Gene was impressed. But even more than by the place by fuckin Barnes. That was the shocker. Gene had to look at him twice. This was not the sallow old slump of a guy who wore what looked like secondhand threads from another decade. His hair was long but neat and stylish, sort of cupped around his head. His face had a definite trace of a tan. He wore zip boots whose expensive-looking leather was recently shined, a pair of light blue denim pants with all kinds of unexpected pockets and silver buttons, a broad black belt with a big silver buckle, and a white muslin shirt, semicowboy.
“Hey, man,” Gene said, “you writin the movie or playin the lead?”
“The God’s truth is, in this business, it’s hard to know.”
“How’s it goin?”
“Give you an example. First night here the director takes me to dinner, wants to assure me he knows what my book is really about. I ask. He says, ‘Illusion and reality.’”
“Your mystery? Death of a Deb?”
“Yep.”
“Shitman,” Gene said, “maybe he was puttin ya on.”
“I wish. That’d make it easier. I wouldn’t have to sit around in meetings talking about illusion and reality. Fuck it. I just keep writin the thing, feedin em pages. Best not to think about it, otherwise your head gets all screwed up.”
“Illusion and reality. That’s a heavy-number.”
“Fuck it,” Barnes said. “Let’s have lunch.”
They went across the street to the famous Schwab’s drugstore of Hollywood, Barnes acting real cool about it, calling the waitress by name and all, ordering himself a bacon and avocado sandwich on toast.
He’s really getting into it, Gene thought.
Barnes said Gene could sleep in his room at the Marmont, since he just used it as a place to write in the daytime now. He was sort of living with this girl and he stayed over at her place every night.
Gene thanked him about the room and asked what his new woman was like.
Barnes scratched his head.
“It’s kind of hard to describe her.”
Gene wondered if she was missing an arm or something. He didn’t want to press it.
“She’s unique,” Barnes added.
Jesus, Gene thought, maybe both arms are gone.
“Oh,” is all he said.
“Yeh. You’ll see. Just don’t say anything to her about plastic.”
“Plastic? What kind of plastic?”
“You know, about L.A. being ‘plastic,’” Barnes said. “A lot of people when they first get out here put it down for being too ‘plastic’”
“Sure, man. No plastic.”
Barnes was gazing off in the distance, over Gene’s shoulder somewhere, far. He absently rubbed his paper napkin at his mouth.
“Belle is very loyal,” he said.
“To you, you mean?”
“Huh? Oh. No. I mean to Los Angeles.”
Belle had nothing missing.
To put it mildly. In fact she was one of the most abundantly endowed women Gene had ever laid eyes on, and the abundance was all in the proper proportions. When people complimented her about the marvelous condition of her body she said, “I work at it,” the implication being that she, as opposed to God, should get the credit, which was certainly true in part but Belle didn’t deal in compromises. All or nothing. Her hair was dark brown and straight, cut short, and her eyes deep brown. The first time you saw her they were likely to seem menacing. Her habitual stances were either with arms folded firmly across her chest, or fists planted on waist, as if ready to bawl someone out if the occasion arose, or even if she thought it arose. She liked to wear long, old-fashioned dresses with lace trimmings, and big hats, all of which she got at thrift stores but which looked very classy when Belle wore them, as probably anything would have. Later Gene learned she was just the same age as he, but in comparison he always kind of felt like a kid.
She lived on a quiet little street off Sunset in a renovated guest cottage behind a big house. It was basically one room with kitchen and bath. She had fixed it up to be comfortable and cozy, but still it seemed too small a place to hold her properly. Gene thought she was the one should live in a castle, not just a part of it, the whole operation.
“Nice to meet you, Belle,” said Gene, smiling, making an affirming nod of his head.
“My God!” said Belle. “He’s so pale. Is he all right?”
“He’s fine,” Barnes said quickly. “Just be nice to him, OK?”
“Be nice to him? Well, of course, I’ll be nice to him. He’s your friend, and besides, he doesn’t look well. Can I get him anything?”
