The Famous and the Dead

21



The following night, in the stately, chandeliered lobby of the Biltmore Hotel in Los Angeles, Mike greeted Bradley with a strong hug and a grand smile. His tuxedo was notch-lapelled and expertly fitted and somehow gave him added height. With Mike was his lovely associate Owens, inches taller than he was, in a sleek pewter-colored dress that matched her eyes. Pearls around her neck. Bradley hadn’t seen her since she came to visit Erin, shortly after helping her survive the ordeal in Yucatán four months ago. He took her hands and kissed her cheek and glanced at the scars on her wrists and furtively inhaled the scent of her though he tried not to.

“I like your new dental work,” she said.

He’d certainly needed it after Yucatán. “The new teeth complete my smile.”

“And I like your conservative haircut. Are you an old-fashioned conservative, or just one of the new ones out to wreck the country?”

“I love this country. And look at you—the same old beauty you always were.”

“Why, thank you. I hope you don’t find it tiresome.”

“Boys and girls?” Mike handed Owens a small silver flask and she smiled, then sipped.

Bradley took it and swirled and smelled it. Cream? Cucumbers? Mint? It was perhaps nonalcoholic and very cold, in spite of being inside Mike’s breast pocket. Bradley thought of the absinthe bar he’d had at his and Erin’s wedding down in Valley Center. What a night. And another day and another night and morning until the last celebrants were gone. Tents in the hills and all the guest casitas full and someone getting the fighting bulls drunk and letting them out of the corral. They’d made Bacchus proud. “What is this stuff?”

“Let’s head down to the basement ballroom,” said Mike, swiping back the flask. “We can hit the bar for an ordinary drink and work the crowd.”

Owens fell arm-in-arm between the men. They swept down the broad stairway toward the downstairs ballrooms, and with each step Bradley felt lighter and more confident and even more clear in the head. What was that stuff? He felt like stripping to his briefs and diving off a ten-meter board. Just before hitting the water he’d arch his back and spread his arms and fly down to Buenavista, knock out Hood with a left uppercut and zoom back here with Erin on his back. For some reason a conversation he’d had with his mother came back to him now, word for word, their voices exactly as they’d sounded when he was five, like someone was playing a tape of it in his head.

“Exactly what crowd will be here?” asked Bradley. “The marquee in the lobby had New England Dental Association, Model Train International, and Western States Fabrication and Manufacture.”

“The last,” said Mike.

“People in your bathroom-products business?”

“Well, in all fields of fabrication and manufacture, Bradley.” Downstairs Mike flagged a waiter and a moment later their three drinks arrived. Bradley got a Bombay martini up with a twist and told himself to go easy on the booze tonight. Mike had gotten him a room but his plan was to leave early and make Buenavista by midnight. He had a full tank in the Cayenne, a “maybe” from Erin, and a nine-o’clock phone call scheduled. He had no doubt that she would want to see him.

The ballroom was crowded and an orchestra played. There were tables set up for dinner but not many people yet seated. Some were dancing. To Bradley there seemed to be no dress code at all. On the men he saw tuxedos, dinner jackets like his own, suits and sport coats and slacks, open-collared shirts without ties, polo and rugby shirts, work shirts with names stitched on the chests, guys in aloha shirts and shorts and flip-flops. The women had a generally higher level of presentation—mostly dresses and suits—but he did see two women dressed in 1890s prairie calico and heavy boots; and three others in buckskins and moccasins festooned with beads and feathers; and two more wearing sheer bathing suit cover-ups over bikinis, and heeled sandals with rhinestones across the toes. He guessed the age range to be twenties to early sixties. No children. Mostly whites, Native Americans, Latinos and blacks, and a few Asians. There was a giant with razor-cut hair and enormous hands, dressed in a tuxedo, and two dwarves in tails. The room was loud enough with conversation to compete with the music. Entire groups burst into laughter. The laughter struck Bradley as knowing and ironic. Everyone seemed to know everyone and there were no name tags.

Bradley sipped the martini, lightly. He noted that nearly all of the guests were drinking highballs or apparently straight liquor and the waiters and walk-up bar were quite busy. Empty glasses were already stacking up on the bar top and bus trays. He also saw that many of attendees were drinking from silver flasks like Mike’s, often offering the flask around to others, as Europeans offer cigarettes.

