The Boy Who Never Grew Up (37 page)

“You’re
here
,” she said, her eyes soft and expectant.

“You can’t keep Stewart Hoag away from a hootenanny. Ask anyone.”

“I’m so glad you made it, Hoagy,” she said, resting her hand on my arm.

“I’m glad you’re glad,” I said, grinning at Cassandra, who had on her denim jacket, jeans, and no hat.

“Gawd,” she cried, giving me a buggy-eyed onceover. “Ya look unreal in evening clothes. I mean, gawd!”

“It is a pretty awe-inspiring sight.”

“Where’s your cute little friend?” she asked.

“She’s off playing seek the sashimi.”

“I mean the Lieutenant.”

“I let him have his Saturday nights to himself, provided he’s back for bed check.”

“Have you eaten yet, Hoagy?” Pennyroyal wondered, gazing up at me.

“I have not.”

“Let me get you something.”

“Not necessary. I’ll get it myself.”

“Please,” she insisted. “What can I get you?”

“I want it all,” I replied. “While a select few of my organs still function.”

Off she went to fetch it.

Cassandra watched her, nodding to herself. “Yeah, yeah, shewa—it all makes sense now,” she commented tartly.

“I seriously doubt that.”

“All day she’s like a love-struck schoolgoil, completely useless to me. Stars in her eyes she has. I figure, hey, Pretty Penny’s getting dicked by someone new. Shewa enough, this afternoon she calls up Trace and breaks it off with him
cold
. So I
know
there’s somebody else. I shoulda figured, y’know? I really shoulda.” She shook her head ruefully. “Wow, I never had a chance with ya, did I? You’re waaaay outta my league.”

I heard a low growl at my feet. Lulu. She’d discovered I fibbed about the sushi.

“It looks mad,” observed Cassandra warily.

“Appearances are not deceiving.”

She showed me her teeth. Lulu, that is.

I showed her mine. And said, “I never claimed to be a perfect father.”

Grudgingly, she went off to mingle, but not until she’d
hmphted
at me, something she got from Merilee.

“Christ, you’re smooth. I actually
believed
all that shit ya told me about being loyal to Merilee. So what are ya gonna do if she takes ya back? Dick ’em both?”

“Cassandra, I hate to disappoint you, but I spent last evening in Trancas with Trace. Then I went to the fireworks show at Homewood. I did not, as you so eloquently put it, dick Pennyroyal.”

“I don’t believe ya.”

“Where were you last night?”

“Me? Cranking out pages in my room. Faxed ten more to our editor. How many pages youse guys done, huh?”

“This is not a track meet, Cassandra.”

“Don’t kid yourself, honey. There’s a finish line, and I’m getting there foist.” She glanced across the patio. “Christ, look at her, will ya?”

Our little cowgirl was working her way back to us through the crowd with my dinner, a shy doe smile on her face.

“What about her?” I said.

“She’s gone. I know women, and that woman is
gone
. I shewa hope ya know what you’re doing.”

“I seldom know what I’m doing.”

“Here you go, Hoagy,” Pennyroyal said, somewhat breathlessly.

I took the plate from her. There was barbecue, beans, cole slaw, corn bread. “Thanks. Doesn’t look terrible.”

“I hope you like it.”

“I’m sure I will,” I said, tasting the barbeque.

“How is it?” she wondered anxiously.

“Excellent.”

“Oh, good,” she said, relieved.

“Gawd, I’m outta here,” announced Cassandra, rolling her eyes. “This is waaaay too sickening for me.”

After she’d gone I said, “She thinks you’ve fallen for me.”

Pennyroyal’s baby blue eyes searched my face. “And what do you think?”

“I think the skies are cloudy and the forecast calls for pain.”

Her forehead creased fretfully. “I still can’t believe what happened to Homewood. I saw the flames when I was leaving. Who would want to do that, Hoagy?”

“Too many people.”

“I didn’t think it would be smart for me to stick around,” she said. “What with the way the family feels about me. I mean, the last thing I need right now is to be caught in your bungalow late at night drinking champagne with no underwear on. …”

I tasted the slaw. It was interesting slaw. It had raisins in it, carrots, a hint of onion. Green, I believe … “You weren’t wearing any underwear?”

She shook her head, slowly and gravely.

“Are you wearing any now?”

She shook her head again, her eyes locked onto mine.

I drained my beer. I was thirsty all of a sudden. “You’re not making this easy for me.”

