A skeletal man on Rollerblades wearing a house dress and ankle socks and carrying a Vuitton tote whirred by and gave us a smile and a nod.
“Pretty ladies,” he singsonged.
“Thanks,” we all yelled after him, and laughed again.
“Don’t mention it,” floated back on the little hot wind he left in his wake. In a moment he was lost in the slowly roiling crowd.
“I love this place,” Glynn said dreamily. “Everybody is so happy.”
“Everybody is stoned on something,” Laura said, smiling at her, “but I know what you mean. Sunset always makes me feel like something funny and fine is about to happen.”
For no reason at all I thought of Stuart Feinstein, back in Palm Springs, huddled like an old, ossified baby in his nest of dark mink. Some of the silly shine went off the morning. I doubted whether, despite his proximity to Sunset Boulevard, anything funny and fine was left for him.
“I wish we could do something especially nice for Stuart,” I said. “I can’t get him out of my mind. He seems so vulnerable. Is there anything that you know of that he needs, Laura?”
“Oh, Met,” she said, and smiled an exasperated smile. “Don’t start trying to fix things up for Stuart, for God’s sake. He doesn’t need anything you could give him. You happen to have a cure for AIDS on you?”
“I just thought…his apartment is so bare. There’s almost nothing in it. I thought maybe we could find some pretty pottery dishes, or a print or something—”
“He doesn’t buy things that will last anymore,” she said. “It depresses him to shop for things that will outlast him. He had some really nice things, or at least Bobby did, his lover who died a few months ago. They lived very well indeed. But Bobby’s family from Iowa or some awful place came and took all his things away while Stuart was out of town, even the paintings and china and silver and crystal. There was some gorgeous Waterford. The only thing they left was the bed. Left it sitting there like a slap in Stuart’s face when he got back. He hasn’t seemed to want to make much of an effort about anything since then.”
“Does he have, you know, enough money? He said he didn’t handle clients anymore, except you. Does he have enough for food and medicine and all?”
“He has enough. I give him some every month. I know he’s okay that way.”
I looked at her. In the brassy sunlight she looked bleached and a little shrunken, even though she was still so beautiful that it was hard to look away from her. My careening, wind-scattered little sister caring for someone else?
“He doesn’t seem the type to take it, somehow,” I said.
“He doesn’t know it comes from me. I deposit it to his account every month on the condition that it stays anonymous. He thinks Bobby did it just before he died. It gives him a lot of comfort to think that, that Bobby died thinking about his welfare. If the truth be known, Bobby was a little shit who never once thought about any welfare but his own. His only gift to Stu was HIV.”
“It’s a wonderful thing to do, Pie,” I said, meaning it.
“It was part of the settlement with old No-Nose,” she said, stretching lazily. “He thinks the extra was for massages for me. Fought it tooth and nail. But we got it. He’d shit sunflowers if he knew it went to Stu. He always hated him. Listen, gang, we’ve got time to do some serious shopping. Y’all game? I want something drop-dead-fuck-you to wear to this interview. This guy’s got prettier clothes than I do.”
The Sunset Marquis Hotel lay halfway down North Alta Loma, on a hill so steep that you practically had to cling to walls to walk down it. I thought that climbing it to Sunset must be sheer torture for leg muscles. Stuart Feinstein’s cowboy boots were wobbling on my feet after two hours of shopping, and Glynn tottered in new high wedgies. Laura, in stiletto-heeled sandals and a new black mini so tight that she had to take tiny, Chinese-empress steps, could navigate scarcely any better than we two. The three of us clung together, arm in arm, wavering and laughing and looking, I imagined, like those old cartoon posters with the characters leaning far back, front foot far forward, that read, “Keep on Truckin’.” We were out of breath and dripping sweat when we reached the little hotel.
