The Douglas Kennedy Collection #1

by Douglas Kennedy

  I watched as Eric kneaded his hands together. Without realizing it, he kept rocking back and forth in his chair. His eyes seemed vacant, haunted. He desperately needed sleep—if only to escape this ordeal for a couple of hours. I so wanted to help. But I didn’t know how to help him.

  “There’s only one piece of advice I can give you,” Joel Eberts said. “And if I were in your position, it’s the action I’d follow: leave the country.”

  Eric considered this for a moment. “But where would I go?” he asked.

  “There are a lot of other places on this planet besides America.”

  “I’m asking: where would I go to make a living?”

  “How about London?” I said. “They have TV in London, don’t they?”

  “Yeah—but they don’t have my sense of humor. They’re English, for Chrissakes.”

  “I’m sure you’d find some niche for yourself. And if not London, then there’s Paris or Rome . . .”

  “Oh yeah, me writing gags for the French. What a swell idea that is . . .”

  Joel Eberts came in here. “Your sister’s right. A talented guy like yourself will find work anywhere. But that’s a secondary concern right now. What you should be focusing on is getting out of the country within forty-eight hours.”

  “Won’t the Feds come after me?”

  “Probably not. The pattern so far is that, once they’ve frightened you overseas, they generally leave you alone . . . unless, of course, you try to come back home.”

  “You mean, I’ll never be allowed back to the States again?”

  “Mark my words—within a couple of years, this whole meshuga blacklist business will be completely discredited.”

  “A couple of years,” Eric said, sounding disconsolate. “Who the fuck ever heard of an American having to go into exile?”

  “What can I say? These are bad times.”

  Eric reached out and took my hand. He squeezed it hard. “I don’t want to go. I like it here. It’s all I know. And have.”

  I swallowed hard and said, “The other options are terrible ones. At least this way, you’ll be able to get away as cleanly as possible.”

  Silence. Eric continued to shift uneasily in his chair, struggling with the decision. “Even if I did decide to leave, there’s a problem. I don’t have a passport.”

  “That’s not a problem,” Joel Eberts said.

  He told us what to do. I insisted that we act on his advice immediately—because, as Eberts warned Eric, he could not afford the luxury of a reflective decision.

  “Forty-eight hours from now, they’re going to expect a list of names from you,” Eberts said. “If you don’t give it to them, that’s it. The steamroller heads in your direction. You’ll be out of a job. You’ll get a subpoena from HUAC. From that moment on, the Department of State will block any passport applications until after you’ve testified. They did that to Paul Robeson. They’ll certainly do it to you.”

  The way around this, however, was to get Eric a passport within the next twenty-four hours. According to Eberts, it usually took two weeks to process an application . . . unless you had proof that you were traveling at the last minute. So, as soon as we left Eberts’s office, we took a taxi uptown to a big branch of Thomas Cook’s on Fifth Avenue and 43rd Street. After some checking around, one of the travel agents there found a single berth on the SS Rotterdam sailing for Hoek van Holland the following night. We bought the ticket, then raced uptown to the Passport Office on 51st and Fifth. The clerk inspected Eric’s ticket to Europe, and told him that, in order to get the passport issued by five p.m. tomorrow (a mere two hours before the SS Rotterdam sailed), he’d need the proper photographs, a copy of his birth certificate, and assorted notarized signatures by close of business today.

  It was a scramble—but Eric just managed to clear the deadline that afternoon. The clerk assured him that he’d have the passport by the end of tomorrow—which would give Eric an hour to dash across town and make it to the ship by six (he had to be on board at least an hour before it sailed). It would be tight, but he’d make it.

  Once we were finished at the passport office, Eric suggested we head back to his apartment at the Hampshire House. Once there, I helped him winnow through his large wardrobe and choose just enough to fit into a single large suitcase. As he put the cover on his Remington typewriter, he suddenly sank into his desk chair.

  “Don’t make me get on that ship,” he said.

  I tried to stay controlled. “Eric, you have no choice.”

