Westlake, Donald E - Novel 50 (16 page)

 
          
"Never
had I known anyone so interested in me." I smile in contented reverie at
my interlocutor. “Do you know what I mean, Michael?" I am remembering his
name, even that. I am under control, by God, I am the captain of my fucking
fate,
I
am the master of whatchamacallit. I say, “I
don't mean
interested,
you know? I
mean . . .
interested!
You know?"

 
          
“I
think I do," he says, gazing at me over his knees and his notebook and his
pencil and his nothing nose.

 
          
“I
mean," I explain further,
“you’re
interested in me, right?"

 
          
“Yes,
I am," he says.

 
          
“Your
readers are interested in me," I say. “People going to the movies are
interested in me.
Everybody’s
interested in me. But not like
Lorraine
. She really dug down in there. She really
wanted to
know
me. But thank God she
didn't care about the details, you see what I mean?"

 
          
He
frowns. “No," he says simply.

 
          
“
Lorraine
wasn't interested in my
biography,”
I tell Michael O'Connor.
“She was interested in my
meaning.
My
biography is
trash,
don't you think I know that? Pop
paperback history, a million pretentious movies,
the
same elements over and over again. The religious interlude, the failed
rapprochement
with the parents, the
ghastly secret in the past, the casting couch, the betrayals, the glitzy
locations, the glamorous diseased marriages, the problems with mood enhancers,
the whole shmear.
Lorraine
didn't care about any of that. Her interest in me went deeper, into
why
these images are so powerful, why
the population sifts itself over and over again for the same histories, the
same qualities,
the
same doomed glamour."

 
          
O'Connor
nods but doesn't write anything. "What conclusion did she come to?"
he asks me.

 
          
I
shake my head, disappointed in him. "Intellectuals do not come to
conclusions, Michael," I tell him. "Intellectuals
consider the situation.
That's enough
for them."

 
          
"And
it was enough for you, too?"

 
          
"It
was paradise," I say. "And yet, almost from the beginning, there were
these small signs of trouble ahead."

 
          
The
Malibu
kitchen was clean again, once more
carefully tended and polished. The television set was gone from the small white
table, the fingerprints were gone from the refrigerator, the hanging copper
pots gleamed as before, and everything was in its place with a bright shining
face.

 
          
At
the butcher-block island, Jack stood, neatly and absorbedly preparing a peanut
butter sandwich on pumpernickel bread. From some other room in the house came a
sound rather like a clap or a slap; Jack looked up, attentive, listening, but
the sound was not repeated. He returned to his peanut butter and his
pumpernickel.

 
          
Buddy
entered the kitchen, rubbing the side of his face, but when he saw Jack his
hand dropped immediately to his side and he forced a kind of careless but
lopsided grin, saying, "Hey, how's it goin’, Dad?"

 
          
Jack
smiled at him. "I say Nietzsche was right: Happiness
is
a woman."

 
          
Lorraine
came into the kitchen, looking grim and
flexing the fingers of her right hand. When she saw Jack and

 
          
Buddy,
she dropped her hand to her side, ignored Buddy, and spoke lightly to Jack,
saying, “Oh,
hello
, darling."

 
          
“Hello, darling," Jack said.

 
          
Buddy
was awkward in the presence of these two together. Trying to hide the fact, he
scuffed his feet and behaved in an elaborately casual manner. “Well, I'm
off," he said, too brightly. “I've been invited to watch the Rams
scrimmage. Wanna come along, Dad?"

 
          
“Another
time, Buddy," Jack said. His eyes and attention were on
Lorraine
.

 
          
“Sure,"
Buddy said, and did too large a farewell wave, saying, “See you guys."

 
          
“So
long, Buddy," Jack said, smiling at
Lorraine
.

 
          
Buddy
left, his lips twitching, and
Lorraine
crossed to the butcher-block island, saying
with some amusement, “A peanut butter sandwich, darling?"

 
          
With
an easy laugh, Jack said, “We can't be intellectual
all
the time, darling."

 
          
With
an easy laugh,
Lorraine
said, “I only meant, darling, you didn't offer one to
me”

 
          
“Would
you like one?" Jack asked her. “Be delighted to make it for you."

 
          
“Thank
you, darling,"
Lorraine
said, and leaned on the butcher block to watch.

 
          
Jack
started another sandwich, absorbed and happy in his work.
Lorraine
watched for a moment, and then said,
“Darling?"

 
          
Still
concentrating on the job at hand, Jack said, “Yes, darling?"

