Hot Properties (64 page)

He wondered how long it would be before Patty would tell about the things she had found. At first she’d swear to keep it to herself—probably to spare herself the embarrassment. But when she got another lover, that fear would dissipate, and it would join the repertoire, another story of another crazy lover from her past. She’d use it, if not in her next novel, then in the one after.

And she didn’t even know how often he had indulged his fantasy, how many times he had bared himself to the Mistress and been stripped of his false dignities, admitted his depraved longings. He loved it. Giving up all the pretenses—the relief of openly being a slave, licking to please, whimpering honestly at the whip, begging to have his silly sex stroked, granted pleasure only when thoroughly exposed as abject and humiliated. He had paid for every session—the arrangement was merely business for the Mistress—but it was leaving her, not Patty, not the magazine, that he regretted.

He arrived at the loft. The leather collar, the magazines, and the Polaroid were there on the coffee table, just as she had told him. He’d have to dispose of them, and the telephone number in his book, before finishing. He didn’t want anything for Patty to cite as evidence. Throwing them in the garbage wouldn’t suffice: he burned the photo and the magazines and went downstairs to the cold garbage room, putting the leather collar at the bottom of one of the bags.

Back upstairs, his phone was ringing. He glanced at the clock. He had been gone for forty minutes, not really long enough for Chico to become anxious. It was probably Patty, desperate to restore her self-respect, not wanting to face a lifetime of knowing that when he most needed her, she simply wasn’t there. A long agonizing phone call would give that back to her. He didn’t mind the idea of granting the favor—but the pain of life was something he no longer wanted to feel. He pulled the plug from the wall jack so the ringing wouldn’t disturb him.

David hunted in the back of the loft for the tall aluminum ladders his brother had used to plasterboard the ceilings and paint the sprinkler pipes their pretty pastel colors. There were other odds and ends, including heavy ropes. David hurried his preparations. Probably no one from the magazine would react to his tardiness quickly enough to arrive soon, almost surely Patty wouldn’t come down to the loft, but he wanted no mistakes, no “happy” accidents.

Climbing the ladder was scary: he felt dizzy at the height, but it was no trouble slinging the rope over the sprinkler pipe. He had a harder time making the right sort of knot. He moved one of the Breuer chairs from the dining table to stand on, and pulled down hard, swinging a bit on the rope to make sure the pipes would hold.

Then he sat and lit a cigarette, trying to imagine how it would look for the unlucky discoverer. In the vast space, his swinging body might not seem particularly ominous. He was dressed in a business suit, and death by a pastel-colored sprinkler pipe fully dressed might even look comic. Should he write a note? A final act as a master wordsmith? Tell his brother and parents why he had really done it? Dear Mom and Dad. I just couldn’t face Ted Koppel. Everyone would assume the death of Gott was the cause.

Well, he thought to himself, pressing out his cigarette, maybe it was. He just couldn’t decide anymore what the neat final summary should be. He got on the chair, put the rope around his neck, tightened it, and kicked the chair away—away from all the stupidity and waste.

Tony drove into the circular driveway of International Pictures’ main administration building, curtly informing the nervous security guard that he was Richard Winters’ son. He climbed the stairs to the second floor, past the painting of the company’s founder, and on into the chief executive officer’s suite. “Go right in.” his father’s secretary told him.

Tony was used to his father’s offices being big and luxurious, but this was worthy of remark. It was larger than most studio apartments, and even had a more complete bathroom and kitchen. He wandered about noting the accouterments while Richard finished a call, opening the refrigerator stocked with everything from champagne to Pepsi, from caviar to Kraft’s onion-and-garlic dip.

“I got a frantic call from Maureen this morning,” Richard said as he hung up, looking Tony over. Tony hadn’t bothered to shave, though he had taken a bracing shower in Garth’s multihead unit, water spraying from every conceivable direction. “You don’t look so bad.”

“I slept it off,” Tony answered.

“Apparently words were exchanged,” Richard commented.

“Can’t call them words. More like verbal switchblades.”

Richard smiled. “I’m glad you haven’t lost your wit.” He raised an eyebrow. “Watch this.” He pressed a button on his desk, and the heavy wooden door to his office let out a whoosh, and then slowly, haunted, closed itself.

