The Sixteen Burdens (12 page)

C
HAPTER
S
IXTEEN

G
RAY
WAS
USED
to doors closing on him, but Charlie Chaplin was the skeleton key that opened them all. As they passed through layers of security at the United Artists studio lot, Gray met eyes with a glowering guard and a resentful receptionist, but everyone let him through without a word.

“They don’t like me,” Gray said.

“Does that bother you?” Chaplin asked.

“Not really.”

“Good,” Chaplin said. “Nobody ever achieved greatness on the quest to be liked.”

Even though it was Saturday, the United Artists offices were bustling with activity. A row of typists against one wall clacked away like an out-of-sync percussion band. Telephones sang out to each other like mynah birds.

They walked into Chaplin’s office. It was a large space adorned in dark browns and deep reds. There were soft leather chairs in one corner and, below the window, a massive wooden desk with ornate gold accents. Like Chaplin’s home, the opulence of the space didn’t seem to suit him. Gray guessed that someone else had decorated the space for him.

Nothing seemed to get much use except for a massive globe in one corner. It was covered with adhesive dots of all colors, all with illegible scribbles next to them.

“What’s this?”

“Ostensibly, it’s a location-scouting globe for our films. In reality, it’s the culmination of more than a decade of searching for other Burdens—an idea from Houdini. Atlas wants to recruit them to his cause. World domination and such. We’ve been trying to find them first and convince them otherwise.”

“How do you even begin to look?”

“That’s the problem. It’s not like they have name tags.”

Chaplin pointed to the built-in shelving spanning a full wall of his office; it was filled with bound collections of newspapers.

“We read. A lot. Looking for places in crisis. Looking for stories of people doing extraordinary things. But maybe with you helping us the search would go faster. It seems you can see us in ways others can’t.”

“I ain’t nobody’s tool,” Gray protested.

“I didn’t call you a tool. I said you were an Artifact. At least that’s my theory.”

“But how can I be?” Gray asked. “You said those things were made by two Burdens.”

“You
were
made by two Burdens,” Chaplin said. “Just not in the traditional fashion. If I’m correct, it would be extraordinary.”

A gray-haired woman with tight lines around her mouth entered the room.

“Speaking of extraordinary.”

“The production keeps calling,” she said. “They have a million questions.”

Chaplin handed her his cane and hat.

“Tell them this:
No. No. That costs too much. Let him get back to you on that.
Just cycle through those responses and you should be fine. And clear the rest of my day.”

Her lips pursed so tightly she could crack a walnut. She stormed off.

“The best secretaries have no sense of humor. Come now. We have one meeting we simply can’t miss.”

They exited the main building, passing through a serene rose garden meant for the kind of contemplation no one there seemed to have time for.

Chaplin led them through a small lot to a huge building that had no windows. It was silver with a curved roof and must have been four stories high. He grunted as he put all his weight into yanking open a large, sliding metal door.

“This is my exercise for the day.”

Bright lights shone inside, bright as the sun.

“Welcome to the Village.”

Gray stared in wonder. It looked as if he were stepping from one outside into another. Inside the hangar was a small, rustic village surrounded by trees. He and Chaplin stood on a dirt road leading to a tiny plaza with a stone well at its center. The homes were quaint one-room structures, the kind that might be found in a village anywhere from medieval Europe to present-day California.

“What’s this?”

“It’s the set from
The Mask of Zorro
. And
The Three Musketeers
. And
The Iron Mask
. And half a dozen other films. It’s our generic rural settlement, which seems to find itself in nearly every film of ours at some point. We keep trying to tear it down but it’s too useful. Sometimes it’s a French hamlet, other times it’s a colonial settlement or an Indian reservation.”

Chaplin led Gray up the dirt road, which cut through a realistic meadow that faded into blackness on both sides of them.

“Right now it’s useless because we’re shooting a prehistoric adventure, but it’s perfect for a bit of privacy.”

As real as the landscape looked, it smelled like nothing, as sterile as a hospital room. And as quiet as a library. Gray felt the heat of giant spotlights overhead as they passed the false well and entered the largest of the homes at the very back of the Village.

Inside was a large tavern, decorated with rich velvet drapes and Spanish-style armor and paintings. At the center was a massive banquet table and, at the table, two men.

“You’re late,” said one man, who wore a black suit and looked stuffy, like an accountant or lawyer.

“I’m not,” Chaplin said. “I always arrive exactly when I intend.”