Inside it was cool and shadowy, with a tiny lounge on the left, full of people looking as if they were closing enormous deals, and a little restaurant on the right full of very young men and women who all looked like Glynn. Rock stars, I thought; Laura had said this place was a hangout for traveling rock bands. Glynn gave them all long, devouring looks. They all looked back at her. One half-raised a hand as if to greet her, then dropped it. He leaned over and said something to the others at his table, and they all turned and studied Glynn. Even in the artificial dusk, I saw her neck and cheeks redden, and she turned away. We went into the chic little ladies’ lounge and combed our hair and washed our hands and put on fresh lipstick, and then headed for the dazzle of light at the back, where the hotel opened into a tree-and-flower shaded patio around a brilliant blue pool. Laura stopped beside the maître d’s desk, and I took a deep breath, and heard Glynn take a similar one. Then we were following a young waiter in white shorts and shirt around the pool to a round table in a corner, shaded with wisteria and some other red-flowered vine I could not identify. Every other table was crowded with people, most of them men in jackets and no ties, and there was a constant low chiming of telephones. Almost every table seemed to harbor someone talking on a phone. The drink of choice, I noticed, was mineral water with lime. So much for the legends of Babylonian excess I had cherished since girlhood.
“Mr. Poythress is running a little late, and says please order drinks or anything else you want and he’ll be right along,” the young waiter said.
“What a pity,” Laura drawled, giving him a slantwise smile from under the brim of a huge, new, black straw hat. In it she looked enchanting, mysterious, completely feminine, something out of the forties, out of the time of Gene Tierney and Veronica Lake. The young man smiled back, dazzled. He looked over at Glynn and smiled even wider. She, too, had a hat, a slouchy canvas affair with a flower the blue of her eyes tucked under its brim. With the sunglasses and the tight blue jeans and wedgies she looked somehow androgynous, like a pretty medieval boy. I felt rather than saw eyes all over the patio swing toward our table and stop. Glynn and Laura made a riveting pair. I settled my sunglasses more firmly over my eyes, hoping I did not look too much like their duenna.
“Enjoy,” said the waiter, and hustled off to get our Calistoga water.
“You might know the bastard would be late,” Laura said. “He’s probably watching from the men’s room window, going to let us sit here just long enough to be insulted but not long enough to be righteously indignant about it.”
From another table a voice called, “Laura!” and we turned. A thin, brown young man in the inevitable sunglasses and baseball cap got up from a table full of similarly dressed young men and women and came toward us, smiling and holding out his arms. He bent over Laura and kissed the air on either side of her face, and then stepped back and studied her, head to one side. He seemed not much older than Glynn.
“You look absolutely fabulous, lovey,” he said. “Are you in town for the screening? I heard you were in Palm—”
“Corky, love,” Laura said. “How good to see you. No, I’m really just up for an interview. I’m meeting Billy Poythress, if he ever gets here. Corky, this is my big sister, Merritt Fowler, and my niece, Glynn. This, you two, is Corky Tucker, who wrote The Right Time and is going to make us all rich and famous.”
“From your lips to God’s ear,” he said. “It’s nice to meet you both. I can see now where Laura gets it.”
His smile slid with equal approval over Glynn and me, and I smiled back. “Hello,” I said. Glynn said nothing, but smiled, a small, three-cornered smile with her mouth closed. I had never seen that smile before. Mona Lisa now…
“Will you sit for a minute?” Laura said. “Catch me up on the buzz about the film. I’ve been out of town, and I’m dying to he
ar—”
“Just for a second,” he said, slipping into the fourth chair. “Billy Poythress scares the shit out of me. I doubt that I know anything you don’t, though. Tomorrow night’s going to be a complete surprise to all of us. Caleb isn’t talking about it, but I hear some big changes have been made. Margolies insisted after he saw the rough cut. Nobody knows what they are. I wouldn’t even speculate, knowing Margolies. A chorus line and a collie dog, probably. Maybe a black tap dancer. But you know all that, of course. Caleb’s undoubtedly told you. You’re the one who should be spilling the buzz—”
“Pring is back then,” Laura said carelessly. “No, I’ve not seen him yet. I’ve been at home, back in Atlanta, just got in this morning. I brought Merritt and Glynn back with me for the screening, but I haven’t had time to call Pring. Is he at home, do you know?”
I stared at her. Atlanta? She did not look at me.
