The Starcrossed

by Ben Bova

  Elton Good was a censor. His job was to make certain that nothing disturbing to the public, contrary to FCC regulations or harmful to network profits got onto The Tube.

  “Is Mr. Gabriel always this late?” Good asked, with a slight edge to his reedy voice.

  Montpelier couldn’t reconcile the voice with the sweetly smiling face. “He had to stop at the hospital. They’re taking the bandages off his face.”

  “Oh, yes… that… brawl he got himself into.” Good edged back away from the table slightly, as if he might become contaminated by it all. “Very ugly business. Very ugly.”

  This is going to be some dinner, Montpelier knew.

  In another soundproofed booth, across the restaurant, Brenda Impanema was smiling at Keith Connors, third assistant vice president for marketing of Texas New Technology, Inc.

  Connors wore a Confederate-gray business suit, handtooled Mexican boots, and had an RAF mustache that curled up almost to the comers of his eyes.

  “I knew I’d spot y’all in the middle of a crowded restaurant even though I’d never see y’all befoah,” he was saying. “I jes’ tole myself, Keith, of buddy, y’all jes’ go lookin’ for the purtiest gal in the place. These Canadian chicks don’t have the class of California gals.”

  Brenda smiled demurely. “Actually, I was born in New Mexico.”

  “Hey! That’s practically in Texas! No wonder yo’re so purty.”

  Connors was beaming at her, the glow of his toothy smile outshining the candle on their table by several orders of magnitude. He had already shown Brenda holograms of his Mexican wife and their six children—all under seven years of age. “Guess I’m jes’ a powerful of lover,” he had smirked when she commented on the size of his family.

  Brenda hadn’t quite known what to expect of the executive from TNT. Bernard Finger had called her that afternoon and ordered her to have dinner with the man and show him some of Toronto’s night life.

  “TNT could take over sponsorship of the whole show, all by themselves,” Finger had said. “They’re big and they’re not afraid to spend money.”

  Brenda glowered at Titanic’s chief. “How nice do you want me to be to him?”

  Finger glowered back at her. “You get paid for using your brains, not your pelvis. There’s plenty action for a Texas cowboy in town. You just show him where the waterholes are.”

  So she had dressed in a demure, translucent knee-length gown and decorated it with plenty of the electronic jewelry that TNT manufactured. As she sat in the booth, silhouetted against the gathering twilight, she glittered like an airport runway.

  “Yessir, you shore are purty,” Connors said, with a puppydog wag in his voice.

  “Do you think,” Brenda asked coolly, “that your company will want to advertise your electronic jewelry on ‘The Starcrossed’? Seems like a natural, to me.”

  The booths at the Roundeley Room were soundproofed so that private conversations could not be overheard, and also to protect the restaurant’s patrons from the noisy entrances made by some customers.

  Gloria Glory swept into the restaurant’s foyer, flanked by Francois Dulaq, Rita Yearling and Gregory Earnest. The effect was stunning.

  Once a regally tall, statuesque woman, Gloria Glory had allowed many years of success as a gossip columnist to freeze her self-image. While she still thought of herself as regal and statuesque, to the outside world she closely resembled an asthmatic dirigible swathed in neon-bright floor-length robes.

  No one ever told her this, of course, because her power to make or destroy something as fragile as a “showbusiness personality” was enormous. In the delicate world of the entertainment arts, where talent and experience counted for about a tenth of what publicity and perseverance could get for you, Gloria Glory possessed a negatonnage unapproached by any other columnist. Her viewers were fanatically devoted to her: what Gloria said was “in” was in; who she said was “out” went hungry.

  So words such as fat, overweight and diet had long since disappeared from Gloria’s world. They were as unspoken near her as descriptions of nasal protuberances went unsaid near Byrano de Bergerac.

  The maitre d’, the hatcheck girl, two headwaiters who usually did nothing but stand near the entrance and look imperious, and a dozen other customers all clustered around Gloria and her entourage.

  The hatcheck girl and most of the customers were asking Dulaq for his autograph. They recognized the hockey star’s handsome face, his rugged physique, and his name spelled on the back of the All-Canadian All-Stars team jacket that he was wearing.

