Loren D. Estleman - Valentino 03 - Alive! (25 page)

“I’ll take your word for it.”

Something in his tone must have alerted the professor. “Do I detect trouble in paradise?”

“You can probably guess its source, unless you’ve stopped listening to your fiancée altogether. Harriet pumped her for information.”

“Fanta lacks guile. There are those who consider it a virtue.”

“I’m not blaming her. If I weren’t up to my hips in guile through this whole business, we’d all be better off.”

“Self-loathing. Charming. I’m a bit put out with you myself. How can you take on the mob and not include me in the fun?”

“I didn’t exactly take on the mob. Anyway, I’d never have heard the end of it if you were to pick up a stray bullet, from Fanta
or
Harriet.”

“Better I do that than blow an artery working at the computer or, worse, pass into my dotage. Frankly, the prospect of being bathed by your wife on a regular basis is far more attractive the first time around. I’m placing my reservation for a seat in your next escapade.”

“There won’t be any more escapades, Kyle. I’m hanging up the deerstalker and assuming the life of the academic I was born to be.”

“You’re not cut out for it. The faculty intrigues would slash you to ribbons. You’re much safer among gangsters and psychopathic attorneys.”

“You’re joking. I’m not.”

There was a brief silence on Broadhead’s end. “Was it that bad?”

“It was too close. The world isn’t a Saturday afternoon serial. You don’t get out in the nick of time every week. Sooner or later the law of averages catches up with you and the cavalry comes too late. I’m not planning to stick around until that happens.”

“Well, we’ll discuss it over lunch. Fanta’s meeting me at the Brass Gimbal, and I need your presence as a buffer when she starts in on exploding floral arrangements and vengeful bridesmaids in pomegranate and pink.”

“I’d like that, if we can agree on some subject apart from homicide and abduction.”

“I suppose there’s always politics. In which case I may get lucky and choke to death on a mouthful of Green Screen veggie burger.”

*   *   *

Valentino ate the Best Boy Bok Choy while his mentor studied the list of films Jason Stickley had provided. “Atrocious penmanship,” muttered Broadhead. “They’re not teaching it in grammar school these days. An entire generation can communicate only with its thumbs.”

“He’d agree with you. It’s at the heart of his philosophy.”

“
Brazil,
uh-huh.
Metropolis
; well, sure.
Westworld,
the
Terminator
franchise.
Blade Runner
.
Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
. So far it’s ‘Gidget Goes to Dystopia.’”

“Read on. These kids are aficionados, not activists. They’re not sci-fi geeks either. You won’t catch them at a
Star Trek
convention or playing
Dungeons and Dragons
.
Modern Times
is on the list.
Breakheart Pass, Hell’s Angels
,
Shall We Dance
—”

“Doesn’t say whether it’s the Japanese version or the one starring Richard Gere.”

“I’m sure it’s neither. Fred Astaire, tripping the light fantastic in the engine room of a luxury liner. See, there’s a theme: pistons and patent-leather shoes. It runs through every genre: comedy, musical, science fiction, western, romance.” He pointed at a title. “When’s the last time you saw Douglas Sirk lumped in with Otto Preminger?”

“I sort of hoped I never would.” Broadhead folded the sheet. “May I borrow this?”

Valentino was surprised. “Sure. I didn’t think you’d be that interested. Does this mean you’re not ready to pull the plug on everyone under thirty?”

“The jury’s still out, and I’m not excluding everyone between thirty and fifty. But our callow Mr. Joy Stick may have given me a hook for my wretched opus. This is the first film movement to transcend category since
noir
. Assuming, that is, it isn’t a flash in the pan.”

“I doubt it. It represents a cultural backlash against technology on the order of the Luddite revolution.”

“Let’s leave the hyperbole to the book section of the
Hollywood Reporter,
shall we? If it still has one. I had high hopes, too, for the young man who predicted the eight-track tape would change the face of music. I even offered to contribute an introduction to his thesis, which retired with him to an ashram in Yucca Valley.”

“You had another protégé before me?”

“I had several. Intellectuals are not monogamous by nature.” Broadhead put away the list, lifted the bun off his burger, and peeled away a layer of soggy arugula, revealing another underneath. He sighed and replaced the bun. “Right now I’d trade my tenure for a sparerib.”

