“Oh, come on, Benny. According to you, everyone’s shtupping everyone.”
“I’m serious. Not only that, I’d say that from the way he reacted to your questions he must have been doing her even after she got engaged to Michael Green.”
“What? How can you say that?”
He paused with the chopsticks in front of his mouth and shrugged. “Because it makes perfect sense.” He popped the shrimp in his mouth and reached for his beer.
Benny and I were eating Chinese take-out at my kitchen table. I’d been working late at the office when Benny called from the law school, where he’d just finished judging several rounds of moot court competition. We agreed to meet at my house for dinner, with Benny to bring the food and me to bring the beer and dessert. I picked up a six-pack of Pete’s Wicked Ale and two pints of Ben & Jerry’s on my way home. Benny, who should never order take-out on an empty stomach, arrived with four egg rolls, a pint of hot-and-sour soup, and four entrees: twice-cooked pork, Szechwan beef, Hunan shrimp, and kung pao chicken. Not that he’d have trouble finishing his portion—three egg rolls and three entrees fell somewhere between a heavy snack and a light meal for Benny. Indeed, we were down to the Hunan shrimp and my kitchen table was strewn with empty white take-out containers. Ozzie sat at attention in the corner, his eyes on his beloved pal Benny, who’d already tossed him half of the last egg roll, which Ozzie caught on the fly with his mouth. Although Ozzie wasn’t picky when it came to Chinese takeout, you could tell he had his hopes pinned on a share of the Hunan shrimp.
Benny took a big chug of beer and set the bottle back on the table. “Look at what we know,” he said. “Start with Sebastian Curry. As an artist, the guy is for shit, right? Even I can tell that, and I’ve got the keen aesthetic taste of a sack of hammers. No gallery would touch his crap until Samantha arrives on the scene. Not only does she touch his stuff. She becomes his goddamn patron saint—stocking her gallery with that schlock, selling it for fifteen, twenty, twenty-five times what it’s worth. The woman was clearly promoting the living shit out of that guy. And remember, we’re not talking Vincent van Gogh and we’re not even talking Jack van Gogh. We’re talking Jack Shit, and you know what that tells me? That tells me we got something more going on here than the usual artist/gallery relationship. That tells me that Natty Dreadlocks was pumping more than just her balance sheet. The proof is when you asked him about his relationship with her. What happens? He gets all flustered, right?”
“True,” I conceded.
“What’s that tell you? If once upon a time they had an affair, what’s the big deal? But his reaction tells me we might not just be talking nooky. We might be talking naughty nooky.”
I gave him a look. “What in the world is naughty nooky?”
“Look at the time period. She’s peddling his schlocky paintings the entire time she’s engaged to Michael Green. Maybe the reason Sebastian got defensive was because he was doing her the whole time—right up until Green got killed.”
It sounded improbable, but no more improbable than any other scenario. “Maybe.”
He shrugged. “You got a better explanation?”
“Not yet.”
“Ask him. He gave you his card. Go over to his loft one morning and ask him straight-out.”
“He’s pretty uptight about it. I’d rather ask Samantha, assuming I can ever figure out a way to talk to her in private.
“Good luck. Her lawyer’s not going to let you talk to her.”
“He might. You never know. It’s worth a try. I’ve got plenty to ask her besides her relationship with Sebastian Curry.”
“Such as?”
“Such as what’s the deal with Millennium Management Services? You think Sebastian got uptight when I asked him about Samantha? You should have seen his reaction when I mentioned Millennium Management.”
“What makes you think she’ll know any more about it?”
“She has to. She was the one who paid Millennium. I also want to find out more about Billy Woodward. He’s the number one item on my list.”
“The guy who committed suicide in front of her town house?”
“Yep. Angela’s mysterious John. I spoke to her about him again this morning. The poor woman calls me every day now. She’s obsessed with him.”
“Can you blame her?”
“At least I was able give her some new information.”
“What?”
