by Paul Neuhaus
Kingdom Come
A Jack Huggins Novel
Paul Neuhaus
“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
― The Lord’s Prayer
1 Jack
The San Fernando Center for Tibetan Buddhism was on Victory Boulevard halfway between Sherman Oaks and Reseda. If I’m being honest, it was a low-rent facility in a seedy building in a not-too-great part of town. It was a supposed bastion of enlightenment even though it shared a parking lot with a Dairy Queen. Billy Wanamaker founded it in 1978. Billy claimed Sam Wanamaker, the actor, was a relation. You’ve probably seen Sam in movies like Raw Deal with Arnold Schwarzenegger, and (less likely) Superman IV: The Quest for Peace. The only reason I ever doubted Billy’s claim was he’s a black dude, and the elder Wanamaker was as white as rice. That’s not a deal breaker business-wise, but still. Of all things to claim.
I’d been going to the Center for about two months. Since before my wife Hailey and I suspended our ten-year marriage. I figured Billy and his Eastern mysticism could help me get my head right—although, truth be told, getting my head right was putting a lot onto Billy’s fairly narrow shoulders. I’d gone diligently, I’d practiced all the theseys and thoseys, and I thought I’d made good progress.
Billy thought otherwise.
When I went, I did whatever Billy said, and little Ava Amelia hung out in Billy’s shitty lobby, quiet as could be. On the last day, the two of us drove out, and Wannamaker looked different. He looked pensive—which wasn’t a state I associated with Buddhist monks. Buddhist monks are centered, placid. Billy looked like he had a load he needed to take off. First thing he said to me was, “Look, you know I like you, right?”
I walked with him into his dojo (although I don’t guess “dojo” is the right word since dojos are for karate). At four foot eleven, he was more than a foot shorter than me. He wore his orange robes like usual and ropey scars covered his bare black arms. I’d never asked him about the scars, but I’d wanted to.
“Sure, Billy,” I said, taking off my jacket.
He put his hand on my chest and stopped me walking. “Keep your jacket on. We’re not doing meditation today.”
I looked down at the top of his head, at his quickly thinning afro. “We’re not gonna do meditation today? What’re we gonna do?”
The little monk, shorter even than Ava Amelia, took a step back and dropped his hand. “We’re gonna talk. Or, more precisely, I’m gonna talk and you’re gonna listen.”
I nodded. “Okay, Billy. You gonna drop some ancient wisdom?”
That seemed to catch him off guard. “No, not ancient. Wisdom maybe, but not ancient.”
I shrugged from my elbows. “Lay it on me.”
“Okay,” he said. “I don’t want you coming here no more, Jack.”
I looked at him, then back into the lobby at Ava. She was reading an issue of Harper’s Bazaar—probably from the 90s. At that moment, with her head down and her eyes calmly focused on the magazine, Ava looked more serene than Billy Wanamaker. I looked back at my sansei (although I think “sensei” is a karate thing too). “Why would you say that, Billy? You’re helping me. Don’t you want my money?”
He looked up at me with soulful black eyes. “I want your money, but I’m not helping you, and that’s why I can’t take your money.”
I had to puzzle that one out. “Is this an ethics thing?”
The light returned to Wanamaker’s eyes. I’d hit upon something he could use. “It is an ethics thing. I’m not just selling pots and pans here, right? I’m selling a mind state, a way of living. And, if I sell it to someone who can’t appreciate it and is never gonna get it—and I do that knowingly—then that makes me a fraud.”
“What do you mean ‘never gonna get it’? What do you mean ‘can’t appreciate it’? I can appreciate it. It’s already benefiting me.”
Billy shook his head. “It’s not. We’ve been over it and over it, but you’re only half here. You don’t listen. Which, come to think of it, is a funny trait in a private detective—who, you’d think, would be all about listening.”
I was getting confused, but I wasn’t getting angry. Sometimes I have trouble outwardly reflecting my inner state. I wished I could relay the not-getting-angry thing to Billy articulately. I could tell Wanamaker worried about getting into a scrap with me. I’m six foot one, I weight about one ninety and I can appear pushy. “I listen…” I said impotently.