“Don’t be healthy on my account.” Fanta, materializing out of nowhere, plunked herself into the vacant chair at the table and flagged down a passing waitress. “I’ll have a zombie.”

The young woman frowned. “We don’t have a full bar.”

“In that case, bring me something to eat that would burn the hide off a rhinoceros.”

“I can suggest the Hot Set. Jalapenos deep-fried in bacon fat with habanara sauce, onion rings on the side.”

“With a pint of stout, dark as the abyss.”

Broadhead looked up. “Does it come with a living will?”

When the waitress left, he said, “My sweet, how was your morning?”

Fanta shot him a look that would fell a Brahma. She looked uncommonly beautiful, with her color high against the black of her hair, shimmering like raw film stock to her shoulders. Her eyes glittered with red pinpoints that might or might not have been reflected from her turtleneck sweater. “You know, Kyle, sometimes you’re long on humor and short on sense. Do I look in the mood to banter?”

“Based on prima facie evidence, I would answer in the negative.”

“Legal Latin only works in court documents. I am, to use a hard-working old Anglo-Saxon word, pissed. The Elks Hall canceled our reservation for the wedding reception. The registrar, a quaint old gentleman of a hundred and eighty, stirred himself after six weeks to look at the books and discovered that you haven’t paid dues since the week Ronald Reagan was inaugurated.”

“I overlooked it in my grief. I am, as you well know, apolitical, but I’ve never forgiven the man
Hellcats of the Navy
.”

Valentino said, “I thought it was
Bedtime for Bonzo
you objected to.”

“Not at all. I thought it a pleasantly mindless romp. I voted for his costar when he ran against Jerry Brown for governor. The chimp, it pains me to report, lost in the runoff.”

“The Elks was
your
idea,” she said. “How is it one of the most brilliant minds of our time, to quote you, managed to go decades without writing out a monthly check and fail to reflect upon the fact that he was no longer a member?”

“Nevertheless I did. However, this is the land of wide open spaces. There must be a substitute.”

“Not within six months either side of our wedding date. If we change it, the chapel I booked won’t be available for another year.”

“Why does the word Vegas come to mind?”

She thrust her face within inches of Broadhead’s. “A dog can marry a Rockette in Vegas. My parents were united in St. Cecily’s. Their marriage has lasted twenty-six years, which may not be longer than your subscription to
Living With Flatulence
, but it’s more than a lifetime to me. They’re flying in from Luxembourg to attend, and if they witness their only daughter dancing with her bridegroom to ‘Danke Schoen’ piped in from the lounge, the international incident that’s bound to follow will result in a war that will look like a garden party next to the one I’ll wage with you.
Fix this!
”

Broadhead paled a full shade; something Valentino suspected had not happened since the Yugoslavian military tribunal or whatever it was had sentenced him to prison for espionage. He appeared at a loss for words for the first time in human memory.

The archivist shifted uncomfortably in his seat, causing something to crackle in the hip pocket of his jeans. He slid out the invitation Jason Stickley had given him and looked at it.

“I have a suggestion,” he said, “if neither of you objects to bare brick.”

25

“IT HAS POTENTIAL,”
Fanta said. “Flowers, streamers, Chinese lanterns—”

“Dynamite, a wrecking ball,” Broadhead added.

“I’d keep my opinions to myself, old bear. When someone throws you a rope, you don’t chew through it. However did you find this place, Jason?”

The intern stood nervously twirling the ring of mammoth keys around his finger. Fanta’s presence had a way, Valentino noted, of upsetting the equilibrium of most males past the age of puberty. “Um, one of our people has an uncle in real estate. His firm represents a family that’s owned it since it was built. They say half the old-growth redwoods in California were cut up by blades manufactured here.”

“Inspiring.” Broadhead, incorrigible by nature, stuffed his pipe.

Some steampunks were at work decorating the huge factory room for the Halloween party. Chains with orange and black paper links festooned the portrait of Victoria centered on the gigantic flywheel and a pair of young men Valentino hadn’t met stood on stepladders at opposite ends of the room, stringing a flexible steel cable with brass lamps with lenses of red glass suspended from it, scrounged from defunct railroads. A young woman who may or may not have been Whistler’s Daughter—scruffy jeans with appliqué flowers and a man’s shirt whose cuffs extended past her arms made an excellent disguise, with her hair twisted into a ponytail—walked about carrying a bucket and dipping into it with leather work gloves on her hands, sprinkling steel shavings about the floor.

