Destiny (76 page)

Lewis, still in bed, exhausted by his lovemaking, heard Helen open the door to him, heard his voice, and groaned.

"Don't tell me," he said when she came back into the room. "He couldn't get through on the phone, so he's come in person."

"That's right." She was putting on some clothes. She did not look around.

"I'm going to tell him." Lewis threw back the covers and bounced out of bed, suddenly purposeful. He grabbed her from behind, and hugged her.

"Now?"

"Why not? He has to know, sooner or later. Everyone does. And I want them to know. I want the world to know. I feel like shouting it from the rooftops."

"I suppose so. It's just—I'm a little afraid of Thad." Something in her face made Lewis pause. He remembered the scene on location that last day in Trastevere. It had never been explained, never even referred to again. However, now was not the moment to start asking questions about that; it was probably nothing of any importance, and she would explain it to him another time.

In that supposition he was wrong, but, that morning, nothing could shake his confidence, not even Thad. He kissed her, aware that the complicity between them, which excluded Thad, gave him pleasure. He began to look forward with relish to the moment when he broke the news, when he saw the surprise register on Thad's face.

In this ambition he was disappointed. He broke the news to Thad with sly charm, his arm around Helen's waist. Thad blinked once, twice, three times—that was all. He continued to sit still, nursing a mug of tea in his plump lap. Hardly missing a beat, he said amiably, "Hey. That's great. When?"

It was Lewis who blushed, to his own annoyance. He suddenly realized that the way he had said it—Helen is having a baby; we're going to get married—it sounded as if he were the father. His own impetuosity, his perverse desire to score off his friend, had now precipitated them into a very awkward situation indeed. Thad was looking at him imperturbably. Lewis threw him a smile.

"Which? The wedding, or the baby?"

"Both, I guess." Thad took a sip of tea.

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"The wedding—as soon as possible. And the baby ..."

"In the spring," she finished quietly, and Lewis felt a quiet glow of triumph; she had taken her cue from him. The sense of pleasurable complicity intensified.

"Terrific. That's really terrific." Thad put down the tea and stood up. "I'm really glad for you both. Now—about the movie. Or maybe I should say movies. " He gave a little smile, and his voice took on a wounded note. "There have been developments, you know. I've been trying to get you two on the phone for days. ..."

Lewis and Helen exchanged glances. The telephone, Lewis saw, was now back on its cradle. He hoped she had put it there unobtrusively: Thad didn't miss much.

He and Helen sat down, and Thad began to pace up and down, waving his arms. He launched into one of his monologues. The editing on Night Game was nearly finished. He had a rough cut; TruflFaut had seen it. Various other friends in Paris had seen it. They had all been knocked out. . . .

Thad was never modest; he saw no need to be now. The way he talked about it. Night Game was going to be like Citizen Kane: it was going to change people's ideas about cinema overnight. It was going to establish his reputation at a stroke, and—unlike the Welles picture—it was going to be an immediate box-office success. . . .

Lewis listened to this, his attention starting to wander. He had heard Thad hold forth about his own work in this vein before, and had been impressed by it. But that had been in Los Angeles, when they first met. In Rome, he had had his doubts when he watched Thad at work; now, they returned to him. Really, Thad laid it on a bit thick. Did he realize how absurd he sounded? He would reserve judgment, Lewis decided, until he actually saw the film, and saw what happened to it. Meanwhile, Thad sounded boastful, and, as usual, his monomania made him untactful. He had not mentioned Helen's performance once so far, and that oversight irritated Lewis. He glanced at her, and their eyes met. With a sense of satisfaction, Lewis decided she was of the same opinion as himself.

"Now ..." Thad had turned to the subject of Henri Lebec. Henri Lebec was a rich, homosexual, indolent young Frenchman, heir to the considerable fortune his father had made bottling mineral water. Lebec saw himself as a patron of the arts, and hung around with a lot of film people. Thad had met him through Truffaut, and it was Lebec who, together with Lewis, had put up the money for Night Game. Fifty thousand dollars each. Lewis sighed. If Night Game died, he would lose that money —but then, he could stand the loss, and so could Lebec. He had been prepared from the first to lose it.