  The headwaiters and most of the men in the growing crowd were panting around Rita Yearling, who wore a seethrough clingtight dress with nothing under it except her own impressive physique. The traffic jam was beginning to cause a commotion and block the newcomers who were piling up at the head of the escalator.

  The maitre d’, with the unerring instinct of the breed, gravitated toward Gloria Glory. He had never seen her before and never watched television. But he knew money when he sniffed it. Calmly ignoring the rising tide of shrieks and curses from the top of the escalator as body tumbled upon body, he gave Gloria the utmost compliment: he didn’t ask if she had a reservation.

  “Madam would you prefer a private room, perhaps?”

  Gregory Earnest, roundly ignored by all present, started to say, “I made a reserva…”

  But Gloria’s foghorn voice drowned him out. “Naah… I like to be right in the middle of all the hustle and bustle. How about something right in the center of everything?”

  “Of course,” said the maitre d’.

  Gloria swept regally across the crowded restaurant, like a Montgolfier Brothers hot-air balloon trailing pretty little pennants and fluttering ribbons of silk. Earnest and the two stars followed in her wake, while the maitre d’ preceded her with the haughty air of Grand Vizier. The jumbled, tumbled, grumbling crowd at the top of the escalator was left to sort itself out. After all, that’s what insurance lawyers were for, was it not?

  Montpelier couldn’t hear the shouts and shrieks from the foyer, of course. But he watched Gloria and her entourage march to the table nearest the computer-directed jukebox. He breathed a silent thanksgiving that Gabriel hadn’t arrived at the same time as Earnest.

  “Um, would you like a drink, Mr. Good?” he asked. Good held up a long-fingered hand. “Never touch alcohol, Mr. Montpelier…”

  “Les.”

  “Alcohol and business don’t mix. Never have.”

  “Well, that’s one thing you and Ron Gabriel have in common,” Montpelier said.

  “Oh? What’s that?”

  “He doesn’t drink, either.”

  “Really?” Good’s perpetual smile got wider and somehow tenser. “That’s a surprise.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “From all the depravity in his scripts, I assumed he was either an alcoholic or a drug fiend. Or both.”

  “Depravity?” Monteplier heard his voice squeak.

  “Yer not married or nuthin’, are yew?” asked Connors. Brenda shook her head slowly. “No, I’m a rising young corporate executive.”

  He was working on his second bourbon and water. Their dinners remained on a corner of the table, untouched. “Must be tough to get ahead. Lotsa competition.” “Quite a bit.” Brenda sipped at her vodka sour.

  “If TNT sponsored yer new show, it’s be a real feather in yore cap, huh?”

  “Yes it would. But I won’t go to bed with you for it” Connors’ face fell. “Wh… who said anything about that? I’m a married man!”

  Now Brenda permitted herself to smile again. “I’m sorry,” she said with great sincerity. “I didn’t mean to shock you. But, well… there are lots of men who try to take advantage of a woman in a situation like this. I’m glad you’re not that kind of man.”

  “Hell, no,” said Connors, looking puzzled, disappointed and slightly nettled.

  Brenda sweetened her smile. Have to introduce him to some of the professiona
l ladies working at the hotel, she knew, before he decides to get angry.

  Earnest sat across the table from Dulaq. Between the two men sat Gloria Glory and Rita Yearling. Four appetizers had been served; two were still sitting untouched but Dulaq’s and Gloria’s were already demolished.

  “And you, you great big hunk of muscle,” Gloria turned to Dulaq, “how do you like acting?”

  The hockey star shrugged. “It’s okay. Ain’t had a chance t’really do much… wit’ the riot and all…”

  Earnest felt his blood pressure explode in his ears.

  “Riot?” Gloria looked instantly alert. “What riot?”

  “It wasn’t a riot,” Earnest said quickly. “It was just a bit of a misunderstanding…”

  “I’m afraid it was all my fault,” Rita offered.

  “Dis Gabriel guy gimme a hard time, so I punched him out.”

  “You hit Ron Gabriel?”

  For an instant there was absolute silence at the table. Even Dulaq seemed to realize, in his dim way, that Gloria’s reaction would have enormous implications for his future in show business.

