“Solved everything yet?” Doctor Moi inquires.
“Yes.”
“There never was a problem, was there?”
“No.”
“More cocoa?”
“Yes.”
“Letter first.”
“No.”
“Detective, I believe that letter is addressed to me.”
“It’s addressed ‘To Whom It May Concern,’ and whether you get it or not is entirely up to me.”
We hang there like that for fully two hours. It really is good stuff. Finally, Moi says, “Just tell me exactly what you want from me.”
“A sign, Doctor, a word, anything that will confirm that what I’ve just read in the sky is all true. That it isn’t just chemicals screwing my head up.”
When I raise my head as a follow-up to my words, I see she is thinking profoundly. She picks up a little bell to ring for the maid, who brings a new cheroot and helps her light it, then goes back into the house without a word. Moi stands up to look at the river, which is black and shiny as an oil slick under the climbing moon. All I have of her is a three-quarter back shot with her long black hair trapped loosely in a tortoiseshell clip with silver inlay, the white silk of her cheungsam catching the moonlight thread by thread.
“The life of a pariah is not easy, Detective, even if you are lucky enough to be a rich one. He and I understood one another. We even talked about it. He told me that when he made his films-not the one good one, but the two dozen schmaltzy ones-he always kept a typical member of the public in mind. That person, for him, was a middle-aged librarian he met just once in Arkansas when he was running around the country promoting his first movie. She was a woman with a college degree whose taste remained mainstream and somewhat redneck, a product of a tribe and culture so complacent, so certain of her own goodness-because everyone in her vicinity agreed she was good-that he was able to identify her as a perfect ersatz muse. Although she didn’t know it, she was the golden one for whom he made the films. And she, in her unlimited mediocrity, is the one who made him rich.”
Moi turns to me for a moment to show the mirth on her face.
“When he first told me that I thought it was so funny-and so clever of him-I couldn’t stop laughing. He didn’t see it that way, though. He told me that this middle-aged librarian in Arkansas had come to dominate his whole life. He had thought that after his first ten million he wouldn’t give a damn about anyone in the audience anymore, but somehow it didn’t work out like that. This librarian had avatars everywhere, especially inside his head and among the matriarchs of Hollywood. He’d done a deal with the devil, you see? That’s who she was, that perfect, good, clean-living, no-nonsense, mainstream, somewhat-redneck librarian from Arkansas. For any pariah, especially an artist, she was the opposition. Poor Frank had done a deal, and the devil had kept her part of the bargain. Frank Charles was very rich. And very lost. There was no way he could get back to that other Frank Charles, the young one who was going to shock and delight the world with his originality and genius. That was all gone. Sold.”
“No way out?”
Doctor Moi nods slowly and profoundly. “He begged me, you know, over and over again. He kept begging me to help until I finally gave in.”
“Yes,” I say, “I can see that.” And so I can. Moi’s mood of sorrow penetrates me as if her aura has quite eclipsed my own. I do not analyze what she might mean by “help;” I feel it with such intensity that no analysis is necessary-or possible. I can actually see Frank Charles here on this balcony in a morose mood, begging Moi, and Moi, elegant and gracious to a fault, doing all she can to help; it’s like watching a scene from a play, with the balcony as stage, but instead of dialogue there is a visible exchange of emotion. I experience her “help” more as a kind of mood of infinite abundance than as anything with practical application. It occurs to me that the drug may be compromising my mind, but then instantly discard the idea as too ridiculous for words. I say, “Are you really telling me the truth, Doctor?” while at the same time asking myself if she has actually “said” anything. But as I speak I’m holding Vikorn’s letter over her shoulder. “Just nod, Doctor, just nod once. You’re far too stoned to lie.” She nods, but I take back the letter. “Just tell me one real thing, Doctor. One real thing.”
She stares at me. I think she is a little annoyed that I still retain some resistance. “There is a film,” she says, as if the statement has cost her dearly. “He finished it in the end. I have a copy.”
As I hand over the letter, I say, “What will you do with it?”
She bites her lip. “Watch it a few more times, then destroy it. I have the only copy in the world. It’s not the sort of thing that could ever go on general release. Even though it’s a masterpiece. He trusted me to destroy it-but he had to have at least one viewer, do you see?”
“For this film, you were the ideal viewer?”
“Exactly. I was the devil he had to deal with for this very special work. I was his authentic muse. You could say he made it just for me. The first time I watched it, I couldn’t believe that any man could portray life so accurately.” She turns back to speak to the moon. “He escaped, you see? In his way, he finally escaped. You may not believe me, but that was the real reason I helped him. If I’d wanted his money, I could have married him, couldn’t I?” She lets a long beat pass. “It was a kind of love we had. Not sexual, much better than that. Artistic, you might say.”
“Doctor, please, may I see the film?”
“No. Never. I promised him. I don’t break promises to the dead.”
I make as if I’m about to leave when I ask, “Khun Doctor, why did you give Frank Charles my name?” The question has startled her, and now she is blinking rapidly. “Of course, I am not certain it was you, but there really is no one else I can think of who might have supplied him with my name and address. No one at all.” Now she is looking at me as if I am slightly crazy. “My name, private telephone number, and home address were found in the Microsoft address book on his computer.”
She turns her head to one side with a frown, then smiles. “Ah! Detective, you are a little too smart for your own good. I remember now. No, it was not me who brought your name to his attention, it was you. You used to be a film buff, no? I think a long time ago you wrote a review of the only film he was proud of-his first one. What was the name? Black Wednesday, no? I think you accused him of plagiarism.”
“I did?”
“Ages ago. You must have hardly been out of the academy.”
It’s coming back to me. It is years since I made a point of remembering the names of directors, or the plots of old movies. I sort of remember an American noir entry at a film festival. It’s very vague, though. If I remember correctly, it was well put together but disappointing in that it seemed to imitate other films. Not very original. Did I really say “plagiarism”? I was one of those passionate young men who mistook the movies for a form of religion.
Moi nods. “When we were on cocaine together one evening he told me about it. He was sort of laughing at his own chagrin, that a third-world Eurasian cop would have the effrontery, et cetera-all quite ironic. Don’t ask me where he got your details from, I’m sure it was nothing sinister. More likely he intended to ask you out for a drink one day and never got around to it. He was very civilized, you know, an urbane bon viveur when his chemicals were properly balanced. If only puppy love hadn’t screwed him up.”
I take my leave, but instead of asking her to call a cab, I decide to go back by river the way I came. She calls a ferryman to take me across. When I’m home and preparing for bed, I remember her threat, that the drug would haunt me the next day with its memory of a lost nirvana. When I wake up in the morning, I experience no symptoms at all. As a matter of fact, I feel terrific. It occurs to me she was lying. Not only about the drug, but also about everything else she said last night. Did Frank Charles really make that film? Does she really have a copy?