I pushed my way forward through the astonished crowd.
"Jesus Christ, Koontz, what're you doing? We're not in Needle Park here."
"I'm doing what I have to, Wine. What the taxpayers pay me to do." He stared at me sharply. I looked around at the crowd. Everybody looked as stunned as I was.
"C'mon, Koontz." I tried to lower my voice. "You can't take a man like this away in front of all these people. You're going to ruin his career. Give him a break. Besides, he's under twenty-four-hour psychiatric care. He's not going anywhere."
"Twenty-four-hour psychiatric care, huh?"
"Yes. With Dr. Carl Bannister. In Malibu."
"Well, Wine, from here on in I don't think anybody's gonna be under Bannister's care, whatever it was worth. Because he was found dead about four hours ago. And as of this moment, Otis King is under arrest for his murder."
14
"How long do you figure he was in the bushes?" asked Jacob, my older son. We were sitting around my kitchen table—he, Chantal, Simon, Aunt Sonya, and I—eating a plain, ordinary pepperoni pizza five hours after the Comedians and Chefs Benefit for Africa broke up with large quantities of untouched gourmet food, including mine, sitting on the flower-strewn picnic tables.
"Supposedly they went jogging at six A.M. That's the schedule, anyway. They run out the gates of the Colony, across the PCH, and up into the hills in an area called the Serra Retreat."
"I know that place," said Simon, who often went surfing in Malibu Lagoon. "There are some ranches up there. Lots of eucalyptus trees."
"And so they say the black man killed the white man with a knife," said Sonya. "This is not so very different from the Scottsboro Boys."
"Oh, come on," I said. "That was 1931. They couldn't get lawyers until the day of the trial and eight of them got death sentences."
"Yes, but they were freed on appeal three years later," said Jacob.
"Wise guy," I said. For the last couple of years Jacob had often affected a world-weary attitude, as if all of society were dictated by jaded journalists and blasé fashion designers. He and his friends were after security and money. It was their way of rebelling against sixties parents who had themselves lost most of their ideals. But, I figured, like everything else, this too would pass. "Anyway," I continued, "this is totally different. A black millionaire is accused of slitting the throat of a white celebrity psychiatrist."
"That is a revolutionary act," said Sonya.
"Very funny."
"So what is revolutionary? Charity benefits?" Sonya snorted. "They accomplish nothing. Worse—they push things backward. I hate to quote the Bible, but it was all in the Fifth Book of Ecclesiastes: 'When goods increase, they are increased that eat them.' All charity does is create more people with more starvation and more disease. In order to change, a nation must change itself. Now, in China—"
"Okay, okay. I know you just took my son to see a rerun of The Battle of Algiers, but this event is about as revolutionary as a stock merger and Otis King is going to have about as thorough a legal defense as John DeLorean."
"So you think he's guilty." This was Chantal.
"I didn't say that. But either the police are stupider than I think they are or whoever set Otis up is a bloody genius, because nobody would have pulled in a man like that on such short notice without a helluva case; And look at what we already know they have: a murder weapon with Otis's prints on it; yards of motivation from Bannister's case notes stating the details of his brother's criminality and, Koontz intimated to me, Otis's personal involvement in it; several witnesses who saw them running into the woods together and Otis running out by himself; and Otis's own extreme paranoid personality and background of child abuse, crime, and drugs."
"Inadmissible," said Jacob.
"Yes, inadmissible, but not to us if we're trying to figure out if he really did it."
"What has happened to you?" said Sonya. "Have you turned into one of them?"
"Sonya, this is a millionaire. Not some poor junkie. And if it were some poor junkie who had killed this guy, I'd call it like it is, too. But, all right, I don't think he did it."
"Ay . . ." Sonya sighed deeply. "You almost gave me a heart attack."
"But I'm not sure. Let me tell you that."
"I don't care. At least you haven't turned into one of them. I was scared that therapy had destroyed you."
