Westlake, Donald E - Novel 50 (20 page)

 
          
A
t first, O’Connor has no idea what's
happened. Pine was talking along, being coherent, making as much sense as he's
ever made today, and then all at once he said, "It's been nice talking to
you," and he smiled and waved by-by, and now he's just sitting there,
unmoving. His eyes are glazed, his mouth holds a loose vague smile, and his
hands rest easily in his lap. He is sitting up and his eyes are open, but he
isn’t home.

 
          
"Mr.
Pine?" O'Connor says, and repeats it louder: "Mr. Pine? Shit,
again?" Shaking his head, he yells, "Hoskins!"

 
          
And
that worthy appears at once, stepping rapidly from the house, hurrying this
way, carrying in his right hand the familiar silver tray bearing a single tall
glass of water, and in his left hand an old black doctor's bag. Arriving,
"You bellowed, sir?" he asks.

 
          
O'Connor
indicates the frozen actor. "You see."

 
          
Hoskins
studies this latest manifestation. "Ah, yes," he says. "I
thought we might go next to Middle Earth.
Particularly if we
were feeling threatened or upset."

 
          
"Maybe
so," O'Connor says. "I thought maybe we were finally getting
somewhere. Can you bring him out of it?"

           
With cheery indomitability, Hoskins
says, "Trust to luck, eh?"

 
          
O'Connor
sits back, notebook resting in his lap, and watches Hoskins go to one knee, put
the tray bearing the glass of water to one side on the patio slate, and open
the doctor's bag. For some little time he studies its contents, then frowns at
O'Connor, saying, "How much longer will you need him?"

 
          
"Hard
to say, exactly," O'Connor answers, tapping his pen against the notebook.

 
          
"Less than an hour?"

 
          
"Oh,
sure," O'Connor says. "No problem."

 
          
"Good,"
Hoskins says. "All in all, one prefers not to use the suppositories."

 
          
As
Hoskins begins taking bottles and boxes from the bag, studying them, fiddling
with them, O'Connor says, "Hoskins, do you have to keep readjusting him
all the time like this?"

 
          
"Oh,
no, sir," Hoskins assures him. "Usually we let him set his own pace,
you know. It's only if he's actually filming, or such. But today, of course, is
rather different."

 
          
"I
see." O'Connor nods,
then
says, "Hoskins, do
you mind my asking? What do you
think
of Jack Pine?"

 
          
"Think
of him, sir?" Hoskins ponders that question,
then
says, "One doesn't normally
think
about one's employer. It's not quite seemly. Still, I would say he's rather
easier than most to get along with."

 
          
"Particularly
when he's like this," O'Connor suggests.

 
          
"Too
true," Hoskins agrees. "Nevertheless, he is rather a sweet person at
heart." Frowning at the sweet person, Hoskins says, "Our next
adjustment is a two-stager. Do you mind my being here in the interval?"

 
          
"You
mean, while I'm questioning him?"

 
          
"Well,
yes, sir, or whatever you do."

 
          
"Is
that necessary?" O'Connor asks. He seems jealous of his privileged privacy
with the actor.

 
          
"You
could perhaps do the second part yourself, sir, if you wouldn't object,"
Hoskins suggests.

           
“No objection," O'Connor says
promptly. “What do I do?''

 
          
“You
have a watch?"

 
          
“Sure,"
O'Connor says, extending his left wrist, showing the Timex strapped there.

 
          
“Good."

 
          
Hoskins
places the tray bearing the glass of water next to O'Connor's chair. He
transfers three red capsules from a bottle out of the doctor's bag to his palm
and then to the tray, next to the water. “When I give you the sign," he
says, “look at your watch, and in exactly three minutes from that time, give
him these three capsules. Make sure he takes them all and washes them down with
all the water. We don't want him going nova on us."

 
          
“No,
you're right," O'Connor says. Feeling something like awe, he looks at his
watch and at the three capsules lying on the silver tray.

 
          
From
the doctor's bag, Hoskins takes a plastic tube with a ball at the end of it.
There seems to be something inside the tube, which Hoskins inserts into Pine's
left nostril. Then he slowly squeezes the ball, counting aloud: “One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five”
Removing the tube from his
employer's nose, he turns and says to O'Connor, “Counting from
now”

 
          
O'Connor
looks closely at his watch. He's very aware of his responsibility.

 
          
Hoskins
puts the tube away, puts the other boxes and bottles away, and closes the
doctor's bag. Then he gets to his feet, dusts off the knees of his trousers,
picks up the doctor's bag, and says to O'Connor, “Remember,
sir
.
Three minutes."

 
          
“I
remember," O'Connor says.

 
          
Pine
suddenly speaks, without altering his posture or expression or changing in any
other way. In a deep sepulchral voice he says, “Frankly, Scarlett, I don't give
a flying fuck."

 
          
“Ah,
yes," Hoskins says, nodding in satisfaction.
“The
Gone with the Wind
remake.
We
just recently completed that."

           
"I know," O'Connor says.
"
He told me."

 
          
"More
of it may surface," Hoskins says, "but it should taper off quite
soon."

 
          
In
that same deep sepulchral voice, still without shifting position or changing
facial expression, the actor intones, "You want something from me, and you
want it badly enough to show a lot of tit in those velvets."

 
          
"Well,"
Hoskins says, "until the next crisis." And he leaves, heading back to
the house again, carrying the doctor's bag with him.

 
          
O'Connor,
mindful of the three-minute deadline, looks at his watch.

 
          
"What
time is it?"