Gene hoped she wasn’t going to give him any medicine.
“A drink,” said Barnes. “You can get him a drink. Me, too. Please.”
She hurried from the room; the kitchen suddenly burst into a clatter of glasses, bottles, and ice. Gene felt slightly in shock, as if someone had hit him from behind with a two-by-four. He supposed this was what Barnes meant when he said his girl was “unique” and “hard to describe.”
He looked at Barnes, who was trying to wink at him, no doubt for reassurance. But Barnes was one of those people who did not have the capacity to wink; both his eyes moved at once in a kind of squint, as if he had just got sand in them.
Belle came out bearing a tray with three cocktails.
“These are old-fashioneds,” she said. “Some people don’t like them. But they should.”
“Love em,” Gene said.
“Hers are great,” said Barnes.
Belle raised her glass and said, “Well, here’s to your friend’s health!”
“Goddam it, Belle, he’s not sick!”
“That’s a toast, for heaven sake. ‘To your health.’”
Barnes took a belt of his drink, grumbling.
Gene started giggling.
He was on the verge of getting really pissed when it suddenly seemed funny.
“Belle,” he said, “the fact is you’re right. I’m run down and I’m done in. I’ve come out here to get cured. I figure California’s my last hope.”
“Well it’s certainly your best one,” she said, suddenly brightening.
“And I think this drink is a sign, a good sign I’m on the right track. I’ve been a bartender, Belle, and I’ve mixed these myself, and I’ve never had a better one.”
She had an absolutely radiant smile, and it was now on full.
“Well, thank you, Gene, I can see you’re a person of standards. That’s so rare nowadays.”
At last, she’d addressed him directly, using his name. Barnes looked drained but relieved, like a man in a car that just swerved barely in time to avoid a head-on collision. From there on in, the evening was a joy.
After avocado vinaigrette, chicken Marengo, asparagus with hollandaise, new potatoes with parsley, and strawberries with cream, accompanied by two bottles of Ingle-nook Chablis, Belle brought out snifters and brandy, and rolled a couple of joints.
Gene finished his ravings over the meal, which in fact was splendid, by telling Belle he could see now why Barnes was in the best shape he’d ever seen him.
Belle agreed, explaining, “The potential was there, it just had to be brought out.”
“But it’s not just good cooking,” Gene said, “it’s the hair, the clothes. He’s a new man.”
“I know,” Belle said. “I did him over.”
She made a sudden little giggle and covered her mouth with the tips of her fingers for a moment, gesture of a naughty child.
“Shee-it,” said Barnes, turning his snifter around, embarrassed and pleased.
Belle turned to Gene, put her fists on her hips.
“Now, what about you?” she demanded. “What’re we going to do about you?”
“He’s, gonna use my room at the Marmont,” Barnes said. “To sleep in.”
“Well, thank goodness someone’s going to get some good out of it with you paying all that money for it when we could rent a nice little house somewhere.”
�
�We’ve been through that, Belle, I know all about it.”
“Well, Gene doesn’t, maybe he wants to know.”
“No, he doesn’t. Let’s get back to him.”
That had the ring of a running battle, and Gene was anxious to help them get off it.
“I need to make some bread, Belle. I owe Barnes, and I want to buy some clothes, get myself together.”
“Are you an artist?” she asked.
“No.”
“Good. That makes it easier. Artists are so sensitive, there’s a lot of things they can’t do. I know because that’s what I am. An artist.”
“She’s good,” said Barnes.
“I’m sure,” said Gene. “I’d like to see—”
“Someday I’ll show you “my studio,” she said, “but the immediate problem is you.”
“I often am,” Gene said.
“No, no, we’ll have none of that self-pity business, we can’t have any of that. This is just a logistical problem.”
“OK.”
“Do you know anything about the horrid swindle called ‘rock music’?”
“Well, I listen to it, kind of keep up, if that’s what you mean.”