"Therapy? Therapy doesn't destroy anybody!" I was so defensive I was almost shouting. Despite the high drama of the past few hours, I was still unable to shake my last session with Nathanson. Even a casual mention of the subject set me off. Chantal looked at me.
"Why don't we calm down and examine some of the facts here?" she said.
"Okay. What about you?" I turned to Simon, who was scribbling some graffiti on the back of my New Republic.
"Any homework?"
"Some math. An English composition."
"Go."
"What?"
"Do it. Just go do it. I don't want to hear about it. And stop using the covers of my magazines for artistic expression. You've got a sketch pad."
I pointed to the bedroom. He glowered at me as he trudged off.
"All right, let's go back to square one."
The phone rang. I picked up. It was Emily.
"Uh, Moses," she said. "I know it's late, but I didn't want you to go off tomorrow morning and waste your day without my talking to you."
"Waste my day?"
"Yes. I don't think I'll be needing your services anymore. As far as I'm concerned, this is all a police matter from here on in and they seem to be doing a satisfactory job. Thank you very much for what you've done. You've been more than adequate professionally, and if you'll send me a bill, I'll of course reimburse you for all your time and expenses, but I don't want you to go any further." She said it all quickly, as if she had rehearsed it.
"Are you sure about this?"
"Absolutely. Good night, Moses. Thank you." She hung up.
"We're fired," I said.
Chantal put her hand to her head. "Wow, this is worse than stand-up comedy. At least there they give you notice. Well, it's been interesting, but brief." She stood and picked up her shoulder bag. "I'll drop the car off in the morning. I'll let you know the gas and mileage. You can send me my check."
"Hey, I didn't say you 're fired. I said we 're fired."
"The case is over. What're you going to pay me with, worry beads?"
"Well, you've already put this grandiose message on the machine about International Investigative Consultants. Maybe we should try to live up to it. This is the era of yuppie entrepreneurship, isn't it? For the next six weeks, anyway. It's either that or open a restaurant."
Sonya and Jacob looked at each other. Chantal glanced at them, then slowly sat back down, studying me with an expression halfway between relief and wariness.
"A restaurant sounds like a better idea," said Jacob.
"Thanks for your support," I said.
"You don't have to do me any favors," said Chantal. "I mean, you don't owe me anything."
"I know."
We sat silently for a moment.
"Well," said Sonya finally. "You're going to start your own CIA. How're you going to do that? Go to the bank and get a loan?"
"First we're going to finish the Otis King case. Or the Ptak and King case or whatever it is. It's sure to be big news in L.A., in fact everywhere, for the next few months, and whoever breaks it open will get a lot of great publicity."
"Suppose it's already solved?" said Jacob.
"That's a risk we have to take." I lit up a joint and passed it over to Chantal. "Meanwhile, I'll show you how to drum up some business on your own. If it works, if you bring in enough on your own, we'll stick with it. If not . . ."
She nodded, sucking on the joint and passing it over to Sonya, who held it at arm's length. "You still insist on giving me this stuff," she said. "You know I consider it a sign of bourgeois decadence and also this young man is a minor. You're corrupting
him."
"I'm seventeen," said Jacob. "At the age of twenty Alexander had already attacked the Persian Empire with thirty-five thousand troops."
"Yeah, and at twenty-three Dennis Kucinich was elected mayor of Cleveland. We all know this is a world of prodigies, but in deference to this woman's age, and to the indisputable fact that we will all be Gray Panthers one day, let's cool it." I took the joint and snuffed it out. "Also, it's almost midnight. Why don't you give your great-aunt a ride home?"
I kissed Sonya good night and gave Jacob a quick hug, and they shook hands with Chantal and left. Then I went into the second bedroom to check on Simon. He was already fast asleep with his head on the unopened math book. I slid it out, took off his shoes, and tucked him in. Then I walked back into the kitchen and sat down opposite Chantal.
"Well, here we are," I said.
"Yes." She looked at me for a moment, then picked up the joint and stared at it. "Your therapist—what did he mean about 'figure' and 'ground'?"
