by Zev Chafets
“You don’t look like you scare so easily.”
“Maybe a little easier than you think. But yeah, not so much. Not anymore.”
“What happened, Linnie. After that day on the phone?”
“The story of my life?”
“The highlights. What about Flanders?”
“Gregg and I got divorced twelve, no thirteen years ago. He busted up his knees, the Rams cut him and he cut me. It was a bad season, you could say.”
“Were you in love with him?”
“Not at the end, no. But I liked him all right. He was good about my going to law school while Teddy was small—”
“How old is he now? Teddy?”
“Nineteen. He’s a sophomore at Columbia.”
“Not a football player?”
“No, not a football player,” said Linda.
“Okay, so you and Flanders split up. Then what?”
“I stayed in LA. By that time I was with a firm that did entertainment law and I was making very big money, three hundred dollars an hour—”
“You must be a good lawyer,” said Mack.
“Damn good,” Linda said. “And I enjoyed it, the entertainment scene. It was fun. That’s how I met my second husband. Roger Chadwick?”
“Should I know the name?”
“I guess not, although if you lived out there you probably would. He’s a producer, not one of the biggest, but fairly well known.”
“How long did that last?”
“A couple years. More than a couple, really. Four, I guess. And then we broke up and I came back here.”
“Why?”
“The short answer is that my father died and left me a lot of money. When I came home to work out the details of the estate, one of the lawyers told me about Liberty Records, which was for sale. It seemed like a good opportunity, so I decided to stay.”
“And what’s the long answer?”
Linda extracted a Kent from her purse, lit it with a gold Ronson, took a long drag and exhaled with her eyes closed. “The long answer is I didn’t like the way I was living out there. Roger was into drugs in a big way, and I got into it, too. Coke mostly, but we did everything. And when he got high, he liked to play games.”
“What kind of games?”
“Sex games, mostly, California style. He used to invite a dozen or so of his closest friends, get naked in the Jacuzzi and then see who did what to whom.”
“If you hated it, why did you go along?” asked Mack. He was trying to sound sympathetic, but he had an erection.
“I didn’t hate it, I loved it,” Linda said in a flat voice. “It got to be the only thing I did love, really; getting wrecked and going crazy and then coming down so I could get wrecked and crazy again. The funny part is, it seemed natural. I mean, that’s the way we were raised, isn’t it? You and I were smoking dope and dropping acid and screwing when I was a junior in high school.
“Then one day I came home from shopping and I found Roger in bed with Teddy and a woman. Know who she was?”
Mack swallowed hard and shook his head. “Who?”
“Teddy’s guidance counselor,” she said. “Honest to God. The three of them were stoned, and she was tied to the bedposts, sort of wriggling around. I just stood there staring, and Roger—I can’t believe I’m telling you this—Roger smiled this dopey smile and said, ‘Hop in, honey.’ ”
“How old was Teddy?”
“Fifteen. He had this dreamy, stoned look on his face and he said, ‘Come on, Linda, it’s cool.’ ”
“Holy shit.”
“Yeah,” she said, taking another long drag on the Kent. “You want to hear the rest? The worst part?”
Mack nodded.
“I was tempted. Just for a second, you know? It was like, okay, this is where things have been heading, let’s get it on. All those years I’d been living like there was no such thing as right and wrong. We got high in front of Teddy, we never made any effort to hide what we were doing. It was just another lifestyle, like belonging to a country club or a church. For just that split second I thought, ‘All right, this is where you step over the line, go all the way.’ ”
“And then?”
“And then I vomited. All over the guidance teacher, who didn’t seem to mind at all. I slapped Teddy so hard he noticed, dragged him, buck naked, out of bed and pushed him out of the room. I don’t really remember what happened after that, just a lot of screaming and breaking things and Roger lying there saying, ‘Chill, baby, it’s no big thing.’ If I had had a gun I would have shot him, and myself, too.”
“Jesus, Linnie,” said Mack.
