by Phil Swann
“Now?” Franklin replied.
“Yes. Monsieur Le Gros keeps private salon. He has an original Bartolomeo Cristofori fortepiano. If we could beg Le Gros to let us in, I could play you my music, and you could tell me about America.”
“Doctor Franklin, is everything satisfactory?” Franklin hadn’t noticed the anxious man as he approached.
“Thank you, monsieur Le Gros, yes, everything is splendid.” Franklin then began to do what he knew he did best. “Monsieur Le Gros, I have made an outrageous faux pas.”
Le Gros became even more rigid. “What, monsieur, is that?”
“I believe that I have neglected expressing to you my appreciation for such a magical evening. It is obvious that beyond the fine orchestra and this talented young composer, the real genius behind tonight’s festivities is yourself. Was it not you, monsieur, who so expertly choreographed the entire performance this evening?”
“Well, monsieur, I might have played a small role.” Le Gros replied, growing by inches as Franklin spoke.
“A small role indeed, monsieur, you are the whole cast. But you are far too modest to ever acknowledge any of these things yourself.”
“Yes, I guess I am,” Le Gros said with a faraway look.
“Can you ever forgive me for my thoughtlessness?”
Le Gros stood with his chest out and head high. “Monsieur Franklin, I am honored. If your evening was enjoyable, then my work has been a success.”
“It has been memorable,” Franklin announced.
Le Gros beamed.
“But alas,” Franklin continued with a falling tone, “there is only one other thing that would have made this evening completely unforgettable.”
Le Gros’s smile diminished slightly. “What would that be, monsieur? If it is in my power, I will make it so.”
Franklin sighed. “No, monsieur, I believe this request would be even beyond your incredible abilities.”
“Monsieur, I humbly demand you allow me the chance to provide the impossible.”
Franklin looked at Mozart, and with his left eye, the one Le Gros couldn’t see but Mozart could, winked. “If you insist. I have always had the desire to see and hear an original Bartolomeo Cristofori fortepiano. I have heard about them, but that is all. I had some hope that I might see one tonight, but it was not to be. Perhaps you may know someone in Paris who has one?”
A smile slowly reappeared across Le Gros’s face. “Monsieur, I have in my possession just such an instrument.”
“No, monsieur, you jest,” Franklin exclaimed.
“No, Monsieur, I do not,” Le Gros exclaimed back.
“Monsieur, you are indeed a truly remarkable man.”
Le Gros gloated, “And I can even do better than that. It just so happens that Monsieur Mozart is a virtuoso on the fortepiano.”
“Is he really? Do you think he’d play for me?” Franklin scammed.
“He shall if I so instruct him to. Monsieur Mozart,” Le Gros said, turning to Mozart, “you will take our honored guest to my private salon. My valet will lead you. Upon arriving, you will play the fortepiano for monsieur Franklin until he instructs you to stop. Is that understood?”
Mozart, who was totally aware of Franklin’s ruse, couldn’t resist his own bit of theater. “Monsieur Le Gros, I was commissioned to compose a piece for the opening and conduct it. I did, now my job is finished. I am not being paid to—”
Le Gros lowered his head like a bull. “You are lucky to be paid at all after your exhibition before the king and queen. You will do as I say, or you will never have a commission in Paris again. That, monsieur, is a promise.”
Mozart played the part to the hilt. “It seems I have little choice.”
“Indeed, monsieur,” Le Gros replied.
Mozart turned to Franklin and winked with his right eye, the one Le Gros couldn’t see. “Monsieur Franklin, it would appear that I am at your service.”
Franklin bit his upper lip to keep from smiling.
“Garçon!” Le Gros barked to the young valet waiting in the wings. “Please escort Doctor Franklin and Monsieur Mozart to my private salon.”
The valet leaped forward, bowed, and then gestured for Franklin and Mozart to follow.
Mozart whispered, “Doctor Franklin, you are a conniving gentleman.”
Franklin, looking straight ahead, whispered back, “And you, Herr Mozart, have a touch of larceny in you as well.”