“I’m not trying to make it easy,” she purred, leaning in to me. I could feel her breath on my neck. “I’m trying to make it hard.”

“And you’re succeeding admirably.”

She laughed. A wicked, delicious laugh. Debbie Dale never laughed like that. She leaned in closer. “Will you come home with me tonight, Hoagy?” she whispered. “I want you. I really, really want you.”

“I thought we went through this last night.”

“And I thought we got past it.”

“It can’t happen, Pennyroyal.”

“But it will,” she vowed. “It has to.”

“No, it doesn’t. Maybe in a movie. But not in real life. In real life, there’s a tomorrow after the fade-out. There are consequences. Hearts get stepped on.”

She gazed up at me, a faint, mocking smile on her lips. “You really should write movies. Such a good speech. So noble and honorable and mature. Henry Fonda could have said it. There’s only one problem with it.”

“What’s that?”

“You’re full of shit.”

“And it’s high time you found out.”

“Has she called you?”

“No.”

“Has she written you?”

“No.”

“Have you heard one word from the woman since she left you?”

“She hasn’t left me.”

“How do you know?”

“I know.”

“
How
? What are you going on?”

“Faith.”

“That’s not much,” she sniffed.

“Don’t kid yourself. That’s everything.”

Cassandra came rushing up to us excitedly. “You’ll never guess who’s trying to crash the party!”

“Elvis?” I ventured hopefully.

“Trace. He’s outside the gate, bombed and howling like a wolf. He’s calling for ya, honey. He keeps saying, ‘Big Steve wants his pretty baby back.’ ”

“Damn him,” Pennyroyal cursed angrily. “Just what I need right now—another ‘Penny the Whore’ headline.”

“Maybe ya oughta go calm him down, huh?” Cassandra suggested. “The guards can’t get rid of him.”

“And humiliate myself in front of the most important people in the movie business?” Pennyroyal raged. “No way.”

“But he’s fallin’ down drunk. Might get himself arrested.”

“Good,” Penny said coldly. “I hope they haul him away and throw him in jail. I’m going inside until he’s gone. Excuse me.” With that she fled for the house. She did not look back.

Cassandra watched her, amazed. “Wow, when that girl breaks it off, she breaks it off.”

“So it would appear.”

“WHERE’S MY PRETTY PENNY?! WHERE IS SHE?!”

“Oh, gawd.”

He had fought his way inside. Two security guards were all over him, but they couldn’t bring down the old quarterback. He was red-faced and wild-eyed, arms flailing, shirt torn. “WHERE’S PENNY?! BIG STEVE IS CALLING YOU!”

It got very quiet. The celebrity party-goers watched Trace with utter disdain. Not because he was drunk or because he was making an ass of himself, but because he so obviously reeked of failure. That’s one perfume everyone in Hollywood is allergic to.

“COME TO BIG STEVE, BABY!”

“Possibly you should see about getting the man home,” I mentioned to Cassandra.

“Why me?”

“You wanted to be a big-time ghost—this is part of it.”

“COME ON, PRETTY BABY!”

“Why don’t
you
do it?”

“I only clean up after my own elephant.”

“Huh?”

“He’s
your
celebrity’s mess, Cassandra, not mine.”

“BIG STEVE NEEDS YOUR SWEET LITTLE PUSSY, PENNY!”

Reluctantly, she nodded. “Yeah, yeah, shewa.” Then she went over to try and calm him down. Guts she had plenty of.

I went inside to find Toy. She was in the living room, chatting with the John Forsyths. She nodded at me and gestured toward the hallway off the dining room. I strolled that way. Past a powder room. Past a spare bedroom, which was being used as a coatroom. A hat check girl sat in there reading the current issue of
People,
the one with Pennyroyal and Georgie on the cover, and the headline “IT’S JUST THE TWO OF US NOW.” At the end of the hall was a small, paneled study with shuttered windows. There was a French provincial cherry writing table, a couple of deep leather armchairs, a wet bar. Norb’s inner sanctum. The place where he came to be alone with his deepest, vilest thoughts. On the walls were framed pictures of him with Harmon Wright, with Anwar Sadat, Menachem Begin, with Boris Yeltsin, Lech Walesa, Michael Jackson, Bob Hope. There was even a picture of him with Matthew Wax on the set of
To the Moon
, inscribed
Thanks for all of these neat toys, pop. Love, Matthew
. I searched through his liquor stock for a single malt. Finding none, I poured myself a calvados in a Baccarat crystal glass and sat down in one of the leather armchairs.