The three of them went from group to group, where Mike and Owens unfailingly drew warm hugs and hearty backslaps and words of good cheer. Fantastic work down there in San Diego, Mike—wonderful! Mike introduced him as Bradley Murrieta, the new partner in MFB—Mike Finnegan Bath—a man he hoped would help to “resuscitate MFB’s wheezing bottom line.” The conferees were polite but seemed slightly skeptical of Bradley, which was fine with him. Owens positioned herself at his side, and occasionally held his arm in such a way that drew looks.

Mike and Owens danced a waltz, then she and Bradley drew a brassy foxtrot and, when it was over, light applause for a dance well done. Bradley was struck again by her lustrous beauty and easy humor. Even now in the late days of winter her skin was tanned brown and smooth, and her black hair was wavy and shiny as obsidian. Silver gray eyes.

Bradley knew that Erin had spent many hours with Owens in Benjamin Armenta’s castle in the Yucatán lowlands, where Erin was held for ransom for ten days. Owens was Armenta’s mistress and Erin had distrusted her at first. But Owens had helped Erin preserve her sanity, and protected her and her baby from men far more wicked than Armenta. From that remote jungle fortress without computers or telephones, Owens had shown Erin how to communicate with her husband, at no small risk to herself. Owens had even helped Erin attempt an escape. Now as Bradley danced with her he was aware not only of her beauty but of her strange history—illegitimate daughter of a powerful Catholic monsignor; attempted suicide; devotee of Mike Finnegan; consort of cartel kingpin Benjamin Armenta; actress, cipher, and siren. What else was she, and what had she done and what did she want? Bradley understood that she was far more versed in life’s shadows than he was, and therefore somehow his superior.

They dined at one of the eight-tops with a two-man extrusion-mold-making company based in Grass Valley, a patent lawyer from Fresno, and two tool-and-die honchos from the Bay Area. The conversation was arcane to Bradley, all about people he’d never met and events outside his experience. It was plain that they were all part of a huge, complex industry about which he was uninformed:

And I told Delmonico himself, right then and there, that we could help this man and why wasn’t that enough? Isn’t that what we’re about? My prospect was a good-enough prospect—maybe not a brilliant man, but—oh, Bradley, can you pass the Thousand Island?

And:

We’ve got to quit apologizing, everyone. We need to be more confrontational. People crave it in this short, violent century. It’s simple as that. Transparency and honesty. They need to know the facts so they can decide.

Or: I’ve never seen such a tender being turn into such a producer. You should have seen the swath she cut through those happy Presbyterians! It just made me realize again how talent can hide in a person and how our job is to bring it out.

Bradley followed as best he could, wondering what a customer’s history or this short, violent century or cutting a swath through Presbyterians had to do with fabrication and manufacture. He thought of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department social events and how it was all cop talk. How much of that would these guys understand? They probably had no idea what a 187 was. He wondered what Erin was doing. He pictured her sitting in that shadowy, low-ceilinged adobe living room of Charlie Hood’s, could see the play of the lamplight off her fine face, and the round outline of their future alive inside her.

By the time dinner was over, Bradley felt tipsy with half the martini and one glass of red wine down, plus whatever Mike had given him from the flask. But he still felt solid, too. They made the rounds from table to table. The conversations became harder to decipher. The miasmal soul I told Delmonico I had secured? At the last second of the final minute of the eleventh hour? Betrayed. Betrayed! Bradley noted that practically every attendee was drinking far more than he was. He watched them carrying two empty glasses at a time to the bar, and two full ones away. The bus trays were overloaded and drinkers were setting their empties on the floor beneath the stands or on the stage or neatly along the baseboards of the walls. The waiters had given up stately attendance for old-fashioned hustle. Bottles were appearing at the tables, buckets of ice and stacks of clean tumblers. The giant delivered a case of something to his table, balancing it high over his head on his fingertips. Yet none of the conferees appeared in the least intoxicated to Bradley. Slightly more animated, but only slightly.

“We can certainly hold our liquor,” said Mike, taking Bradley by the arm and heading to an empty table. Owens led a tall man to the dance floor and looked over her shoulder at Bradley with an oddly apologetic expression. The men took off their jackets and put them over empty chairs and sat with their backs to the wall. The giant swung by with a bottle of Scotch that Bradley recognized as rare and expensive and placed it in front of Mike with three glasses. His face was huge and bony but pleasant enough. He gave Mike a smile, then strode away.

“Bradley,” said Mike, opening the bottle. “I’m worried for you.”

“Don’t be—things are good. The Blands are gone and Dez is pushing Warren into retirement. Hood’s on the run and it’s only going to get worse for him. Carlos has a new business plan for me, according to Rocky, but Rocky can’t tell me what it is. And Erin? Well, I think she’s coming around. I think I’m starting to add up to something in her eyes again. It’s all coming together, Mike.”