“Yeah, Jesus. Anyway, I took Teddy and checked into the Beverly Hills Hotel. For the next few weeks I just sort of lay around trying to figure out how the hell my life had turned out this way. ‘You’re Linda Birney,’ I kept saying to myself, as if that meant something. I guess I was detoxing, too, although I didn’t admit it at the time. God only knows what Teddy thought.”
“You never discussed it with him?”
“I was too ashamed. I wanted to believe that he was too young to understand what a whore his mother was.”
“And then what?”
“And then, luckily, my father died. I guess I shouldn’t put it that way, but it’s true. I mean, we weren’t especially close, and he’d been sick—he died of cancer. Anyway, I saw a chance to get out of LA, move to someplace normal, get myself back.”
“You should have called me—”
“And said what? ‘Hi, Mack, this is the girl who dumped you in college, how about fixing everything for me, just for old times’ sake?’ I told you I’ve thought about you a lot, especially since coming back here, but I never considered getting in touch with you. That was over.”
Green noted the past tense. The story shocked him, but it excited him, too; he had to admit that he wondered what it would be like to be with Linda in a room full of naked strangers. He lit a Winston and looked around the darkened restaurant, trying to figure out a way to ask what he wanted to know.
“So, what’s your life like now?” he said finally. “Have you Seen the Light?”
“I’m not a nun, if that’s what you’re asking. Maybe I wanted to be at one point, but I don’t have the temperament for it. I’m damn careful, though, I can tell you that. And I don’t do drugs anymore. Do you?”
“Just this,” said Green, holding up his glass. “Maybe smoke a joint now and then.”
“Well, a joint …”
“I guess there’s not much action in Oriole, anyway,” said Green.
“There’s action everywhere,” said Linda. She took a sip of water.
“You seeing anyone now?”
“Not really. This is going to sound terrible, but most of the men I meet here are too square for me. I hate the life I lived in California, but the thing is, I lived it. It’s like a secret; once you know it you can’t unknow it. God, I’m sick of hearing myself talk. Tell me about you, Mack. What kind of book are you writing?”
“I’m not sure,” said Mack. “It keeps changing on me.”
“Well, whatever it is, it brought you back here. I’m glad.”
“Me too. Especially now. This feels like a dream.”
“What kind of dream?” asked Linda in a soft voice.
“Well, an erotic one,” Mack said.
Linda gave him a direct look. “Do you want to seduce me, Mackinac?”
“It’s crossed my mind.”
“Then consider me seduced,” she said. “Have you got somewhere we can go?”
“How about your place?”
She shook her head. “No. Teddy’s home for fall break.”
“Okay, what about the Hilton? There’s one around here, if I recall.”
“All right,” she said.
Mack laughed. “You know, I’ve been fantasizing about you for twenty-five years. Linda Birney, the unattainable dream. And now it’s happening. I feel like pinching myself.”
“Let’s go to the hotel a
nd I’ll do it for you,” said Linda in a low voice.
“Easy as that?”
“Yeah,” she said, stubbing out her cigarette. “Easy as that.”
Twenty
Wolfowitz met Conlon at his office, a small suite of rooms in a gray commercial building west of Herald Square. It was the kind of office an old-time movie private eye would have, grungy and disreputable, not unlike the man whose name was on the door. Wolfowitz appreciated the investigator’s unabashed authenticity. Over the years he had published a number of mysteries by ex-cops and private investigators who looked as wholesome and healthy as forest rangers. Nobody would ever mistake Conlon, with his pot belly, blue-veined nose and heavily Brylcreemed pompadour, for a forest ranger.
Years ago, Wolfowitz had told Conlon that he wouldn’t be needing pictures of Mack and Louise, and he had never used him to snoop on his wife again. But he had been impressed with the investigator’s discreet professionalism and had employed him ever since on sensitive cases. Conlon had looked into the backgrounds of potential libel litigants, engaged in industrial espionage against other publishing houses and tracked down writers who had gone AWOL with their advance money. This time, he had a report on Mack Green’s movie deal.