"It's kind of like that old perceptual trick, being able to pick out a pattern in a field of dots. Or the cliché about not seeing the forest for the trees."
"And you don't do that?"
"Sometimes I let my problems interfere. At least he thinks so."
"But that's true for everybody, isn't it?" She turned the joint in her hand and put it down. "My ex would use all those terms—neuro-this, retro-that—for things that were common knowledge anyway. In the end I saw he was using them as a way to control me. At least most of the time." She looked up at me and smiled. "But you do all right the way you are. I can tell."
"Thanks. You do too."
She shrugged, a funny little line curving up just beneath her lower lip and disappearing in the hollow of her cheek.
"You know, it's a long time since I thought I was falling in love with somebody." The words weren't premeditated. They just came out of me from some mysterious place. Like the ground coming out from under the figure—or was it the reverse?
Chantal blushed slightly and looked away. I felt embarrassed too. I didn't say anything until she turned back to me.
"Sorry about that. I didn't mean to . . ."
"No. That's okay. Those are just big words and . . ."
"You've heard them before."
She nodded. We sat there in the kind of uncomfortable silence they say you can drive trucks through. I could hear her breathing and feel my pulse rate going up. After a while we were staring at each other like a couple of seventeen-year-olds at a drive-in.
"You know, for somebody who was a stand-up comic, you're very shy."
"That's not so strange, is it?"
"No, I guess it's not." I looked at her again. "You wanna break your rule?" I asked.
"Yes."
I took her hand and we walked slowly into my bedroom. In the green light of the neon wall clock, we began to undress each other.
"Y0u're trembling," she said.
"So are you."
"It's not so serious."
"No, it's not. At least I don't think it is."
Our clothes fell to the floor and I could see her body outlined in the closet mirror. It was long and smooth with a soft round butt that curved neatly into white-white thighs. Her pubic hair was the same auburn as her head but coiled in tight little springlike curls against her skin. I wrapped my arms around her and we lowered ourselves onto the bed. And then we made love. The earth didn't move or anything. But considering we had never done it before, and considering what had gone on that day, and considering the battle scars of the participants and that I still couldn't move off my right side because of my mending ribs, considering all that, you could say it was pretty terrific.
The phone rang the next morning at 5:46. It felt like a terrorist attack. I fumbled for it in the dark, almost knocking the radio and lamp off my headboard.
"Hel1o," I groaned.
"Hello, Mr. Wine."
"Yeah?"
"My name is Nick Steinway—no relation. Would you mind coming down to my office? I'd like to speak with you."
"Speak with me? Do you have any idea what—"
"It's a short day, Mr. Wine. And there's only so much time to get things accomplished. If you could be over here in, say, fifteen minutes, I'll have you done and out by six-thirty."
"What is this—a haircut?"
"Cute. Look, Wine, be here. You'll be glad you did."
"Where's here?"
"Global Pictures, Executive Building, Suite Two Hundred. How do you take your eggs?"
"Sunny side."
He hung up.
I looked over at Chantal, who was staring groggily at me. "Go to sleep," I said. "I'll be back in a few minutes." I got up and gave myself the two—minute shave. At precisely 6:05 that morning I walked through the door that said PRESIDENT, WORLDWIDE PRODUCTION into Nick Steinway's reception room. The way things were operating, it could have been three in the afternoon. Two bearded guys of about thirty were talking anxiously on a white leather couch with an attractive silver-haired woman about ten years their senior while, through an open doorway, a group of four men in suits were visible going over some papers amidst pots of coffee in a dining alcove. But they all seemed to have something in common: they were all rubbing their eyes.
"You must be Mr. Wine," said the secretary, a motherly type in a gray smock. "Mr. Steinway wants to see you straight away." She buzzed the inner office. "It's Mr. Wine."