He cocked one fuzzy eyebrow at me. The left. “Oh yeah? Can you list the Pāramitās? I’ll give you a hint, there’re six of them.”
Ugh. I didn’t know there was gonna be a quiz. “The Pāramitās. Those are the virtue things, right?”
Billy nodded. “Those are the virtue things. The perfections, the transcendent virtues, the major practices of the bodhisattva.”
He waited patiently for me to answer his question. And he’d go on waiting a while. I didn’t have the answer despite being told dozens of times. The Pāramitās were core; they were foundational. If I didn’t know them by now, I would never get them. I surrendered. “Do I owe you anything else for the month?”
The tension went out of Wanamaker’s body. He didn’t relish lowering the boom. He was a nice guy, and not just because of the Buddhism thing. A little of the relaxed, neighborhood-y vibe came back into him, a side he didn’t show much. “Naw. We square. Can I tell you something, though? Man to man. ‘Cause, even though I know you ain’t gonna do it here, I want you to get your head right.”
I nodded.
Billy looked around me at little Ava waiting in his lobby. He looked back at me, his expression deadly serious. “The Buddha once said, ‘The pussy-whipped cannot walk the Dharma Path’.”
I spared a look at my girlfriend too. “Did the Buddha really say that?”
“I don’t know, man. The Buddha said a lot of shit.”
I nodded to him and turned to go.
The monk’s voice stopped me and I looked over my shoulder as he spoke. He was counting on his fingers. “One: Dāna pāramitā: generosity, giving of oneself. Two: Śīla pāramitā: virtue, morality, discipline, proper conduct. Three: Kṣānti pāramitā : patience, tolerance, forbearance, acceptance, endurance. Four: Vīrya pāramitā: energy, diligence, vigor, effort. Five: Dhyāna pāramitā : one-pointed concentration, contemplation. Six: Prajñā pāramitā: wisdom, insight.”
I nodded and smiled. He was right; I would never remember all of that.
As I walked through the Center’s lobby, Ava Amelia put down her magazine and followed me. She was five foot two with graceful curves, short brown hair and slanted gray eyes. Not slanted eyes like Asian eyes, but slanted eyes like a cat’s eyes. She wore her usual uniform. A sweater, a skirt breaking about mid-thigh, sheer black stockings and loafers with a thick clunky heel. It was a look I didn’t see around much anymore, a look out of the 90s. Ava had just been born when it was popular, so I didn’t know where she’d gotten it. Reruns of Friends probably. On the right kind of woman (and Ava was definitely one of those), it stressed the feminine and brought out not only my manly protectiveness but a lustful streak both wide and deep. I don’t know if that’s what 90s Couture had had in mind, but that’s what they’d gotten. Out of me, anyway.
When we got out onto the blacktop, I pointed at the Dairy Queen. It’d become a custom that, after my sessions with Billy, Ava would get a vanilla soft serve cone dipped in chocolate. “You want your ice cream?” I said to her.
Ava shook her head no. She wore just enough makeup to look like a girl and not enough to look like a harlot. Her skin was pale and her pale blue eyes were enormous.
“You’re sure?”
The head shake again.
“Oka
y,” I replied. “It’s your… ice cream funeral?”
She giggled and got into my car, a red Jeep Wrangler with a black convertible top.
As we drove toward Sherman Oaks, I went as fast as I could up Victory. The rattling of the ragtop reminded me of a real downside to Jeep ownership: Going over fifty miles an hour raised the decibel level in the cabin to ear-damaging levels. I was sure my hearing was worse than it’d been when I bought the vehicle five years earlier. Maybe my early onset deafness was the reason I couldn’t process Billy Wannamaker’s Pāramitās. But no, that wasn’t it. I couldn’t get the Pāramitās to stick in my head because there was something wrong with my head, a fogginess that’d set in in just the last year. It was something I couldn’t pinpoint, much less understand.
As Billy would say, a funny trait in a private detective.