  “I don’t want to leave you. I don’t want to leave Ronnie. I’ve got to see him tonight.”

  “Then call him. See if he can get back here.”

  He started to sob again. “No. I couldn’t bear the goodbye. The scene at the docks. All that heartrending crap.”

  “Yes,” I said quietly. “I’d avoid that if I were you.”

  “I’ll write him a letter—which you can give him when he comes back here at the weekend.”

  “He will understand. I’ll make sure he does.”

  “It’s absurd, all this.”

  “Yes,” I said. “It is absurd.”

  “I’m just a jokesmith. Why the hell are they treating me like Trotsky?”

  “Because they’re bullies. And because they’ve been given carte blanche to act like bullies.”

  “Everything was going so well.”

  “It will go well again.”

  “I love what I do, S. I’ve found my niche. Not only does it pay me ridiculous amounts of money, but writing the show also happens to be a lot of fun. Which is something that work isn’t supposed to be. That’s what really hurts about having to run away—knowing that, for the first time in my life, everything is the way I want it to be. The job. The money. The success. Ronnie . . .”

  He gently released himself from my arms, and walked over to the living room window. Night had fallen on Manhattan. Down below was the black interior of Central Park, flanked by the seductive glow of lit apartments along Fifth Avenue and Central Park West. What always struck me about this view was how perfectly it reflected the city’s spirit of arrogant indifference. It was a skyline that issued a challenge: try to conquer me. But even if you did—even if, like Eric, you were fêted as a New York success—you still didn’t ever really make your mark on the place. All that striving, all that ambition—and the moment after you’d had your moment, you were forgotten. Because there was always someone else in Manhattan coming up right behind you, battling to have their moment. Today, Eric was the hottest writer in television comedy. When the SS Rotterdam set sail tomorrow night, word would spread that he’d fled overseas rather than name names. Some people would applaud his actions, some would deplore them. By this time next week, however, he’d be a tertiary consideration in the minds of any of his professional colleagues. Because that’s how things worked. His disappearance would be like a death. Only those who loved him would mourn his absence. For everyone else who knew him, the shock of his vanishing would be a temporary (and welcome) respite from all the incumbent pressures of work. For a few days, people would talk among themselves in hushed voices about the transitory nature of success; and the ethical rights or wrongs of Eric’s choice to flee the country. Then the subject would be dropped. Because it was the start of another week and a new show had to be written.

  Just as it always did.

  Though I didn’t ask him, I sensed that Eric was thinking what I was thinking, as we both looked out on the muted glow of that uptown skyline. Because he put his arm around my shoulders and said, “People spend their entire damn lives chasing what I’ve had.”

  “Stop talking about it in the past tense.”

  “But it’s over, S. It is over.”

  We ordered in dinner from room service. We drank two bottles of champagne.

  I slept on his sofa bed that night, wishing all the time that Jack was in town. The next morning, Eric drew up a list of his debts. He was nearly five thousand dollars in the red to places like Dunhil
l, and Brooks Brothers, and 21, and El Morocco—and assorted other watering holes and purveyors of luxury goods, with whom he maintained an account. He had less than a thousand dollars in the bank.

  “How did you land yourself in this mess?” I asked.

  “I always picked up the tab. And I also discovered a post-Marxist weakness for luxury items.”

  “That’s a dangerous failing. Especially when coupled with reckless generosity.”

  “What can I say . . . except that, unlike you, I’ve never known the pleasures of thrift. Anyway, one good thing about leaving the country is that I’ll be out of reach of the IRS.”

  “Don’t tell me you’ve got a tax problem too?”

  “It’s not a problem, actually. It’s just that I haven’t filed a return for . . . I don’t know . . . maybe three years.”

  “But you have been paying them some tax, haven’t you?”

  “Well, if I haven’t taken the trouble of filing a return, why would I also bother sending them some money?”

  “So you owe them . . .”

  “Lots. I think it’s something like thirty percent of everything I’ve earned ever since I’ve joined NBC. Which is a sizeable chunk of change.”

