Forward to Glory

by Brian Paul Bach

‘I am Friesian by birth, but I served apprenticeship in Temple Chambers, took silk, and made court in Cardiff for seven years. The American Bar Association invited me to guest-star in selected cases within the confines of your great nation, as part of a cultural exchange program, championed by Judge Goth, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States of America. Your honor.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘And, your honor?’

  ‘And what, Lawyer Cuxhelm?’

  ‘Proceed.’

  ‘Thank you, your hon – I mean, Lawyer Cuxhelm. I, uh. I was just waiting for the next thought to pop into my head, as the pressure of this court has… Now, I received evidence that has been classified by me and my consultants as inarguable. It is also my pleasure to declassify this evidence and present it for public scrutiny. It is as follows. The late Isaac Davis was presented with a long nine ceegar, which, relayed through the person of the strolling player Jack Nicholson, he, Mr. Davis, did light up and thus smoke. And yes, he did inhale!’

  There was some smug laughter in the courtroom. The newsreel cameras continued to grind away with great fervor.

  Judge Proth savored the audience response to his little showbizzy joke-ette, then continued.

  ‘The cee-gar had what I would call the peculiar distinction of being signed by none othah than Fee-dell Castro, President of the very clearly Hostile and Illegal State of Koobah. The deciding factor in this evidence is the fact that the signature was rendered in the significant and conclusive medium of Ink Fraish, popularly sold under the brand name ‘Magic Marker’ within plastic containers that classify them as writing instruments. That’s where the Burkmart reference comes in.’

  He glared at Butterbugs.

  ‘Certified experts have determined that the ingredient Sarcobbian Ytyrbium difoxate, a grievously toxic substance, which is injurious to our race, is indeed a key ingredient in Ink Fraish. If this chemical compound is ingested in any way, it will wreak havoc upon the organs and tissues that are in line to receive it. Without a shadow of a doubt, we have ruled that late Mr. Davis was the subject of an assassination plot by insurgent ruffians from that island nation. Everbody want the Kooban cee-gars, but they know they can’t haive them in this here homeland. And they never shall! As long as the Ensnarer and Drubber Castro –’

  Judge Proth duly censored himself at this point. He then resumed.

  ‘Therefore, it has been ruled that Fee-dell Castro, President of the Hostile and Illegal State of Koobah, was responsible for the death of Mr. Davis.’

  ‘But, was the smoking of the cee-gar enough to make somebody go into a tailspin, or was it something else?’ Butterbugs blurted out.

  ‘Silence, client!’ snarled Judge Proth. ‘Further debate on this issue is impossible. You cannot appeal because all charges against you have been dropped.’

  ‘But this case hasn’t been closed yet!’

  ‘M’lud –’

  ‘Shaddap da bodayas!’ snapped the Judge, relapsing into the obscure Coral Gables-cum-Jersey-cum-Cuban accent of his youth. Then he regained his composure and wound up the case, as a result of Butterbugs’ observations.

  Thus was the aging President of Cuba sentenced, in absentia, to death by lethal-cocktail injection.

  Butterbugs was free.

  And the free world was free of the living specter of Isaac Davis.

  Secretly, Butterbugs thought, ‘Viva Fidel! Thank you for your deed!’

  Sonny Projector already had a deal to make a picture next year in Havana.

  As for Muaz-José Khirigh, the beverage procurer, he and his union of Hollywood Party Servers were silently ecstatic. They had pulled it off. Tincture of Sarcobbian Ytyrbium difoxate, the exact/same toxin found in Magic Marker juice, had come out of an eyedropper behind the serving bar and swum into that little old nipperkin of St. Judex-Chrysostum liqueur that blazing day, bound for the belly & brain of their tyrant. The rage Davis had instilled in his servants called for immediate action and a permanent outcome.

  The luck of the coincidence was unbelievable. In a small box in Judge Proth’s safe lay the signature long nine cigar, with only traces of the most minimal ash at the end. One attempt had been made to light it, but in no way had Exhibit #43 ever been smoked. Fidel’s signature was complete, and thus, worth much more on eBay. A bit of discreet trimming would indicate that the ’gar had never been lit, and certain chemical procedures could be enacted that would ensure that ignition smoke had never been transferred throughout its penile mileage.