My apartment building was a six-unit on Dickens Street in Sherman Oaks. I had the upper front. Hailey had moved from the upper front into the upper rear when we’d split. Like always, I checked Hailey’s spot when I parked the Jeep. It was empty which meant she’d probably gone to the Pavilions on Ventura to score some of her tasteless (but not odorless) Lean Cuisines and her Diet Sprite. I was relieved she wasn’t home. It’s tough having your ex-wife living in the same apartment building you share with your fuck bunny.
I stepped out of the Jeep and Ava did her little jump to the ground. She got out of her side of the vehicle like a golden retriever which was endearing; I guess. As we walked along the side of the building toward the front, I noticed a car parked in the lone guest spot right at the rear of the structure. It was a BMW. Late model, shiny-clean. Very unusual for my side of town. When we got within sight of my apartment, we saw the driver. It was a dark-haired man in sunglasses and a suit. Expensive shoes. Tie loosened. When he saw us, he stood, brushing off the butt of his slate gray trousers. I didn’t recognize him until he took off the sunglasses. Even then I had to squint. “Randall?” I said.
Randall Dunphey grinned. “I’m flattered,” he said. “It’s been a while.”
I nodded. “At least ten years.” He’d been 18 when I’d seen him last, just about ready to graduate high school. He’d done well.
Our guest nodded and looked at Ava. “I didn’t know you had a daughter, man.”
I rolled my eyes, giving Miss Amelia the key to the apartment. “I don’t,” I said as the girl brushed by us. She didn’t look at, smile at, or acknowledge Dunphey at all. It was her way. Dunphey watched her go in a way that annoyed me. “What can I do for you, Randy?” drawing his attention back away from my girl’s ass.
“Oh,” he said. “I guess I need a favor. An all-in-the-family style favor.” He wasn’t talking about Archie Bunker. Howard Dunphey, his father, had been my mentor. He’d taught me everything I knew about the detective business—at a time when I’d really needed a career change. After that, he’d gotten cancer and died. I told him I’d look after his boy. I hadn’t. Not really. Randall knew about that promise, and now he was playing on it.
“What kind of favor?” I asked. “Professional? Personal? You need money?” I hoped he didn’t need money. I didn’t have any.
He did a magician’s flourish down either side of his body. “Do I look like I need money to you?”
I conceded that he didn’t.
“No, this is professional. It’s your general ballpark. I’ve mislaid somebody, and I want you to see if you can find them. I can pay you. I’m not going to trade entirely off the friend-of-my-dad thing.”
I didn’t want to take his money, but I’d probably have to considering the way things were right then. Anyway, I was willing to put off talk of rates until I knew more about what he was into. “Okay, Randy. I got a shit-box office up on Ventura. Or we could get coffee somewhere…”
Dunphey shook his head. “I don’t wanna go to no shit-box—even though you did a great job of selling it. And coffee’s out since what I’ve got to say isn’t for public consumption. All I need is to be overheard by some Valley yokel. Can’t we just do it here?”
I nodded, trying not to take offense. I was a Valley yokel. I motioned him to follow me up the short wooden staircase. My place is a one-bedroom with a decent-sized living room, a bath and a kitchen with pink tile. Dunphey whistled when he saw my posters. Over the couch was The Seven Samurai, vintage, landscape orientation with a heavy black frame. On the wall facing the driveway, I had The Maltese Falcon and Yankee Doodle Dandy. Over the TV was Duck Soup, also landscape.
“You got better posters than Gary,” he said.
“Gary?”
“Friend of yours,” he said with a smile. “Gary Pasternak.”
I knew Gary Pasternak. From a prior case. And now he was a big shot independent producer. I just didn’t know Randall knew him. “You work for Gary?”
He nodded and looked sheepish. “I do. I leveraged our history. I knew you knew him so I told him I knew you. He hired me on the spot. I’m surprised he didn’t check my bona fides with you.”
I shrugged. “No big deal. I’m glad you finally benefited from our association. Sit down.” He sat down on the sofa underneath Toshiro Mifune. “You want something to drink? I got soda, or I can put coffee on.”
He shook his head, pointing at the wall behind the TV. “That the bedroom? Did the girl go in there?”
I could hear the television in the bedroom through the wall and nodded.
“Can I ask you who that is? I mean, where’s Hailey?”