“That sounds about right. You see it’s in my opinion the easiest way of making money without knowing much, the whole ‘rock music’ business. I use the term ‘music’ loosely, it’s really just noise for children, but it is a business, I’ll grant you that, and shrewd men make piles of money in it by taking advantage of innocent children who have no taste. Well, when I was naive and impressionable I got to know a lot of those people, in the Groups and the record companies and all the rest of it, but eventually I couldn’t stand to hear the ‘music’ anymore, it was absolutely upsetting my equilibrium. But I’m still friends with a lot of those people unless they’ve done something horrible, because basically I’m a loyal person. Some of them might be able to hire you for something, and I can start calling tomorrow.”
“Hey, Belle, that’s terrific, but I’m just a fan, I don’t really know anything about—”
She waved the objection away like a pesky mosquito.
“That’s the beauty of it, you see, you don’t have to know anything. You’re slim and kind of cute, even though at present a little anemic-looking, but you have a nice way about you. I think you might fit in. It’s sort of an instinct. You look very much like someone I know in Black Oak Arkansas.”
“I’ve never been there,” Gene said.
“Not the place, the Group.”
“See, I’m just a hick,” Gene said.
“They’ll think that’s refreshing,” Belle said. “Take my word. I always know about these things.”
“She does,” Barnes affirmed.
Belle seemed relieved about having settled Gene’s future, and went to put a record on her battered old portable phonograph. When she turned it on, static came out. Then she put the record on, and if you strained you could hear the thin sound of the music over the static. It was the old Broadway musical Finian’s Rainbow. That was the only record she played anymore.
“It’s pretty, I think, don’t you?”
No one dreamed of disagreeing.
The next morning Gene woke to the phone ringing. It was Belle. She had already set up an appointment for him.
“Have you ever heard of Muller, Behr and Starkie?” she asked him.
He hesitated.
“Is it a Group?”
Her giggle escaped.
“No, it’s a business.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. They’re not. They’re not even ashamed, for heaven sake. They are what is alleged to be a public relations firm, which means they take a lot of money from the rock stars and those who want to be stars who are taking money or trying to from the innocent youth who have no taste, in return for getting their names mentioned places and having people talk about them. Ray Behr is a friend of mine and he said he’d see you about doing something for them.”
“At least I could sweep the office.”
“I don’t think they do that.”
“Well, thanks. I’ll talk to this guy.”
“Don’t mind him, now. He’s very cynical. Of course you’d have to be, to make a living like that. But he’s very good-hearted, even though he doesn’t act like it. He’s very sleek-looking. Starkie is the fat one. Muller left the firm. After a year he couldn’t take it anymore. He’s a forest ranger in Oregon now. I can’t say as I blame him.”
She gave him an address on Sunset and said to go by after lunch.
Gene didn’t know what to wear to the interview, so Barnes looked through the stuff in his suitcase and picked out some faded jeans and an Iowa Hawkeye T-shirt. It had a picture of an enraged gold hawk on a bright blue background.
“Why that?” Gene asked.
“It looks crazy,” Barnes explained. “Besides, they won’t have seen one before. It’ll be something new.”
The office was on the fourteenth floor of a tall, anonymous-looking building on Sunset. Going up in the elevator with a man in a dark blue business suit and tie, and a woman wearing a medium-length dress, with stockings and standard heels, Gene wondered if Barnes had steered him right. Maybe it would be an ordinary business office.
His fears were unfounded.
The only furniture in the big main room was water beds. One yellow, one red, one blue. On one of them a young guy wearing a motorcycle jacket was tickling the bare tan tummy of a girl wearing a handkerchief halter top and tight denim shorts with assorted patches. On another one was a big fat guy in white pants and T-shirt sitting in a Buddha pose. That must be Starkie. Beside him on the floor was a pink princess telephone and a bottle of Wild Turkey.
There was a small room off of this where a woman with big shades was working an electric typewriter. Gene found the typewriter kind of reassuring.