  Indeed, Isaac Davis had never inhaled.

  60.

  How Do You Fill A Vacuum When A Vacuum Stops Being A Vacuum?

  The Post-Isaac Davis Era in Hollywood promised to be exciting. For starters, gone was the man himself, that obnoxious boor who would never be missed, not even by his fellow paranoid-sociopathic fascists. But what remained was the main mass of the edifice known as Isaac Davis Heavy Industries International, that most beau of ideals of what a multinational conglomerate can be – but shouldn’t be. ‘Dirty’ was a word far too clean to describe IDHII. There were very few, even in the upper echelons of the Group itself, who would be able to give a proper overview of what the true dimensions and ramifications of this concern really were. Only Isaac Davis himself could have accomplished that daunting, secretive task. And you know what happened to him.

  So it came as an exhilarating double-shock to Butterbugs when he got a call, via Sonny Projector, from IDHII’s Board of Trustees, inviting him, Butterbugs, for an afternoon tea/meeting at the Isaac Davis Innovative Center for the Isaac Davis Heavy Industries International Group in downtown LA, in two days’ time.

  ‘Not to worry’, said Sonny. ‘It’s not an indictment. It’s an olive branch, baby.’

  Butterbugs was wondering if there might be some hard feelings about his ‘involvement’ with the hideous final moments of Isaac Davis, the trial, his encounter with the dead man’s family’s rage at the Castro Outcome, and his own scot-free status.

  ‘You’ll soon find out,’ Sonny concluded.

  On the day of the encounter, Butterbugs drove his ’59 Ferrari to the meeting. He just wanted that particular rig; no special reason.

  IDHII’s Universal HQ was indeed ‘innovative’, and as a matter of fact, it perfectly reflected its namesake’s involuted personality. Its concept and structure had even called Isaac Davis’ sexual orientation into question, as the conformation of the architecture was decidedly an opposite of the usual corporate jockeys’ priapic gestures, as far as landmark headquarters are concerned.

  As everyone in the civilized world knew, Isaac Davis had made pop culture history a few years back by conceiving and commissioning one of the architectural world’s most daring and audacious works of construction. Having the spot-cash money to pay (in full, and instantly) for whatever he wanted in this existence, Isaac Davis had created the world’s first full-height skyscraper that achieved the seemingly impossible. To go where no skyscraper had gone before. Straight down. Here was an oblong mass, almost an exact replica of the Amoco Building in Chicago.

  [Now dubbed the Aon Bldg. Ed Stone, architect, 1972. 80 stories. 2.3 million sq. ft. 1136’ high; 194’x194’ footprint. Exterior in Carrera marble, refaced with granite – a job that cost more than the building’s original expenditure.]

  A mass which, due to the severe yet dynamic paranoia of its Owner, thrust itself into the earth with all the perpendicularity of an elevator shaft. Some called it an ostrich hole. Others said ‘spider hole’.

  At the plan’s unveiling, Isaac was ebullient. Skidmore et al had nixed the offer. Frank Lloyd Wright confessed that he found the proposal ‘interesting’, but he thought Davis was ‘too much of a bastard’. Philip Johnson had had enough of dictators in his youth. I.M. Pei wouldn’t touch it. The project made Zaha Hadid feel ill.

  So, in typical Davis fashion, the Owner had gone to obscure tracts (and lengths) in order to seek out those who would serve him. At length he found his architect, in Yean, North Korea. Kim Chi
n Chil had designed several of the Dearest Leader’s missile silos and bomb vaults, and now that he and the D.L. were living in exiled luxury on Wrangell Island, their services became available.

  ‘It’ll serve as a spike in the turf – an anchor – to prevent Vegas from ever becoming waterfront property!’ Isaac D. bragged, waving his flabby arms like a spastic chicken. Seismologists could never agree whether this boring into scary geology was a filler plug in a dangerous gap, or if this gesture was just ‘asking for it’.

  So was the ‘crustscraper’ (coinage of the term was instantly embraced internationally) successfully built and opened for business, after an undisclosed number of casualties.

  ‘I showed ’em! I tell you, I showed ’em! As I always will!’ was Davis’ official reply to all his critics.

