Show Business Is Murder (6 page)

“David—”

“After everything I did for you. How we live, the clothes on your back, and it's not enough for you.”

“What you did for me? Having me followed for the last six months? I haven't seen him in—”

“You saw him yesterday.” David knew all about it. She'd met him at the Mark Bar. He shook the memo at her. “It's here in black and white.”

“I had a drink with him is all—”

This time it was David who walked away. He opened the door to the terrace and stepped out on the roof. The fog had lifted but the sky was gray and dense, and the temperature had dropped. Snow was in the air. At the edge of the terrace
was a low brick wall that separated the terrace from thin air. Below was the closed courtyard, earth and stone now. In the spring, grass and daffodils.

He heard the phone ringing. He charged back into the apartment. He didn't want Miranda to get it. The answering machine picked up and the ringing stopped. He listened. She said he had a love affair with the phone. But it was like an extension of his personality. When the
Times
did the feature on him, they took his picture with a phone on each ear and another on his desk. God, he loved it. But lately, since he'd stopped going to the office, he'd just let it ring, or let the answering machine get it.

“Miranda?” It was Nora, the bitch, her sister. Always butting her nose in. “Are you there? Pick up. I'm worried about you.”

He got hot, seething, began screaming at her, though she couldn't hear him. “We're working everything out, not that you care, you trouble-making bitch.”

“You say that, David,” Miranda said, “but we're not working anything out. It's too late for that.” Her cheeks were pale, her eyes distant.

“I swear, Miranda, I'm turning over a new leaf.”

“Yes. Like when you don't let me go to the dentist, and to even the supermarket by myself.”

“I don't want anything to happen to you. Most wives would be thrilled to be taken care of like I take care of you.”

Miranda sighed. “We've been married twenty-five—”

“Wonderful years—”

“Some wonderful years—”

“You turned everything we had into shit.”

“I broke it off with him.”

“You saw him yesterday, don't you remember?”

“I told you, for a drink. That's all.”

“It's not all. It's never all.” He went back to the terrace, slamming the door. Gratitude. No one had any anymore.
Miranda was ungrateful for anything he'd done for her. There'd been a scene in Philadelphia—what the hell was the name of the show? His brain was fuzzy. Anyway, they'd cut her number. He'd come down after a tearful phone call, but first he'd made his own calls. The number was put back in.

He couldn't lose her. She was his whole life, more important even than
The Naked Truth
. Why didn't she understand that? It was for her own good. Yes, he'd had her followed, yes, he'd had the phone tapped. How else would he know what was happening in his life? He'd done what any good husband would do.

One more call. Ruben Bronson. He'd trained Ruben from scratch. Ruben was production stage manager on
The Naked Truth
. When was the last time David had talked to him? Once more to the speed dial. “Listen, Ruben—”

“David, I was just going to call you. Can you come in tonight? We have a problem.”

“I have some things I have to do.”

“It's Jenny's replacement. You haven't been around. She's not working out—”

“You handle it.”

“Okay, if that's what—”

“I love ya, kid.” David hung up.

In the kitchen he scrawled the letter to Patrick on the phone bill. He had to write around the notes he'd made about the people Miranda called and the numbers he didn't recognize.

“Why have you stopped going to the office?” she said.

“I want to be with you.”

“You're driving me crazy, David. You've got to give me some space.”

“So you can sneak around and meet your friend, the loser?”

“I have other friends.”

“Yes. Like Linda Marshall who warned you that I was dangerous.”

“If you listen to my phone calls, you have yourself to blame. Linda is a therapist. She thinks you need help.”

“She's just a dyke who wants you for herself.”

Miranda stared at him, weeping. Her tears made red streaks on her cheeks. She was tormenting him. Why didn't she just stay where she was? He closed his eyes and made her go away.

The quiet became oppressive. He went into the bedroom. She was back in bed, where they would find her.

