Jack and Dori, both off their feet now, clutched in each other's violent embrace, kicked and bit and scratched and punched and rolled around on the red carpet among the feet of the nearer brawlers. Being down there, intent on their pummeling, each with an earlobe of the other clenched in their teeth, they were among the last to hear the wail of the approaching sirens.
34
"We were going to honeymoon in Brazil," I tell O'Connor, “but the marriage didn't last that long, so I went with Buddy instead.''
So many things startle and perplex this fellow. He goggles at me. “You had the honeymoon anyway?'' he demands. “With Buddy?”
“Well," I explain, “it was never going to be just a honeymoon, anyway. It was always going to be a deductible expense.''
He doesn't get that part either. “A trip to Brazil? A honeymoon in Brazil? With or without the bride? A deductible expense?''
He is beginning to astonish me as much as I'm astonishing him. For a media maven, he sure as hell doesn't know much. I say, “Don't you know what Brazil's famous for?''
“Coffee," he says.
“No."
“Inflation."
“No."
"Brazil nuts?"
"Faces," I tell him.
His face is one of which they would never approve. He gapes at me with it. "Faces?"
"They've got a clinic down there," I tell him. "It's the most complete plastic-surgery operation in the world."
"In Brazil?"
"Absolutely. Plastic surgery to the stars; that's where it's done. Any operation you can think of and some you probably can't. Everybody goes there."
"I didn't know that," he says.
Feeling kindly toward him, I explain as gently as I can: "That's because you're nobody."
Not quite gentle enough, perhaps. Looking and sounding snippy, he says, "I'd always thought there were any number of plastic surgeons right here in Los Angeles."
"Oh, sure," I say. "Anybody can get hacked away at by those Bev Hills butchers, but if you want to be taken seriously in the industry, your face and body better say
MADE IN BRAZIL."
"I never guessed," he says.
"I tell you, Michael," I say, "I've had a standing reservation forever. I go down once a year, talk it over with the doctors, see what we want to snip and tuck."
"You've had plastic surgery?" He's peering at me, looking quite surprised at the idea.
"Are you kidding?" I ask him. "At my age, with the life I've led, there's only two ways I could look the way I do: either a painting in the attic, or a plastic surgeon in Brazil. I go Brazil."
"Gosh," he says.
"You bet. Every spring, I arrange it so my time's free, I fly on down to Rio and take in the carnival, and then go on to the clinic for the overhaul. Then back I come, feeling great, looking great, ready for another year of self-abuse."
"So that's where you planned to go with Dori Lunsford for your honeymoon."
"Right. The doctors could have worked on the both of us at the same time. Dori was getting a little flabby around the edges; she needed tightening up.”
“But when the marriage ended, you went with Buddy instead.”
“The last few years, Buddy's been coming down with me every time.” I chuckle, thinking of how serious Buddy can be when he puts his mind to it. “He really pays attention down there.” I say. “Takes notes, talks with the doctors, observes the operations. Not me; I don't want to see what faces look like when they're open.”
“But Buddy does.”
“I kid him sometimes,” I say. “When he's around and not mad at me, you know?”
“Buddy gets mad at you?”
“Oh, nothing serious,” I say. “He worries about me, that's all. You know what I mean.” But this conversation is making me edgy. Some sort of dark cloud is coming up from between the pieces of patio slate, swirling up, enveloping me. But it's not a bad cloud, not an evil cloud, no; it's a friendly cloud. It is here to help me, protect me, save me.
“Well, what do you kid Buddy about?” O'Connor is asking me, as the cloud rises between us. “During those times when he isn't mad at you, what do you kid him about?”
“That he's gonna know as much about the plastic surgery as the doctors pretty soon,” I say, “and I won't have to go down there every spring; I can stay here and Buddy can do the nips and the tucks.”
“He's that interested, is he?”
The cloud is obscuring everything. I try to remember what we're talking about. Brazil. “I'm about due,” I say, reaching up and patting the back of my hand against the underpart of my chin, feeling the looseness there. “I may have to start going twice a year,” I say. “Well, it's been nice talking to you,” I say, and I enter the cloud.
