Pinball (13 page)

As Osten examined the watch, he pictured it on Donna’s dark wrist. “How much is it?” he asked.

Naming the price, the salesman forced a casual smile. “It is truly a timeless timepiece. Its value will never go down. Therefore, it’s a very good hedge against inflation—even at the price of a Cadillac!”

“I don’t plan to hedge inflation with it,” said Osten. “It’s a gift for a friend.”

“Marvelous choice,” purred the salesman. “You know, it’s water-resistant.”

“Good,” said Osten. “My friend hates water.”

The salesman pretended not to hear the quip. “Your friend is sure to find the black face very dramatic,” he said.

“More than likely,” said Osten. “My friend is black.”

“He’s sure to cherish such a gift,” the salesman said primly.

“He is a woman,” said Osten as he took a roll of bills from his pocket and counted out the exact amount in a neat stack on the counter.

“That’s a lot of money to carry around like that!” remarked the salesman, impressed with the stack. “Aren’t you afraid somebody might rip you off?”

“Not at all,” said Osten. “I’ve learned how to make myself invisible!” He laughed, then added, “That reminds me: I want the face of the watch replaced by one without the watchmaker’s name.”

“No name?” The salesman was horrified. “But then it would be invisible—no one will know it’s the world’s most exclusive timepiece!”

“Exclusive or not, a timepiece merely pieces time, right? Only music lets you hear time passing. My girl friend is into music—not time.”

Without a word, the salesman picked up the watch and carried it to the back of the shop. In a matter of minutes he returned “Here it is, as you requested it,” he said, handing the watch to Osten. “It’s just lucky that to please your black friend you didn’t also want the watch thickened,” he murmured with a sneer, opening the shop’s steel door for Osten. “That couldn’t be done on the spot, you know!”

Without taking the slightest notice of him, Osten walked out.

He selected a small hotel buried between two burlesque theaters off Broadway. He woke up the porter, an elderly black man in a Mexican hat and mirrored glasses who was dozing next to the switchboard, and asked him for a room with a bath.

“For yourself? Or will there be two?” asked the porter sleepily, rubbing his eyes.

“I’m alone,” said Osten.

“Sure, that’s what they all say,” said the porter with a sigh as he reached for a key. “How long you staying?”

“A day. But just in case I get hooked on somebody
from the shows next door, I’ll pay for two.” He handed the man some bills.

The man muttered, “No luggage?”

“It’s all up here,” said Osten, pointing at his head.

Osten stayed in his room only long enough to use the toilet. Then he went down the corridor to the public telephone. After carefully closing the folding door of the phone booth, he dialed Nokturn Records.

“Nokturn Records, the house of Goddard, good morning!” answered the operator, her voice almost a recording and as out of place as Nokturn’s advertising pitch which, given Goddard’s anonymity, had always struck Osten as patently ridiculous.

Before Osten spoke, he coughed. By slightly straining the muscles of his throat in this way, he was able to lower the pitch of his normal voice and make it sound raspy and guttural. The little trick, employed so often, had become habitual. Osten asked for Oscar Blaystone, the president of the company. When Blaystone’s secretary answered, Osten asked to speak to him.

“May I say who’s calling?” asked the secretary.

“Mr. River,” said Osten. “Swanee River.”

“Mr. Swanee River?” she repeated suspiciously.

“That’s right.”

“Mr. Blaystone can’t be disturbed at the moment. He’s in conference. I’m afraid you’ll have to give me your number, and I’ll—”

“Be brave,” Osten interrupted. “Just tell him Swanee River is on the line. He’s expecting my call. I’m his swan song, so to speak!” he chuckled.

Soon he heard Blaystone assuming a cordial breakness-like voice on the other end. “Hello? Mr. River? Swanee River? Let me call you back on my private line. Where are you?”

“In a melting pot,” he said.

“A melting pot?”

“Yeah. Manhattan in the summer,” said Osten, and he read Blaystone the number on the phone.

A minute after he hung up, Blaystone called back. “I got your cable with the new code name two weeks ago,” he said reproachfully. “I’ve been waiting for your call ever since.”

“I’ve been busy,” said Osten. “Anyway, we talked recently.”

