Dreams Are Not Enough (29 page)

“Okay, go ahead,” he muttered.

“But I do have several excellent concepts for a feature.”

“Send outlines.” PD glanced at his watch and rose: he had a one o’clock lunch with Lee Rich ofLorimar.

“Come on, Barry, let’s talk on the way down to the garage.”

The uniformed attendant brought Barry’s dusty Dodge, then PD’s new Coupe de Ville. On the way to the Lorimar offices in the Valley, PD figured to whom he could present Barry’s feature ideas. He was constitutionally incapable of missing a bet for a client.

It was well after three when PD arrived back at the office. Lana was saying into the phone, “—still out, Mrs. Zaffarano, but I’ll tell him the minute-Oh. He just walked in. Mr. Zaffarano, your mother’s on line three. She called a few minutes ago. It’s urgent.”

Visions of disaster dancing in his head, PD ran into his office.

“Mom?

What’s wrong? “

She blurted something about his father, but she was weeping too hard for him to make out anything more. His mother was not a weeper. She had not even wept when he broke the news of his engagement.

“Mom, calm down,” he said.

“Are you home?”

“Yes…”

He went weak with relief: any dire illness or accident to near and dear, and she’d be at a hospital.

“Hang in there, Mom. I’ll be right over.”

With a hasty command to Lana to cancel his afternoon appointments, he rushed back to the elevator and was in the underground parking before his car was put away.

Lily Cordiner Zaffarano, a handsome woman in her early fifties, normally presented an immaculate appearance. In a town full of girl sized matrons, she was maturely plump, and her innate practicality informed her that she therefore must put forth more effort. A masseuse arrived with a folding table at the house every Monday, Lily had standings twice a week for facials and shampoos, and when it came to clothes, her one minor deviation from prudent chic was to always wear some variation of the purple tones. Frank Zaffarano rewarded these wifely efforts with uxorious fidelity, no minor thing in Hollywood.

As PD jerked to a halt in front of the big Colonial house on Beverly Drive, his mother rushed onto the pillared portico, her hair and clothing disheveled.

The apparition was so out of character that he goggled.

“Quick!” she shrilled.

“Get inside!”

Slamming and locking the front door after them, Lily leaned against the wood, panting.

PD glanced around to ascertain that neither of the maids was present to witness his mother’s descent into apparent madness. The sole movement came from sunlight flickering on the rock crystal chandelier.

They were, thank God, alone.

“Mom—what’s all the excitement?”

Breathing in those animal gasps, Lily stared mutely at him.

“Come on. Mom, let’s go in the den.”

She didn’t move.

Suddenly it occurred to PD that maybe his father was dead.

“Mom, is Dad … is he okay?”

“For now….” Her mouth pulling frantically. Lily burst into tears.

Conquering his filial compunctions, PD slapped his palm hard across both her cheeks. Tears continued flowing down the smudged, reddening marks of his slap, but the hysterical gasping ceased.

“Mom,” he said gently.

“Hey … what gives?”

“This came while I was getting … dressed.”

He realized her left hand was crumpling a piece of paper. Taking it from her grip, he straightened the slick, photocopied page.

It was a copy of an IOU written in his father’s hand. Frank Zaffarano promises to pay the sum of $425,000 to Robert Lang on or before September 14, 1969. Over the photocopy, in different writing, was pencil-slashed: SIX DAYS OVERDUE.

“Robert Lang is Bart Lanzoni’s son,” she said.

PD nodded. Bartolomeo (Bart) Lanzoni and Francescoj (Frank) Zaffarano, compaesani from the same impoverished hilltop town in Sicily, had been closest friends. Frank had gone around red-eyed for weeks after Bartolomeo had died of multiple myelo ma Robert Lang (PD did not know at what point the name had been anglicized) had inherited his father’s interests, the most public being the Fabulador Hotel in Las Vegas, where Barry and Alyssia had had their wedding breakfast almost exactly a decade ago.

Though PD had never met Robert Lang, he had been close enough to Bartolomeo Lanzoni to call him Uncle Bart, and the old guy had slipped him a folded five-dollar bill at every meeting. How could a round-faced old sweetie like him have a son who put the screws to people?

Then PD reminded himself that Uncle Bart was no saint either, but part of the New Jersey bunch who had migrated to Nevada after World War

II.