He returned to the kitchen and rinsed his hands, stacked the dishes and utensils in the dishwasher, all but the bread knife, which he dried carefully and put in the oak block on the counter.

The afternoon was waning.

“Please, David,” she said, “Patrick will be home soon.”

“We were working it out,” he said. He was on the terrace again, walking around. He looked at the canvas-covered hot tub with its blanket of withered leaves and crusty pigeon droppings, the Adirondack chairs around the table. The empty mug someone had left under the table wore a moldy crust.

He took off his glasses and placed them on the table.

He looked at his Rolex. There was blood on the face. He raised it to his lips and licked the blood off. It was four o'clock. Patrick would be home soon.

He listened to the sound of the elevator, the key in the lock.

“Mom? Dad? I'm home.”

For a brief moment David stood on the low brick wall that enclosed the terrace, then he stepped off.

JOHN LUTZ

“
ARE YOU TRYING
to tell me dogs can talk?”

Braddock had been in Hollywood three long years now. He hadn't been able to sell a screenplay, but he was sure he'd heard and seen just about everything, much of it right here in Savvie's bar, within spitting distance of Wilshire Boulevard. But here was something he hadn't expected, like an opening scene from an old
Twilight Zone
episode.

The old man sitting across the table from him smiled, wrinkling his seamed face even more and giving him the look of one of those dolls with heads and faces made from dried apples.

“No,” he said, “not every dog. But some dogs sometimes, if a certain operation is performed on their palates and if they are properly trained.” He took a swig of blended Scotch and twinkled an eye at Braddock. “I know how to train 'em.”

Braddock was barely in his twenties, but he knew he was no fool. “Who trained
you?
” he asked.

Mitty—that was the old man's name—twisted his lips in an odd mobile line that changed his smile to a tight grin. He had small, even teeth that were yellowed and probably false. “Dr. Darius,” he said, “the veterinarian surgeon who discovered and perfected the operation.”

“Sure,” Braddock said. “I think I met him once.”

“Doubt it,” Mitty said. “He's been dead for over fifty years. But before he died he taught me not only how to develop the facility of speech in certain dogs of a particular combination of breeds, but the operation that makes it possible.”

It was dim in Savvie's. Outside the tinted windows only an occasional pedestrian trudged past in the ninety-degree heat. This time of the afternoon there were no other customers in Savvie's. Braddock, Mitty, and Edgar the part-time bartender had the place to themselves. Braddock considered what Mitty had told him. How naive did the old joker think he was?

“I suppose you're a rich man,” Braddock said.

Mitty raised bushy gray eyebrows high on his deeply furrowed forehead. “I wouldn't be sitting here with you and Java sipping this cheap Scotch if I was rich, now, would I?”

“Java?”

Mitty nodded and glanced down and to the side, toward a dog that had been so still and quiet that Braddock hadn't noticed it. Java was a small black and white pooch sitting patiently on its haunches near his chair.

“I didn't see it there,” Braddock said.

“Java's a
he,
” Mitty corrected.

“Sorry, fella,” Braddock said to the dog. For only an instant, he half expected the dog to answer.

Java resembled one of those miniature collies, only his hair was shorter. And he did have a funny look around the mouth, as if he were sort of smiling. As if he knew something.

“Why didn't Java introduce himself?” Braddock asked.

“Introduce yourself, Java,” Mitty told the dog.

At the mention of his name, Java woofed.

“That's talking?” Braddock asked.

“Not at all. You can't expect a dog to know the English
language without learning it. And I didn't give him the proper commands. What he is, he's shy, not much of a performer. That's why I said he wouldn't talk here and now. But he's getting better, more outgoing.”

“Where have you performed?” Braddock asked, being careful to look at Mitty when he asked. “I mean, you and Java?”

“Nowhere yet. We're working up to it.”

“Uh-huh.” Braddock sipped his drink, a club soda with a lime twist. He never drank before evening, keeping his mind clear to write. He'd soon discovered that many of the powerful people in the film industry were blatant con men, not to be believed. If he'd been naive when he arrived in L.A., he was long over it. Now there were calluses on his cynicism.