  And yes, the critics as well as the public had to admit, the place was workable, if not spectacular – in an on-edge, Jules Verne sort of way. Most of the inhabitants found the light shows and fake scenery that were projected outside the ‘windows’ were far better than the perpetually Kuwaiti-khaki-toned ceiling of hopelessness and despair that still reigned in the skies above LA. Outside the quadruple glazing, implied, manufactured environments ruled. At one moment it might be the Vale of Kashmir they saw, a wintry Canadian Rockies forest the next.

  A contract with MTV to provide sound ’n’ visuals fell through at the last minute. It would have been very ‘un-Isaac’ anyway. As it was, the eminent Bill Cameron Menzies and Ed Steichen had been the visual consultants.

  (In many cases, it was not shameful or inappropriate for thinking people to work for Isaac Davis. As George C. Scott bellowed in Paddy Chayefsky’s ‘The Hospital’ (UA, 1971), ‘Everybody lives with lies!’)

  At the very bottom of the crustscraper, even below the Board’s ‘pent-up-house’ was a luxury restaurant called The Pump Shed. Projected onto the walls were endlessly running loops from Henry Levin and Charlie Brackett’s CinemaScope production of ‘Journey to the Center of the Earth’ (20th-Fox, 1959), with Pat Boone and Jim Mason, one of Davis’ favorite pictures (though he snottily never admitted so publicly, on account of having nothing to do with its production).

  The ritzy bar down there tended to generate nervousness, what with the creepy Bernard Herrmann music and ‘Arne Saknussem’ being uttered every few minutes. Placed in a significant and spotlighted niche on the wall was a certificate that proudly proclaimed that no academic geologist had ever ‘had the guts’ to take refreshment there.

  The restaurant was nicknamed ‘The Dump Shack’ or ‘The Sump Shack’, as Davis was constantly boasting that all the waste from the building proceeded past this point through a Prime Drain and into a cistern of indeterminate depth, gravity-driven, odor-free, and surely environmentally-friendly.

  Right.

  He personally believed that Verne’s concept of an internal ocean was true – perfect for the dissipation of liquid-prone waste! Thus, he wore a ‘Save the Earth’ button in public for years, and millions thought he was a fair-minded environmentalist who was really doing something about the earth’s degradation.

  One additional note: infrequent but certain percolations of sewage were reported to occur, with no explanation as to why, in the Silver Lake area, causing property values to crash.

  After eine tasse tea in the corporate pent-up-house at the drain of the building, Butterbugs faced the Board.

  ‘Why have you asked me to this place?’ he queried.

  Deukalion Smith and Loby Cruncheon were the Board’s senior members. Their associations with everything from the RAND Corporation to ALEC to the American Enterprise Institute were well known, but Butterbugs was not intimidated by their heritage (and the Heritage Foundation came within their net, by the way).

  Meredith Chegley, Board member, and scion of the vast Chegley Stores empire, got right to the point.

  ‘Butterbugs, since you are one of our most treasured, respected and featured actors that the world has ever known, we were wondering if, now that that sonofabitch Davis is gone, if you might lend your good and sparkling name to our urgent mission?’

  ‘You have my attention,’ said Butterbugs, calmly.

  ‘Butterbugs, we would like you to assume the mega-high office of Director-General of the IDHII Group on a temporary basis, with the complete and utter purpose of overseeing the Group’s complete, utter, and final dissolution. We ask you, as the final COO, to preside over this process, as we, Board members all, will be so taxed in our duties regarding the actuality of such a dissolution that we would naturally be required to honor a great name as a centrally-placed Warden, in the midst of our trials.’

  Butterbugs was indeed startled at this proposal, but he remained cool.

  ‘Why, then, do you wish to dissolve this mega-enterprise?’

  ‘Because, my respected auroral star, whose performance in ‘Lenin’ (UA) so impacted our very souls with impressive thoughts and ideas, we wish to rectify the wrongs done by said asshole Davis. To disband his Evilish Empire, and to continue to serve our own and the Earth’s interests under more respectful and toned-down guises.’

  Butterbugs could sense a tad bit of corporate wiliness here.

  ‘And one thing we did learn from Davis, that we intend to pursue in our own powerful ways. Do you know what it is? Save the Earth! And as we used to say back to him: ‘Gung-ho, fat boy!’’