Mike poured them each a shot, held his glass up to the chandelier and twirled it. He looked pensive. “It’s Erin. She is your love and your reason for living. What worries me is this—what if something happens to her?”

Bradley sipped the Scotch. “Nothing’s going to happen to her.”

Mike raised his eyebrows and looked away. “What if? Accidents? Disease? Enemies?”

“That’s why I’m trying to get Erin back to Valley Center, like ASAP. I can protect her and the baby there. It’s secure now. Nothing like that kidnapping will ever happen again. Me, her, and Thomas. The family unit. That’s how it’s going to be. I can feel it, Mike. She’s going to come back to me. Soon.”

“What if she doesn’t? What if you don’t know her heart as well as you think you do? You’ve been quite surprised by her thus far, correct? By her independence and anger and strength in resisting you? What if she moves further away from you with the birth of Thomas? What if all of her heart goes to him? This is commonplace in many women.”

Bradley drank again and studied Mike’s face. Mike looked concerned but crafty. Bradley surveyed the crowd and saw the same basic expression on every face in the room. Mike’s worries about Erin and him were ridiculous, he thought. “Are these people all like you?”

“You could say that.”

“Are a lot of them partners?”

“Very few. I applied for permission to bring you and it was granted. We keep the partners segregated until we or someone upstairs finds a synergy. Then introductions follow. Hitler and Himmler are a good example. But most of our work is far more subtle—thousands of couplings over the centuries.”

“Upstairs?”

“Well, we here are only the foot soldiers. Journeymen. Both sides of this competition are dictatorships, basically—the only organization model that can really work on this scale. The King on one side, and the Prince on the other. Beneath them are clearly defined hierarchies. Of course the nature of devils is to rock the boat. So you can imagine the delinquency, trespassing, obstruction, and insubordination that go on between us mid-levels. Endless, really. It can get competitive. That’s what almost everyone in the room is talking about by now—their work. It’s shoptalk. These biannual rallies are our watercooler, our place to gossip and catch up and brag and berate.”

“How do you drink so much booze and not show it?”

“We metabolize differently, which is necessary for very long life. Alcohol is only about one-tenth as strong as it is for you.”

“What’s in the flasks? Everybody’s got one.”

“What’s in the flasks is a closely guarded secret. I can tell you it’s all organic and is nonalcoholic. It’s actually a mild antidote for alcohol, kind of an energy drink. It promotes clarity, confidence, energy, and even a small amount of generosity. It brings forth memories in startling detail. So, the more alcohol, the more antidote. It’s a big standoff is what it is. We crave abandon but utterly detest being out of control. Just like people. Some of us practically live on the stuff.”

“How does that potion stay cold up against your body like that for hours?”

“Cucumbers. And that’s all I’m going to say about that.”

Bradley wanted a good shot of the secret potion. Mike nodded and handed him the flask, and he drank the cool, sweet liquid. He remembered Mike’s words during their visit to Beatrice in the mine: A journeyman devil can hear human thoughts from thirty feet away, so long as those thoughts are clear and emphatic. “You don’t doubt me as you used to.”

“No,” said Bradley. He took another little sip and handed back the flask.

“That’s good. We can’t build except on trust.”

Bradley felt a thorough sense of well-being easing through him, something whole and undefeatable. “I believe in you, Mike.”

“I still hear small doubts.”

“I could lie to you but what good would it do?”

“None. I truly hope that you and Erin can patch things up. I worry, yes. And I certainly do wonder if you and Erin will be able to see eye to eye on the raising of Thomas. You are very different people. In many ways you have opposing beliefs and values. This is my number one concern.”

“We’ll raise Thomas as we see fit. End of that story.”

“Oh? And when you and Erin disagree?”

“It’s called compromise.”

“I’m tickled by your idealism, Bradley. Your mother had it, a big fat streak running right down her middle. Of course she hid it well but it gave her purpose. It allowed her to steal from the rich and give to the poor, and to herself. Joaquin? The same. Ideals pave the way for so many actions, both noble and atrocious.”

“We’ll work out what is best for Thomas.”

“I wonder if you will tell him who he is, someday? Tell him of Joaquin and his generations through Suzanne and through you?”

Bradley held Mike’s gaze. “I don’t know. It tormented Mom, what to tell me.”

