to do is spend time with Tom, but maybe we’ll see.’
Two things happened at once to end our discussion. First, Dylan emerged from the hotel, looking presentable in polo shirt, shorts, and baseball cap, although his legs were obscenely white and his train
ers were a disaster. Second, Conrad pulled up in the S-class, bang on cue. For a moment the commissionaire looked annoyed. . probably by those trainers. . until I stepped forward and opened the door for Prim, and until I pressed a twenty-euro note into his hand.
We stood and watched her as she waved from the rear window of the departing car.
‘Will she ever be seen again?’ Dylan asked.
‘What?’
‘Joking, Oz, joking. It just looked like a movie scene, that’s all.’
‘You’ve still got a weird sense of humour, mate. Or you’ve been watching too many movies.’
‘That’s all Benedict Luker has to do in his sad life,’ he said, with a bland smile. ‘Where are we going?’
‘For a walk. You look as if you could use the exercise. Then we’ll talk.’
I led him away from the hotel, past the car museum that is Tom’s favourite place in the entire charted world, and up an escalator to the road that leads to the rock on which Monaco was founded. It was a steep climb, and by the time we reached the square in front of the Grimaldi Palace, Dylan was breathing hard. (We could have taken a bus, or even a taxi, but I didn’t tell him that.)
‘This is very nice,’ he croaked, as we looked out across the city, ‘but it’s fucking hot.’
‘Appreciate it, Mike,’ I told him. ‘It’s part of the joy of being alive.’ To cool him down a little, I walked him through the cathedral. . hoping that we wouldn’t bump into the archbishop. . pausing for a moment’s reflection at Grace Kelly’s grave, one movie star paying his respects to another, until finally we turned into the network of narrow old streets and found a shaded bar.
I ordered a couple of bottles of Sol and leaned back in my chair. ‘Well, Benny,’ I began, ‘what do you want for the rights?’
‘A million dollars.’
I laughed so hard that the waiter looked hesitant about bringing me the beer.
‘A million dollars, just like that. You really have been living in a fantasy world, pal. This isn’t The Horse Whisperer or Gone with the Wind that you’re offering me. Let me explain something to you. Every movie project is a risk, and every investor participates in that risk. As the author of the original work, that’s what you’d be, an investor just like me. This is the way it plays: I buy an option to develop Blue Star Falling as a cinematic work. If it goes all the way, the option price is an advance against a production fee, which is a percentage of the gross budget.’
‘What’s that likely to be?’
‘Which? The percentage or the gross?’
‘Both.’
‘Okay, let’s say two and a half per cent of a budget of thirty million dollars. That’s three quarters of a million.’
He gazed at me thoughtfully, as the waiter finally served each of us a beer with a wedge of lime jammed into the neck. ‘And that’s all I’d get?’ he asked, as he pressed it down into the bottle.
I did the same with mine, took a swig, then nodded. ‘That’s the norm. We might cut you in on a percentage of the DVD profits, though, as an added incentive. If you’d been sensible enough to get yourself an agent, he’d have asked for that.’
‘How much?’
‘Same percentage, two and a half.’
‘What would the likely take be from that?’
‘That’s impossible to predict.’
Dylan killed most of his beer on one gulp and waved for two more. ‘So out with it, what are you going to offer me?’
I glanced at my watch. ‘Until about two hours ago, I was going to offer you a hundred thousand US. Now. . nothing.’
He almost fell out of his chair. ‘Nothing? Come on, I’m Benny Luker, author, and I’m letting you in on a book that’s doing very nicely in the US. Forget the past, this is a commercial proposition I’ve got here.’
I sighed and opened the bomb-bay doors, ready to release. ‘Benny, I can’t forget the past, and you can’t wish it away either. I wasn’t going into this deal on my own. I’m not a producer, that’s not my thing. I’ve got a partner, who was going to do all the development work, and direct.’
‘Who?’
‘Miles Grayson.’
He looked at me blankly. ‘So?’
‘So? So!. . Like Susie said, are you sure that Dutchman didn’t shoot you in the fucking head, Dylan? Remember that scam you and your mate pulled? It involved kidnapping Dawn, Miles’s pregnant wife, Prim’s sister, and you went along with it. If he had caught up with you, he’d have shot you himself, as often as it took to get the job done. I fancy he still might.’
Comprehension spread across my undead friend’s face. ‘Shit! I’d forgotten about him.’
‘Miles isn’t someone you can forget.’
‘What if I wrote to him, and to Dawn, apologising for my part in that and saying I’d no idea it was going to get that serious?’