“Recently? That was six months ago!” said Blaystone. “You must keep in mind,” he continued with exaggerated emphasis, “that I have no way—absolutely no way—of getting in touch with you when I need you. And I
do
need you. There are a lot of papers to be signed by Goddard—and soon. But all I get is your phone voice, these talks and your various code names, each one canceling out all the others. Do you know what I’m saying?”

“I do. You say it every time I call you. Anything else?” asked Osten.

“Yes! For starters, I need a new authorization from you for transfer of your foreign royalties from the last album. In less than a month that LP earned back your advance. In Great Britain, you have established an all-time record. Imagine—Great Britain alone! In Latin America, your Spanish-language songs sold over—”

“Use the same Swiss account, the same number, I gave you last time,” Osten broke in.

“All right. But I need your Goddard signature on the new tax forms. And please don’t change the shape of the G in your signature the way you did last time. We have no way to reach you to have it confirmed! It’s the only ID you have, at least as far as we and the IRS are concerned. Then there’s this matter of Etude Classics. I put through that renewed two-year agreement whereby you—Goddard—reimburse Nokturn—including agents’ fees and all the rest—for distributing and promoting Etude Classics. The whole deal is absolutely secret—just like the one that’s about to expire—and Etude has no way of knowing, or even suspecting, that you keep them in business.”

“And it better stay that way,” said Osten. “Etude isn’t
the only company I keep in business. I keep Nokturn going too.”

“Yes, of course,” Blaystone agreed hastily, “but that’s no secret.” He paused. “You do realize, don’t you, that without your subsidy, Etude Classics would have gone under years ago! And if you continue to support them at the present rate, so could you. Do you have any idea how much money it costs you to float them? For that kind of money you could even resurrect Beethoven!”

“I don’t have to—if I keep Etude alive.”

“Oh, I know, I know,” said Blaystone, and Osten could hear the warmth in his voice. “But I have to laugh every time I think of that poor old snob who heads Etude—and of how grand he is about letting us sell his select list of classics! If he only knew! He should see the mountain of returns we get!”

“What did you do with the latest returns?”

“We followed your instructions and gave all the unsold Etude LPs—thousands of them, I might add—to schools and hospitals and music libraries all over the world. Don’t worry; we keep a complete accounting of all such gifts and—”

“Good,” said Osten. “What else?”

“You might want to check your royalty statements, and as I said, there are tax returns for you to sign. We need you to approve some press releases, and then there’s all the fan mail. Hey, in the latest batch there’s even a letter from the White House. An official envelope marked ‘personal.’” He chuckled. “Not bad! Not bad at all! How does it feel to have a fan way at the top?”

“How soon can I get all that stuff?” asked Osten, anxious to have the call over with.

“Anytime.”

“Who will make the delivery?”

“I’m going to lunch right now; I can drop it myself. Tell me where.”

“Stop your taxi on the southwest corner of Broadway and Forty-seventh Street. A guy in a Mexican sombrero and mirror glasses will be standing there waiting. Hand it out the window to him. In a plain manila envelope.”

‘Does it have to be a taxi? Can’t I take the company car?”

“A taxi,” said Osten firmly. “It’ll do you good to be in the real world for a change.”

“Speaking of the real world,” said Blaystone, “when can it expect another record from you?”

“The real world? Or Nokturn? You’re getting greedy,” said Osten.

“Maybe,” said Blaystone, “but so are the fens. Can you give me some idea?”

“I’m working on something,” said Osten, “and I’ll let you know when it’s ready.”

“I should hope so,” said Blaystone. “After all, we are your record company.”

“For the record, you are,” agreed Osten. “Now hurry up and catch a taxi to meet my Zapata!”

“Yes, sir!” snapped Blaystone playfully. “Anything else?”

“Yes. Follow my usual rules. Don’t tell anyone where you take all these papers. Remember: one break of our nice little pact—and no more music!”

“Have I ever failed you?” asked Blaystone solemnly. “Believe me, I know Nokturn’s got a good thing going with you. Why would I want to spoil it? We certainly wouldn’t want the competition to know who you are and come skulking after you with offers!” he laughed. “Now, tell your man Zappa to expect a mail drop in twenty minutes!”

“Not Zappa—Zapata,” Osten repeated. “Is that it for now?”

“I guess,” said Blaystone. “No, wait! When you call next time, what name will you use?”