The young musician and the old philosopher exited through the large double doors on the east side of the hall and entered the lush tuilerie gardens of the Louvre. A light rain had given way to a balmy Paris evening, and the moon reflected off a fountain in the center of the garden. The smell of rose and honeysuckle permeated the air.
“Oh, what a lovely night, would you not agree, Herr Mozart?”
“Yes, it surely is. But please, Doctor Franklin, call me Wolfgang.”
“Wolfgang, what a delightful name! I am Ben.”
“I am honored, Ben. So tell me—Ben—about your America.”
“’Tis a tall order, Wolfgang. Let me see.” Ben put his hand on Wolfgang’s shoulder as they strolled through the palatial garden. “First off, it is not my America, ’tis all the colonists' America. I should begin at the beginning, always a fine place to start. Some years ago a few of us got together in Philadelphia—that is my home. Oh, what a bevy we are too. There’s young Tom Jefferson, I have already told you a little about him. A fellow named John Adams, nice chap but can be somewhat of a horse’s rear end at times—oh, but John’s bride Abigail—let me tell you about Abigail. Taking nothing away from the queen of France of course, Abigail possesses two of the most heavenly—”
“Ben,” Mozart exclaimed. “You are a Frenchman.”
“My young friend,” Ben replied, “when it comes to food or a man’s loins, we are all Frenchmen.”
Mozart howled.
Part One
Chapter One
Los Angeles, California
They were connected, man and music. With eyes closed and with a gentle sway, the pianist’s hands glided over the keyboard without a moment of indecision. A tri-tone passing chord. Damn, that’s nice. I’ll do it again in the second verse. And he did, seamlessly modulating from one key to another, wrapping the familiar refrain in chords voiced so warmly as to melt stone. It was “Moon River” that filled the lobby-bar of the Los Angeles Airport Holiday Inn. Some listened, most didn’t, but the man at the piano couldn’t have cared less. He kept his eyes closed and played. He was at peace—totally at peace.
“Hey, piano boy, you deaf?”
Without so much as a ritardando, the pianist turned his head and opened one eye.
“I asked you,” the man yelled from across the room, “to play me and my little lady here a song.”
Reclosing the one eye, the musician stopped, took a deep breath, and then reopened both. “What would you and…your little lady like to hear?”
“How about something good?” The man let out a laugh that could be heard throughout the hotel’s lobby.
The pianist only slightly moved his lips before he closed his eyes and returned where he left off in the song.
“What the fuck did you just say?” the man yelled, leaping to his feet.
The piano player stopped abruptly and looked at the man with a cold smile. “Oh, did I say that out loud?”
Two highball glasses and a bowl of mixed nuts crashed to the ground as the irate man lunged from his table. “You wanna get it on, you little homo?" he said, ripping off his sport jacket. "Come on, right now. It’s you and me, piano boy.”
The beer-bellied businessman was now standing directly over the piano player. Without changing expression or even missing a beat, the musician ran an arpeggio up the keyboard, concluding with a right-handed uppercut into the businessman’s groin. The man fell to his knees, coughing and gasping for air. As his left hand began playing an old-time gospel-style stride, his right hand yanked in rhythm on the businessman’s ti
e, bouncing the man’s face onto the upper register of the keyboard. Blood spit over the keys as the man’s nose slammed into them.
From the first angry word, the bartender, a formidable young black man, sped from behind the bar. By the time he reached the action, the businessman was a limp and bloody rag. The bartender grabbed the piano player by the back of his tuxedo jacket and flung him off the bench. He picked up the businessman and sat him in a nearby chair. “Just keep your head back, sir. Janet,” he yelled to the waitress cowering in the corner, “get some ice for Mr. Harshbarger here.”
A short, balding man in a conservative gray suit frantically excused himself through the spectators. “Sir, are you okay? John, who did this?”
“David Webber.”
“The piano player?” The manager shouted. “Where the hell is he?”
The bartender pointed toward the bar.