  “And you put nothing aside.”

  “For God’s sakes, S—when have I ever done anything sensible?”

  I stared down at the list of debts, and resolved to settle them myself once Eric was on the far side of the Atlantic. In addition to my invested portion of the divorce settlement, I’d been saving consistently since writing for Saturday/Sunday, and I’d also just banked that five-thousand-dollar advance from Harper and Brothers. So I’d be able to clear my brother’s name at assorted emporia around town. The IRS would be another matter. Maybe I could sell some stock, or get a mortgage on the apartment. For the moment, however, I just wanted to get Eric aboard that ship. Worried that he might suddenly lose his nerve and vanish for a few critical hours, I made him promise to stay in the apartment until four thirty . . . when we’d grab a cab to the passport office.

  “But this could be my last-ever day in Manhattan. At least let me take you to lunch at 21.”

  “I want you to lie low, Eric. Just in case . . .”

  “What? That J. Edgar Hoover and his boyfriend have decided to tail me for the day?”

  “Let’s just get through this as cleanly as possible.”

  “There’s nothing at all clean about this. Nothing.”

  Eric didn’t like it—but he eventually did agree to stay put for the day while I did all the busywork. I got him to write me a check for the remaining thousand dollars in his bank account. I went to his branch of Manufacturers Hanover, cashed it, and bought him the equivalent amount in traveler’s checks. I paid a fast visit to Joel Eberts’s office and collected a power-of-attorney document. Then I rushed uptown to Tiffany’s and bought him a sterling silver fountain pen, and had it engraved: From S to E. Always.

  I was back at his apartment by three. He signed the power-of-attorney form, giving me complete charge over all of his financial matters. We agreed that come tomorrow, I’d find a storage depot, in which all his remaining clothes, papers, and personal effects would be lodged until he returned home. He handed me a thick envelope, addressed to Ronnie. I promised him I’d get it to him as soon as he was back in the city. Eric ducked into the bathroom for a moment, and I managed to slip the wrapped gift from Tiffany’s into his suitcase. Then, just before four thirty, I looked at him and said, “It’s time.”

  Once again, he went to the window, leaning his head against the glass, staring out at the city.

  “I’ll never have a view like this again.”

  “I’m sure London has its moments.”

  “But they’re low-story ones.”

  He turned toward me. His face was wet. I bit my lip.

  “Not yet,” I said. “Don’t get me crying yet.”

  He wiped his eyes with the back of his sleeve. He took a deep breath. “Okay,” he said. “Let’s go.”

  We left quickly. The doorman hailed us a cab. We got stuck in god-awful traffic on Fifth Avenue, and just made it to the passport office with two minutes to spare. Eric was the last customer of the day. When he approached the window, the clerk who had been dealing with his papers yesterday told him to take a seat for a moment.

  “Is anything wrong?”

  The clerk avoided eye contact with us. Instead, he picked up a phone, dialed a number, and spoke quickly into it. Putting it down, he said, “Someone will be with you in a moment.”

  “Is there a problem?” Eric asked.

  “Just take a seat, please.”

  He pointed to a bench on the opposite wall. We sat down. I glanced anxiously at the clock on the wall. With rush-hour traffic it would take, at best, forty minutes to get Eric to the 46th Street Pier. Time was of the essence.

  “What do you think’s going on?” I asked Eric.

  “Nothing, I hope, except mindless bureaucracy.”

  Suddenly a side door opened. Out walked two gentlemen in dark suits. When Eric saw them, he turned ashen.

  “Oh shit,” he whispered.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Smythe,” one of them said. “I hope this isn’t an unpleasant surprise.”

  Eric said nothing.

  “Aren’t you going to introduce me?” the gentleman asked. Then he proffered his hand. “Agent Brad Sweet of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. You must be Sara Smythe.”

  “How do you know that?” I asked.