LUDE
At first, O’Connor has no idea what's happened. Pine was talking along, being coherent, making as much sense as he's ever made today, and then all at once he said, "It's been nice talking to you," and he smiled and waved by-by, and now he's just sitting there, unmoving. His eyes are glazed, his mouth holds a loose vague smile, and his hands rest easily in his lap. He is sitting up and his eyes are open, but he isn’t home.
"Mr. Pine?" O'Connor says, and repeats it louder: "Mr. Pine? Shit, again?" Shaking his head, he yells, "Hoskins!"
And that worthy appears at once, stepping rapidly from the house, hurrying this way, carrying in his right hand the familiar silver tray bearing a single tall glass of water, and in his left hand an old black doctor's bag. Arriving, "You bellowed, sir?" he asks.
O'Connor indicates the frozen actor. "You see."
Hoskins studies this latest manifestation. "Ah, yes," he says. "I thought we might go next to Middle Earth. Particularly if we were feeling threatened or upset."
"Maybe so," O'Connor says. "I thought maybe we were finally getting somewhere. Can you bring him out of it?"
With cheery indomitability, Hoskins says, "Trust to luck, eh?"
O'Connor sits back, notebook resting in his lap, and watches Hoskins go to one knee, put the tray bearing the glass of water to one side on the patio slate, and open the doctor's bag. For some little time he studies its contents, then frowns at O'Connor, saying, "How much longer will you need him?"
"Hard to say, exactly," O'Connor answers, tapping his pen against the notebook.
"Less than an hour?"
"Oh, sure," O'Connor says. "No problem."
"Good," Hoskins says. "All in all, one prefers not to use the suppositories."
As Hoskins begins taking bottles and boxes from the bag, studying them, fiddling with them, O'Connor says, "Hoskins, do you have to keep readjusting him all the time like this?"
"Oh, no, sir," Hoskins assures him. "Usually we let him set his own pace, you know. It's only if he's actually filming, or such. But today, of course, is rather different."
"I see." O'Connor nods, then says, "Hoskins, do you mind my asking? What do you think of Jack Pine?"
"Think of him, sir?" Hoskins ponders that question, then says, "One doesn't normally think about one's employer. It's not quite seemly. Still, I would say he's rather easier than most to get along with."
"Particularly when he's like this," O'Connor suggests.
"Too true," Hoskins agrees. "Nevertheless, he is rather a sweet person at heart." Frowning at the sweet person, Hoskins says, "Our next adjustment is a two-stager. Do you mind my being here in the interval?"
"You mean, while I'm questioning him?"
"Well, yes, sir, or whatever you do."
"Is that necessary?" O'Connor asks. He seems jealous of his privileged privacy with the actor.
"You could perhaps do the second part yourself, sir, if you wouldn't object," Hoskins suggests.
“No objection," O'Connor says promptly. “What do I do?''
“You have a watch?"
“Sure," O'Connor says, extending his left wrist, showing the Timex strapped there.
“Good."
Hoskins places the tray bearing the glass of wate
r next to O'Connor's chair. He transfers three red capsules from a bottle out of the doctor's bag to his palm and then to the tray, next to the water. “When I give you the sign," he says, “look at your watch, and in exactly three minutes from that time, give him these three capsules. Make sure he takes them all and washes them down with all the water. We don't want him going nova on us."
“No, you're right," O'Connor says. Feeling something like awe, he looks at his watch and at the three capsules lying on the silver tray.
From the doctor's bag, Hoskins takes a plastic tube with a ball at the end of it. There seems to be something inside the tube, which Hoskins inserts into Pine's left nostril. Then he slowly squeezes the ball, counting aloud: “One. Two. Three. Four. Five” Removing the tube from his employer's nose, he turns and says to O'Connor, “Counting from now”
O'Connor looks closely at his watch. He's very aware of his responsibility.
Hoskins puts the tube away, puts the other boxes and bottles away, and closes the doctor's bag. Then he gets to his feet, dusts off the knees of his trousers, picks up the doctor's bag, and says to O'Connor, “Remember, sir. Three minutes."
“I remember," O'Connor says.
Pine suddenly speaks, without altering his posture or expression or changing in any other way. In a deep sepulchral voice he says, “Frankly, Scarlett, I don't give a flying fuck."