Sitting casually on a barstool with his legs crossed, smoking a cigarette and sipping a glass of whiskey, was a dark-haired, moderately handsome thirty-something-year-old man in a blood-stained tuxedo.
“Call security,” the manager said. “Then call the police.”
Chapter Two
“Sign right here, sir.”
David Webber, tie undone and tuxedo jacket draped over his arm, signed the document the elderly officer pushed toward him.
The officer opened a manila envelope and poured the contents onto the counter. “Now, sir, I’d like for you to verify this is the personal property you had on your person when you were brought in and that it’s all accounted for. You can sign right here.”
David remained expressionless as the officer pushed another form in front of him. He took his wallet, a half pack of Marlboro Lights, a tarnished silver Zippo lighter, sixty-four cents in change, and an almost new roll of breath mints.
“Yeah, it’s all here,” he said, dropping the items into his bloodied tuxedo jacket pocket and signing the form.
“Okay, sir, that’s it. Here's your receipt,” the officer said, handing David the pink carbon. “Ms. Peterson said you should wait for her out front.”
“Thanks,” David mumbled, putting on his jacket.
“You’re welcome, and you have a nice evening, sir,” the old officer crooned with a tone David knew was perfected for the sole purpose of pissing off people like himself even more than they already were.
David put on his jacket, turned up the lapel, and walked out the front door of the LAPD Pacific Division. The rain had become drizzle, and a record low for Southern California in mid-June was forecast. He pulled a cigarette from his pocket, lit it, and looked at his watch. It was a little before one thirty in the morning. He looked down Centinela Boulevard. He saw two police officers on the sidewalk, a homeless woman, and a taxicab, but no J.P. He looked the other direction down Culver Boulevard—two taxicabs, a green sedan, and a sheriff’s cruiser, but again, no J.P. "Where the hell are you?" he moaned aloud.
A second later, a ’75 red Mercedes 450SL slowly rolled from the LAPD car garage and stopped at the side entrance where the word BOOKING hung over the door. A young LAPD officer stepped from the passenger side of the car laughing. David watched the officer exchange a few words with the driver before shutting the door and heading inside. The car rolled onto Culver Boulevard, made a U-turn, and pulled over to the curb, stopping in front of David.
Jean Ann Peterson rolled down the passenger side window and pushed her nose sideways with her index finger. “I’m bustin’ outta here. Ya with me?”
“Very funny,” David said, getting in the car. “What were you doing with the cop? Getting a date?”
“I can’t believe you, luv,” the attractive, red-haired woman said with a British accent. “I knew you’d never win a personality of the year award, but assault with a deadly weapon? Good lord, David, what were you thinking?”
“Assault with a deadly weapon? What weapon?” David replied as J.P. pulled onto Culver Boulevard.
“The piano.”
“A piano classifies as a deadly weapon?”
“It does when you use it as a springboard for someone’s face. Luckily for you, neither your victim nor the hotel wants to press charges.”
“Lucky me. Why?”
“Well it seems the man’s wife, you remember her, the one you affectionately referred to as—let’s see, how did you put it? ‘Your cow in lipstick.’”
“Actually, it was your heifer in high heels—still can’t believe he heard me,” David said, flicking his cigarette out the open window.
“Whatever. At any rate, it turns out she was not his wife after all. The very charming officer Josh, that was the dreamboat's name, and yes, I was trying to get a date, told me the real Lady Harshbarger is back in Missouri doing the Donna Reed gig with their three children. Once it was pointed out to Mr. Harshbarger if he pressed charges, he’d have to testify to why he was there, whom he was with, and what started the altercation, he became very forgiving. As for the hotel, they’d just as soon avoid bad press and forget the whole thing.”
“Those weasels,” David laughed. “They could give a shit about bad press. What they’re afraid of is me bringing up in open court the little matter of illegals working in their kitchen for fifty cents an hour.”
J.P. shook her head. “David, luv, you’re one of a kind.”
“So I’m off the hook?”
“Not entirely. The police are still charging you with reckless endangerment and disturbing the peace. By the way, you owe me seven hundred and fifty dollars.”