“I hear he’s holed up out at Margolies’s place in Malibu, pitching the new film. It’s about Joan of Arc, or some saint. God knows. Margolies probably remembers Ingrid Bergman in the original. The skinny is that he’ll let go the money only if he likes this version of Right Time and if Caleb can find the right saint for the new one. He’s talking about a nationwide talent search, the old GWTW business—”
“My God, Joan of Arc,” Laura said, and laughed indulgently. “Maybe they can get the collie to play Joan. Burn a saintly dog. That ought to part Margolies with some dough. What does he think of Right Time, have you heard?”
“I don’t think he’s seen it since he asked for the changes,” Corky Tucker said. “Tomorrow night’s the night for all of us. I heard that somebody from the production met him at a party in Malibu and he smiled, though.”
I laughed, thinking he was making a joke, but Laura looked over at me and said, “Whole films, whole careers, have risen and fallen on Margolies’s smile,” she said. “Listen, Corks, do you think you could get three tickets for tomorrow night for me? I’m not going to be any place Pring can call me, and I really do want these two to see the film. I think they think I do porno flicks, or something.”
“Sure, I’ll have three left at the box office for you. It’s at the metroplex in Century City, you know, where we screened Burn. I hear Margolies will be there with most of the Vega brass. Probably won’t be able to hear for all the folding money rustling. Maybe he’ll put all the Fowler-Mason women in the Joan thing. You three are turning heads all over this patio, you know that?”
“Go on with you, you big old tease,” Laura said in a mock belle’s drawl. “You’re just trying to turn our poor heads. Thanks for the tickets, Corky. We’ll see you tomorrow night.”
“Six o’clock. Everybody’s going on to Spago after. Say hi to Caleb for me if you see him before then.”
“I will,” Laura said, and he went back to his table. Everybody at it waved at Laura. Laura waved back, smiling widely. She still did not look at me. I felt the strangeness and unease rise like mercury in a hot thermometer.
“What’s this business about being in Atlanta?” I said.
“I’ll tell you later,” Laura said. “Here comes Poythress.”
Over the years since I left the agency I have formed the habit of talking silently to Crisscross. I tell her things that I somehow never tell other people; when something particularly absurd or embarrassing or appalling occurs I tell her. When I am happiest or saddest or silliest I sometimes tell her, too. I tell her these things in person, of course, when we do meet, but I talk with Crisscross far more often than I see her. When I saw Billy Poythress approaching us around the pool I tuned her in.
“Lord, CC, he looks just like Porky Pig,” I radioed across the miles home. “His cheeks hang down and jiggle and he has a round little butt and little plump bow legs, and that snouty nose. He should have an apple in his mouth. And you should see what he’s got on!”
Billy Poythress did indeed look like Porky Pig, but a corrupted, faintly malevolent Porky. There was something dried-out and unhealthy about him, even though he literally shone. His cheeks and forehead glistened with sweat or lotion, his little eyes glittered in folds of flesh, and he wore a lilac and purple satin baseball jacket and cap that gave back light like sunlit lava. Clay-red hair curled from under the cap. His teeth flashed white in a wide smile, and rings on the hands he held out to us as he trotted across the pool apron glittered, too. Heads at every table swiveled to follow him. Hands lifted in salute. Voices called after him. He acknowledged them all with little nods, but he kept his eyes on us. The eyes on the patio found us and lingered, to see who was, this day, Billy Poythress’s anointed.
He stopped and looked at us, hands clasped under his chin.
“I couldn’t even guess,” he said in a lilting falsetto. “You three have utterly confounded me!”
“I’m Laura Mason,” Laura said, uncoiling herself from her chair and extending her hand to him. He mopped his brow in mock relief, even though he was, I was sure, well aware which of us was Laura.
“As good a guess as any,” he said, and I felt the hair rise on the back of my neck. It was a purely visceral reaction. Nothing good was going to come to Laura from this posturing little man.
She introduced us and he kissed us on our cheeks and patted our hands and said that he should be doing an interview with all three Fowler-Mason girls, and then he settled himself into his seat and looked around the patio. At a slight lift of his plump hand the waiter scurried over, nearly tripping in his haste.