“How about Zapata?” said Osten and hung up.

On the way out of the hotel, Osten stopped at the desk. The porter was napping again.

Osten woke him up and said, “Can I borrow your hat
and glasses say, for an hour?” He passed some bills over the counter without waiting for an answer.

“What for, man?” mumbled the porter, still half asleep. Then he eyed the money and quickly handed over his hat and glasses.

“For a quickie,” said Osten. “This chick—her name’s Tequila Sunshine—gets excited only if I’m wearing a big hat, dark glasses, and nothing else.”

“No kidding,” said the porter, intrigued, but Osten was already out the door.

The yellow cab had barely stopped at the curb when Osten approached it from behind and tapped on the window. Blaystone rolled the window down, and Osten, keeping his face concealed under the brim of the sombrero, wordlessly took a large manila envelope out of Blaystone’s hand. Then he knocked twice on the roof of the cab, Blaystone rolled the window up, and the taxi drove off.

Osten dropped the hat and glasses in the lap of the serenely napping porter and went up to his room. He opened the big envelope and spread its contents out on the bed. He glanced through the royalty statements, signed the IRS documents and the transfer authorization, and carefully examined the terms of the contract between Nokturn Records and Etude Classics in which, for the next two years, Nokturn agreed to distribute Etude’s records for a specified sum of money and guaranteed a minimum sale of each of Etude’s labels. He then slowly scrutinized the letter of agreement between Goddard and Nokturn, signed it, and placed it and the other documents in several prestamped envelopes; these he would mail directly to Blaystone in care of a special post office box maintained by Nokturn solely to receive communications from Goddard.

Finished with business, he stretched out on the bed,
propped himself on one elbow, and riffled quickly through the assorted fan letters selected by Nokturn for him to look over. There was a consistency about fan mail. It always seemed to comprise regular categories: technical questions from scholars and music critics—to which, out of fear they might trace him, he never replied; appeals to settle disputes over his music that had arisen out of conflicting reviews—to which he never replied either; and a few serious letters of appreciation from some of his better-educated fans—which, even though he read them thoroughly, held no interest for him, for he had learned long ago that there were few things in the world less imaginative than the painstaking attempts of music fans to communicate soulfully.

There was one envelope Nokturn had not presumed to open. It had “The White House, Washington” embossed on it in blue, and “Personal—please forward by insured mail only” typed next to the address: Mr. Goddard, c/o Nokturn Records, Hemisphere Center, New York City. He tore off the side of the envelope and pulled out several densely typed sheets of official White House stationery, the crest watermarks clearly visible when he held the paper to the light. Before he started to read the letter, he turned to the end to see the signature, but it was unsigned.

Disappointed, he turned back to the beginning, and he was instantly absorbed by the first sentence: “You are, dear Goddard, probably reading this in the seclusion of a shabby hotel somewhere.” He smiled, swallowed, and read on. “You are also probably apprehensive that I am one more of those conniving females who envy you the peace of your self-imposed exile and who would do anything to hunt you down and share it with you for whatever length of time you would allow. Do not worry. I have no such plans. I love you for the richness of your music, not for the poverty of your existence. I am not, and never will be, some girl you once picked up simply because she liked your music and could never guess who you were. I am like no other woman you have ever had or ever will have. And if you are patient enough to read this letter with the same
care that I give to listening to your music, you will know why.” A weird, tingling sensation of panic—that these words had come from someone who knew him, or was about to know him—swept over him.

He finished the letter. Then, half afraid he would come across some important revelation he had missed, he read through it again. One passage near the end slowed him down. “Even though this letter reminds you that the fearful isolation you have chosen keeps you from a fuller life, where you could be yourself with someone like me, you’ll probably hate it because it threatens the security of the prison in which Goddard is locked. I know how predictable and drab your real life must be when you are not Goddard—particularly when you are composing music you’re not willing or brave enough to acknowledge as your own.”

Osten’s panic gave way to anger. Her harsh words—“poverty of existence,” “predictable,” “drab”—came down like lashes on his heart, and he felt his fabulous mystery turn into a prison with no exit. What right did this woman—probably just some clever White House secretary—have to tell him who he was? And how dare she assume that just by listening to his music she could know anything about him at all?