The Paper Dragon (40 page)

"That's
Fiddler
, isn't it?"

"What?"

"
Fiddler
on the Roof. That's Tevye's character, isn't it?"

"That's a different thing entirely," Arthur said. "I
lived
through this with my father and my sister, and I can tell you…"

"When was that, Arthur?"

"I don't know, she's married now and has three children, she was only eighteen at the time. But I can tell you that the showdown between those two shook our house from the roof to the—"

"Very often, though," Oscar said, "something can seem very dramatic in life, but not when it's put on the stage."

"I think he's presented it
very
dramatically," Hester said, and smiled.

"Yes, no one has any objections to the dramatic structure," Mitzi said.

"It's just these few character changes."

"Why can't the father work in an office someplace? Or why can't he have his own business? If you insist on his being Italian, why can't he be a building contractor?"

"There are a great many Italian building contractors," Hester said.

"I don't see why he can't be a mailman," Arthur said. "The way I wrote it."

"We're trying to understand him in terms of the modern theatergoer."

"Besides, there was a mailman in the Schisgal play."

"Which Schisgal play?"

"The Tiger."

"Write me a play like
Luv
" Mitzi said, "and I wouldn't ask for a single change…"

"Brilliant," Stuart said.

"Penetrating," Oscar said.

"Can't I be a social worker, Arthur?" Hester asked. "I'm
so
tired of playing college girls."

"If this man were educated…" Stuart said.

"Which man?"

"The father. If he were educated, we could offer the part to somebody like Fonda, you know."

"In fact, I hear Fredric March is looking for a play," Oscar said.

"They'd be great with Hester."

"I'd love to work with either one of them," Hester said.

"Don't think they wouldn't love to work with
you
, baby," Mitzi said, and finished her drink.

"You're a marvelous actress," Stuart said.

"Thank you. I see the social worker as a very dedicated person, don't you?" Hester said, turning to Arthur.

"I don't know anything about social workers," Arthur said. "My sister was a simple girl living in a house she wanted to get out of. That's what this play is about. The fight between her and my father. She wins the fight, Carol wins the fight and goes off to school. All this other stuff…"

"That's not your sister's real name, is it?" Mitiz asked.

"Carol? No."

"What's her name?" Oscar asked.

"Julie. Why?"

"I just wanted to know."

"I didn't know this play was based on an actual experience of yours, Arthur," Stuart said.

"Well, most fiction comes out of a man's life, doesn't it?" Mitzi said.

"I guess so."

"We're not asking you to change the
reality
of the situation," Hester said.

"We're just asking for a few revisions that would make the story more understandable to a modern audience."

"You talk as if I wrote it back in the Middle Ages," Arthur said, and Oscar immediately laughed. Everyone at the table laughed with him.

"Well, you understand what we mean," Mitzi said, drying her eyes.

"Yes."

"What do you say, Arthur?" Stuart said.

"I don't know. Ill have to think about it."

"Certainly," Mitzi said. "We don't expect a man to make a snap decision. Not when he's worked on something for such a long time."

"That's right," Oscar said.

"You think about it," Hester said.

"Can you let us know by Friday?" Mitzi asked.

"That's only the day after tomorrow," Arthur said.

"Yes."

"Well, I thought… I'm in the middle of a trial, you see, and… I thought I'd read the play over the weekend and see if your suggestions…"

"Well, the only reason I'm suggesting Friday," Mitzi said, "is because they're bringing the new Osborne play over from London, and they've asked Hester to play the part."

"Osborne," Arthur said.

"Yes."

"His new play."

"Yes. And I promised I'd give them an answer before the weekend. And then, of course, I'd still have to go to the people at the Rep and work all that out, so I think you can understand the reason for speed."

"Well, I…"

"The changes seem reasonable, Arthur."

"Well…"

"I think a social worker could be very exciting," Hester said.

"Fonda would be great for the father," Oscar said.

"Think it over, and let us know by Friday, will you?" Mitzi said.

"I'll think it over."

"He'll let you know by Friday," Stuart promised.