  “Uh… yeah. Once. Between de eyes.”

  Gloria’s bloated face seemed to puff out even more and she suddenly let loose a loud guffaw. “Oh no! You punched that little creep between the eyes! Oh, it’s too marvelous!” She roared with laughter.

  Dulaq and Rita joined in. Earnest laughed too, but his mind was racing. Fearfully, he touched Gloria’s bouffant sleeve. She wiped tears from her eyes as she turned to him.

  “Um, Gloria,” he begged. “You’re not going to, uh… broadcast this, are you?”

  “Broadcast it? Ron Gabriel getting what he’s always asking for? It’s too delicious!”

  “Yes, but it could, well… it could reflect poorly on the show.”

  Gloria put her napkin to her lips and for a wild instant Earnest thought she was going to devour it. But instead she wiped her mouth and then flapped the napkin in Earnest’s direction, saying:

  “Greg… you don’t mind me calling you Greg, do you?”

  Earnest hated being called Greg, but he said, “No, of course not.”

  “All right, Greg, now listen. It has always been my policy to speak no evil of the people I like. I like Bernie Finger and I love this heavyweight champion you’ve got here…” She nodded in Dulaq’s direction. “And you’ve got a lovely new starlet She’s going to be a winner, I know. So, no matter how much I loathe Gabriel, I won’t breathe a word about the fight over the air.”

  Earnest sighed. “Oh, thank you, Gloria.”

  “Nothing to it. You are getting rid of the little creep, though, aren’t you?”

  “Oh we certainly are,” Earnest assured her. “He’s on his way out. Never fear.”

  Ron Gabriel, meanwhile, had arrived and let himself be led quietly to Les Montpelier’s booth. He didn’t see Gloria, Earnest, et. al., mainly because he was wearing dark glasses and the restaurant’s twilight lighting level was quite dim. As it was, Gabriel had a little difficulty following the head waiter who showed him to the booth. He tripped over a step and bumped into a waitress on the way. He cursed at the step and made a date with the girl.

  As he slid into the booth, he said, “I’m not eating anything. They just pumped me so full of antibiotics at the hospital that all I want to do is go, home and sleep. Let’s just talk business and skip the socializing.”

  Before Montpelier could respond, Elton Good pulled a thick wad of notes from his jacket pocket.

  “Very well, Mr. Gabriel. I like a man who speaks his mind. There are eighty-seven changes that need to be made in your script before its acceptable to FINC.”

  “Eighty-seven?”

  Good nodded smilingly. “Yes. And as you know, hehheh, without FINC’s mark of approval, your script cannot be shown on American television.”

  “Eighty-motherloving-seven,” Gabriel moaned.

  “Here’s the first of them,” said Good, peering at his notes in the dim lighting. His smile widened. “Ah, yes… when you have the character Rom standing behind the character Ben, who’s sitting at the command console, I believe…”

  “That’s in the second scene,” Montpelier murmured.

  “Yes. Rom puts his hand on Ben’s shoulder… that’s got to come out.”

  “Huh? Why?”

  Good’s smile turned tickening. “Can’t you see? It’s too suggestive. One man standing behind another man and then touching him on the shoulder! Children will be watching this show, after all!”

  Gabriel looked across the table at Montpelier. Even though half the writer’s face was covered by dark glasses, Montpelier could read anguish and despair in his expression.

  “I shorely do love my wife,” Connors was telling Brenda, between bites of steak. “But, well, hell, honey… I travel an awful lot. And I’m not exactly repulsive. When I see somethin’ I like, I don’t turn my back to it.”

  “That’s understandable,” Brenda said. She toyed with her salad for a moment, then asked, “And what does your wife do while you’re away on all these business trips?”

  He dropped his fork into his lap. “Whattaya mean?” Brenda widened her eyes. “I mean, does she fill in the time with volunteer work or social clubs or at the golf course? She doesn’t stay home with the children all the time, does she?”

  Connors scowled at her. “No, I reckon she doesn’t. We belong to the country club. And she’s a voluntary librarian, over t’the school.”

  “I see.”