“My investigator Charlie confirmed that Woodward’s mother wasn’t in the hospital when Angela met him. She was living in a trailer park in southern Illinois, somewhere on the outskirts of Metropolis. Still does. Claims she’s never been sick a day in her life. Also claims she hadn’t heard from her son in more than a decade. Charlie thinks she’s telling the truth about that. Apparently, she didn’t even know he was dead until Charlie told her.”
“Did the guy have any brothers or sisters?”
“One older sister. She died in an auto accident when Woodward was in high school.”
“Who else knew him?”
“I’ve got one name for sure. Harry Silver.”
“Who’s Harry Silver?”
“He’s the head of a little company across the river in Sauget. I’ve got an appointment to see him tomorrow morning.”
“What kind of company?”
“It’s called Pinnacle Productions.”
Benny frowned. “Pinnacle? What is it?”
I blushed slightly. “I believe they’re in what is known as the adult entertainment industry.
“Strip clubs?”
“Movies.”
“No shit? Porno? Right here in River City?”
“They operate in an industrial park off Route Three.”
“Whoa. So this guy—the dude who killed himself—he was in those films?”
“In the films, around the films, behind the films. He apparently worked for Pinnacle for a few years. Harry Silver knew him fairly well. He’s willing to talk to me. He agreed to meet me tomorrow.”
“Hey,” Benny said with a grin, “make sure you give Harry my phone number. You tell him to give me a buzz if he ever needs the expert services of a fluff boy.”
Being Benny’s pal means expanding your vocabulary in ways not measured by the verbal portion of the SATs—from the alternative meaning of “pearl necklace” to the job category known as “fluff girl.”
I smiled and shook my head. “I hate to break your heart, boychik, but I don’t think they use fluff boys.”
He put his hand over his heart in mock dismay. “I am shocked. Women have needs, too. You tell him that when it comes to the fine art of fluffing, Benny Goldberg is a big supporter of women’s rights.”
“I’ll be sure to tell him that.”
“I’m serious, woman. You tell him that in ten minutes I’ll have his coldest porno queen leaning back with a sigh and saying, ‘Thank you, Big Daddy.’”
He peered into the carton of Hunan shrimp and then glanced over at Ozzie, whose tail immediately started flopping. Benny looked back at me. “You want any of this shrimp?”
I shook my head. “I’m plotzing.”
He stifled a rumbling belch. “I’m starting to get a little full myself. Better save some room for your ice cream.” He turned toward Ozzie. “You in the mood for a little Hunan action, Oz? This stuff’ll put lead in your pencil.”
Ozzie gave a jubilant bark and dashed over to Benny.
“In his bowl, Professor,” I ordered.
Benny patted him on the head. “You hear Miss Manners? Time you and I show a little class, eh? Stay right here, my man.”
Ozzie watched as Benny went over to his bowl and used his chopsticks to plop the rest of the Hunan shrimp into it. He turned toward Ozzie, who sat at attention, his eyes fixed on Benny, who glanced at me. I nodded.
He gave Ozzie a wink and a thumbs-u
p. “Go for it, dude.”
Ozzie scrabbled across the kitchen floor to the bowl.
Benny went over to the refrigerator and peered into the freezer section. “Whoa! Chunky Monkey and Jerry’s Jubilee!” He turned to me with his hand on his heart. “Rachel Gold, you are one awesome babe.”
I leaned back with a big sigh. “Thank you, Big Daddy.”
Chapter Eighteen
Pinnacle Productions was in a nondescript building in a nondescript industrial park along a nondescript section of Route 3 in Illinois. I pulled into a parking space near the front of the building. The top half of the Arch was visible in the distance to the east. The building was one of those windowless warehouse tilt-ups that exist somewhere along the design continuum between airport hangar and Home Depot. There was no name on the building—just the street address stenciled in large numerals above the steel door. To the right of the door was a keypad code device and, for the rest of us, a speaker box and a buzzer. I pressed the buzzer.
“Who is it?” a female voice asked over the static.
“Rachel Gold to see Mr. Silver.”
A pause, and then the door buzzed. I pulled it open and stepped into a no-frills reception area. To my left: a metal coat rack. To my right: a wall-mounted fire extinguisher and pay phone. A half-dozen stackable plastic chairs were arranged along each of the side walls. A battered metal magazine rack was at the end of the row of chairs to my left, and a scarred wooden coffee table was in front of the chairs to my right.