Lewis, who had always had more money than he needed, never thought

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about it a great deal. He had been prepared to gamble on Thad, and to help him, but if Thad was leading up to a suggestion of further investment in some new project, Lewis knew he intended to refuse. One loss, yes; but he was not profligate and he was not a fool. And from now on, his financial circumstances would be very different. He would have a wife to look after —and the baby.

It became gradually clear, however, that this was not Thad's drift. Thad was now talking about money, quite big money, but it wasn't Lewis's, or Henri Lebec's.

"So the thing is . . ."he was saying, "the word is out. And the distribution deals on Night Game are just falling into place. Like, suddenly, everyone wants it. We're hot. Truffaut thinks I ought to enter it for Cannes. We might even get American release—limited, you know—movie theaters near campuses, a few art houses in New York, that kind of thing. But it's a start. I mean, we could win the fucking Palme d'Or at Cannes and it wouldn't mean a goddamned thing back in L.A., but if we get an American showing, and some good returns, that will mean something. Then we make one more picture in Europe—I'm thinking about London—and then we go back to America with the third. Then we stay there, of course. We won't need to piss around in Europe then. But if we get this backing, the whole process can be speeded up, that's the point. Film Three can be big. And Film Four can be—"

"Backing? What backing?" Lewis interrupted testily, and Thad turned around to him, looking injured.

"You haven't been listening, Lewis. I just told you. . . ."

"Tell me again. I didn't quite grasp it the first time."

"Okay." Thad sighed, sat down again, and adopted a patient tone of voice. "There's this distribution company called Sphere. It's an American distribution company, right? You've got that, Lewis? It was in a bad way, but it's been bought. By Partex Petrochemicals."

He produced this name—with which Lewis, a banker's son, was famihar —in the manner of a conjurer producing a rabbit from a hat.

"And?"

"And Partex has big plans for Sphere. They're pouring money into it, Lewis. Oil money. They're expanding the distribution side as of now, and they're going to launch a production financing arm. They want to back independent films. My films." Thad gave a smug Httle smile. "They're smart. They've seen the falling attendance figures in America. They know all about the effect of TV—who doesn't? And they aren't fazed. Because they think, and I know, that there's a whole new audience out there, just waiting to be tapped. The youth audience, Lewis. The ones who are sick to death of watching reruns of Gunsmoke every night, the ones who are going

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to Start pouring back into the movie theaters once someone is smart enough to give them the right product. Movies that talk to them. Not Jane Russell and dancing girls and all that studio crap. Real movies. American movies. The kind of movies I make."

"You've only made one so far."

"Lewis. Lewis. Please. I'm being serious now. . . ."

"Okay. Okay." Lewis shrugged. "And you're saying this company— Sphere—they might want to back you?"

"They want in on the distribution of Night Game, and they're talking money about Film Two right now. Not six-figure money, Lewis, seven-figure. We're not talking small time now."

"Uh-huh." Lewis leaned back. Thad's bhthe confidence was irritating him more and more. He longed, suddenly, to puncture it. All right, so Thad had always claimed not to understand the complexities of finance— he was just the director, he used to say, back in L.A.; that was where Lewis came in; he needed Lewis because Lewis understood figures.

Lewis did, up to a point. He had hved with high finance day in, day out, for the first eighteen years of his life. He could read a balance sheet, sure. He used to read The Wall Street Journal, and then face his father's inquisition on its subject matter. He had taken an economics course at Harvard— though that had been mostly theoretical. If he had gone into Sinclair Lowell Watson, he would have been painstakingly trained by his father, and Lewis had always grandly assumed that he would have been more than able to cope. But film finance? That was a minefield. He had hstened to the talk in L.A., carefully. In Paris, before it was decided to keep Night Game very low budget, and finance it through Lebec and himself, he had briefly, with the aid of Lebec and various contacts of Thad's, tried to raise outside financing, bigger financing, for the picture.

It had been like juggling bubbles. A lot of wheeling, and a lot of dealing. Tax shelter deals. Completion bond deals. Overhead provisions. By the time Lewis felt he was beginning to grasp it, he realized that the people he'd been talking to were not going to deliver. One by one the bubbles had burst.