There were things about the Hollywood offer that had bothered Wolfowitz from the start. For one, Tommy Russo seemed almost unhappy about it. Even more puzzling, he didn’t understand why anyone would buy a Mack Green novel sight unseen, for six figures. He had asked Conlon to look into it, and now the detective was ready to give him some answers.
“The first thing is, this guy Ligget’s a front,” said Conlon, coming right to the point. He knew, after all this time, that Wolfowitz was not a man interested in pleasantries.
“A front for who?”
“Guy named Jeff Reggie,” said Conlon. “He’s a producer out there, does a lot of porno crap and some regular B movies.” He squinted at his typewritten notes. “I could give you some titles if you want. I’ve got ’em right here.”
“Later,” said Wolfowitz. “Unless it’s important.”
Conlon shook his head. “What’s important, looks like, is that Jeff Reggie’s cousin is Herman Reggie. That’s interesting.”
“Why? Who’s Herman Reggie?”
“He’s a bookie,” said Conlon. “Very big time. Also, he does enforcement for other bookies. You wouldn’t like him.”
“And he’s connected to this?”
“Yep,” said Conlon, consulting his notes again. “He owns a part of the deal. It’s a payment for a bad gambling debt.”
“Mack’s not a gambler. He doesn’t even play cards.”
“No, but his agent does. Tommy Russo. He bet with Herman, he lost to Herman and he paid up by giving his share of the book, which is entitled The Diary of a Dying Man, to Herman.”
“I know the name of the book,” said Wolfowitz impatiently; the one drawback in dealing with Conlon was his plodding thoroughness. “How do you know he gave the book to Reggie?”
Conlon fixed the editor in chief with a mysterious stare. “Mr. Wolfowitz, I can’t reveal that information,” he said. In fact, Conlon knew because Jeff Reggie had told Ligget, who had told Conlon’s associate in California. The reason Ligget had been so forthcoming was that Conlon’s associate was a moonlighting LA narcotics detective who threatened to bust him for dealing cocaine if he didn’t talk. These transactions were almost always easier than the client imagined, which was why Conlon liked to keep his professional secrets to himself.
“Okay, so Reggie owns 10 percent of the book,” said Wolfowitz. “That still doesn’t explain why his cousin bought the movie rights.”
“They think it’s going to make a lot of money,” said Conlon. “Ligget says his cut, just for fronting the deal, could be half a million bucks.”
“Half a million dollars?” Wolfowitz repeated, scratching his head. For once the gesture was real; he was genuinely baffled.
Conlon shrugged. “I’m not a movie critic, but they think a story like this, the author offs himself and leaves a book about it as a suicide note, is a big deal.”
“Offs himself? They’re crazy, Green’s not going to kill himself, he’s just writing a novel about someone who does. It’s fiction.”
“Whatever,” Conlon said noncommittally. It occurred to Wolfowitz that the ex-cop, with his little notebooks and written reports, probably hadn’t forgotten that he had once caught Mack Green sleeping with his wife.
“I wonder where they got the idea that Green was going to kill himself?” Wolfowitz mused. “Wait, did the name McClain come up?”
“McClain?” said Conlon, scanning his report. “Nope, no McClain. Who’s he?”
“Nobody,” said Wolfowitz. “It was just a thought.” Suddenly he felt a shiver of apprehension. Mack’s book, whatever Reggie had in mind, would be worthless once Horton’s suicide novel appeared. And if the bookie found out that Wolfowitz had ruined his investment, there could be trouble. “Tell me something. This guy Reggie—would you say he was dangerous?”
“Which one?”
“Either one, but I meant the bookmaker.”
“Jeff Reggie’s a pussy,” said Conlon. “Herman?” He raised his eyebrows. “There’s better people to owe money to.”
“No, I mean in general. If somebody cost him a lot of money, say, do you think he might do something violent?”
“That would be speculation on my part,” said Conlon.
“We’re not in court,” said Wolfowitz impatiently. “Speculate. What do you think?”
“What I think is that Herman Reggie wouldn’t gamble a hundred bucks, let alone a hundred thousand, unless he knew it was a sure thing.”
