Getting Garbo (29 page)

“Okay, lemme hear. Who is Donald Gentry?”

“Was,” Arzy corrects me. Keeping his eyes on the road. “Mr. Gentry cashed out last night. Took a header off Mulholland during a car chase. After breaking into a mansion in Holmby Hills. We traced him back here. You saw the loot. Ties him to every Hillside burglary in the last few months. Including, with your ID on Addie's jewelry, the one at your ex-house.” Arzy throws a glance my way. “He drove a neat little T-Bird, looked almost like yours.”

You wish. “Still doesn't tell me who he is.”

“Gentry worked part-time as a parking valet at Chasen's. That's how he got a line on the people he hit. Thursday nights were his favorite. Maid's night off, everybody in Bev Hills eats out. We should have tumbled to that sooner. He'd spot his prospective victims at Chasen's, get their addresses out of the glove compartment. Then next Thursday he'd clock 'em into the restaurant and know he had a couple of hours to operate. Sometimes he even had house keys. Copied them while parking the cars at Chasen's. So he could walk right in when he wanted to. Made those burglaries look like forced entry after the fact. Like at Addie's house.”

“How much of the stuff he took did you get back?”

“Half, two-thirds maybe. He fenced the rest. But we're working on that.”

“So if Gentry's dead, what happens now?”

“We wrap it up. Orders from headquarters. There'll be a press conference. The big brass will show off the recovered loot for the TV cameras and declare it a win for the department. We tag Gentry for everything. Case solved, investigation closed.” He shoots a glance at me. “Good news, huh?”

I nod. Giving him solemn. When I want to do is dance a jig. Shoot off fireworks. I'm in clover.

We're passing the spot on the Strip now where Kim's billboard is. “Pretty girl,” Arzy says. “She ought to be in the movies.”

Meaning Hollywood? Meaning the Academy Theater? I'm not going to touch that one. Unless he pushes it. He doesn't. We ride quietly together. Beyond the Strip, past the vast rolling lawns and tall sculpted hedges that conceal the dark mansions along Sunset Boulevard.

“I took a TV writing course at UCLA last year,” Arzy says. “Know what they taught us were the two most important words for a writer?”

“‘How much'?”

Arzy laughs. “Better.
What if.
The professor, he was an old-time screenwriter, wrote
The Prisoner of Zenda.
He said those two words have launched more stories than you can imagine. What if.” We stop for the light at Rexford and Sunset. “It means taking something that really happened and turning it inside out. Then projecting that possibility.”

He's dying to tell. So I give him the feed line. “Okay, Arzy. What if…”

We're rolling again as Arzy considers.

“What if there's this heavyweight guy, famous, let's say he's a—a big time politician. Being blackmailed. I mean, sucked dry. But he's got a chance to get it all back. All he has to do is bump the blackmailer. Of course, he'll be the first one everyone'll nominate. So he needs an alibi. So what if—he arranges that he's seen entering the er-r Senate Chamber, shakes a lot of hands, then slips off in between, does what has to be done, and slips back in at the end, makes a lot of noise, and hopes nobody can prove he was gone?” Arzy stops in the driveway at my house. “How's that sound to you? As a storyline?”

“Depends. How's your story end?”

“Funny, your pal Wellman asked me the same thing. Well, it's Hollywood, so it has to have a happy ending. The politician skates.”

“And the cop?”

“He has the satisfaction of knowing he was just one card away from a royal flush.”

• • •

Arzy drives off and I go for the front door. As I'm opening it, I hear a gunshot. Sort of. A champagne cork lands at my feet. Here's Jack Havoc behind the bar. With an overflowing bottle wrapped in a towel. Pouring vintage Piper Heidsieck into a pair of my hand-blown Venetian champagne flutes.

A toast,
he shouts.
I propose a toast—to Donald Gentry!

He hands me my wine, we clink glasses and sip. The champagne is icy cold and sparkling. Perfect.

This is the new you,
he says.
The old you would've said, It's too early to be drinking. Or, I was saving that bottle of champagne for a special occasion—

“Which this sure as hell is!” I knock back the rest of my glass. Pour myself another. Top off Jack's glass. “We're celebrating. Our horse came in, along with our ship, our number and—”

—and we won the lottery, beat the bank at Monte Carlo and drew the Get Out Of Jail Free card! We won the game, Roy!