Directly ahead was the sole exception to the no-frills decor: a fortysomething receptionist with teased platinum hair and tortoiseshell reading glasses was seated behind a metal desk. She had bright red lipstick, long false eyelashes, a face that had been exposed to far too much sun for far too many years, and a formidable pair of breasts bulging against her royal-blue Tommy Hilfiger T-shirt. She’d apparently been stuffing videotapes, catalogues, and invoices into envelopes when I’d buzzed. Centered on the wall above her head was the company logo in hot-pink script:
PINNACLE PRODUCTIONS
“More Peaks than the Rockies!”
As I approached her desk, she sealed the envelope she was holding and peered at me over her reading glasses.
“Guild, right?” She was chewing gum.
“Gold.”
“Gold.” She smiled. “Hey, Gold for Silver. That’s pretty good.”
I smiled politely.
She paused to blow a bubble and pop it. “I’m Jillian Silver, honey. Harry’s wife. He had to go to the bank. Oughta be back in a sec. If you don’t mind waiting, you can sit out here.”
The phone rang. Jillian answered with a cheerful, “Good morning, Pinnacle Productions!…Oh, hi, Murray. How are you?…Sure, just a sec.” With the phone cradled against her neck, she turned toward the computer on her desk and began typing. “Let me get that account up on the screen.”
I looked around. On the walls over the chairs were posters advertising various Pinnacle Production videos: Screwing Private Ryan, Anal Affairs, There’s Something Inside Mary, American Hair Pie, Jurassic Pussy, Inside Jenni Chambers.
I took a seat and sorted through the magazines strewn on the coffee table. To say the least, it was a diverse collection. There were several issues of a glossy periodical called Adult Video News along with issues of The Economist, The New Yorker, Hustler, Glamour, Playboy, American Scholar, Soap Opera Weekly, and Paris Review. With the exception of the Hustler and the Playboy, which had no subscription labels, and the Glamour and Soap Opera Weekly, which had labels for Jillian Silver at the office address, the rest of the magazines were addressed to Harry Silver at a ritzy suburb of St. Louis. The fact that Harry Silver subscribed to American Scholar, The Economist, and Paris Review was intriguing. That he would put old issues in his waiting room—where aspiring porno starlets and studs awaited their audition calls—was puzzling. Somehow, I couldn’t imagine Tyffany Platinum, the featured actress on the Anal Affairs poster, settling down with Harold Bloom’s American Scholar essay on nihilism and mockery in Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida. Nor could I imagine the next Harry Reems scrutinizing the piece entitled “Virtual Orphicality in the Romantic Poets,” in which the author, an assistant professor at Wesleyan University, opines that “once proper recognition is given to the difference-based nature of linguistic meaning that must necessarily be seen as a ‘reaching-beyond’ into an incompletely articulated extra-linguistic presence, one realizes that the virtue of gesture is not subsumable under a system of textuality.” Then again, if Harry Silver himself was settling down with these essays, what in God’s name was he doing in this business?
The door to the right of the reception desk opened and a skinny guy in his twenties came in pushing a cart piled high with videocassettes, mailers, and various papers. He had a scraggly beard and was wearing baggy jeans and a Black Sabbath T-shirt. Still on the phone, Jillian motioned him toward the side of the desk. He set the cart there and gave me an appraising glance before going back through the inner door. Self-consciously, I tugged at my skirt, realizing that he must have assumed I was here for an audition. I glanced up at the image of Tyffany Platinum, her hands pressed against the sides of her face, her perky mouth formed into an O of surprise as she looked back over her shoulders at the camera, wearing nothing but a silver thong and spiked heels. Platinum and Silver and Gold—oh, my. Platinum and Silver and Gold—oh, my.
I was leafing through the Glamour when Jillian got off the phone. “Oh, brother,” she said with a sigh.
I looked up. She was staring at the videocassettes on the cart and shaking her head. She turned to me. “That was a distributor in Maryland. Ever since we put our catalogue on the Internet we’ve been so busy.”