“You’re not Clint; where is Clint?” Billy Poythress said. There was a slight petulance in his voice. Sulky Porky.
“Clint tore his rotator cuff playing volleyball yesterday and had to have surgery,” the young waiter said. “My name is Charles. The maître d’ asked me to take special care of you.”
“Oh, screw his rotator cuff,” Billy said. “What a bother. He knows exactly what I want when. I hate having to go over it all again.”
“I’ll get it right, I promise,” said the waiter, smiling winningly. I felt a curl of anger at Billy Poythress. What a spoiled brat.
“Well, then, I’ll have a split of chilled D’Iberville water, no ice, one wedge of lemon, not lime. You have it; Clint keeps it on ice for me. And then I’ll have a wedge of papaya with the tuna carpaccio and the gazpacho verde with plain croutons, not the garlic, and a plate of polenta with parmesan. You don’t have to shake your head at me; I know it’s not on the menu. Clint always tells the kitchen when I first come in. Make sure the parmesan is Reggiano. And I’ll finish with the lemon crème brûlée and decaf espresso. Lime there, not lemon. Oh, dear. How rude. I’ve gone bumbling ahead of you ladies. Please…”
And he gestured for us to order. The young waiter, scribbling furiously, cast us a wild look.
“Caesar salad and iced decaf,” I said, picking the simplest thing I could find on the menu.
“That sounds good,” Laura said, and smiled at the waiter.
“Same for me,” Glynn said. He smiled so broadly that I thought his peach-fuzz cheeks were going to split. He dashed away.
He was back in an instant.
“No papaya today, but there’s some pretty passion fruit,” he said anxiously. “And the polenta’s gone, but the cook has some nice potato and rosemary risotto, a fresh batch. And just between you and me the crème brûlée has seen better days.…”
His voice trailed off and I looked at Billy Poythress. His face had swelled and gone deep red, and his eyes were lost in slitted folds of flesh, but his smile remained fixed.
“Get Tony for me,” he said, gesturing at the maître d’.
“Sir, I can—”
“Get Tony!”
The boy turned and fled. Billy Poythress turned to us, face still vermilion with temper, smile still fixed, and said, “This is insupportable. I eat lunch or dinner here two and three times a week. I always mention this place in my columns. I absolutely rave about the food, even though there’s better at half a dozen places on Sunset alone. I put this plac
e on the map with anybody who counts the day it opened; half the people come here because I do. I will not put up with this sort of treatment.”
The maître d’ arrived, lean and saturnine in a dark suit, bending slightly and correctly from the waist over Billy Poythress.
“There is some dissatisfaction?” he said in a flat, precise voice. It occurred to me that this was far from the first time he had stood here like this.
“I ordered papaya and polenta, and that’s what I want,” Billy said tightly. “You’ve never run out before. This waiter, this Charles person, is totally incompetent, and I want him fired. On top of everything else he was extremely rude to me. Extremely rude.”
His voice had risen to a treble shout, and I felt rather than saw heads turn all over the patio. I looked down into my Calistoga water. I felt my face begin to burn. Across the table from me I felt Glynn flinch. Laura sat very still.
“No, he wasn’t,” she said then, sweetly, and smiled up at the maître d’. “I thought he was perfectly polite and charming, and most attentive. It’s scarcely his fault if the kitchen is out of something. I’m afraid Mr. Poythress is upset at me, and spoke before he thought. I apologize to both of you.”
And she smiled her enchanting triangular smile, the one that mesmerized cops and directors and older sisters alike, and sat silently, looking obliquely up at Billy Poythress under the brim of the hat.
He flushed an even deeper magenta, but dropped his eyes.
“My apologies, too, Tony,” he muttered. “The young lady has better manners than I do. I will expect some adjustment on the bill, however.”
“The house will be happy to have all of you as its guests,” the maître d’ said stiffly, and turned and walked away. We four sat in silence, and then Billy Poythress said, “You are an example to us all, Laura Mason. At least I saved you a hefty check; I make it a policy never to pick up a tab. Now. Let’s finish our drinks and then we’ll have our little interview. Let me tell you about this place; did you know that Van Heflin drowned in the pool here?”
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