“She came close many times. At night, when you children were asleep, she would go out to the barn in Valley Center and confer with the head in the jar. And read through Joaquin’s brief letters. And write in her own growing journal. This was her secret life, but it wasn’t a fantasy life, it was genuine. As Suzanne Jones—woman, mother, schoolteacher—she was only half. The other half is the woman that you came to know. So, will you tell Thomas who she was? Who you are? Who he is?”

“I’ll know what to do when the time comes.”

“I wonder what Erin would say about it. Certainly, she would leave you instantly and forever if she knew what you have kept from her. The head, the history, the fortunes you have plundered every bit as nimbly as Joaquin ever did. I’m impressed that you’ve kept her in the dark for as long as you have. But . . . I can’t see her tolerating your most unusual truths. Certainly she would not reveal them to her firstborn son. Erin would take Thomas and move to the Borneo jungle before doing that.”

“I’m sorry you think so little of her. She’s all I’ve ever wanted.”

“Don’t lie to yourself or me. What about the loot you so enjoy taking? The loot that compounds monthly in your safes under the barn? You want your treasures very badly, too. And you crave the excitement of snatching them. It’s in your blood.”

“We’ll work it out.”

“I have something to tell you. I want you to listen until I’m finished, and remain outwardly calm. I want no answer at this time. I only want you to hear. Can you do this?” Bradley sipped the Scotch and waited. Mike placed his hand on Bradley’s shoulder. “Bradley, you will soon realize that you need a companion on your journey with Thomas. I want you to consider Owens. She is markedly fond of you. She is everything she appears to be—a beautiful, bright woman. Look at the way she dances. Look. I know her inside and out. She is not my daughter but my partner, as you may have concluded. I have never had a more loyal, agreeable, satisfying, and satisfied partner in all of my long life. She could bring all of these qualities to you. In order to do so she would need to break away from me completely and absolutely—Owens can only give herself to one purpose at a time. She is simply that way. It is her character, and one I cherish. But I would willingly transfer her to you. Owens and I have discussed this. She would make an exemplary wife, and mother for Thomas. She has depths that you do not have, and she would open them to you and to your son. She wants children of her own, with the right man, of course. In the long run, Bradley—and the long run is foremost on the minds of every being in this room—I want what is best for you and Thomas. I love Erin dearly as a sister and a friend but she is not an ally to me, except as she is an ally to you. If she is your enemy, she becomes my enemy and she will be engaged as such. If her heart remains hard against you, and if Thomas becomes the sole focus of her life, then you will become diminished by the rage and impotence of unanswered love, and Thomas will grow up to become a hesitant, coddled, insignificant man. You must consider the necessity of taking Thomas away from Erin and allowing Owens help you raise him.”

“If you lay a hand on either of them, I’ll kill you.”

Mike gave Bradley’s shoulder a powerful squeeze, then lifted his Scotch. “This is what I mean about rage and impotence, Bradley. This is why I ask you to consider this spectacular and devoted woman. I don’t expect a decision from you now. Enjoy the birth of Thomas. Revel in young fatherhood. But there will come a day when my words and this offer will sound like music in your ears. That day may come soon or it may come later. So, don’t forget, Bradley, that just as I sit here now with you, I will someday sit with Thomas, discussing our mutual projects and the bounties of life, long after your bones are in the earth.” Mike released Bradley’s shoulder and both men stood as Owens came from the dance floor toward them. Her dress caught the chandelier light in shifting facets and her body, perfect and trapped, rippled beneath them. “Behold. See. If I were a man . . .”

Bradley hooked his tuxedo coat off the chair and held the chair out for Owens. He slid it forward as her weight settled. “Pardon me.”

“You will change your mind over time, Bradley,” said Mike. “You most certainly will.”

“Go to hell, Mike.”

“I think I missed something,” said Owens.

Bradley walked around the dance floor and through the tables, headed for the stairs. The orchestra started up “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes.” The dwarves sat on opposite sides of an empty table, leaning forward and arguing loudly, an ocean of empty glasses between them. An old woman wearing a prim and very faded Victorian dress, one of the few old people in the room, caught Bradley by his shirtsleeve and thrust a silver flask at him. He swallowed some and gave it back her. She didn’t let go of his arm. “I’m Eva. And Mike told me that you met Beatrice.”

“Yes, I did.”

“What did you think of her?”

“I kind of felt bad for her.”

“Well, don’t forget what she is. She’ll be out in a few short years. There’s always been lots of back and forth between us and the dullards we’re trying to keep from ruining humankind. Mike is so swashbuckling sometimes, and darling, too, of course. I’ve never seen him happier than he is now. It’s all your fault! I’m very happy to have you with us.”