‘He’d probably do one of two things: come after you himself, or tell your publisher who you really are, and have your book taken out of print and remaindered. You better believe me, he’s got the clout to do that.’
‘Then I’m stuffed.’
He was too, or he would have been if I hadn’t been overcome by an unprecedented burst of sentimental generosity. ‘You’re right, though,’ I said. ‘There is money to be made. Tell you what, I’ll give you a fifty-thousand-dollar advance for a three-year option off my own bat. I’ll have Roscoe, my agent, draw up a contract and you’ll sign it, no questions asked, same terms I’ve just outlined. There are two people in the world with a chance of persuading Miles to let you live and to go along with this project. I’m one, but it would be a long shot even for me. No, I’ll have to get Dawn on-side.’
‘Do you think you can?’
‘Maybe, if her sister backs me up.’
‘Prim. Will she?’
‘I reckon. I still have some leverage there. I’d never use it, but she can’t be certain of that.’
‘Leverage?’
‘Our son, Tom. I control her access to him. I love the wee chap, and I’d never cut him off from his mother, but it gives me a hold over her. She’ll co-operate with me.’
‘If she knows what’s best for her?’
‘I’d never put it that way, but she needs to stay on my good side and she knows it.’
Dylan stared at me; I think he was a wee bit scared. ‘God,’ he murmured, ‘what a calculating bastard you’ve become.’
I grinned and gave him the old Jim Holton line. ‘Aye, and don’t you forget it.’
4
After another beer or two, Dylan agreed to the deal. I arranged to meet him at the Columbus at ten next morning with an agreement for signature, and a cheque for fifty thousand, drawn on my dollar account, then we walked back down the hill and went our separate ways. He set off to look at the boats in the marina, and maybe indulge in a few day-dreams; I grabbed a taxi and went home.
When I got there I went straight to my office and called Roscoe in Los Angeles. I was in luck: he was at his desk. He has all sorts of standard contracts in his files, and knew exactly where to find one to fit the purpose. I gave him the numbers, and asked him to fill them in, then send the finished article to Audrey by e-mail, for her to prepare. He must have been busy, for he didn’t bother to ask what the hell I was doing buying movie rights to anything. But if he was, some of that was my doing: Roscoe’s star has risen alongside mine in the film world.
That done, I changed into Speedo trunks and went out to the terrace. Prim and Susie were in the pool with the kids, Jonathan included. He can swim almost as well as the other two, but we still make him wear armbands.
I dived in and surfaced beside Tom and Janet. ‘Hi, you two. Had a good afternoon?’
‘You’ve been drinking beer,’ said my daughter, disapprovingly.
I nodded. ‘Yup, and you’re just jealous ’cos you’re not old enough.’
‘Mum took us out,’ Tom told me, as if no one else ever did. It’s funny: he calls both Prim and Susie ‘Mum’, but we’re never in any doubt
which one he’s talking about. The wee chap looked as pleased as Punch. For various reasons. . all of them her own fault. . Primavera hadn’t seen much of him during the previous year, but clearly he didn’t hold that against her.
‘Let me guess where.’ I chuckled.
Prim swam across; like Susie, she did not see the need for a bikini top. Her nipples were different, bigger yet smaller, if you know what I mean. ‘The motor museum,’ she said. ‘I come all this way, and I wind up looking at cars.’
‘Those are the rules with our boy,’ I told her. ‘You can take him anywhere you like in Monaco, as long as it’s the motor museum.’
‘Can’t you wean him off it?’
‘Why should I? I like it too.’ I grinned at Tom. ‘What was your favourite car today, son?’
‘The bubble car.’
‘Again? That’s two days running. Usually he has a different favourite every visit,’ I explained.
‘Maybe he wants to associate that one with both of us.’
‘That’s very perceptive: you may well be right,’ I granted.
‘What’s your favourite, Mum?’ Tom asked.
‘The Cadillac, nineteen sixty-three model,’ Prim told him. I stared at her, surprised.
‘That’s Dad’s favourite too,’ our son explained. ‘Can you buy one, Dad?’
‘There would be no point. I’d never drive it; all we’d do is look at it, and we can do that at the museum.’
‘Can we get a bubble car, then?’
‘I doubt if there’s one to be found any more, Tom. Do you know, your Grandpa Blackstone used to have one of those, way back, before your Aunt Ellie and I were born. I’ve never been able to figure out how he got in and out of it.’
‘That’s a strange choice of car for a young man,’ said Susie, appearing beside us with a furiously paddling Jonathan in tow.
‘My mum’s parents approved of it,’ I said, ‘or so she told me, for a reason which probably occurs to you, but which we need not discuss in front of the children.’
For The Death Of Me ob-9 Page 3