Tony clapped. “That’s fabulous!”

Richard snapped his fingers. “Don’t tell me being head of a company ain’t worth the effort.”

“Oh, I won’t. You’ve got power and I’ve learned that’s what counts in this business.”

“Oh, dear.” Richard got up from his country French table that he used as a desk and moved toward one of the eight-foot-long couches. “Two months in Malibu and you’re a cynic.”

“I want to leave,” Tony said.

“What’s keeping you?”

“I put that badly.” He looked his father in the eyes. “I’m leaving.”

“Don’t be elliptical, Tony. I hate that. Tell me what’s going on.”

“The script’s not finished. There’s another scene to write before you bozos get your hands on it and demand countless rewrites.”

“One scene?” Tony nodded. “Don’t you think writing one last scene isn’t too much of an imposition?” Richard asked, a patient parent, confident of his child’s ultimate good sense. “Have you had a fight with Garth? Or is this because of your mother?” he went on, sure of his omniscience.

Tony looked away. His glance fell on his father’s multiline phone. Four of the six buttons were lit. “How many secretaries do you have?” he asked.

Richard followed his glance. “An assistant and a secretary.” He nodded at the phone. “It never stops. I could spend all my time returning phone calls.”

“Must be nice,” Tony said.

Richard grunted. “It’s not. It’s debilitating.”

“Oh, come on. To be so pursued. Must be wonderful.”

“You’re wrong. I’m always saying no to people’s fondest dreams. It’s like being a doctor in a terminal ward. The best news I can give anyone is that their death will be painless.”

“You also make their dreams come true.”

“Not to hear them talk.
They
make their dreams come true—I only get credit for their nightmares.” Richard shifted his position. He seemed impatient. “If you envy it, try for a studio job. You’re overqualified. In fifteen years you’ll have my job.”

Tony nodded. “That’s an idea. I hadn’t thought of it.”

“Why are you walking out on the project?” Richard snapped, his irritation unleashed.

“Because I don’t give a fuck about it,” Tony answered. “I don’t give a fuck about any of this, I realize. Something sick pulled me out here. I don’t know what it was. I think maybe it was to impress you and Mom.”

“Well, I’m not impressed. I’m impressed by people finishing what they start. I had heard the script was going well. Very well. If Garth is satisfied, and he told me he
was
last week, it’s a movie this company wants to make. You’d be a fool, worse than a fool, to walk out now.”

Tony bit his lip. Richard was making him nervous. He had come here convinced he wasn’t giving anything up, that the project was merely a toy for Garth, just as his penis had been last night, something to keep the great actor occupied until the studio came up with a real movie for him. That wasn’t Tony’s reason for wanting out, but it had made the contemplation easier.

“Don’t run away like your mother,” Richard said wearily, rubbing his temple. He sighed. “And don’t bother punishing me. Neither of us is worth messing up your life.”

“Mom didn’t run away,” Tony complained.

“That’s exactly what she did. She’s converted it in her mind to political heroism, and I suppose you had no reason, being so young, to know differently. She not only wasn’t called by the Un-American Activities Committee—why should she be? she wasn’t a party member—she wasn’t even blacklisted.”

“That’s bullshit,” Tony said angrily.

“It’s a matter of
fact,”
Richard said. “Check with the people who really did lose their jobs. She was a baby in the forties and early fifties—we didn’t move here until fifty-one. She knew a lot of communists, but she wasn’t one. She had a nervous breakdown, Tony.” He stared at his son for a moment. “After being fired off Felson’s picture, she collapsed. She claimed it was because of the blacklist, because she had supported the Hollywood Ten. Supported!” He laughed. “She met them at the train station and had Dalton Trumbo over for dinner—
once.”

“She never claimed she was involved before the hearings. Simply that she helped—”

“Come on, Tony! She pretends to be the Joan of Arc of the McCarthy period.” He leaned forward. “She couldn’t handle failure. Rejection. Unlike most actresses, she had no struggle in her career until she came to Hollywood. She was the bright young star of Broadway. She expected this town to lie at her feet. And it did for a while. But she’s a stage actress. The magnification of the camera made her look like a ham. And she wouldn’t adjust—she believed she was infallible, that the directors were fools. She got a reputation for being a prima donna and she wasn’t a star. She forgot that ‘prima’ precedes ‘donna.’ So she was fired. And then no one was knocking down her door.” He closed his eyes and swallowed hard. “And she hated me because I had followed her out here as a nothing and I became a network vice-president within a year and a half.” He opened his eyes and moved his head from side to side as though it were stiff. “I was just supposed to be the handsome, smiling husband—not the big success. Between her envy and her arrogance and her failure, she flipped out.”