We sprawl on the easy chairs, across from each other. Ice bucket and wine on the coffee table. Plenty more where that came from. Grinning, almost giggling. With delight. With relief. The man who's climbed the steps of the gallows has just been told his services will not be required today.

“You know,” I say, “you're the only one in the world I can really talk to about this.”

That's why I'm here, kid.

At that moment I love him like the brother I never had.

Then the phone rings.

I pick it up. Figuring it might be a reporter. Maybe the death of Donald Gentry, burglar and murderer, is starting to leak. It's not a reporter. It's a familiar voice. One I didn't expect to hear again.

“Roy? It's Val.”

Val Dalton. My agent. My ex-agent. My ex-friend.

“Hey, Val, how are ya?” Hail fellow.

“I'm—so sad about Addie, please accept my deepest condolences. It's horrible. I would have been at the funeral, but I was in London on business. Just got back this morning. And I heard a bulletin on the news that the police caught the man who did it. How are
you?
”

“Trying to stay afloat,” I say. Wishing he was still on my team. “It's very thoughtful of you to call.” He did the right thing, let him hang up now. Recede into my past. Where I relegated him.

“Actually, there's something else I want to talk to you about. It's kind of awkward, but—I just got a phone call. From Jack Warner. He'd like to see you. At his office. Today.”

“Probably ran out of nails for the crucifixion and wants to know where he can buy more.” Give a nervous laugh. Val quiet on his end. “What's he want with me?”

“He wouldn't say. But my advice would be to go see him. What do you have to lose?”

“You coming with me?”

“That wouldn't be appropriate. We don't represent you anymore.”

“But he called you.” Val doesn't say anything. “Okay, I'll get Nate Scanlon and we'll go out to see the old bastard and—”

“He called me because he won't speak to Nate. Hates his guts. He wants to see you alone.”

I think it over. I take so long that Val thinks he's been disconnected. “Roy, you still there?”

“Yeah. Fine. I'll go see him. Want me to call you afterward?”

“You don't have to. I'm just relaying a message.”

“Thanks, Val.” I hang up.

Guess you still don't have an agent,
Jack Havoc says.

• • •

Jack L. Warner is dressed all in white, except for a black four-in-hand tie and a black carnation in the lapel of his ice cream suit. He looks like Cab Calloway about to sing “Minnie the Moocher.” He's hunkered behind the protective barrier of his huge desk. Clutching and stroking a New York Yankees baseball bat.

“Collectors item,” he says, although I didn't ask. Spouting his rapid fire, semi-coherent shorthand. “World Series trophy. Old time. Signed by Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, that whole crew. Valuable. Americana.”

And good for close range defense. He must be remembering the last studio Christmas party when I tried to take a poke at him. They say Zanuck walks around his office swinging a polo mallet. The Colonel has a baseball bat.
C'est la guerre.

“I'm not a total schmuck, you know,” he says. Is he reading my mind?

“Talk about TV, they forget, who introduced sound? Snickering at me, all over town, fuckers at
Variety,
printed my internal memo, ‘Please note that NO television sets can be used as props or allowed to be seen on screen in any Warner Brothers motion picture.' Radios, record players, harmonicas and ukuleles, okay, but no TV, not in the living room, not in the bedroom, not in the den, not in the crapper, not nowhere. TV sets are
verboten
and if anybody disobeys, I make it clear I'll can their ass—”

It's a motor mouth monologue. Can't get a word in. And I don't know what the point of any of it is.

“—and why do I do this? Ask yourself? Like to make myself into a laughingstock?” The Colonel thumps the Yankees bat down on the desk. “No, it's because I'm in a fuckin' war! Damn tube, stealing my customers, sitting home on their asses, guzzling beer and watching Lucy, nice girl, never made a dime for us in the movies, and do I think I can win this war? I DO NOT! Holding action. Delaying tactic. I know that. Fight 'em 'til you can co-opt 'em. On my terms. And sure enough, one day, here's Leonard Goldenson, ABC-TV, he says, ‘Colonel, how would your studio like to make shows for us?' And I tell him, ‘Well, not really, but if the price is right and you can guarantee me enough of 'em, then maybe we can talk.' Convince him, if I do this, doing him a favor. Giving him that slick Warner Bros. kind of movie-making for his crummy little tube—”

The Colonel rises and comes around the desk. Giving the bat a few test swats. If he comes near me, I'm going to bash him with the big metal ashtray next to me. But he moves to the window overlooking the studio street.