“Can’t you be serious for once?”

“It’s not in my nature.”

The man looked vaguely familiar to Gray, but he couldn’t quite place him. The other, however, with his thin mustache and slick hair, was unmistakable. Gray couldn’t help himself.

“You’re Douglas Fairbanks!”

The man smiled and winked.

“Am I?”

There in front of Gray was the greatest adventure hero in silent film. The man who had flown on magic carpets, shot arrows through apples at a hundred yards and had won more sword fights than anyone could count. Despite himself, Gray rushed up to shake his hand.

“It’s an honor to meet you!”

“It’s an honor to be me!”

They shook. Fairbanks flashed his trademark smile, the beguiling one that in films had galvanized soldiers and melted the hearts of fair maidens. His hair was grayer and his face rounder than his days as Zorro and Robin Hood, but his presence was as charismatic as ever. Gray half expected him to jump onto the table with a sword in his hand, ready to cut down pirates or thieves.

“It seems you have a fan,” Chaplin said to Fairbanks. “I can assure you he didn’t greet me with the same enthusiasm.”

Fairbanks smiled, and Gray saw the energy in the room bend toward the man. It was nearly imperceptible, but the air around Chaplin and the other man pulled toward Fairbanks. It was as if the man’s mere presence was a magnet.

The stuffy man stood up. His hair was thinning and he had wrinkles around the corners of his eyes and mouth. He reached out to shake Gray’s hand.

“Good day,” he said. “My name is D.W. Griffith.”

His voice was kind, and it belied his stern expression. They shook.

Chaplin sat Gray down at the table. A spread there included boiled eggs, a bowl of fruit and a platter of finger sandwiches made of cucumber and cream cheese. Griffith poured Gray a glass of iced tea.

Fairbanks leaned back in his chair and put his feet on the table, as if he were a young rogue during the Middle Ages and not a modern-day movie star in his mid-fifties.

“Who is this young man and what is he doing here?” Fairbanks asked. “I thought this was a private meeting to talk about Mary.”

“It is,” Chaplin said. “And who better to help than Mary’s son?”

Chaplin held out his hands with a flourish, as if he were a salesman showing off a new car. His guilty smile didn’t help sell it.

Griffith leaned in toward Gray.

“I see it in the face and hair,” he said. “That countenance is Mary’s. The curls, too. But the eyes. The young man is definitely—”

“Houdini’s last trick?” Chaplin asked.

Only Chaplin laughed. Griffith looked to Fairbanks, whose smile had flipped a U-turn. Gray felt he was the butt of a joke he didn’t understand.

As Gray reached for a sandwich, Fairbanks’s eyes followed him.

“Why is he here? Where did he even come from?”

His voice was steely, and the welcome mat his smile had unfurled was promptly rolled up and locked inside. Chaplin put his hand up as if to beg Fairbanks’s pardon.

“Just let me explain, Doug.”

Chaplin turned to Gray.

“Houdini once nicknamed us the Show Business Burdens: Mary with her beauty, me with my humor, and Douglas here with his irresistible charisma. I think he meant it as an insult, but we all rather liked the label. What more natural place for people of our abilities to end up than in Hollywood? We may not be great warriors or great thinkers, but we do have some use. During the Great War, for example, we used our celebrity to sell millions of dollars in war bonds.”

Gray looked at Griffith, who had none of the strange energy the others did.

“What about Mr. Griffith? He ain’t nothing?”

Griffith nodded politely, as if it were the obvious truth. Chaplin wagged his finger.

“D.W. has the most important quality of any of us. He’s a loyal friend.”

“But he don’t
do
nothing?”

“He does more for us than you could imagine,” Chaplin said. “The four of us, including your mother, founded United Artists years ago. Griffith runs the film side of the business better than any of us ever could.”

Fairbanks cleared his throat.

“Enough chit-chat. Why is he here?”

Chaplin cleared his own throat and fingered his hat nervously. Gray realized he hadn’t cracked a joke in the past few minutes.

“Gray was with Mary last night when she was abducted.”

Fairbanks jumped up, just like Gray had pictured he might, but without a sword.

“What? Why didn’t you say so?”

He faced Gray.

“What happened?”

Gray’s stomach churned, like the time he had been caught shoplifting. He was used to dealing with bullies, cops, and average Joes, but he had never had the eyes of such important people on him. His mouth, normally so smart, felt very stupid.