 
          
Startled,
O'Connor looks past his watch at the actor, and finds the man looking back at
him, calm and relaxed and apparently in perfectly ordinary shape. O'Connor
says, "Mr. Pine? Are you all right?"

 
          
"Of
course I'm all right," Pine answers, his manner now surly, even snappish.
"Who the hell are you?" he demands. "You better scram before I
call Security."

 
          
"I'm
Michael O'Connor. We've been talking here."

 
          
Pine's
face goes blank. In that deep sepulchral voice again, he says, "Rhett.
Rhett Butler. And I don't take shit from any man."

 
          
Exasperated,
trying to find some way to get Pine back on track, O'Connor says, "Did
Dori Lunsford get the beach house?
After the divorce?"

 
          
The
actor frowns at him, uncomprehending, and slowly that expressive face changes,
lightens up, becomes cheerful and welcoming again.
"The
interviewer!"
Pine says, delighted to see him. "Where you
been, Michael?"

 
          
O'Connor,
becoming wise in the ways of Jack Pine's mind, says, "Took a walk around,
looked at the property."

 
          
"Nice
here, isn't it?" Pine smiles around at his
land,
and O'Connor notices how he manages never to look directly at the swimming
pool. Still smiling, the actor says, "No, it was
Lorraine
who got the beach house, finally, after a
long fight. Dori would have gotten
this
place, only we didn't actually have to get divorced."

           
“You didn't?"

 
          
“No.”
The actor smiles broadly in remembered pleasure. “It was a real pleasant
surprise. I got an annulment, not a divorce. Turns out, prenuptial
consummations don't count.”

 
          
“So
this has been your home ever since.”

 
          
Pine
looks around, looks left, looks right, smiles in comfortable ownership,
never
looks directly at the pool. “Yeah,” he says dreamily.
“There's no place like home.”

 
          
A
heavenly chorus sings;
hallelujah. Jack floats down the wide
staircase, a dust mote among the dust motes, his fingertips gliding down the
polished oak balustrade, his feet never touching the stairs. Shafts of sunlight
bend around him, creating a personal monogrammed rainbow just for Jack Pine.
Imagine!

 
          
Partway
down the stairs, Jack meets sullen, grumpy old Buddy coming up, in loafers and
chinos and a beautiful beige cashmere sweater that just eats up all the sun.
“Hi,
Buddy,” Jack sings, pirouetting on
the stairs, the chorus turning his words into madrigals, the dust motes writing
the music on the staffs of sunshafts. “Just get in, Buddy Buddy?”

 
          
“Looks
that way,” grumbles Buddy, not in tune with the music or the day at all, and he
stumps on up the stairs, barely even glancing in Jack's direction.

 
          
Why
can't Buddy be happy?
Jack
is happy. Jack floats down a step
or two,
then
stops to consider a sudden kind of
revelation. Wafting about, gazing upward at Buddy's bent receding back, Jack
says, "Buddy? Isn't that my sweater?"

 
          
"It
was," Buddy says, without pausing or looking back. As Jack watches, with
tiny tendrils of distress creeping about his heart, Buddy pounds on up to the
top of the stairs and disappears down the wide white hall.

 
          
"Sir?"

 
          
It
is Hoskins's voice, taking a solo above the chorus. Jack floats around to face
down-flight, and there stands Hoskins, all in black, at the bottom step, his
hand upon the newel post.

 
          
"Ah,
Hoskins," Jack breathes, grateful for the distraction that made him forget
. . .

 
          
.
. .
something
.

 
          
"Dr.
Ovoid's here, sir," Hoskins announces.

 
          
Elation
lifts Jack even farther into the air, inches and inches above the mundane
wooden steps. "Goody!" he cries.

 
          
Hoskins
lifts a surprisingly expressive hand from the newel post and gestures
gracefully with it, as he says, "I put him in the east parlor."

 
          
"Oh,
yes! Oh, yes!
The east parlor!"
And Jack sails
through the air, over Hoskins's surprised and laughing head, sweeping away
toward the east parlor.

 
          
Within
the east parlor,
waiting,
looms Dr. Ovoid, large and
round and sleek and buttery and well-satisfied, with a dead-white face and tiny
hands and feet. The east parlor itself is a lovely room, full of flowers and
morning sun and white wicker furniture; but at the moment Dr. Ovoid stands by a
prettily curtained window, smiling as he gazes out upon the rose garden in rich
and luxuriant flower. And behind him, on a long table, rests a rolled-up black
silk bag a bit larger and much softer than a quart whiskey bottle.

 
          
The
hall door swings open of its own accord, and in a moment Jack swirls in,
surrounded by fairy garlands and cherubs trilling hosannahs. "Good
raorrrr-ning, doctor," sings Jack, and in great good spirits he flies
around the ceiling.

           
Dr. Ovoid turns and beams upon his
patient, happy to see this happiness, happy to be appreciated, happy to be
wanted.
“Good morning, Jack," he
says, and rubs his tiny hands together, and paces to the long table.

 
          
While
Jack eagerly watches, dancing in place, the doctor's tiny fingers untie the
silk ribbon holding the silk bag closed. Then he unrolls the bag down the
length of the table, showing the coral-colored silk lining within. The silk bag
is like a half-size sleeping bag, one foot wide and three feet long, and its
interior is lined with compartments displaying bottles of pills, bottles of
powders, boxes of capsules and ampules, packages of inhalers and suppositories,
all sorts of wonderful things for good little boys and girls. “Living better
chemically,” Jack says, rubbing his hands together, smiling down at the
assortment.

 
          
Dr.
Ovoid steps back and spreads his hands like a showman, displaying his wares.
“Well, Jack,” he says. “And how do you want to feel today?”