“Are those all your titles?” I asked.
“Pretty much. Harry’s partner has another studio in Arizona. That’s where we film a lot of our titles. But we still make some here, and we handle the shipping for everything out of here.”
The phone rang again.
“Good morning, Pinna—Oh, Harry, the girl’s here. What’s taking so long at the bank?…Well, how much longer?…Okay…No, he hasn’t called yet…Okay. See you soon, baby.”
She hung up and gave me sympathetic smile. “Harry’s running late. Maybe fifteen minutes.”
“I can wait.”
“You’re here about Billy Woodward, right?”
“Did you know him?”
“Naw. Billy was dead before I met Harry.”
“When did you and Harry meet?”
“Five years ago. At the Adult Video News Awards. I was living in Vegas back then. They hold the awards out there every year.” She showed me the diamond engagement ring and matching gold wedding band on her ring finger. “We been married almost three years.”
“Billy Woodward was in some of Harry’s films, right?”
“I think that’s right, but I’m not positive. That was a long time ago.”
“Would those films have been made here?”
“Oh, yes. Harry has a whole studio in back.” She gestured toward the door to the right of her desk. “Soundstages, editing booths, the whole works. They’re filming one today. Why not go back there and look around?”
I glanced at that door. “I don’t know.”
“You should. Really. We’ve got other girls back there—besides the actresses, I mean. It’ll help give you a sense of what Billy Woodward did on the production side. Let’s see where they’re shooting this morning.” She checked a schedule on her desk. “Okay, here’s what you do. Go through the door and turn left. Follow the corridor around to the right and you’ll end up in Control Room A. You can watch from there. I’ll send Harry back when he gets here.”
I followed her directions to Control Room A, which was a small room jammed with electronic equipment—recorders, editing machines, and the like. The room smelled of burned coffee and doughnut grease
and cigarette smoke and stale perspiration. There were three guys in the room, all in their late twenties, all dressed in jeans and sweatshirts. Two were seated in front of a video monitor screen. The third was leaning back in his chair against the side wall, his arms crossed over his ample stomach, his head resting on his chest. It took me a moment to realize that what I first mistook for a low electronic buzz was the third guy’s snores. On a metal table next to the sleeping man was a coffeemaker, a stack of Styrofoam cups, and a nearly empty box of glazed doughnuts.
The front wall of Control Room A was a large picture window that looked onto a dimly lit film set which consisted of a three-sided façade of a bedroom. A queen-sized bed with a brass-rail headboard was against the back wall. There was a window to the right of the bed that appeared to look out onto a country landscape. The pretty view was actually a poster taped to the other side of the window frame—a bit of set design that reminded me, incongruously, of the Jimmy Stewart movie It’s a Wonderful Life.
From across the control room I peered through the window, trying to make sense out of the six people on the set, all of whom seemed to be waiting for something to begin. There was a heavyset guy in his forties seated with his back to me in a director’s chair. His chair actually had the word Director stenciled on the back. He had a headset resting on the back of his neck and was talking on a cell phone. Next to him, seated on a plain director’s chair, was a much younger guy with a long nose and thinning brown hair. He was scribbling something on a clipboard balanced on his lap. Leaning against the side wall of the bedroom façade was a fat, bald guy with a big video camera on his shoulder. He was talking to a skinny guy with tattooed arms and a big tool belt. Both were smoking cigarettes and occasionally glancing toward the two people at the far end of the set, who appeared to be the actors in the scene about to be filmed. They were certainly dressed for the roles. The man was naked and the woman was in a black teddy and spiked heels. The naked guy was seated on the edge of the bed and the woman was on his lap. The guy had a blond crew cut and the muscular physique of a bodybuilder. The woman had red hair and the finest pair of breasts money could buy. I glanced at the monitor, which was apparently receiving a live feed from the video camera on the fat guy’s shoulder. It displayed a tilted and slightly off-center shot of the man and woman on the bed. She was leaning against him, whispering in his ear as her hand moved slowly up and down between his legs.
Trophy Widow Page 16