“Take your time,” Fairbanks said, though his tone indicated the exact opposite.

In a quiet voice, Gray told them the story, how he had followed Pickford to the circus and then tried to confront Atlas himself. How Pickford stepped in to rescue him, entrancing the strong man but getting knocked out by Sugar.

The gleam in Fairbanks’s eyes left him and his mouth grew tight.

“So it’s your fault she’s been captured? She was trying to save you after she explicitly told you to stay away!”

“If we’re passing out blame, Doug, then take a heaping spoonful yourself,” Chaplin said, “for not helping Houdini take care of Atlas the first time around.”

Fairbanks looked from Gray to Chaplin.

“Houdini tried to ruin me!”

Fairbanks slammed his fist on the table. Griffith looked anxious.

“If she’s harmed in any way I’ll hold the bastard responsible.”

At first Gray thought Fairbanks was talking about Atlas, but then he realized that Fairbanks was referring to him. His face felt very hot.

“I was tryin’ to help her,” Gray muttered. “More than any of you did.”

This was going all wrong. Gray finally got to meet his film hero and the man hated him.

“I would have been there in an instant if she had only told me,” Fairbanks said.

“You two haven’t been on speaking terms for months,” Chaplin said.

“I am still a man with two fists!”

He stood up and paced the room.

“I think you need to get some air, Doug.”

“I don’t need air! I need us to make a plan to rescue Mary. And if none of you has the guts to face this Atlas fellow then I’ll do it myself!”

Fairbanks stood up and walked out. He slammed the front door shut, but it was only a stage door and bounced silently off the frame. They heard him exit the hangar.

“Leave him be,” Griffith said. “It’s probably best that you keep him out of this for now. He’s too emotional.”

“Of all us Burdens, he’s probably the most powerful,” Chaplin said, “but also the most temperamental.”

Gray just wanted to change the conversation.

“Why are you called Burdens, anyway?”

“It’s a kind of nickname passed down through history,” Chaplin said. “Anyone with one of humanity’s great talents will discover, soon enough, that their gift is as much an encumbrance as it is an advantage. Being exceptional comes with all sorts of strings attached. It’s a responsibility we didn’t ask for. It’s a danger we can’t escape. At the end of the day, our blessing is a burden.”

C
HAPTER
S
EVENTEEN

“D
OUGLAS
F
AIRBANKS
HATES
me,” Gray said.

The thought agitated him—a grain of sand wedged in the folds of his brain. He slumped in the back seat of the Pierce-Arrow as Chaplin drove them east down Sunset.

“Hate is such a strong word,” Chaplin said. “But, yes, probably accurate.”

“Gosh, thanks.”

“It’s not your fault. He and your mother have a history as long as it is tumultuous.”

Chaplin parked on the north side of Olvera Street, the traditional Mexican neighborhood and oldest part of the city. They walked through the Spanish-style plaza, charming in the way tourist destinations were.

“Why are we here?” Gray asked.

“My wardrobe is short a sombrero,” Chaplin said. “Come along.”

A man skilled in guitar and nonchalance sat at a bench playing Mexican folk music, his foot discreetly pointing to his tip jar.

“We’re not all movie stars,” Chaplin said, dropping a nickel in the jar. “Historically the Burdens have been great politicians, warriors, inventors, and thinkers. And some are nothing at all. Not yet, at least.”

The walkway narrowed and they were flanked by a rummage sale of Mexican souvenirs: colorful skirts, cacti in pots, hand-carved flutes. There was a sound of something sizzling, and Gray followed the smell past a burbling fountain to a small restaurant where an old woman out front was pounding tortillas by hand. She was wrinkled like dried fruit, but large and sturdy.

“Is your grandson here?” Chaplin asked her. “
¿Está su nieto?
”

The woman looked up, and when she saw it was Chaplin, began spouting a litany of rapid Spanish, wagging her finger at him. She seemed unconcerned that he was one of the most powerful men in the city.

“We’ll just try inside,” Chaplin said.

Gray followed him into the restaurant, which was little more than four mismatched tables and a pass-through to a narrow kitchen. The floors were terra cotta tile, and the crumbling walls were painted bright colors to hide the ruin. Gray had seen the same technique employed by certain women on Santa Monica Boulevard, and to the same ineffectual result.

He and Chaplin sat down at a table and waited to be served. Gray politely ignored a rat running along the baseboard, who politely ignored him in return.

“I do love a place with ambiance,” Chaplin said.