  “The doorman at the Hampshire House knows you. And he informed us that you’d been with your brother in his apartment since yesterday evening. After, of course, your visit to the law offices of a certain . . .” He held out his hand. His associate put a file into it. He opened the file. He read aloud from it. “The law offices of a certain Joel Eberts on Sullivan Street. He has impeccable subversive credentials, your lawyer—not to mention a file on him as thick as the Manhattan phone book. Then, after your little legal powwow, you headed to the offices of Thomas Cook at 511 Fifth Avenue and booked passage on the SS Rotterdam, departing this evening. Afterward, of course, you came here to the passport office, hoping to pull that last-minute travel ruse, so beloved of individuals trying to leave the United States in a hurry.”

  He shut the file.

  “But, I’m afraid, you won’t be leaving the country tonight—as the Department of State have put your passport application on hold, pending the outcome of the Bureau’s investigation into your political allegiances.”

  “That’s outrageous,” I heard myself saying.

  “No,” Agent Sweet said mildly. “It’s all perfectly legal. After all, why should the State Department issue a passport to someone whose presence overseas may be harmful to American interests . . .”

  “Oh for God’s sake,” I said, “what harm has he done to this country?”

  Eric said nothing. He just sat on the bench, staring down at the fake marble floor.

  “If he cooperates with us tomorrow, his passport will be issued within twenty-four hours. If, of course, he still wants to leave the country. Five PM tomorrow at NBC, Mr. Smythe. I look forward to seeing you there.”

  With a curt nod in my direction, Agent Sweet and his associate left. Eric and I sat motionless on the bench for a few minutes. Neither of us could move.

  “I’m dead,” he said.

  I stayed with him again that night. I tried to get him to talk things through—to work out some sort of strategy before facing Sweet and the NBC people tomorrow.

  “There’s nothing more to discuss,” Eric said.

  “But what are you going to do?”

  “I am going to get into bed, pull the covers over my head, and hide.”

  I couldn’t stop him from doing that. Nor did I want to—as, at least, I would know where he was. He was so exhausted, so stressed, that he fell asleep shortly after getting into bed. I tried to follow suit—but I spent much of the night staring at the living room ceiling, feeling both convulsed wit
h rage and utterly helpless in the face of the FBI’s onslaught on my brother. My mind was speeding, as I tried to figure some sort of possible way out of Eric. But I came up with nothing. He’d either have to name names, or suffer the consequences.

  I wanted to believe that—if I was in his position—I’d play Joan of Arc, and refuse to cooperate. But everyone envisages themselves doing the heroic thing when sitting in an armchair. Brought face-to-face with the reality of the dilemma, however, things often turn out differently. You never really know what you’re made of until you find yourself standing astride a precipice, looking down into a very deep void.

  Sleep finally hit me around three that morning. When I jolted awake again, the sun was at full wattage. I glanced at my watch. Eleven twelve. Damn. Damn. Damn. I shouted for Eric. No reply. I got up from the sofa and went into his bedroom. He wasn’t there. Nor was he in the bathroom, or the kitchen. Panicked, I scoured all surfaces for a note, telling me he’d gone out for a walk. Nothing. I picked up the house phone and spoke to the doorman.

  “Yeah—Mr. Smythe left around seven this morning. It was funny, though . . .”

  “What was funny?”

  “He called me before he came downstairs, and asked me if I’d like to make ten bucks. Sure, says I. ‘Well, I’m gonna take the elevator down to the basement, and I’ll give you ten bucks if you open the service entrance and let me out. Oh, and if anybody comes by looking for me this morning, just tell ’em I haven’t left the apartment.’ No problem, I tell him. I mean, I can easily shaddup for ten bucks.”

  “Did anyone come by?”

  “Nah—but there’s been these two guys in a car, parked across the street since I came on duty at six.”

  “So they didn’t see him leave?”

  “How could they, when he went out the back.”

  “He didn’t tell you where he was going?”

  “Nah—but he had a suitcase with him . . .”

  Now I was alarmed.

  “He what . . . ?”

  “He had this big suitcase with him. Like he was goin’ away somewhere.”

  I thought fast.

  “How’d you like to make another ten bucks?” I asked.