“You don’t suppose they’ll sell it before spring?” Fanta asked Jason.

“No way. This whole neighborhood is soaked with diesel oil and lead byproducts clear down to bedrock. Ten oil sheikhs pooling their resources couldn’t afford to clean it up to suit the EPA.”

“I can’t think of a better blessing for starting our life together. Ask your friend’s uncle to book it for June sixth.”

Broadhead said, “Are you sure, my dear? It’s the first place we’ve looked at.”

“The first
you’ve
looked at. The closest thing to acceptable I found on the Net has a crack house on either side. Instead of those little disposable cameras on the tables, we’d have to set out Saturday Night Specials so our guests can shoot their way out of the neighborhood.”

“I’m sure that before June we can find a pawnshop that will give us a good price on them.”

She fished a checkbook and pen from her shoulderbag. “What’s the deposit?”

“We got it for forty.”

Valentino touched her arm just as she began writing. “Let me get it. I’ve been racking my brains for a suitable wedding gift. So far all I’ve come up with is his and her boxing gloves. This will be a start.”

Her smile was dazzling. She put away the checkbook. “Thanks, Val. Isn’t that nice of him, Kyle?”

“There’s always a friend willing to help walk a man off the plank.” But Broadhead lit his tobacco contentedly. Realization that he’d dodged a relationship bullet had sunk through finally to his educator’s brain.

“Come to the party,” Jason told the couple. “You can see it in full blowout mode.”

“That’s very kind of you, but I just sent my iron tuxedo to the dealership for an undercoat.”

She transferred her smile to the young man. “Thanks. We’re flying to Neufchâteau next week.”

“We are?” The professor took the pipe from his mouth.

“It was going to be a surprise, but I don’t want Jason to think we’re blowing him off. Mom and Dad want to meet you. They’re treating us to a holiday as an engagement present.”

“Must we fly?”

“I’ll have the flight attendants ply you with Scotch as soon as we board.”

“I’ll have to talk to the department head. A man with my responsibilities can’t go jet-setting off to Luxembourg on a moment’s notice.”

“I’ve already spoken to him. He says it’ll be a hardship, but the university can probably manage to survive by using the assistant who’s been teaching your classes all year.”

“An exaggeration. I’ve logged one hundred minutes this semester alone.” As his future bride wandered off with Jason for the grand tour, Broadhead seized Valentino’s arm and turned him away. “You have to get me out of this. Surely someone in Vancouver or someplace has footage of Byrd at the Pole and you need to bring along a contemporary of the explorer’s to authenticate it.”

“You’re not that old.”

“I’m old enough to have taught Fanta’s father how to tie a shoelace, but it isn’t him I’m worried about. Her mother tells grand dukes what to do. I can’t bully her the way I can a room full of post-adolescent undergrads.”

“Everyone has to meet his mother-in-law sooner or later.”

“But not on her turf!”

“I’m sorry, Kyle. I’ve given up lying.”

“Fine time to pick to adhere to the higher principles.” He looked about him, puffing thick clouds from his pipe. “I wonder if this place is as combustible as it appears.”

*   *   *

The great Wurlitzer pipe organ was playing when Valentino opened the door to The Oracle, an etude of some kind. The virile bass notes hummed through the channels and made the floor buzz under his feet. He looked a question at a painter on his stepladder applying primer to a cherub prior to gilding. The man answered with a shrug. A man was not king of his castle as long as it was under construction and anyone could wander in and out.

Lorna Hunter sat at the keyboard in the orchestra pit, her long slender fingers gliding up and down the scale. She had her hair tied behind her neck and wore a tailored suit that slyly hinted at rather than disguised what lay beneath. Valentino hoped someday to put that image behind him. It wasn’t how one was supposed to picture a friend.

When she finished with a little flourish, he applauded. Her shoulders tensed and she looked back over one, then smiled. “I hope you don’t mind. I’m out of practice. I’ve decided to go back to work.”