  The whole Board burst into robust jollity.

  ‘I’m sure you said that to his face!’ observed Butterbugs.

  ‘We did! I tell you, we did!’ The sober Chegley paused, out of mental invention imperatives. ‘But only at his picture on the wall!’

  More laughter.

  Butterbugs now noticed a baroque golden frame on said wall, conspicuously empty, with a few canvas threads and oil paint shavings along the edges. What looked like saber slashes marred the gypsum board behind.

  ‘But I seriously want to emphasize’, Mr. Chegley continued, ‘that our commitment to environmental issues will march on. And on and on and on.’

  ‘Well, that’s better,’ Butterbugs exhaled.

  There was rustling, coughing, and re-settling of everyone who occupied the scrapey-sounding leathery Board chairs.

  Then, it was almost as if a pin-spot suddenly illuminated the urgent visage of Deukalion Smith, as he asked, in a plaintive voice which rose in a slightly withered progression:

  ‘Will you SERVE?’

  An intermezzo of ruminative thought, endorsed by the Board, ensued.

  Unbeknownst to Butterbugs though, the Group’s dissolution would invariably serve the agendas of all those fourteen Board members who owned the corporation now. For, free as they were from the iron grip of Isaac Davis’s personal tyranny, their concerns could, if a few hurdles were jumped, retreat from the tedious and dangerous stage upon which Davis had placed its activities, such as his very public dalliances with motion pictures, so as to return to the occult world of covert substructures whence they came, and from where it was vastly more comfortable – and profitable – in seeing to some of the world’s darkest business.

  Now the star known as Butterbugs had long been meditating on the state of the world and its risks, and to him this invitation was akin to the concept of actually presiding over a program of, say, the magnitude of ridding the world of nuclear weapons, once and for all. To the actor/star, it sounded like it could be an opportunity, a step past the mere limitations of the strolling player.

  Loby Cruncheon stepped forward.

  ‘We have certain schemes that, on the surface, may sound somewhat radical to you, but due to our careful consideration and consultation with experts of all kinds, why, we plan to enact them in sequence. What could be more natural? Thus, the incredible demands that will be made upon us, and thus, our need for a nobleman to stand at the tiller whilst we engage in our honest labors of the field. Do you follow me?’

  Butterbugs raised his eyebrows, but he replied:

  ‘I think that I almost do.’

  ‘G
ood. Gooood. Let me give you the one beautiful example. The fine example of our enlightenment. This building, the very building in which, and under which, we sit this day – this building will soon be evacuated, emptied, wired for earthquake sensors, and gradually filled with non-organic landfill rubbish until full, then sealed permanently with ferro-concrete.’

  Thus, he explained, would the modern evil that was IDHII find itself made purposeful in death. And even this grave would, in future, only be referred to as the landfill that did its part for humanity in the field of earthquake prediction.

  The Board exhaled their approval and pride in this scheme, via the polite mutter of officers who are totally of the same mind.

  ‘So, here we stand, on what will soon be compressed mass of complete and utter denseness; the earth itself!’ Butterbugs exclaimed, in wonder.

  ‘Aye!’ agreed Smith, grimly.

  ‘This spot, soon to be a non-entity. It’s hard to believe!’

  ‘Believe it, Butterbugs! Believe! And YOU will be its author!’ encouraged Loby.

  ‘Eine splendid achievement!’ Faris-Ferris Cheung said, speaking up for the first time, in his heavy Austro-Hungarian-Chinese accent.

  ‘It vill be gemüchlichkeit! said Loris Leung, ditto.

  ‘How long, then, will the term of my service be?’

  ‘No time at all, Butterbugs. The space of two bare months will be sufficient.’

  Loby was benevolent.

  ‘We have checked with Sonny, and your next picture, a thrilling adaptation of Pierre Louÿs’ ‘Aphrodite’, begins filming in Alexandria, ninety days hence. After which, you commence your long-cherished role as Bob Moses in Robert A. Caro’s masterful biography, ‘The Power Broker’,’ added Smith.

  ‘That leaves me with a month off.’

  ‘Precisely, Butterbugs.’

  ‘This position may give me some added insight for my role as Bob Moses.’

  ‘It certainly may, Butterbugs.’