Belinda Book 2 the last part

I don't think I looked up from my work until a good two hours had passed. The

pool was empty, had been for some time. But Alex was walking towards me

across the redbrick terrace, and smile or no smile, I could tell he had

something on his mind.

"Hate to break in on you, Jeremy," he said, "but it's time for a little

conference with your little girl."

When I came into the living room with him, I knew by the look on Belinda's

face that something bad was happening. She sat there in her white tennis

skirt and cotton pullover with her hands on her naked knees, not looking at

anyone. Her hair was in braids, the way I especially loved it, but it left

her face defenseless. She looked like someone had hit her one fine blow

between the eyes. She resembled Bonnie when she had that expression, shocked

and unable to react. G.G. was sitting beside her. He was holding her hand.

"Ash Levine and Marty are on their way over here," Alex said. "Marty has a

deal for Belinda... you know, how to make everything OK for Bonnie and him

now. You know."

Did I? I think I was a little too stunned to respond. It wasn't merely what

Alex had just told me, it was the way he seemed to take it himself. Had

everybody known this was going to happen? I had not.

I turned and looked at Belinda. G.G. looked easily as unhappy as she was, but

then he said: "Belinda, just see him. See what's he got to say. Do that for

yourself." I understood what G.G. meant.

Ash Levine and Marty arrived fifteen minutes later. Belinda wanted me to

remain in the room. But G.G. and Alex disappeared.

This was the first time Marty and I had laid eyes on each other, and I think

I was unprepared for the unbroken assurance with which he grabbed my hand and

smiled.

"Nice to see you, Jeremy." Was it? He was like a man running for public

office rather than a man fighting for his job. The silver gray suit, the gold

jewelry, it was all there, along with the jet black hair and the eyes that

locked onto you with the feverish look of an addict. You could feel this guy

all right when he was still two feet away.

"Hi ya, sweetheart!" he said to Belinda with the same "spontaneous"

affection. "So good to see you, honey!" Then he sat beside her, his arm on

the couch behind her. But I noticed he did not touch her.

Ash Levine-dark tan, navy blue suit, prematurely gray hair, reed-thin body-

had settled in the leather chair by Alex's desk, and he was the one, white

teeth flashing, who began to talk.

"Now, Jeremy, the important thing here is for everybody to come out of this

smelling like a rose. That's what we're all here for, right? You know how

much we admire Alex. We really like Alex. I mean Alex is Hollywood, they

don't make stars like Alex anymore, right? But thanks to 'Champagne Flight'

he is in the midst of a pretty damned exciting comeback and I think Alex

would be the first to admit that what's good for 'Champagne Flight' has been

pretty damn good for us all, right-?"

On and on he went as I looked at Belinda and Belinda slowly lifted her eyes

and looked at me. A touch of a smile at the end of her lips for only an

instant. Then it was lost. But not on Marty, I didn't think. Marty was

watching both of us, eyes darting back and forth.

"-a couple of episodes of 'Champagne Flight' featuring Alex and Belinda," Ash

Levine was saying, "I mean, the publicity would be fabulous for Alex after

all that's happened, and for Belinda! It would be terrific for Belinda. I

mean, they've heard about Belinda, and they've seen pictures of Belinda, and

then, hey, they'd see Belinda-and not in some grainy foreign film, some

glitzy mink advertisement, hey, prime time, it's Belinda. And the focus is on

her. We're talking number-one show in the country and, when we go back on the

air, hey, we'll break all the records, I mean, the fan mail has been

fabulous, simply fabulous, I mean, the fans are outraged that 'Champagne

Flight' was preempted, the fans simply don't understand. I mean, if the

network won't play ball, hey, we're getting offers from cable, the

independents, we can sit down and create our own network for this thing just

with the independents, hey, Alex and Belinda in the same episode, give them

back the man they miss and Belinda? I mean we're talking not just number one,

we're talking special event!"

Belinda's face was changing. She wasn't smiling, no, but her eyes had the old

steadiness. She looked at Ash. She looked at him for a long time, and then

slowly her eyes shifted back to me. That curl of a smile again. Bitter?

Frankly amused? Was she ready to let out a high-pitched scream?

"Hey, Ash!" Marty said, gesturing for silence. "Hey, no need to address these

remarks to Jeremy, hey, Belinda's a smart girl, aren't you, sweetheart?

Belinda knows what we're talking about." His voice had changed suddenly with

the last phrase. He turned to Belinda. Silence. Silence with Ash sitting

there with his fingers laced together on his knee. And me saying nothing as I

watched all of them.

"Honey," Marty said, "do this for Bonnie. That's what I'm asking. We can cut

the crap, honey. Do this to straighten things out."