“You’re in luck,” Gray said. “This place is filthy with it.”

Two large oil paintings hung on the wall, completely out of proportion for the cramped space. One was a portrait of what looked like a wealthy Mexican family, the other was of a stocky, rifle-wielding man on a horse. Their noses were upturned, as if to willfully ignore their current station presiding over five-cent tamales in a run-down Mexican cafe.

A young man trotted out to them with menus, and when Gray looked up he saw that it was the fat coconut from the boys home—Panchito.

“You can walk!” Gray said.

He wore a bandage on his head and a scowl on his face.

“Of course I can walk,” Panchito said. “I bet I can walk better than you.”

Chaplin cast a pointed look at Panchito.

“You two have met?”

“It’s not my fault!” Panchito said. “Mrs. Pickford told me to watch him. I had to get in close.”

“You were supposed to keep your distance and make sure he didn’t get into trouble.”

Panchito glowered at Gray.

“All he does is get into trouble. Just ask Mrs. Pickford.”

“Mary has been kidnapped,” Chaplin said.

Panchito frowned and slumped into a chair.

“I should have been guarding her, not wasting time on this guy,” Panchito said. “Why’s he so important? Who is he? And what kind of name is Gray Studebaker, anyway?”

“He was originally named Hennessey,” Chaplin said. “I think we can all agree he dodged a bullet there.”

Chaplin walked to the counter and ladled some kind of purple-red juice into two glasses. Panchito scowled but said nothing. Chaplin handed Gray a glass.

“Now, introductions. I am a proper Englishman after all.”

He sipped from his glass.

“Mm. Hibiscus. Chito, you know this is Gray Studebaker. What you don’t know is that he’s Mary’s biological son. That’s why you’ve been keeping an eye on him recently. At least part of the reason.”

Panchito looked at Gray as if trying to see Pickford in him.

“And Gray, this is Panchito. He has a special skill of his own.”

“The power to annoy?” Gray asked.

Gray saw the energy around Panchito swell. He jumped at Gray, but Chaplin seemed to expect this and caught him by the back of his collar.

“As you can see, he’s a rather brave young man for his height,” Chaplin said. “And his girth.”

Panchito stopped struggling and Chaplin let him go.

“Gray, do you know who Pancho Villa is?”

“Wasn’t he some kind of Mexican bandit?”

“Mexican
revolutionary
,” Panchito said. “He ruled the entire north of Mexico and was the bravest general the country has ever known. He was the Robin Hood of Mexico.”

Chaplin both nodded and frowned—
close enough
.

“Pancho Villa was the bravest man of his day. Unfortunately, he was assassinated about the time Panchito was born. No one knows for sure who was responsible, but they sought to wipe out the entire Villa family.”

“I’m going to hunt down the man who killed my father,” Panchito said, “and kill him back. Twice.”

The only thing Panchito looked as if he had ever killed was a double fudge malt at Carrie’s Ice Cream Parlor.

“No revenge today,” Chaplin said. “Pancho Villa’s mother—Chito’s grandmother—took baby Panchito and fled north to California, abandoning their lands and fortune. They came to Hollywood because a year earlier Villa and I had met; we became acquaintances, if not friends.”

Gray sipped the juice. It was like nothing he had ever tasted: sweet and floral, like he imagined it would taste for a hummingbird sipping nectar.

“Pancho Villa had the greatest courage of any person on Earth,” Chaplin said.

He nodded to Panchito.

“And now he does.”

Gray looked at the round-faced kid, whose gentle features were hardened by the stony look in his eyes.

“I thought these talents weren’t hereditary.”

“They’re not,” Chaplin said. He looked down in his drink and swirled it with his finger.

“It appears that courage wasn’t through with the Villa family. There was more work to do, and I always believed it would be in Hollywood with the rest of us. But now I believe it’s with you, Gray.”

Gray looked down; he’d rather make friends with a beehive.

“Come on, I’m sure you’ll make great friends,” Chaplin said. “You have so much in common: You’re both the same age. You both grew up Downtown. Both of your fathers were viciously murdered.”

“He’s not even one of us,” Panchito said. “He has nothing to offer.”

“That’s where you’re wrong.”

Chaplin reached over and rested his hand on top of Gray’s. Gray felt that same buzz of energy, like from Atlas and Elsie.

