Dead Lines

‘Then you know what I mean. Lovely, like a soft whisper in your ear. No interference, just clean sound. If you can convince Mr Benoliel we’re on to something, you’ll get free units for life. You and five – no, ten of your friends.’

Peter gave a dry chuckle. ‘And?’

Weinstein lifted an eyebrow. ‘Five thousand shares, IPO guaranteed to be set at twenty-three dollars a share.’

Peter raised his own eyebrow even higher. He hadn’t survived a career in films for nothing.

Weinstein grinned devilishly. ‘Or five thousand dollars, up front, your choice, payable when Mr Benoliel invests.’

‘How about ten thousand?’

Weinstein’s smile remained, tighter but still friendly. ‘Okaaay,’ he said, mimicking Joseph’s deliberate drawl. ‘Pardner.’ He pulled a folded piece of paper from his pocket and began scrawling on it with a fountain pen. ‘Do you have an agent?’

‘He hasn’t heard from me in a while.’ Peter examined the short, neatly penned document. The address was in Marin County. He would probably need to go north anyway, for Phil’s funeral – if there was going to be one. He asked for the fountain pen and signed. ‘What the hell,’ he said. ‘Joseph rarely changes his mind.’

Weinstein excused himself and returned a few minutes later with a white cardboard box. In the box, buried in layers of foam, were ten plastic ovoids in various cheery colors.

‘All active and good for a year. Push the help button for instructions.’

‘How do you open them?’ Peter asked.

Weinstein demonstrated. Pressing a barely visible dimple on one side released the upper half, which swung aside with oily smoothness. There were no buttons. A screen covered most of the revealed face and lit up pearly white with black touch keypad and letters, different from his Motorola. The unit was neatly made and felt just right in his hand, slightly warm, slightly heavy.

‘It’s not a gift from aliens, is it?’ Peter asked.

‘It should be,’ Weinstein said, chuckling. ‘No, it’s entirely human. Just … people.’

Weinstein handed Peter the box and looked around the drawing room. ‘Quite a place,’ he said. ‘Have you worked here long?’

Peter smiled. Joseph did not like to be talked about, in any fashion, by anybody.

Weinstein turned serious. ‘Get this done, Mr Russell, and you’ll rate a visit to our new headquarters, as well as your bounty money. Then you’ll meet the man behind Trans.’

Peter folded shut the top of the box. ‘I’ll put these in my car,’ he said.

‘That lovely old Porsche?’ Weinstein asked. ‘Is it a replica?’ ‘Nope,’ Peter said.

‘Then it’s older than I am,’ Weinstein said.

After Weinstein’s departure, Peter followed Michelle up the long curve of marble stairs to the second floor. Flaubert House was huge and quiet, as solid as a tomb but cheerful in its way. ‘That was awkward,’ Michelle murmured. ‘Joseph knew someone’s daddy way back when. Now one of his boys sends a salesman to hit him up for ten million dollars.’

Peter walked beside her for the last few steps, silent. It had taken him into his forties to realize that the true art of conversation was saying almost nothing.

‘Joseph’s been a little down. I mean, not that he’s ever a ball of fire, you know? But a little less twinkle.’

In truth, Joseph had never struck Peter as being capable of twinkle. Blunt honesty, sharp conversation, an uncanny ability to pin down character – and a good joke every now and then – defined his few charms. Over the years, Peter had come to like Joseph; honesty and the occasional joke could make up for a lot.

Michelle looked tired. ‘Says he has a palooza of a chore for you. Won’t tell me what. Man stuff, do you think?’ Her long legs carried her more quickly over the thick Berber carpeting in the broad hallway.

‘Monkey nuts,’ Peter said.

Michelle smirked. ‘I’ll tell him you’re here.’ She left him standing between walls covered by framed glossies of movie stars. Most of the stylish portraits were autographed, souvenirs of Joseph’s days as a producer. Peter recognized them all: beautiful or soulful people brooding or sunny, feigning humor or dignity, looking inaccessible or seductive, but all seeking approval no matter what attitude they copped. Long ago, he had realized an almost universal truth about actors. They became real only when they were being witnessed, when they were on-screen. Hidden behind doors, alone, or looped around a reel and locked in a dark metal can … For an actor, not being seen, not having an audience, was worse than limbo.

‘All right,’ Michelle said, returning. ‘He’s decent.’ She opened a door near the end of the hall. ‘Joseph, it’s Peter.’

‘Who else would it be, Eliot Ness?’ a voice bellowed in the dark beyond.

Michelle sighed. ‘Ten percent bonus if you leave him a contented man.’

‘I heard that!’

Michelle sighed loudly and closed the door behind Peter.

Joseph sat in a huge leather chair near full-length windows opening onto a false balcony about a foot deep and faced with black wrought-iron railing. Lights from the front drive and the last of the sky glow drew him in broad grainy strokes like chalk on velvet. The room also contained an antique oak bar from a saloon in Dodge City, so the legend went, and two brown leather couches separated by a square black granite table. ‘Goddamned awkward,’ he said. ‘Did Weinstein try to suck you in?’

‘Yeah. Ambition,’ Peter said.

‘In spades.’

Peter nodded. His eyes adjusted slowly to the twilit gloom.

‘Offer you stock to convince me?’ ‘And cash.’

Joseph chuckled. ‘They’ve been yammering at me for a week. Goddamned things don’t work. You’d think they would check that out before they try to hit up a rich old fool.’ There was a strange set to Joseph’s words. ‘Old trumps rich,’ he murmured. ‘And fool trumps old.’ He was staring fixedly through the windows. Peter stood about six feet from the chair. ‘Anyway, I’m glad you’re here. I need you to go see a woman. Interested?’

‘For you, always,’ Peter said.

‘She may be the most charismatic female on the planet. Certainly one of the smartest. If I went personally, she would play me like a farm trout. You, however … You know women better than any man alive. You’ll survive.’

Peter gave a small, dubious laugh.

‘Well, you will. You’ve made it with over two hundred women, photographed maybe two thousand, and Michelle genuinely likes you. That’s a résumé no other man in my experience can equal.’

‘Who gave out my track record?’

‘We’ve known each other a long time,’ Joseph said. ‘I did some research before bankrolling your films.’

‘A bit exaggerated,’ Peter said. ‘I never kept count.’

Joseph lifted his hand, spread his fingers, then let it drop back to the chair arm. ‘Before she met me, Michelle used to know a lot of photographers. Long-haired sacks of fermented pig shit. That’s what she called them. But not you.’

‘I’m respectable?’ Peter asked.

‘Not if you work for me, you aren’t.’ Joseph shifted in his chair. ‘This woman you’re going to meet is seventy years old. She’s the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, bar none. I’ve watched her on TV. Her teeth aren’t perfect, but she smiles like some sort of Eastern saint, whatever you call that.’

‘Kwan Yin,’ Peter offered.

‘Yeah, maybe. Her name is Sandaji. Used to be Carolyn Lumley Pierce. She’s from the Bay Area, started out as a New Age groupie, but I checked up on her, and she’s been through hell and come out wiser. Amazing story. She’s holding meditation seminars in Pasadena.’