“Let’s go sit down,” PD said, putting his arm around his mother’s plump shoulders, leading her into the den. Lily sat on one of the leather game chairs and buttoned her lavender blouse.

“Have you talked to Dad?” PD asked.

“He’s on location today, he won’t be back until late.” Lily was talking with her usual sensible coherency.

“PD, there’s no way we can pay it.”

“How much can you pay?”

“Nothing.”

“What do you mean, nothing? Mom, this is me. Your son, PD. I’ve hit you for a loan often enough to know you’ve got money stashed in every bank in Beverly Hills.”

Lily shook her head.

“There’s nothing left in any of the accounts. Two weeks ago I drew out everything to give your father. He told me he needed it to pay Robert Lang off or else something dreadful would happen.”

“Lang threatened to kill Dad?”

“Or me, or you, or Annette or Deirdre.” Lily’s voice sank.

“Or even Jeffie.” Jeffrey Fitzpatrick, Annette’s five-month-old, the first, the only, the adored grandchild of the Cordiner clan.

“How much did you hand over to Dad?”

“Two hundred and twenty-three thousand and forty dollars. He lied to me and said it’d cover his marker, and then went to Vegas for the night. To pay Robert Lang, he said. But he must have tried to get the full amount and lost it all.” She spoke without recrimination.

PD stared for a long, bitter moment at the copy of the IOU, thinking of the immense salaries his father had earned for many years, the bonuses, the stock options, the Newport Beach house which had been sold at a substantial profit.

“Why was it addressed to you?” he asked.

“That’s the worst part….” Her ample bosom rose and fell in a gasp, but she said with reasonable calm, “I was getting ready to go to a Mary’s Guild tea and Dilly brought up my mail. The envelope only had my name.”

“You mean no address, no postmark?”

“Mrs. Lily Zaffarano—nothing else.”

“Where is it, the envelope?”

“I must’ve left it in the dressing room.”

PD followed her up the curving staircase and through the big airy bedroom that she shared with his father. She handed him a thin white envelope across which mrs. lily zaffarano was penciled in huge letters.

“Somebody must have dropped it in your mail slot.”

“That’s what’s so terrifying. Don’t you see, PD? They’re watching the house.”

“Jesus,” he whispered, wondering why this hadn’t occurred to him immediately.

Moving to stand well back from a window, he looked out at the large, comfortable houses and manicured green gardens that were the choicest of Beverly Hills real estate. A peaceful, nostalgically familiar

scene. There were no pedestrians, and the Jag and the Mer N

cedes across the street were as empty as his Cadillic.

Yet, a half hour ago, immediately before or after the mail delivery, this envelope had been dropped in the mail slot by some hood who knew the neighborhood intimately.

Lily was twisting her wedding band and staring at him with frightened eyes.

“There’s no choice, Mom,” he said.

“Dad’ll have to find the four twenty-five.”

“He can’t,” his mother whimpered.

“PD, he can’t.”

“What about the house and cars?”

“We have three mortgages, no equity. We owe the bank more on the cars than we’d get for them secondhand.”

“Mom, I’d give it to you in a moment, but I’m in hock, too. I owe for my new Cad, the office furniture.” And for Beth’s ring, but he didn’t mention this.

“What about friends?” he asked.

“PD, everybody knows about Dad. Who’d lend him that sort of money?”

“Uncle Desmond always comes through for the family.”

“He won’t anymore.” She drew a long, wavering breath.

“The last time your father had to borrow from Desmond, Desmond told both of us that we had to understand this was the last loan from him. And furthermore, if he heard of any trouble in Las Vegas again, he’d fire Dad instantly.”

“A threat. He’d never carry it out.”

“PD, you know the ins and outs better than I do. Before Wandering On, Desmond nearly lost the studio. He’s still fighting for his life. You must have noticed he’s letting a lot of family things go by the board.

In the old days he would have stepped in between you and Beth. ” Though she said the words unemotionally, her lips quivered.

“And you know how he feels about Hap living with that Mexican girl Barry’s still married to. Do you think he’d let that go on if it weren’t for her films bringing Magnum out of the box-office slump?” His mother glanced in the dressing table mirror, noticing a misplaced strand of hair.

Smoothing it compulsively, she went on, “Mind you, I’m not blaming Desmond. He raised me in a fine home, gave me a college education, he’s helped Dad from the beginning—he’s been more like a father than a brother to me. I owe him everything.”