“You mean Green killing himself?”
“I didn’t say that,” Conlon said, looking directly into Wolfowitz’s cold gray eyes. “I just said that if Reggie thinks he can make that kind of dough on a book by a dead writer, and he’s shelling out a hundred grand of his own money for a book by a dead writer, you’re gonna wind up with a book and a dead writer.”
Wolfowitz was silent for a long moment as he digested Conlon’s analysis. “It would have to be suicide, though,” he said finally. “Or at least look like suicide. Could he do that?”
Conlon grunted as he shifted his weight off his hemorrhoids. “Make it look like a suicide?” he said. “Hell, there’s ways to make it look like he croaked from the bubonic plague.”
Twenty-one
“God, you’re magic,” said Mack, running his hands lightly over Linda’s bare back. They were in bed at the Hilton, a bed they had barely left for two days.
Linda rolled over on her side and ruffled Mack’s hair. “That’s what you keep saying,” she said.
“It’s the way I feel.”
“Yeah, but I think I’m entitled to better dialogue.”
“If I were an electrician would you expect me to rewire your house?”
“Damn straight,” said Linda, kissing him lightly on the lips. “That’s better, by the way. Most guys would have said, ‘If I were an electrician, I’d turn you on.’ ‘Rewire the house’ is original.”
“Glad you like it,” said Mack. “Do most guys say the same things in bed?”
“Sure,” said Linda. “At least in the beginning.”
“Is that what this is? A beginning?”
“Why don’t you answer some questions for a change?”
“For instance?”
“For instance, what do women say to you in bed?”
Mack flashed on the long, dreary line of literary ladies from the Big Ten states. “They say, ‘Why haven’t you published a novel in so long?’ ”
“Good question,” said Linda. “Why haven’t you?”
“I’ve been waiting for a really great idea,” said Mack.
“That’s the official answer,” said Linda. “Now, tell me the real one.”
“What makes you think that isn’t it?”
“Because I’m not a moron. Look, Mackinac, I told you abou
t my life and I told you the truth, every sordid, shitty, scary detail. You asked and I answered. Now it’s your turn.”
“Ah, Linnie,” Mack sighed, “I don’t know what the real story is myself. One day my books stopped selling, the critics turned on me and I guess I lost my nerve. I couldn’t work anymore.”
“Writer’s block,” said Linda.
“People think it’s some kind of a romantic affliction,” said Mack, “but it’s not, it’s like having insomnia. You know how the more you want to sleep the harder it gets, and the harder it gets the more frustrated you are? That’s writer’s block. You get up in the morning and you say, ‘It’s ten, I’ll start at noon.’ At noon you say, ‘I might as well get some lunch first.’ At two you decide that there’s no point in starting so late, you’ll get to work tomorrow. Tomorrow comes, it’s Wednesday, you decide to wait until Monday, get a fresh start with the new week. On Monday you look at the calendar, see it’s the twenty-fourth, and say to yourself, ‘I’ll begin on the first of the month.’ And every single time you know you’re lying, that you won’t start in an hour, or tomorrow, or next month, because when you sit down to write, nothing comes out. You start to hate yourself for lying, and feel sorry for yourself because you know you’re not lying on purpose, you just can’t help it because you can’t force yourself to be smarter or funnier or more interesting than you are. And you start to feel desperate.”
“It sounds awful,” said Linda.
“Yeah,” said Mack. “It is.” In all the years of failure he had never admitted to anyone how scared and miserable he was. He had misgivings about telling Linda, too; he didn’t think she was the kind of woman who liked losers. But now that he was talking, he felt a compulsion to continue. “You remember my dad, right? He used to tell me, ‘Life’s what you say it is.’ That’s what I did, I said ‘Everything’s all right.’ I said it to other people and I said it to myself, and in the meantime I kept drinking and laughing and racing around, trying to drown or placate or outrun whatever it was that was keeping me from writing.”
“I notice you haven’t said anything about women,” Linda said.