David looked at her.
“Bail amount, luv.”
David rubbed his face and sighed. He retrieved another cigarette and lit it.
“You have another one of those?”
“Thought you quit.”
“It was more of a good idea.” David handed her a cigarette. “Besides, it goes well with the whole look tonight.”
“And what look would that be?”
She pushed in the cigarette lighter, letting the cigarette dangle from her lips. “You know, the incredibly sexy and mysterious older woman—that would be me, of course—who rushes out in the middle of the night to a seedy police station to bailout her helpless, troubled, not-too-intelligent yet irresistible young lover—that would be you. I think the black scarf is a nice touch, don’t you?” She pulled a black silk scarf from around her neck, took both hands momentarily off the wheel, and wrapped it around her head.
Smoke came out of David’s nose and mouth as he laughed. “J.P., you’re my agent. In the ten years we’ve known each other, we’ve slept together twice. Once when you were drunk, the other when I was. That hardly qualifies us as lovers.”
J.P. pulled the scarf off, lit the cigarette, and blew smoke. “It’s my fantasy, luv. And one would think that out of sheer gratitude one would be happy to indulge one’s fantasy for springing one’s bum out of the clink.”
“What one thinks is that one’s read one too many Jackie Collins’s books.”
“Hush,” J.P. said, slapping David on the knee.
She turned the car onto the northbound 405. The rain began falling steadily, turning the freeway into a river of taillights. J.P. rolled both her and David’s windows up just enough to keep the rain out but let their smoke escape. She turned on the windshield wipers and the radio to a light jazz station. “So, you want to tell me about it?”
David stared out the passenger side window. “What’s left to tell? I told you pretty much everything that happened on the phone. The guy was an asshole. I was minding my business just playing the gig. This guy yells from his table if I take requests. I ask what he wants to hear. He yells at the top of his lungs, something good. Then he starts busting a gut like that’s the most original joke ever. That’s when I made the cow comment. Next thing I know, he’s coming after me. I was just defending myself.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about,” J.P. said.
“Then I don’t know what you’re talking about,” David replied, blowing smoke out the
window.
She spoke firmly but still softly. “Don’t bullshit me, Webber. You know exactly what I’m talking about.”
“No, I really don’t.”
J.P. turned off the radio, reached across the console, and took David’s hand. “David, it’s me. Don’t treat me like one of your little actress–slash–cocktail waitress Twinkies. I know you better than anybody, and I’m probably the only friend you have left.”
“Great. I’m a musician, and my only friend is my agent. Priceless.”
“Luv, you can be a real dick sometimes,” J.P. said, removing her hand. She turned the radio back on, and the two sat in silence as the Mercedes crept up the Santa Monica Mountains.
As is often the case in a place where oceans, deserts, mountains, and valleys lay within a few miles of each other, weather can change quickly. As the car came over the apex, the sky cleared, and the lights of the San Fernando Valley sparkled below like a million diamonds on black velvet.
David reached over and turned down the radio. “Sorry, Jeep.”
J.P. responded with a sigh. Jeep, the name David always used to signal the end of the jokes and sarcastic banter the two had become so good at over the years.
“You’re right, J.P. Hell, you probably are my only friend.”
J.P. looked at David. He looked tired and sad. She took his hand again. “What’s wrong, David? You’ve always been the angry young man type. But as dark and brooding as you’ve always been, you still retained a sense of humor about things—demented sense of humor, I admit, but…”
David smiled.
J.P. returned a sad smile of her own. “But, David, the past month or so, it’s like there’s no joy in life at all for you anymore.”
David stared out the window for a long moment. When he spoke, it came almost as a mumble. “It wasn’t supposed to turn out like this.”
“Like what?”
“Like this. Who I am. It wasn’t supposed to turn out this way.”
“How was it supposed to turn out?”
J.P. could see that David looked like someone who needed to empty his soul. Confess every fear and demon he had locked inside. But she wasn’t surprised when he answered, “Different, just different.”