I sighed, pulling the chair away from the computer. I was already married to Hailey when I’d last seen Randall. “Hailey and me are on the outs,” I told him. “That girl’s name is Ava. We live together.”
Dunphey cocked his head and dropped his sunglasses into his coat pocket. “How old is that girl, Jack?”
“Twenty-four,” I said, hoping he would drop the subject.
“Okay, okay,” he said. “I don’t judge. It’s none of my business.”
I chose not to let it go myself, riffing on something he’d said in the driveway. “Anyway, how’s she gonna be my daughter? I woulda had to’ve had her when I was fourteen.”
Randall grinned. I could see how that grin probably got him a lot of traction with PAs and D-girls. “You coulda had her when you were fourteen. A fourteen-year-old’s dick works. You don’t gotta be old to have a kid. You can be young and or stupid.”
“I feel like we’re digressing. How’s Gary?”
“Gary’s a fucking asshole,” Randall said. “But I feel like you knew that.”
“I take comfort in it. Knowing things never change.”
“I take no comfort since Gary’s in my ass balls-deep every goddam day. Metaphorically.”
“He pays you good at least?”
“Yeah, he’s paying me. I moved up the ladder. I guess you’d call me a Junior Executive. He has to pay me good or I’ll jump ship.”
I nodded. “Back in the day, a kid like you, in this town, would blow most of that money on… well, blow. What’re you spending it on now?”
He didn’t even hesitate. “BDSM paraphernalia. I’m a shithead all day long. Nights, I wanna be humiliated.”
I half-smiled. “I could humiliate you now if you want.”
“You willing to shit on my chest and call me ‘Rhonda’?”
“No. I mean maybe the Rhonda thing.”
“Leave it to the professionals.”
”Check.” That was a weird avenue I hadn’t expected to turn down. It was time to get to the meat of the thing. “What can I do for you, Randy?”
“I’m a Junior Executive. Like I told you. That means I got responsibilities. Producers, they delegate. Sometimes, they delegate so much that I do everything. I’m on a movie right now where I should get EP credit, but I won’t. It’ll go to the guy who’s supposed to be doing it, but would rather sleep ’til noon and spend his afternoon at the Augustine Wine Bar. Thing I’m working on right now… It’s big. It’s an action movie. Part of a franchise. Big, big star. But there’s
a problem. A big, big problem. You know the business. You’re familiar with the term ‘Troubled Production’…”
I knew the business, but only in an armchair way. The business, Hollywood history, the Movies. It’d been an avocation of mine since I was a kid. My parents had been in it. I wasn’t able to follow in their footsteps. “What’s the nature of the trouble?”
“Injuries. Bad weather. Shutdowns. We’re up against a Completion Bond. Deadline is Monday. If things don’t turn around between now and then, we default and guess who takes the ride all the way down? I’ll give you a hint: It’s not Mr. Augustine Wine Bar.”
Okay, so the kid was up against it, but I didn’t see how I could help. “Bad weather, injuries, shutdowns… Where’s the wiggle room? How do we pry you out before Monday?” It was Thursday.
He brightened at the word “we”. Figured I was down to help. I was down to help. He leaned forward a bit as the seven samurai looked on. “Monday would’ve been just another day if what just happened hadn’t happened. There was nothing between us and wrapping principal photography.”
“What just happened?”
“I told you I mislaid someone… I mislaid Tad Albright.”
“Oof,” I said. Tad Albright was probably the biggest star in the world. He was my age, and he’d been the biggest star in the world for twenty years. Action was his game. Smart action, though. Not like that Fast and Furious bullshit. He’d been riding an espionage wave for a while. I had to assume Randall was working on one of those. “How’d you mislay a whole Tad Albright?”
Dunphey raised a finger. “Technically, I had nothing to do with it, but no one’ll factor that in when the bond comes due. You must know a little about Albright… He’s a crazy cultist, but he’s also got a work ethic like a motherfucker. It’s easy for me to see why he is where he is. James Brown dropped the title ‘Hardest Working Man in Show Business’ when he died. Tad Albright picked it up. The guy’s a loon, but he’s a nice, hard-working loon. That’s why it’s weird he went to lunch yesterday and didn’t come back.”