“Ah, yes," Hoskins says, nodding in satisfaction. “The Gone with the Wind remake. We just recently completed that."
"I know," O'Connor says. "He told me."
"More of it may surface," Hoskins says, "but it should taper off quite soon."
In that same deep sepulchral voice, still without shifting position or changing facial expression, the actor intones, "You want something from me, and you want it badly enough to show a lot of tit in those velvets."
"Well," Hoskins says, "until the next crisis." And he leaves, heading back to the house again, carrying the doctor's bag with him.
O'Connor, mindful of the three-minute deadline, looks at his watch.
"What time is it?"
Startled, O'Connor looks past his watch at the actor, and finds the man looking back at him, calm and relaxed and apparently in perfectly ordinary shape. O'Connor says, "Mr. Pine? Are you all right?"
"Of course I'm all right," Pine answers, his manner now surly, even snappish. "Who the hell are you?" he demands. "You better scram before I call Security."
"I'm Michael O'Connor. We've been talking here."
Pine's face goes blank. In that deep sepulchral voice again, he says, "Rhett. Rhett Butler. And I don't take shit from any man."
Exasperated, trying to find some way to get Pine back on track, O'Connor says, "Did Dori Lunsford get the beach house? After the divorce?"
The actor frowns at him, uncomprehending, and slowly that expressive face changes, lightens up, becomes cheerful and welcoming again. "The interviewer!" Pine says, delighted to see him. "Where you been, Michael?"
O'Connor, becoming wise in the ways of Jack Pine's mind, says, "Took a walk around, looked at the property."
"Nice here, isn't it?" Pine smiles around at his land, and O'Connor notices how he manages never to look directly at the swimming pool. Still smiling, the actor says, "No, it was Lorraine who got the beach house, finally, after a long fight. Dori would have gotten this place, only we didn't actually have to get divorced."
“You didn't?"
“No.” The actor smiles broadly in remembered pleasure. “It was a real pleasant surprise. I got an annulment, not a divorce. Turns out, prenuptial consummations don't count.”
“So this has been your home ever since.”
Pine looks around, looks left, looks right, smiles in comfortable ownership, never looks directly at the pool. “Yeah,” he says dreamily. “There's no place like home.”
DREAM SEQUENCE
A heavenly chorus sings; hallelujah. Jack floats down the wide staircase, a dust mote among the dust motes, his fingertips gliding down the polished oak balustrade, his feet never touching the stairs. Shafts of sunlight bend around him, creating a personal monogrammed rainbow just for Jack Pine. Imagine!
Partway down the stairs, Jack meets sullen, grumpy old Buddy coming up, in loafers and chinos and a beautiful beige cashmere sweater that just eats up all the sun. “Hi, Buddy,” Jack sings, pirouetting on the stairs, the chorus turning his words into madrigals, the dust motes writing the music on the staffs of sunshafts. “Just get in, Buddy Buddy?”
“Looks that way,” grumbles Buddy, not in tune with the music or the day at all, and he stumps on up the stairs, barely even glancing in Jack's direction.
Why can't Buddy be happy? Jack is happy. Jack floats down a step or two, then stops to consider a sudden kind of revelation. Wafting about, gazing upward at Buddy's bent receding back, Jack says, "Buddy? Isn't that my sweater?"
"It was," Buddy says, without pausing or looking back. As Jack watches, with tiny tendrils of distress creeping about his heart, Buddy pounds on up to the top of the stairs and disappears down the wide white hall.
"Sir?"
It is Hoskins's voice, taking a solo above the chorus. Jack floats around to face down-flight, and there stands Hoskins, all in black, at the bottom step, his hand upon the newel post.
"Ah, Hoskins," Jack breathes, grateful for the distraction that made him forget . . .
. . . something.
"Dr. Ovoid's here, sir," Hoskins announces.
Elation lifts Jack even farther into the air, inches and inches above the mundane wooden steps. "Goody!" he cries.
Hoskins lifts a surprisingly expressive hand from the newel post and gestures gracefully with it, as he says, "I put him in the east parlor."
"Oh, yes! Oh, yes! The east parlor!" And Jack sails through the air, over Hoskins's surprised and laughing head, sweeping away toward the east parlor.