He had been watching the office from the drugstore counter across the street on Madison Avenue, drinking three cups of coffee, and then wandering over to browse the paperback racks near the plate glass window (
The Paper Dragon
, he noticed, was still in print) and then going back to the counter for a fourth, and finally nauseating, cup of coffee. He was heading for the paperback racks again when he saw the lights go off across the street. He quickly paid his check and went to stand just inside the entrance to the drugstore. Chickie came out onto the sidewalk first, wearing a black cloth coat with a black fox collar, and Ruth came out of the office immediately afterwards, pulling the door shut behind her, locking it, and then trying the knob once again before stepping out of the doorway. She looped her arm through Chickie's, and the two women started up Madison Avenue, their heads ducked against the wind. Sidney opened the door immediately and went outside. The sidewalks had been shoveled almost clear of snow, but the footing was treacherous, and the wind was brutally sharp. His eyes began to tear at once. He was wearing gloves, but he thrust his hands into his pockets nonetheless, looking up immediately to make sure the girls were still in sight, and then wondering again why he was behaving so foolishly, following them home from work this way, ridiculous, a man his age.

Ruth lived four blocks from the office, and he supposed they were heading there, though he didn't much care
where
they were heading so long as they
got
there quick. His feet were freezing, and his ears throbbed. He lowered his head as a fierce gust of wind knifed the avenue, took one hand from his pocket to clutch his homburg tightly onto his head, holding it there as the wind raged. His coat flapped wildly about his knees, his trousers were flattened against his legs, he coughed bitterly and hung on to his hat, pushing against the wind, trying to keep his footing on the slippery pavement. The wind died momentarily, and he took a deep breath and raised his head and then stopped dead in his tracks because the girls were directly ahead of him on the corner, not fifty feet away.

A tan Cadillac was parked at the curb, its engine running, white fumes billowing from its exhaust. The driver of the car had leaned over on the front seat toward the window closest to the curb, which was open. Both Ruth and Chickie, vapor pluming from their mouths, were slightly bent as they talked to the man in the car, snatches of sound rising, carrying unintelligibly on the wind to where Sidney stood rooted to the sidewalk. He watched a moment longer, and then realized how vulnerable his position was. Ducking into a doorway, he stared at the Cadillac from his new vantage point, watching as Ruth opened the front door and got onto the seat beside the man driving. She reached behind her almost immediately to unlock the back door, and Chickie opened the door and climbed in. Sidney blinked. The car idled at the curb a moment longer, and then gunned away in a burst of power, skid chains clanging.

Sidney emerged from the doorway and watched the car as it went up the avenue and out of sight.

In a moment, the wind rose again.

Leo Kessler was wearing an overlarge red robe, belted loosely at the waist. Beneath the robe, he wore a ribbed undershirt with shoulder straps, and red-and-white check undershorts with black piping on either leg. He had taken off his shoes and replaced them with fleece-lined slippers, but he was still wearing black socks supported by yellow and black garters. Every now and again, he dipped his nose into the brandy snifter in his hands, and then looked up at Sam Genitori, who was outlining what had happened that day in court. "Mmm-hmmm," Leo said, "mmm-hmmm," and then dipped his nose into the brandy snifter again, and looked up at Sam, and rose and walked to the windows and then walked back to his easy chair angled before the marble fireplace in his apartment on East 57th Street, and made himself comfortable, looking down at his long hairy legs and flashy garters, and nodding, and saying "Mmmm-mmm, mmm-hmmm," and then sipping a little brandy again.

"So I told him just where he could go," Sam said. "You got any more of that brandy?"

"Help yourself," Leo said.

"Damn egotistical jackass," Sam said, and poured some brandy into a shot glass.

"I think you were a little too rough with him," Leo said. "Don't you want a snifter for that?"

"I don't know where they are."

"Under the bar. Near the wine glasses."

"Too much trouble," Sam said. "
Salute
," he said, raising the shot glass, and then downing the brandy in one swallow. "Ahhhhhhhh," he said. "What do you mean too rough on him?"

"
He
seems to think he did a good job today."

"Knowles, you mean?"

"Mmm-hmmm."

"How do you know?"

"He told me."

"You saw him today?"

"Yes."

"Where?"

"At the office."

"He came to the office?"

"Mmm-hmmm."

"Why?"

"To ask for six million dollars."