“Actually, ABC, saving my life. Enormous factory here in Burbank. Standstill. Nobody using it. Fuckin' directors, wanna shoot movies only on location, location, LOCATION!” Sounding like a real estate broker. “England, France, Italy, Timbuktu. Anywhere but Stage 28. Empty sound stages. I'm losing money. Hand over fist. But—”

He positions himself in front of the window. Like Casey at the plate. Wiggles his ass. Waits for the invisible pitch—and knocks it out of the park. Doffs a make believe cap to the crowd. Triumphant.

“But now I got TV to pay the bills! Made the first deal, made the best deal. Give 'em
Maverick,
Sugarfoot,
77 Sunset Strip,
Cheyenne,
Hawaiian Eye,
Jack Havoc.
Now it's okay by me to see a TV set in one of our movies, 'cuz it'll be showing a Warner Brothers TV show.”

He pauses. Gleams his full denture smile at me. Waiting for a round of applause. Maybe he's totally lost it.

“Well, Colonel, that was—damn shrewd of you.”

“Bet your ass. I'm a survivor, Roy. Are you?”

Now he asks? Sonuvabitch blackballed me. Left me sliced and diced in the gutter.

“Are you a survivor?” the Colonel repeats.

“Remains to be seen,” I say.

“That's what they say at funerals.” He guffaws like he got off a Milton Berle one-liner. Leans the bat against the wall. “C'mon, kid, gotta go to lunch. That's not an offer. Walk me to the commissary. Eating with Gromyko, the Russki asshole from the U.N. Like to give him a boot in his gazongas, but I'm gonna buy him a sirloin steak and take him on a tour of the lot. Gotta peddle our movies and TV shows in Russia, too, even if they are fuckin' Commies.”

We're strolling along the campus-style path between the executive buildings. Down the street between bustling sound stages. A surreal scene that everyone on the lot takes for granted. Cowboys, Indians, dance hall girls, tethered horses, horseshit, an obese teamster snoring in the back of a buckboard, a black-suited agent pitching a young actor-wrangler who's practicing his lassoing on him. As we pass, each and every one of them take notice of Jack L. Warner—and me. He ignores them all. The plantation owner doesn't have to fraternize with the slaves.

“Buried a couple of my brothers,” he says out of nowhere. “Decided then, only other funeral I'm going to is my own. Period. Might not even go to that one.” Bigger guffaw. “Too damn depressing. Makes you think about what you don't want to think about. But take my wife, hey, I sound like Henny Youngman, ‘Take my wife, please.' Anyway, my wife, she goes to funerals, better manners than me. She was at Addie's funeral, and she came back and told me about you giving this eulogy, that what you call it? Better than Georgie Jessel, she said. That's all she could talk about. You made her cry, so now she won't stop noodging me, so that's why I hadda see you.”

“I don't really underst—” I manage to squeeze in before the Colonel is off again.

“I grew up in New York. Lemme tell you, I was the toughest, meanest
momser
in the borough of Manhattan. Play by my own rules. Fair fight is any fight I win. Except I never kicked a man when he was down. Oh, maybe if he was a wiseass and asking for it, but you know what I mean.”

“Not yet,” I say.

“We had a beef, you and me, we squared off, took our best shots, hey, I won. Kicked you halfway to Canarsie. You're dead meat on the West Coast. Can we agree on that?”

I could hit him. But I'm curious where this is going. “Okay, we can agree on that.”

“So, just to get my wife off my back, so she won't keep noodging, I'm declaring a whaddayacallit, an armistice. You lost your wife, you're handling it like a man, I respect that. So. Helping hand. Christian thing to do. Even though I'm Jewish. Maybe we'll fight again some other time. But this time, it's over. You wanna make movies, go make movies.”

“Nobody will hire me.”

“Go ask 'em again. Maybe they changed their minds.” We're in front of the commissary. Near the private entrance to the Blue Room. “Give you something else to think about, kiddo. You can walk away clean. Today. But the sets are still standing on Stage 11. You give me two more years as Jack Havoc and right now I'll double your salary, quadruple it next year. Cash bonuses up front when we go to syndication, for all episodes produced. During hiatus you can make a movie wherever you want, for Zanuck, for Goldwyn, watch out for that cocksucker Harry Cohn, and listen, no loanout fee, you keep all the money. Maybe I'll even have a movie you want to do. Match best offer you get.” His grin outshines Doug Sr. “Only proviso is, either way, don't go around town telling people I did something nice. I got a reputation to protect.”