Within the east parlor, waiting, looms Dr. Ovoid, large and round and sleek and buttery and well-satisfied, with a dead-white face and tiny hands and feet. The east parlor itself is a lovely room, full of flowers and morning sun and white wicker furniture; but at the moment Dr. Ovoid stands by a prettily curtained window, smiling as he gazes out upon the rose garden in rich and luxuriant flower. And behind him, on a long table, rests a rolled-up black silk bag a bit larger and much softer than a quart whiskey bottle.
The hall door swings open of its own accord, and in a moment Jack swirls in, surrounded by fairy garlands and cherubs trilling hosannahs. "Good raorrrr-ning, doctor," sings Jack, and in great good spirits he flies around the ceiling.
Dr. Ovoid turns and beams upon his patient, happy to see this happiness, happy to be appreciated, happy to be wanted. “Good morning, Jack," he says, and rubs his tiny hands together, and paces to the long table.
While Jack eagerly watches, dancing in place, the doctor's tiny fingers untie the silk ribbon holding the silk bag closed. Then he unrolls the bag down the length of the table, showing the coral-colored silk lining within. The silk bag is like a half-size sleeping bag, one foot wide and three feet long, and its interior is lined with compartments displaying bottles of pills, bottles of powders, boxes of capsules and ampules, packages of inhalers and suppositories, all sorts of wonderful things for good little boys and girls. “Living better chemically,” Jack says, rubbing his hands together, smiling down at the assortment.
Dr. Ovoid steps back and spreads his hands like a showman, displaying his wares. “Well, Jack,” he says. “And how do you want to feel today?”
LUDE CONTINUED
O’Connor watches Jack Pine's dreamy eyes, dreamy smile. Will the man ever get down to it, get to the point? But the closer he comes to present time, of course, the harder it becomes to keep him moving. "There's no place like home," O'Connor says, repeating the actor's last words in an effort to get him in motion again.
"Ohhhh, yes." Those dreamy eyes find O'Connor's eyes and gaze into them. "I'm safe here," says that dreamy voice.
"The world's left outsid
e."
"Yeeessss." The eyes are filling with color, becoming less dreamy. "It's very nice here, very restful," and the voice gets stronger, the words faster, "after a hard day at the studio." The voice is going up in pitch, the eyes are pinholes in a decaying face, the words are coming faster and faster: "I can warm my flank, create a cause by the crater of the Susanna sometimewhenthesoonsunsome- soonsunsooooooOOOOOO—!!"
"Oh, my God!" O'Connor cries, lost in the actor's keening. "The pills!"
"YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!”
Fumbling in haste, O'Connor blunders out of his canvas chair and onto his knees beside the dead-faced, pin-eyed screaming actor. His nervous fingers chase the three red capsules around the silver tray like an overeager puppy snuffling after ants on the sidewalk. He manages to capture all three, fold them into his palm.
“YYYYYYYYYYY—'"
O'Connor clutches the back of Pine's neck with one hand, shoves the capsules with his other hand down into that black and red straining screaming maw, reaches for the waterglass.
“Y! Y! Y! Y! Y!”
O'Connor pours water into that mouth; some bubbles out again, over the actor's chin and down onto his pale blue terry-cloth robe, but some stays, oozing past the screams and down the gullet.
“y-ng! y-ng! y-ng! Y-ng! ngngngngngngngngng- ngng . . ."
O'Connor, still kneeling, still holding the waterglass— now half empty—sits back on his heels and watches. The noises from the actor's mouth lessen, become arrhythmic, more like burps or hiccups or dry leaves. O’Connor, his brow furrowed with guilt and fellow-feeling, says, “Mr. Pine? Jack?''
The actor grows silent. Then, all at once, he shudders all over his body, as though reacting to some strong explosion deep within. After an instant of rigidity, he begins to tremble, as though freezing cold, and a look of terror crosses his face. Folding his shoulders in defensively toward his ears, he brings his knees up to his chin and wraps his arms around his legs. The look of terror increases, becomes a rigid stare into the deepest pit, and in a small, cracking, weak, tremulous voice the actor says, “That—That—That—That can—That can . . . hurt”
Westlake, Donald E - Novel 50 Page 13