“Nice to be on the team.”

“Your timing is pitch-perfect, and the West has always been the most interesting territory, bar none. And this economy is making people question everything they think they know. They’re so angry and afraid and sometimes desperate. You wake up in the morning and can’t help but smell the fear. It’s the most delightful peacetime work environment I’ve experienced since the Great Depression.” She reached up and pinched Bradley’s cheek.

He stood outside where guests arrived and the valets dashed into the dark with tickets in their hands. He dialed Erin and while the phone rang he rocked up and down on the balls of his feet, feeling the strong flex of his calves, and recalled in detail, though for no apparent reason, flying a kite with his brother when he was five, a big blue Chinese dragon with a six-foot wingspan and a long tail and big white teeth. They were at Huntington Beach on the twenty-second of August, 1991, the water was sixty-eight degrees, and the swell was out of the southwest. Now Bradley could clearly see that kite wobbling back and forth in the stiff onshore breeze, zigzagging higher and higher into the blue sky, slashing away with its great white teeth, and he could feel the pull of the plastic handle, and the warmth of the sun on his back, and the grit of the sand trapped between his skinny boy hips and his low-slung canvas trunks.

“Hi, baby.”

“Brad. I was sleeping. How’s the convention?”

“It’s over and I’m on my way.”

“No. I’m sorry. I’m tired and I want to sleep, just me and Thomas tonight.”

Bradley said nothing for a long beat. He felt the optimism draining out of him like milk from a ruptured carton. “I’m very disappointed.”

“Tired is tired. I wrote a song today. Maybe tomorrow we can see each other.”

“When? What time?”

“Please let me sleep on it.”

“But for tonight I could just curl up on the couch like I have been. Or on the floor in your room. Whichever you want. I wouldn’t even wake you up.”

“That’s a really nice offer. But no. Not tonight, Bradley. Thomas is quiet now.”

“That’s really good, honey.”

“I don’t like your tone of voice.”

“I love you.”

“I know you’re furious at me. You can’t hide it. I’m sorry it’s like this, Bradley. I don’t know how else to get through.”

“Let me be with you.”

“Not tonight.”

“I love you with all my furious heart.”

She clicked off. Bradley stood for a moment in the cold February night, then gave his ticket to the cashier and paid the parking charge. He headed west to Sunset and the Whisky, where he had first seen Erin McKenna six years ago. She had been onstage with her first band, the Cheater Slicks, and he’d fallen for her before the first song of their first set was over. He was sixteen but looked nineteen, had a good fake ID and a solid vodka buzz. Two nights later he finally caught her eye and he had not let go. Now, heading for the front door of the Whisky, Bradley remembered their first conversation perfectly:

When you look at me it’s like walking into a beautiful room. I’m Brad Jones.

That’s a pretty thing to say.

I’m short on words right now.

I’m Erin McKenna.

After the last set tonight, we need to talk.

Oh, we need to, Brad Jones?

Yes.

What are you going to talk with if you’re short on words?

I’ll find something.

In honor of that memory Bradley had a vodka rocks, listened to the band, thought about Erin. Six years with her. He knew that thousands of men had seen her perform here in L.A., and half of them had fallen for her just as he had. But he had had the luck. He was the one who got her. She had given herself to him, along with her trust and love. She would soon give a child to him.

Mike’s cool cucumber potion continued to stoke his memories, bringing them back in splendid detail. But his memories of Erin were not a comfort now; rather they were bitter torments of regret and frustration and of all that he had lost in her. Lost. Every beautiful remembered image cut him; every fond recalled word rang with impermanence. He drank two more vodkas hoping that his anger would soften but they only made it worse. He called her but she didn’t answer. He headed out of town on the 101, then cut east on Interstate 10, which took him to Monterey Park, where the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department was headquartered. He pulled into the parking lot of a Circle K he knew.

Looking back and forth between the storefront and the rearview mirror he tied a black bandana loosely around his neck. Then he set the lucky Santana Panama on his head and dropped the heavy .40 caliber derringer his mother had given him into the breast pocket of his tuxedo coat. He got them ready as he walked across the lot. He came out with a plastic bag stuffed with cash and a tall can of sweetened tea for the road and a promise from the facedown clerk not to get up off the floor for exactly five minutes. He had apologized to the terrified clerk and removed his wallet, added five twenties to the eleven lonely dollars inside, and worked it back into the man’s pocket.