Toy breezed in a moment later. She left the door open. You don’t close doors at Hollywood parties. People will think you’re snorting or fucking in there. “Such a lovely party, isn’t it?” she said gaily. “Abel would have adored it so. He loved the glitter, the lights, the laughter.” She took a seat behind the writing table. “I understand our friend Trace has made his usual drunken scene. And the poor dear wonders why no one will give him a job.”

“No, he doesn’t,” I said. “He knows perfectly well why no one will.”

She glanced at my drink. “Fix me one of those, would you, dear?” Then she sat back with a weary sigh and massaged her cheeks. “People have no idea how exhausting it is to smile and be charming for hours at a stretch. No idea at all.” Relaxed, she looked closer to fifty than forty, which she probably was.

I poured her a calvados. Her eyes caught and held mine when I handed it to her. There was nothing but confidence and determination in them. I couldn’t hurt her. She wanted me to know that. I sat. She took a sip and plopped her Tony Lamas down on her husband’s two-hundred-year-old writing table. “Okay, let’s have it, honey,” she said harshly.

I leaned forward. “Could you repeat that?”

“You heard me the first time.”

I tugged at my ear. “Tennessee?”

She nodded, impressed. “Murfreesboro. Been there?”

“Passed through once.”

“Don’t bother going back. I never did. Ran away when I was thirteen. Believe me, it’s nicer here.” She looked around at Norb’s den. “Much nicer.” She sat up straight and rolled up her sleeves like a shitkicker getting ready to arm-wrestle someone, which I suppose she was. Her wrists were thin but looked strong. So did her hands. Her nails were painted plum-colored. She waited.

“I was wondering how close you and Abel were.”

“We both loved to gossip,” she replied. “Something we didn’t really discover about ourselves until we became neighbors. He’d stop over for coffee the morning after a party and just dish away. He loved dirt more than anyone I’ve ever known. It made him positively giddy with laughter.”

“And before you became neighbors?”

“What about it?” she asked.

“Trace mentioned you used to provide Abel with girls for his parties. Back in your career days.”

She sipped her drink and said nothing.

“Is that so?”

“Consider your source, why don’t you?” she said.

“Meaning Trace made it up?”

Again she said nothing. Gabby she wasn’t.

“It would be a mistake for you not to talk to me.”

She crossed her arms in front of her chest. “You’re the one who’s making a mistake, honey.”

“Is that a threat, Toy?”

“Let’s just say Norbert has been known to get very upset at anyone who offends me.”

“Am I offending you?”

“You’re working on it.”

“I could come back tomorrow morning with Lieutenant Lamp, and he could do the asking. Only, it’ll go public that way.”

She raised an eyebrow. “And it won’t if it’s just you and me?”

“My interest is in Matthew Wax. Exposing you doesn’t interest me at all.”

“
Exposing
me? You make it sound like I’ve got something I want to hide.”

“Doesn’t everyone?”

She stared at me. “You’re a sleazy, horrible little man, aren’t you?”

“I’m not all that little.”

She stared at me some more. “Okay, so I set Abel up with some girls,” she said reluctantly. “So what?”

“Was Pennyroyal Brim one of them?”

“Pennyroyal Brim?!” she cried in shock. Or a pretty good imitation of it. “Where on earth would you get such a crazy idea?”

“From her. She told me the two of you worked together, briefly. She told me a nice, vivid horror story all about how Norb and you raped her.”

Her eyes froze. Something deep inside going snap-crackle-pop. I didn’t know what, or what to make of it. “Rape? Is that what she called it?”

“What do you call it?”

She raised her chin at me. “Exactly what did she tell you, honey?”

“That you got her involved with Shambazza under false pretenses. That you lured her to Norb’s house, drugged her, and did an array of unspeakable things to her. How do you remember it, Toy?”

She was silent a long time. A vein in her right temple began to throb. She massaged it. “I misjudged her, okay? I thought she wanted the work, and knew what she was getting into. It turned out she didn’t. She didn’t have what it takes, either.”

“Not like you, huh?”

“Don’t sit there judging me,” she snapped hotly.

“I could stand if you prefer.”

“It was just a mistake, that’s all. These things happen. I made sure she was well compensated for her trouble. And I left her alone after that. Crossed her off my list.” She poked at her glass with a fingernail. “She and I get alone fine now. It’s not as if the little girl hasn’t done all right for herself.”