I turned as the office door swung open by itself, or rather by a remote control operated by a short, wiry man in his late twenties seated on another white leather couch, this one about twice the size of the one in the reception room. He was talking on the phone while glancing at about a half-dozen scripts that were stacked on his lap. "He can call me what he wants," I heard him say as he gestured for me to come in. "He's three days behind and he's going to have to cut ten pages." He hung up and stood, shaking my hand. "Mr. Wine, I presume .... Just a second. I'11 be right with you .... Did you get those eggs?" But before I could answer he walked right past me into the reception room. "Have you solved that second act?" he said to the two guys on the couch. "When you have it, let me know, And don't forget, your next project is with me." Before they could answer, he was into the dining alcove, leaning over the table of suits. "Yes to a negative pickup," he said. "But you have to give us Europe and a completion bond." He picked up an empty pot. "Get these guys some more coffee, Elizabeth." He replaced the pot and shot past them back into his office, closing the door behind him. "Now," he said, "let me tell you the problem we have."
"Let me guess. You've signed a multi-million—dollar deal with a man who's just been arrested for murder."
"Correct."
"And you have to decide whether you want to back him up or not."
"Exactly. But we have to decide quickly because a lot of public relations damage is already done. I'd say in about a week Global Pictures will have to get behind him or let him twist in the wind. I can't imagine he's innocent, but we can't afford to project a bad image on this. It's even more extreme than the Landis case. Try dealing with the talent in this business." He shook his head. "Oh, well, on an assembly line you have to work with asbestos."
"Why me?"
"I saw you at the benefit yesterday. I heard you were working for Emily Ptak."
"Who told you that?"
"Eddy Sandollar."
"How'd he know?"
"Eddy knows everything. It's his business. You might turn out to be a big donor, after all. Anyway, l checked you out. I have facilities to do that in a hurry. So, how much do you get for this?"
"Five hundred a day plus expenses."
"Five hundred? You've been making two hundred."
"You know my fee?"
"That's my job. An agent comes in here asking a hundred thousand for a screenplay, I have to know if that's what the writer's been making."
"Five hundred or forget it."
"All right," he said. "But I was going to offer you another arrangement. Your r
egular fee and a fifty-thousand-dollar bonus if you solve the case. It's what we call a step deal."
"I'll take it," I said.
When I arrived back, Chantal was sitting in the kitchen reading the paper and drinking coffee.
"Luck is on our side," I said, coming up from behind and kissing her. "We've already got a new client." I told her about Global Pictures and its junior workaholic president. "The only drawback is," I explained, "we've got to get it solved in a week. Otherwise it's of no use to them. Steinway takes us off the payroll. And needless to say, we're never to tell anyone who we're working for."
She pointed to the three-column headline on the front page above photographs of Bannister and Otis: NOTED COMIC HELD IN PSYCHIATRIST SLAYING.
"Anything new in it?"
"They found the corpse exposed in a ravine behind the Serra Retreat. Apparently it was buried under some leaves and slid down."
"That fast? Who found it?"
"Some wranglers at the ranch—Jack Goldman and Danny Aronowitz."
"Kosher cowboys," I said, pouring myself a cup of coffee · and slugging down some quick caffeine. "Where was the knife?"
"They don't say. But it was discovered by a Marianne Walders, an aerobics teacher at the Malibu Movers. We'll have to go see her."
"I'll do that. I'm going out there to look at the scene of the crime. I want you to stay here and check with Stanley Burckhardt. He's bound to have turned up something by now, and if he hasn't, I'd like to know why. Also, I want to know more about Nastase's trips to Trieste. Get the precise dates and destinations if you can. Where he stayed. Who he saw. Whatever. Check with the INS and see where and when he got his citizenship. There might be something in that.
Also, go down to the Hall of Records and find out whether Bannister owned his own house—Sixty-three A, Malibu Colony. It may not tell us much, but it's standard operating procedure. Then meet me at two o'clock at Zucky's Delicatessen on Wilshire."
"Yes, sir." She looked at me cooly.
"Look, I know what you're thinking. I'd love to spend the whole day with you, do this together, but if we're going to solve this thing, we're going to have to divide and conquer."
"That wasn't what was bothering me. But anyway . . ."
The Straight Man - Roger L Simon Page 11