Mitty leaned back and regarded him. Braddock regarded the old man right back. He had to be in his eighties, and he dressed like a racetrack tout in
Guys and Dolls,
tan checked sport coat, red shirt, redder bow tie. The tie had a sprinkling of tiny black polka dots and was perched in an oddly rapacious way at his Adam's apple like a brilliant exotic butterfly, carnivorous and going for the throat.

“As I recall from seeing you in here before,” Mitty said, “your first name is James.”

“Correct.”

“Like James Braddock, heavyweight champion of the world.”

“Never heard of him.”

“He was long before your time. But shouldn't you still know yours is the same name as a heavyweight champion?”

Braddock almost pitied the old man for the question. “That kind of ancient knowledge is useless now. It's a new world. Linear logic is dying. If something comes up and I need that kind of information, I can always get it from the Internet.”

Mitty shook his head with unexpected violence, as if trying
to jar loose the persistent butterfly tie clinging to his throat. “You have to be able to think, to synthesize, not just have a lot of facts at your disposal. Everything's connected to everything else.”

“That's what I'm telling you,” Braddock said. “The Internet.”

“But the world didn't start when the Internet was invented. Or just as you were born.”

“I think it pretty much did,” Braddock said. “At least, when it comes to useful information.”

Mitty appeared saddened by this statement. He looked down at Java. Java looked back. He still seemed faintly amused and, yes, rather shy. A strange thing in a dog.

A fat man in oversized Levi's and a tropical-print shirt waddled in from the heat and breathed in the air conditioning with a smile as he wiped a wrist across his perspiring forehead.

“Glad I could find somewhere to get a drink,” he said. “Everyplace else is closed because of the election.” He settled his bulk on a bar stool that seemed to bend beneath his weight, though that was probably an optical illusion. “How come you're not closed?”

Edgar, who was a huge man himself, in his sixties with the build and misshapen ears of a former pro wrestler, said, “ 'Cause last election day, we knew who to vote for. Fact is, though, we were about to close.”

Mitty winked at Braddock and smoothly and slowly tugged on Java's leash until the little dog was out of sight on the other side of his chair. Then he raised a gnarled forefinger to his lips in a signal for Braddock to be silent.

“What's the big secret?” Braddock whispered across the table.

“Java,” Mitty said. “Even if you don't believe me, he's a valuable piece of show business property. But I must trust you with him for a few minutes.”

No one spoke, not even Edgar, busy behind the bar, as Mitty wrapped Java's leash around the table leg, using an elaborate kind of slip knot. He hand-signaled for the dog to sit and stay, then went shuffling off toward the men's room. Java didn't move or make a sound. Braddock had to admit the pooch was well trained.

The fat man finished his beer and made his way back out into the heat.

Edgar looked over at Braddock. “You ever hear of Mitty and Buddy?” he asked.

“No. And are you really getting ready to close?”

“Naw, I just said that to get rid of that guy. If he'd stayed around, he would have thought Mitty was nuts. I like Mitty. I don't wanna see that. And Mitty was bound to start bragging again about that dog. You can't shut him up for long.”

“That's for sure,” Braddock said. “But I don't know why he'd brag about the dog.”

“Not
that
dog,” Edgar said, “Buddy. Mitty and Buddy used to be one of the hottest lounge and resort acts in the country. But I'll tell you something: that dog there, Java, looks a lot like the photos I seen of Buddy.”

“Come off it,” Braddock said with a laugh. “You mean this Buddy was a talking dog?”

“I mean it,” Edgar said, stone faced. “He even talked to some scientists the government sent when they heard about him.”

“Funny I never read about that,” Braddock said.

“Well, it's kinda like UFOs.”

“How so?”

“The scientists didn't believe it even after they heard it. 'Cause they didn't want to believe it.”

“But I've heard of UFOs.”

