“Does it exist?”
“Couldn’t find it. Found me a registry of production companies, and there wasn’t a Sara Something or a Sara Anything in the whole list.”
“Sara,” I said. “Sara something.” I thought about it for a moment. “What about Zarathustra?”
“Say what?”
“Zarathustra, with a Z, not an S. It’s a Nietzsche thing, and our boy had a thing for Nietzsche.”
“Wasn’t he the bald guy what played for the Packers?”
“Sure he was. Check it out. Zarathustra Productions.”
And that was it, exactly. With an office in North Hollywood. There wasn’t much about it on the Web, just a few contact numbers, but one of them was for a Reginald Winters. Reggie from the West Coast. I laughed when I saw it. What a perfect name for an upwardly striving Jewish kid from Tacony to adopt, as if he played tennis in his whites growing up, summered on Mount Desert Island, had cousins at Andover. Reginald Winters. The more I rolled it over my tongue, the more I was certain it was a phony. It’s the kind of name that would be picked by a kid who had read one too many Archies and decided he was more a Veronica than a Betty kind of guy. Reginald Winters. How fake could you get? Except it wasn’t.
“I found out what I could about him,” said Skink after a few minutes checking out his databases. “Born in Ohio, graduate of Northwestern, started off as a reader for Paramount before latching onto his current position.”
“How old is he?”
“Mid-twenties.”
Ouch. Not the right guy, not the right guy at all. So much for my phony-name theory. “What’s his job?”
“Vice president.”
“Vice president of what?”
“Acquisitions, apparently.”
“Oh, I bet. Just the job for a kid in his twenties. The new Irving Thalberg. He’s an errand boy. That’s why he was dealing with Darryl the Realtor. Who does he work for?”
“The big boss at Zarathustra is a guy named Purcell,” said Skink. “Theodore Purcell.”
“Theodore, huh?”
“It’s his place. Apparently he’s been in the business for decades.”
“How’s the company doing?”
“Used to be big. Remember Tony in Love, huge hit back in the early eighties?”
“That sentimental piece of garbage about two doomed lovers where everyone ends up in tears?”
“It made me cry, too, mate. I’m not ashamed to admit it. That was Theodore Purcell. And Piscataway with Gene Hackman, the one with the car chase. And then The Dancing Shoes.”
“The Dancing Shoes?”
“Apparently things have gone a bit downhill since.”
“Not a surprise with those turkeys. What’s his background?”
“Can’t tell. All I get are filmographies, and they all start with him buying the book and then producing Tony in Love.”
“How’d he get the dough to buy the book?”
“Don’t know.”
“I bet I do. And he was even too cocky to change his first name. Do you have an address?”
“I’ve been looking. Nothing. He doesn’t want to be found.”
“How about on Stanford Quick’s phone? Any numbers match up with Purcell?”
“Nothing directly. But there does happen to be a number what came in to his phone a few times and what is seriously unlisted. Can’t get a thing on it. And when I calls it, the voice what answers won’t give me any info. Just wants to know who the hell I am and tells me not to call again. Quite rude, actually. Chinese guy, by the sound of it.”
“Give it another call. Tell the guy who answers that you have a package for Mr. Purcell. A gift basket from Universal, but you’re having a hard time finding the house. Try to get specific instructions on how to get there. Maybe he’ll give up the street and the number.”
“You think he’ll fall for it?”
“One thing I know about Hollywood, they love their gift baskets.”
THE HOUSE was high in the Santa Monica Mountains, overlooking the ritzy compound of Malibu. The ride was winding and steep, switching back here and there as we rose ever higher alongside the ravine, brown desert spotted with green. I stopped by the squawk box in front of the rusted gate. Beneath the intercom was a mailbox without a name or a number, and atop the gate, off to the right, sat a camera, pointed directly at our car. I leaned over to press the squawk-box button.
Nothing.
I pressed it again and then again.
Still nothing.
“Are you sure this is it?” said Monica. “Maybe we passed it already.”
“This is it,” I said, and pressed it again.
“What you pressing so much for?” came a voice from the box, the voice tinny and from the East, not the Northeast but the Far East. Not quite Chinese, but something. “We not deaf. We hear you. Now, what you want?”
“We’re here for Mr. Purcell,” I said.
“You have appointment?”
“No, sir.”
“Then what you pressing button for? Go away. Mr. Purcell not here for you.”
“I think he’s expecting me.”
“No he’s not. Mr. Purcell resting. Mr. Purcell ill. Mr. Purcell in New York. Mr. Purcell not here for you. What you got, script? We don’t take script unless we ask for script, and we never ask for script. Put in box, and we won’t get back to you. Go away now. Mr. Purcell has headache and cannot be disturbed.”
“You must have a law degree.”
“Why you want to insult me, when I just do my job?”
“Tell Mr. Purcell that Victor Carl is here to see him.”
“Victor Carl?”
“That’s right.”
“You Victor Carl?”
“That I am.”
“Ah, Mr. Carl. About time.”
“Excuse me?”
“We been expecting you for days. Hurry, hurry. Mr. Purcell waiting for you.”
“I bet he is,” I said as the gate swung slowly open.
When it had opened wide enough to pass through, I drove slowly forward. The drive headed up and then around, through a rising, overgrown landscape of thick flowers and shade tress and weed-strewn patches of sun-dappled lawn.
“I guess he’s going the charm route,” I said as we made our way up the drive.
“I think I’ll be immune to Mr. Purcell’s charms,” said Monica.
“Don’t be so sure. He’ll lay it on thick. But however charming he might be, don’t ever forget.”
“Forget what?”
“That he’s a liar. If the secret to success in Hollywood is to never say an honest word, then he’s found his perfect place. He’ll be convincing, his sincerity will flow free and threaten to drown us in its earnestness, he’ll peer into our eyes with the most unaffected gaze, and every instinct will tell us to trust him. We’ll end up liking him and we’ll want to believe every word he says. That’s how good a liar he’ll be. But don’t ever forget that he’s a liar, pure and simple, born to it, like the snake is born to crawl and the tiger is born to kill.”
“So why are we here in the first place, Victor, if all we’ll get is lies?”
“Because a great liar doesn’t make up his lies out of thin air. In every effective lie will be a kernel of truth, and that’s what we’re looking for. The kernel of truth about what that bastard did to your sister.”
52
The man from the squawk box was waiting for us at the front entrance of the house. He was short and thin, with a shock of very black, very false hair perched uneasily atop his wrinkled skull. He wore sandals and a scowl, white pants, a loose flowered shirt. He had to be at least ninety, maybe more. The oldest Filipino houseboy in the world.
“You Victor Carl?” said the man, clearly not impressed with what he was seeing.
“That’s me.”
“And your lady friend?”
“A friend.”
“I think Mr. Purcell happier to see lady friend than you. I know I am. Leave car in front and come with me.”