This point of view was a collection of familiar facts arranged into an unrecognizable bouquet. Despite its newness, Tony wasn’t shocked. He knew his father had a reason to justify himself, but still he didn’t doubt him. He spoke painfully, abandoning years of restraint, which made his words plausible. Besides, he was a man who prided himself on accuracy. Tony knew that if he challenged his father’s story, proof, absolute proof, would be submitted. “But she did make it in the business,” was all that he could offer as refutation.

“Do you think her work on TV is first-rate?”

Tony lowered his head. He felt his mouth tremble.

Knowing the answer to the questions, Richard went on. “She’s not a genius, Tony. And I’m not a monster.”

“So what?” Tony looked up. “What the fuck has this got to do with me?”

Richard stood up and then paused as if he had forgotten where he meant to walk. “Garth rehired you after he and I had a long talk at a party. He couldn’t understand why you had refused to do the rewrite last time. He liked you. Admired your work. He thought he’d been supportive. Couldn’t understand why you walked away.” Richard had been speaking to his empty desk chair. He moved toward it now. “I’ve just told you why you walked away last time.” He sat down and covered his forehead with the heels of his palm, pressing. “I’ve got a splitting headache.” He released the pressure and finally looked at Tony, his voice hoarse: “You throw another temper tantrum now and you’ll never work in this town again. Maybe that doesn’t matter to you. Your mother they eventually forgave. But she’d had a breakdown and then worked in the theater for fifteen years. What’s your excuse?”

“My God,” Tony said, feeling outraged. “You talk about me like I’m a spoiled piece of shit! I’m one of the best young playwrights in the country—”

“No you’re not,” Richard said quietly. “Stop kidding yourself. New York is loaded with tiresome middle-aged people who had a few promising early years. If you’re not careful, you’ll be one of them soon.”

“You really don’t give a shit about me,” Tony blurted. “You talk cold … coldly about me. Like I’m an employee—”

“Yeah, sure, if I loved you I’d support your deluded image of yourself. Academy Award-winning screenwriters don’t walk off projects! Tom Stoppard wouldn’t walk off! Nobody!” Richard shouted, his face reddening. “Even if you had achieved what you think in your head you have, even then!” He quieted, grabbing his head in one hand and furiously massaging each temple. “I feel it’s my fault—leaving you with her.” He pointed out the window. “There is a real world out there, Tony, where curtains ring down on tragic lives. People don’t stand up at the end and wipe off ketchup.
If you
humble yourself,
if
you work hard for
years
—then perhaps, at the end of your life, you will be treated like a prince.” As though he caught a glance of himself in a mirror—enraged, his arm thrust out—Richard resumed a tranquil pose. “Being a great artist, Tony, means you answer all the crap the world dumps on you with your work— not with more crap.”

Tony felt frozen in place. His hurt had been chilled, the fire of his outrage doused. His father’s words sobered not merely his brain, but the world as well. “If you admired my plays, you wouldn’t say that. The truth is, you think I have to pay dues because my work isn’t great.”

Richard shook his head, not to contradict Tony, but sadly to himself—giving up on a hopeless case. “Even if I thought they were works of genius—
especially
if I thought they were—I’d want you to finish. If you’re as great as you think you are, then this script, and all the rewrites in the world, should be child’s play for you. I know you’re smarter than Bill Garth and Jim Foxx, I know you’re smarter than me. So what?”

“I don’t think I’m smarter—” Tony stammered.

“Yes you do! You think you’re smarter, handsomer, wittier, more talented. But that’s the point. You only think it. You haven’t proven it to anyone.”

“All right!” Tony pleaded. He put his hands up in surrender. He felt his mouth weaken, his eyes fill. “Stop. I’ll go back. I’ll finish the script. I’ll shut up. I’ll sleep in the fucking servants’ quarters. Just shut the fuck up.”