“That's 'cause there are more of them than talking dogs.”

“So why's Mitty telling me all about this stuff?” Braddock asked.

“Because he's dying.”

Braddock sat back. “What?”

“He's got something bad wrong with him, some kinda rare blood disease nobody can do anything about. I think he wants to sell you the dog.”

“Buddy?”

“Naw! Buddy's been dead more'n forty years. Java. Mitty knows a smart young guy can work up an act and make a fortune with Java. He likes you, thinks of you as a son. He told me that.”

“I only met him a few months ago.”

“He says that right away you reminded him of himself when he was young, full of ten kinds of malarky and burning to make some kinda smash in the business.”

“Ten kinds of malarky?”

“I'm only repeating what—”

Edgar broke off what he was saying as Mitty emerged unsteadily from the men's room and returned to the table. There were wet spots on the front of his pants and his fly was slightly more than half zipped up, just far enough that Braddock decided not to bring it to his attention and embarrass him. As Mitty sat down, he drew from an inside pocket a folded, aged envelope.

“Look at these,” he said, lovingly spreading the ancient contents of the envelope on the table so Braddock could examine them.

There were old playbills, press clippings, and grainy black-and-white photographs. Several of the photos were of posters extolling the virtues of Mitty and Buddy. On one of the posters they were headliners at some Catskills resort Braddock had never heard of. The only photo of Buddy was a grainy black-and-white of the dog with his leash wrapped around a post, much as Java's leash was wrapped around the table leg, with the same distinctive kind of slip knot. Buddy and Java did look a lot alike.

“You think I wasn't big in show business at one time?” Mitty asked. His complexion was sallow. He dug in a pocket and deftly swallowed a pill with a swig of Scotch, waiting for Braddock to answer.

“I believe that,” Braddock said.

“But you don't believe about Buddy.”

“I didn't say that . . . ”

“And you don't believe Java here is trained to speak.”

“Listen,” Braddock said, feeling sorry for Mitty, “I've gotta be honest. I'm like all the rest of them out there. I don't believe dogs can talk.”

“Not
dogs!
” Mitty said desperately. “
Certain
dogs. Maybe one in a hundred thousand.
If
they're trained.”

“And have been operated on,” Braddock reminded him.

“Only some of them. Now and then there's one that has the proper palate formation and doesn't require the operation. And to tell you the truth I never even tried the operation. I love dogs, can't cut on 'em like I was a trained surgeon. After Buddy died I gave up show business. Then, when Dr. Darius's widow died and the family let me look through his papers, I was overjoyed to learn there were rare dogs that didn't need the operation in order to learn a facsimile of human speech.”

“Dogs like Java?”

“Like Java,” Mitty said. “It took me years to find him.”

“Maybe Buddy and Java just happen to be similar,” Braddock said.

“Certain breeds . . . ” Mitty said mystically.

Braddock looked again at the yellowed newspaper clippings and photographs on the table. “I've got to admit, you were impressive, you and Buddy.”

“It could be Braddock and Java,” Mitty said. “This is a way for you to beat this business, Jim! This is opportunity knocking, if only you'll believe it's out there!”

“Opportunity usually has a price,” Braddock said, remembering this was L.A.

“It does this time, too,” Mitty told him. “I'd never lie to you. Java is valuable and he's all I have to sell. I've gotta get six thousand dollars for him.”

“Six
thousand?
I don't have that kind of—”

“Yes, you do! I heard you say you sold some foreign rights to a screenplay you wrote four years ago, when you were only nineteen.”

“That's the only thing I ever sold,” Braddock said. “And if it weren't for that money I'd have to get a j—j—”

“Job,” Mitty said.

“I have difficulty even saying the word,” Braddock told him, feeling a chill.

“So did I when I was your age. That's because our kind knows our calling, our business. Don't you understand? I'm offering you the way in! Chaplin with his tramp outfit and cane! Laurel with Hardy! The three tenors! Braddock and Java!”