Rather admiring his own experienced cynicism, he now remarked that the fact that Sphere was talking money meant precisely nothing. When they signed a deal, and, better still, a check—then, he said with a glance at Helen, he might start getting impressed.

Thad looked hurt. "I guess you're right, Lewis," he said in a small humble voice, so Lewis began to feel Uke a bully. "I don't understand these things too well. I never did. I mean, the guy I met from Sphere—he'd take one look, and he'd know I was a sucker, right?"

"Well, not exactly, Thad." Lewis shifted uneasily. "You could be right.

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They could be serious. If they made the first move . . ." He hesitated. "How come they heard about us in the first place?"

Thad looked complacent. "They've got their ear to the ground, I guess. There's a lot of interesting work being done in Europe right now, and I'm American. Maybe they picked up on the word about Night Game. I don't know. But when this guy Scher saw the rough cut of Night Game, he said he liked it a lot. He was just being polite, I guess. Didn't want to hurt my feelings ..."

"Oh, come on, Thad." Lewis leaned forward. "Are you trying to make me weep, or what? If he said he liked it, he probably did. It's just that that's not the same as writing you a big fat check for the next film, carte blanche, that's all. . . ."

"I know that, Lewis. Now that I think about it. And I never thought it would be carte blanche exactly. . . ." He stole a little look at Helen. A little look at Lewis. Spread his hands.

"Maybe you see, now, Lewis, why I had to come over. I need you back in Paris. I need your help. I can't handle all this without you, Lewis." He gave a gusty sigh. "Still. I suppose I'll have to try. For a while." He gestured at Helen. "Now that all this has happened. Yes?"

Lewis bowed his head. He knew what that meant, and the meekness of Thad's manner did not deceive him for an instant. It meant Thad wouldn't be satisfied until he had Lewis on a plane at the earliest opportunity. Until he did, he would simply sit there and not go away. Lewis looked at Helen; she looked at him. He knew she was thinking the same thing. To Lewis's relief, she spoke first.

"When do you want him, Thad?" she asked.

Thad looked at his fingernails. He said, in a little voice, "How about tomorrow?"

When Thad had gone—he needed to buy some clothes, he said, which had surprised both of them—they discussed this new development. In a way, as she said, it wasn't a new development at all, because they had both known that once Thad finished editing, Lewis would have to re-join him, and throw himself fully into the role that Thad had assigned him. The moment had just arrived a little sooner than expected, that was all.

"You could come with me," Lewis said, putting his arms around her. "If it's not safe for you to fly, we could go over on the boat. Let's do that. Thad can't object, and if he does, I'll tell him to go to hell. I want you with me. I can't bear not to be with you, not now. . . ."

He buried his face against her neck and kissed her. It was she who

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pointed out the problems of this plan, and who gently dissuaded him. They went into the sitting room, and sat down on the fat red chairs, and talked it all over, back and forth.

The reasonableness of their discussion pleased Lewis: he felt they were both being very adult. Yes, he could see it—he would be tied up with a whole lot of meetings, and Helen wouldn't see him that much anyway. Paris was an hour's flight from London. Whenever there was a gap in the schedule, Lewis could fly back. Helen would be better off staying here, in many ways. It was quiet and calm, and she liked it. She could rest, look after herself and the baby. . . . Here, having felt again that sweet and reassuring sense of complicity, Lewis paused, then broke off. They looked at each other. She took his hand.

"He thinks it's your baby, Lewis," she said finally.

"I know he does." Lewis shrugged. "So what? It's none of Thad's business, either way. It's private. It's you and me and what we decide, what we feel, that matters."

"It's just that it happened so quickly. I didn't know what to say. And we hadn't decided—what we'd tell people."

Lewis could see the uncertainty and the vulnerability in her face. As it always did, it renewed his self-confidence, his sense of protectiveness. The more vulnerable Helen seemed, the stronger Lewis felt—this seemed to him entirely proper.

"My darhng." He bent across, and kissed her. "I love you. We're going to be married. I'll take care of you and the baby. So, in a sense, it will be my baby. It is my baby. I'll try and be a good father. I like babies. . . ." He smiled. "I'm terrific with my sisters' kids—you ask them, they'll tell you. I'm an uncle six times over already." He tried to lighten his voice, to cheer her up, but in spite of himself, his face grew serious.