“Do for ya?” Starkie said.
“Spose to see Behr,” Gene said.
Starkie nodded and patted the place beside him on the water bed. Gene guessed he meant for him to sit down there so he did. Starkie handed him a red balloon that hadn’t been inflated yet. Gene didn’t know what the fuck he was supposed to do with it.
“Blow it up?” he asked.
“Right.”
Gene took a deep breath and started to blow up the balloon.
Starkie tapped him on the shoulder.
“No, man,” he said. “That way.”
He pointed across the room to a big red tank that looked like a fire extinguisher. The leather jacket guy was standing by it filling a balloon from it. When it was filled, the guy put the end in his mouth and let go, so whatever was in the balloon shot into him. Then he started to giggle.
Gene felt like a real hick. Blowing up the goddam balloon himself. This was the latest high. Laughing gas. The kind dentists use.
Gene got his own balloon of laughing gas, took it in, all in one rush, blinked, and looked out the window. Los Angeles was gray and giggly. Towers tipped. The freeway crawlers looked funny.
“Huh?” asked Starkie, smiling.
“High,” said Gene. “I mean up. We’re high up. Here.”
It sounded hilarious. He laughed. Starkie nodded.
In another moment it was gone, the tipping buildings and the fun. It was a short high but it was new, it was all the rage just then. Gene saw a number of big red tanks in the weeks ahead. He was glad he’d learned right off they weren’t fire extinguishers.
Starkie patted the water bed again and when Gene sat down he gave him a glass of Wild Turkey. That was better. Steady, sure, down and in. He knew about that.
The phone rang, Starkie yelled, “Patty, turn that shit down.” The girl who’d been having her tummy tickled, and most recently, licked, jumped and turned the switch and the speakers went off. Starkie picked up the phone.
“Starkie,” he said.
He nodded, grunting.
“Sure ya can come. Oversight. Laurel Canyon, above the Deebs place. After five.
/> “Look for tents. Not pup, Arabian. Yeh. Hey—got a photographer? Bring em.”
He put the phone back and had a slug of Wild Turkey.
“Sound again?” Patty asked.
“Noise,” said Starkie. “Turn it on.”
She did.
Starkie grimaced.
“Stone Hinge,” he said.
“What’s that?” Gene asked, sipping faster.
“New client. Just took em on. Ball buster, gettin anyone to listen to em, much less talk to em.”
Several joints and several Wild Turkeys later a slim, cool-looking guy came in, handed something to the typist, took some message notes she gave to him, riffled through them, slipped one in his pocket, crumpled the others, and dropped them on the floor beside him. He came out to the other room, poured a Wild Turkey, but just before he brought it to his mouth grimaced, looked around the room, then at Starkie, asked, “What kind of shit is that you’re playing?”
“Stone Hinge,” Starkie said.
The guy shook his head, then sighed.
“Well,” he said, “at least it’s a challenge.”
He closed his eyes and knocked down the shot of Wild Turkey.
Starkie said, “Gene’s here to see ya.”
Gene stood up.
“Belle sent me.”
Ray Behr gave a small grin, looking him over, taking him in.
“Of course,” he said.
He was brisk again, occupied.
“See you out there,” he said to Starkie. “Gene, come with me.”
Ray Behr drove a vintage silver Oldsmobile sedan, probably 1940. It was high up off the ground, and the engine sounded like the motor of a small airplane. It was hard to talk, which Gene was just as glad of. He didn’t know what to say to Ray Behr, though he already thought that he liked him. He was one of those guys who you might miss his age by ten years. You looked at him one way, he might be a very hard-living thirty. From another angle, you’d swear he was a well-kept forty. He was always moving, even standing still—tossing a key ring or fiddling with coins. He wore tight jeans, ankle-high boots, an expensive buckskin jacket, slightly fringed. Brown hair razor cut, face on the ashen side. His laugh was not funny. Amused maybe, in a distant kind of way.
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