“Mom, I understand. You don’t want to beg anymore.”

“Beg? I’d crawl to the studio if it’d help.”

“Let me talk to him, then?”

Lily gave him a doubtful look.

“What can we lose?” he asked.

She patted his cheek.

“You’re a good boy.”

He managed a grin.

“Didn’t you raise me that way. Mom?”

“And, PD, your father’s a very talented man. The best husband a woman could want—generous, loving, warm. And he’s been a good father. You mustn’t think any the less of him because he has this weakness. It’s as if he has a disease. He can’t help himself.”

“I’ll go see Uncle Desmond and drop back afterward,” PD said soothingly.

As he left the house, he was wondering what was so good and wonderful and loving and warm about a man who exposed his family, even his baby grandson, to murderous Nevada casino owners.

Not having an appointment, PD waited over an hour to see his uncle.

The conversation in the inner sanctum went exactly as his mother predicted, yet PD was unprepared for the raging tirade of refusals.

Stunned and not a little frightened, he forced himself a step closer to the desk.

“Uncle Desmond,” he said earnestly, “I never would have asked, but Mom’s petrified. Lang had one of his goons hand-deliver the IOU to the house.”

“Robert Lang—another dago out of Cosa Nostra country. He’s Mafia and so was his father.” Desmond Cordiner leaned across his desk, thrusting his long, scimitar nose toward PD.

“Don’t you know they’ve been sniffing around this studio? Before I let them in the door, I’ll see Frank Zaffarano in hell!”

“But, Uncle Desmond, this is for Mom, the girls, Jeffie.”

“Your father should have thought of them when he had his fun. I’ve warned that has-been often enough. He’s worked his last day at Magnum.”

“No way!” The never-dormant agent within PD burst forth.

“He’s got over two years to go on his contract!”

The vibrant anger left the tanned, wrinkle-creased face. Desmond Cordiner was expressionless as he said, “Magnum contracts have a morals clause.”

Holy Mother of God—he doesn’t care if Lang puts holes in all of us, thought PD.

“Uncle Desmond,” he said placatingly, “Dad’s in the middle of a film.”

“Tomorrow morning another director will take over,” his uncle said, buzzing for his secretary.

Frank Zaffarano sat slumped in his chair at the head of the dining table. In this rare pose of dejection, his short neck appeared nonexistent, and the bristle of thick gray mustache almost completely hid his sensual, very pink lips. In front of him was spread a banquet.

A large, compartmented dish held the antipasto—purplish red Gaeta olives gleaming with gar licked olive oil, pimentos, marinated mushrooms, proscuitto ham sliced thin enough to be transparent, redolent Tuscan finocchiona salami. Wedges of heavy textured bread nestled in a silver basket. The tomato and fresh basil sauce congealed atop the pen ne Nothing had been touched.

Lily came in from the kitchen, a long mauve hostess skirt rustling around her, a covered dish in her hands. When Frank was late, she sent the maids home, personally serving the fine Italian food she lovingly prepared for him.

As she set down the dish, Frank lifted the cover, replacing it listlessly.

“I have no appetite.”

They both turned at the slam of the front door.

“Hi Mom, hi Dad,” PD said.

“You’re back,” Lily said, giving her son an anxious smile.

“I’ll fix you some fresh pasta.”

“Mom, I need to talk to Dad. Privately.”

“Your mother knows everything,” Frank said.

“There are no secrets in this house.”

“Frank, I have some calls to make about the retreat for young marrieds—I told you I’m in charge, didn’t I?” Lily said.

As she touched a kiss on her husband’s bushy gray hair, a sigh shuddered through his body and he clasped her hand silently.

Reaching the hall, she said, “There’s fruit for dessert. The espresso’s made.”

PD held himself in check until an upstairs door opened and closed, then he snapped, “I could kill you!”

“I almost did the job myself.”

“Have you made Mom the usual promises that you’ll quit?”

“Your mother knows I don’t have enough money to flush the toilet, much less bet.”

“She should be canonized, staying with you.”

“Desmond called right after I got home.” Frank’s voice momentarily regained a fraction of its loud verve.

“He told me I should come in early tomorrow and clear out my office. I asked him what the hell he was talking about. He said you’d come to him with my difficulties.