  He retrieved his fork and studied it for a moment, then changed the subject as he went back to the attack on his steak. “I wanted t’get yore opinion about how many TNT products we can use on the show? As props, I mean.”

  “Well,” Brenda said, “the action’s supposed to be taking place seven hundred years in the future. I don’t think too many existing products will be in keeping with the scenario…”

  Connors! face brightened. “They’ll still be usin’ wristwatches, won’t they? We make wristwatches. And pocket radios, calculators, all sorts of stuff.”

  “Yes, but if they’re the same products that are being advertised during the commercial breaks, then the viewers will…”

  “Well, spit, why not? The viewers’ll think that TNT’s stuff’s so good people’ll still be usin’ ’em seven hunnert years from now. That’s terrificl”

  “I don’t know if that will work…”

  “Shore it will. And I’ll tell yew somethin’ else, honey. I don’t want any shows about computers breakin’ down or goin’ crazy or any of that kinda stuff. We make computers that don’t break down or go crazy and we ain’t gonna sponsor any show that says otherwise.”

  Brenda nodded. “I can understand that.”

  “And where do you get your hair done?” Gloria Glory was asking Rita.

  Earnest watched with growing concern as the two women chatted about clothes, hairdos, cosmetics, vitamins. Is Gloria probing Rita to find out about her real age? Does she know about Rita’s earlier life and her Vitaform Processing?

  Across the table from him, Dulaq was demolishing a haunch of venison, using both hands to get at the meat.

  If he had thumbs on his feet he’d use those, too, Earnest told himself with an inward wince of distaste.

  Then he felt something odd. Something soft and tickly was rubbing against his left ankle. A cat? Not in a place like this. Don’t be absurd. There it was again, touching his ankle, just above his low-cut boots and below the cuff of his Fabulous Forties trousers.

  He pulled his left foot back abruptly. It bumped into something. Glancing surreptitiously down to the floor, Earnest saw the heel of a woman’s shoe peeking out from under the tablecloth. A pink shoe. Gloria’s shoe. And the tickling, rubbing sensation started on his right ankle.

  She’s playing toesies with me!

  Earnest didn’t know what to do. One doesn’t rebuff the most powerful columnist in the business. Not if one wanted to remain in the business. Yet…

  He f
rankly stared at Gloria’s face. She was still chatting with Rita, eyes focused—glowing, actually—on the beautiful starlet. But her toes were on Earnest’s ankle.

  Suddenly his stomach heaved. He fought it down, manfully, but the thought of getting any closer to that mountain of female flesh distressed him terribly. She’s fat and ugly and… old! But what really churned his guts was the realization that whatever Gloria wanted, Gloria got. There were no exceptions to the rule; in her own powerful way, she was quite irresistible.

  Maybe it’s Dulaq she’s after. How to let her know she had the wrong ankle? Earnest pondered the problem and decided that the best course of action was a cautious retreat.

  Slowly he edged his right foot back toward the safety of his own chair, where his left foot cowered. He tried not to look directly at Gloria as he did so, but out of the corner of his eye he noticed a brief expression of disappointment cross her bloated face.

  His feet tucked firmly under his chair, Earnest watched as Gloria squirmed slightly and seemed to sink a little lower in her seat. Dulaq chomped away on his venison, oblivious to everything else around him. If she’s made contact with him, Earnest raged to himself, he hasn’t even noticed it. He’ll ruin us all!

  Rita was saying, “And I take all the megavitamins. Have you tried the new multiple complexes? They’re great for your complexion and they give you scads of energy…”

  Earnest squeezed his eyes shut with the fierceness of concentrated thought. If she’s after Dulaq and he doesn’t pay attention to her, we’re all sunk. I’ll have to get into the act and (his stomach lurched) volunteer for duty with her. At least, she’ll be flattered enough to forget about Dulaq.

  Trying not to think of what he’d have to do if Gloria liked him or was after him in the first place, Earnest quietly slipped off one boot and stuck his toes out cautiously toward Dulaq’s side of the table.

  His stockinged toes bumped into a leg. He quickly pulled back. Trying not to frown, he wished he could see what was going on under the table. Gloria’s leg shouldn’t be extended so far; she was missing Dulaq entirely, no doubt.