"Did you give it to him?"

"I gave it to him."

"You gave him six million dollars?"

"I authorized six million dollars for his new picture, yes."

"You gave that idiot six million dollars?"

"Someday, Sam, when I have a little time, I'll explain the motion picture business to you."

"Don't bother," Sam said. "All I know is that after his performance in court today, I wouldn't even trust him to walk my dog around the block. So you give him…"

"I don't have a dog," Leo said.

"Even if I
didn't
have a dog," Sam said, "I wouldn't trust Knowles to walk it around the block."

"He's a good director."

"He's a lousy witness."

"He makes good pictures."

"That's debatable."

"I'm not talking about
artistic
pictures, Sam. Artistic pictures can get you in the subway if you also happen to have a twenty-cent token. Ralph Knowles is a good director because his pictures make money."

"Some of them."

"Most of them."

"He
still
almost wrecked our case today."

Leo shrugged. "I'm not so sure he did, Sam. I heard him telling it this afternoon, and I've just now heard you tell it again, and I'm not so sure he wrecked our case at all."

"Leo, take my word for it…"

"Driscoll, maybe. Maybe he wrecked
Driscoll
. But not the case, and not API."

"He told them—"

"He told them he used the book."

"Yes, but he also—"

"He also told them there are no fairies in his pictures. What's so bad about that?"

"Leo, the point—"

"You want a man to go around saying there are fairies in his pictures? Come on now, Sam."

"Leo, by saying what he said—"

"It made it seem like Driscoll wrote a dirty book."

"No! It made it seem—"

"Which Knowles made into a clean picture."

"Leo, I think you're missing something important."

"What's more important than making clean pictures the whole family can go see? Is Walt Disney doing so bad with it?"

"Leo…"

"He also said he made two characters out of one character, right?"

"Yeah, did he tell you about
that
?"

"He told me. But
they
claimed one of those characters was a fairy, and
that's
where he had them, Sam. Because it wasn't."

"What wasn't?"

"A fairy."

"Leo, he walked into a trap, don't you see that?"

"It would have been worse the other way."

"What other way?"

"If he denied something he actually did. If he told them he
didn't
make two characters out of one."

"Leo, the truth is he doesn't
remember
what he did."

"Oh, certainly he does. He wrote the picture, didn't he? He directed it, didn't he?"

"All right, suppose he
did
make two characters out of one?"

"That's exactly what he did."

"Then where did he get the idea?"

"What do you mean?" Leo asked.

"For the other character? The
second
character."

"Where?"

"From the play, Leo."

"What play?"

"
Catchpole
."

"What?"

"In our files, Leo."

"What?"

"At the studio, Leo."

"He never said that."

"He didn't have to say it."

"Why would anyone think…"

"Because first he said, Yes that's what I did, I made two characters out of one, but then he couldn't remember which characters he'd put together to form the second character, and then he said the villain in the book wasn't a queer, or even the guy in the picture, and Leo I am telling you he made a holy mess of the whole damn thing."

"Well, he may be a horse's ass," Leo said, "but he is a
bright
horse's ass. I cannot believe…"

"It's what he did, Leo."

"He's too smart for that."

"He's a jerk, Leo."

"A whole lot smarter than most directors around."

"A moron, Leo."

"And certainly smarter than a tinhorn shyster like Brackman."

"Leo, he may have wrecked our case beyond repair."

"The stupid bastard," Leo said.

If Christie were here, Jonah thought, she would pour some boric acid into hot water (it must be
scalding
hot, darling, she would say) and then insist that I soak my wrist in it, changing the water whenever it got lukewarm, that's what Christie Dunseath Willow would do. And I would allow her to do it while marveling at how adequately she ministered to my needs, and delighting in the sight of her, and simultaneously knowing that we did not have a marriage at all. Oh how surprised they all were, our friends, oh how shocked, stunned, disbelieving when they learned that Christie and I were going to part (but they're such a
darling
couple) that we were going to take up separate residence and live separate lives (so marvelously alert, so much
fun
to be with) that finally we were going to end this ridiculous, sham exercise, recognize it for what it really was, and chalk it off as a total failure (both so bright and talented, so very much alive).