 
          
“There's
something I don't understand, darling."

 
          
“What's
that, darling?"

 
          
Lorraine
hesitated, then went ahead: “Buddy, darling."

 
          
With
a quizzical laugh, Jack glanced at her, then back at his sandwich-making.
“Buddy, darling." he echoed. “What's not to understand about Buddy?"

 
          
“His place in your life, darling."
Lorraine
said,
her manner
firm.

 
          
“Darling,"
Jack said, “he's my oldest friend in
all the
world."

           
“Yes, I know,"
Lorraine
said dryly, “you ate sand together."

 
          
Cheered
by the memory, Jack said, “Oh, did I tell you about that, darling?"

 
          
“Yes,
you did, darling."
Lorraine
took a deep breath, then plunged ahead, saying, “But your relationship
with Buddy must have changed since then. You aren't in that sandbox
anymore."

 
          
“Well,
of course not," Jack said, chuckling as though she were making jokes.

 
          
“And
to a recent arrival on the scene, darling,"
Lorraine
persisted, “it does look awfully as though
Buddy is a mere sponge."

 
          
“Oh, darling!"
Jack said, reproachful.

 
          
“A
sponge,"
Lorraine
repeated, inexorable.
“A wastrel.
A parasite.
He lives on you, darling, borrows money he never
repays, treats your possessions ... as though he owns them."

 
          
“Is
it wrong, darling," Jack asked, pleading prettily for understanding, “to
be generous to an old friend?"

 
          
“It
goes beyond generosity,"
Lorraine
insisted. “It's almost as though Buddy had
some hold over you, some—"

 
          
Quick,
urgent, Jack said, “Why do you say that?"
And added, as
an afterthought, “Darling?"

 
          
Casual,
not noticing the force of his reaction, she said, “Oh, I don't mean anything as
melodramatic as blackmail, darling, as though you'd committed a
murder
or something—" She broke off
and looked with some surprise at the sandwich Jack had been making. "Why,
darling," she said. “You've stuck the knife right through the bread."

 
          
Jack
held up the knife, the pumpernickel slice impaled on it. His voice hoarse, he
said, “I'll start another sandwich . . . darling."

 
          
“But
all unknown to all of us, a cloud
was hanging over our heads, completely unsuspected. A cloud named Rubelle
Kallikak.”

 
          
The
courtroom, a large traditional place of gleaming dark wood benches and
railings, high pale ceiling, large side windows, judge seated on a tall
impressive banc flanked by the flags of the
United States of America
and the state of
California
, was crowded with onlookers but was almost
perfectly still. The six jurors sat in somber intensity, deeply aware of the
solemnity and import of their work here. The judge, whitehaired, stocky,
fatherly, fondled his gavel and gave his full attention to the questioning of
the witness.

 
          
That
witness. The plaintiff, in fact: Rubelle Kallikak. A filthy slattern of
seventeen, already spreading in hip and thigh, dressed in cast-off garments a
year from their last cleaning, her hair a mare's nest, her nose snot-smeared,
her dull eyes a monument to a lifetime of improper diet, she sprawled in the
witness chair with a filthy baby shlurping at her sagging breast. Before her
was spread the courtroom: in the seats on one side of the aisle her family,
dozens of Kallikaks (of whom Rubelle was the beauty), and on the other side the
media, eyes and ears wide open.

 
          
To
her left stood her attorney, a slick-haired sleazeball in a maroon leisure suit
and bright blue wide tie. Seated at the defense table were Jack and
Lorraine
, hand in hand, with their battery of
brilliant and expensive lawyers all in pinstripes.

 
          
The
sleazeball attorney spoke: "And do you, Rubelle Kallikak," he
demanded, in a voice which would have been thrilling were it not so nasal,
"do you see in this courtroom the man who lavished such promises upon you,
ravished you, and left you with child?”

 
          
Rubelle
waited a moment to be sure the flood of words had spent itself, and then she
nodded and smeerped the back of her hand across her nose and nodded again and
said, "Uh-huh.”

 
          
The
sleazeball attorney nodded. His worst fears, it seemed, had been realized.
"And would, you Rubelle Kallikak, point out to this court and the jury
that deceiver?”

 
          
Snot
glinted from the back of the hand Rubelle raised. Her finger pointed directly
at Jack.

 
          
The
baby started to snivel.
Lorraine
gave Jack
an I
'm-with-you pat on the shoulder.
Jack smiled at the jury. The jury did not smile back.