“We’ve had time to develop our talents over the years. Take Mary, for example. She was always beautiful—it’s what got her into film in the first place. And yet it takes a certain amount of skill to wield a beauty that intense. People became so drawn to her that they couldn’t stop gawking. She could control them that way. Almost all men, and a handful of women.”

Chaplin removed a coin from his pocket.

“I always call tails.”

He then reached over and tickled Panchito, who giggled despite himself.

“Stop that!” he said.

Gray saw Panchito’s laughter vibrate the air. Chaplin flipped the coin, and it landed on tails. He did it a second time. Again tails.

“My humor, it has taken me years to grow into it. Years to master. We don’t have that luxury right now.”

Chaplin slapped his hand on the table.

“We need you, Chito, to grow up, and grow up fast.”

“How?” Panchito asked.

Chaplin looked at him, then at Gray.

“Hold hands.”

“I’d rather kiss a goat,” Panchito said.

“That can be arranged,” Chaplin said.

Gray grabbed Panchito’s hand before he could protest. The jolt of energy startled Panchito, but he didn’t pull away.

“Gray, how do you see Chito’s energy?” Chaplin asked.

“It’s kind of like a bubble that expands around him when he gets worked up.”

“That’s his courage,” Chaplin said. “At its core, what is courage? It’s a willingness to face an opposing person or thing. We need to see it in its heightened state.”

Chaplin thought for a moment.

“Chito, what frightens you most?”

Panchito set his jaw tightly.

“Nothing.”

“Come on, now. You can’t be brave against something if you aren’t afraid of it.”

Panchito looked down at the floor.

“My grandmother dying. Policemen. And cockroaches. I hate cockroaches. They’re all over our apartment.”

Chaplin tapped his upper lip, right where his toothbrush mustache would be. He looked around the restaurant and unscrewed the metal cap of a ceramic pepper shaker sitting on one of the tables. He set the cap on the counter in front of Panchito.

“Pretend this is a cockroach. What would you do to it?”

“I’d flick it away it.”

“OK. Think about flicking it away, but don’t actually touch it.”

Panchito gave him a dubious look.

“Go on,” Gray said. “Your hand’s getting all sweaty.”

Panchito looked at the pepper shaker cap long and hard. Nothing happened.

“Focus on being brave against the cockroach,” Chaplin said. “Tap into your courage.”

Panchito groaned and turned back to the cap. He stared and stared until a vein began to bulge on his temple. The cap sat there, defying him.

“For every cockroach you see, there are a hundred others in the walls,” Chaplin said. “They’re coming for you. For your grandmother.”

At that, Panchito flinched. Gray saw a wall of energy around him flare and thrust outward. When it hit the pepper shaker cap, it went sliding off the counter, tumbling onto the ground.

“Gee whiskers!” Panchito said.

Chaplin clapped gleefully. Gray ripped his hand away.

“Well done!” Chaplin said. “I can see that being useful.”

Panchito focused on a spoon on the table. Nothing happened. He put his hand on top of Gray’s and tried again. This time he thrust it away with a bit more force, sending it clattering toward the wall.

“This would have taken years to develop,” Chaplin said. “But because of Gray I imagine you’ll be able to do it on your own within a day or two.”

A smile crept across Panchito’s face.

“This will allow me to avenge my father.”

“All in good time,” Chaplin said.

Panchito stood and paced the room, all five steps of it.

“That’s what you keep telling me. You keep stringing me along, getting me to do all your chores without giving me anything in return.”

Chaplin put on his best stern face.

“I’ve told you many times that when you’re older I’ll help you make peace with your father’s killer.”

“I
am
older,” Panchito said. “I’m fifteen and a half. That makes me a man!”

“Let’s agree on ‘man-child’ and call it a day,” Chaplin said.

Panchito clenched his fists and thrust a fork off the table, this time free of Gray’s touch. It flew into the wall with enough force to stick there.

“And it’s not peace I want with Jesús Herrera,” Panchito said. “It’s revenge.”

He stormed out of the restaurant. Gray looked at Chaplin.

“That’s who you want me to be pals with? He needs a muzzle and a shot of nerve tonic.”

“He’s a little excitable, but he has a good heart,” Chaplin said. “And right now we need a warrior if we’re going to face Atlas.”

“What if he won’t help us?” Gray asked.

“I’ll talk to him,” Chaplin said. “He will, either out of duty or, if necessary, out of coercion.”

“Coerce him how?”

Chaplin rubbed his hands together anxiously.

“I’d give him what he truly wants. I’d take him to his father’s killer.”