Belinda didn't answer. But she had lost the shocked look utterly now. She was

looking through the French doors at the garden, at the distant green house

maybe. It almost seemed that she hadn't heard Marty. That she was alone in

the room.

Marty was looking at me. No expression really, just looking, the face

amazingly calm compared with the body, which had the look of an animal about

to pounce.

"Let me talk to Jeremy alone a moment, Marty," Belinda said. She got up and I

went with her into the hallway. But she didn't say anything to me. She just

looked at me, as if she expected me to talk, and so I did. I put my hands on

her shoulders.

"You remember what Ollie Boon said to you about power," I said "-all you

wrote to me in your letter about that?"

She nodded. The numbed expression had definitely melted, and her eyes were

quick though not untroubled. She waited for me to go on.

"Honey, he was right," I said. "You don't like to have power over people. And

you don't like to use it."

Again she nodded, but she did not give anything back. She was studying me,

and as always, with her hair pulled back and up into the tight braids, her

face had a simultaneous innocence and determination.

"But I think this is a time," I said, "when you can go against that

inclination again, and use the power that you have." Again no response.

"I know what you're thinking," I said. "You're thinking about G.G. and the

rumors. You're thinking about the call you made to your mom."

"And about you, Jeremy," she said. "What they tried to do to you, too."

"I know. And nobody's going to blame you, honey, whatever you decide. But

what I'm saying is, if you do this, if you just do what they want and make it

all right for them-two episodes of this 'Champagne Flight' thing-well, then,

all your life you'll know you got them off the hook and what happens to them

after this is their affair."

Her face registered the most subtle surprise. It brightened visibly. It was

like watching morning sun slowly fill a daylighted room.

"You mean you're saying do it?" she asked me. Amazement just like when we

were riding in the van out of San Francisco only a few nights ago.

"Yes, I guess I am. Bail them out. And then you really can just turn on your

heel and walk away."

She looked up at me, wonderingly, confused.

"I thought you wouldn't want me to do it," she said. "I thought you would

never forgive me, never understand."

"Look, as it stands, there's still a chance to get everybody out of this in

one piece-and then we'll all be free."

"Oh, Jeremy," she whispered. She stood on tiptoe and kissed me. "Thank God."

And for the first time since she'd come back, I thought I saw the radiance of

my Belinda. The anxiety and the darkness were almost gone.

Bonnie was waiting in the dark limousine just inside the gates. And when we

went outside, we saw that Alex was with her. He was sitting in the backseat

with the door open, talking to her, and I heard him say, "Excuse me,

darlin'," as he got out.

I stood with Ash as Belinda and Marty went towards the car, and then Marty

got in. Alex had come to join us and Alex shook Ash's hand and said how

beautiful Bonnie looked, that she was really a vision, and Ash said what a

pleasure it was to see Alex, always a pleasure, of course.

Marty was now getting out of the car. He looked at Belinda, who was standing

there waiting, her braids twisted a little as they came down to her

shoulders, her head slightly bowed. He reached out to touch Belinda's arm.

"Get in and talk to her, honey," he said.

I felt myself tense all over as Belinda got into the car. I walked down the

gravel path slowly until I could hear her voice, thin and low, but distinct

nevertheless.

"Hi, Mom."

"Hello, darlin'."

"You feeling better now, Mom?"

"Yes, darlin', thank you. I'm so glad you're all right."

"Mom, is it OK if maybe, to smooth things over, you know, that I could be in

one of the shows?"

"Sure, darlin', that would be nice, just real nice."

"You know, just a small part. They were talking about maybe me and Alex

Clementine-"

"Sure, darlin', whatever you want."

Another car, a shiny little BMW, was nosing up the drive. It came to a halt

on the other side of the open gate, and Marty made a gesture to the men

inside. Three of them got out. They were photographers, one with the old-

fashioned accordion-style camera, the other two with Nikons and Canons on

black straps around their necks.

Then Marty asked Bonnie and Belinda to step out of the limo, and Belinda came

out first and then helped Bonnie, who blinked and lowered her head as she

stepped into the bright sun.

A vision she was, truly, even her pallor was exquisite, set off by the vivid

red of her carefully tailored wool suit. Her hair was a sleek mass of black

silk curving just at the shoulders. Through the thick lenses of her glasses,

she appeared to look past us, unseeing, as she put her arm around Belinda's

waist. Belinda slipped her arm around her mother. Belinda inclined her head

towards her mother ever so slightly. And the photographers went to work.

It couldn't have taken three minutes. The yard was deadly quiet except for

the snapping and grinding of the cameras. Then the men got back into the car,

and the BMW made a sharp U-turn and drove away.

Belinda helped her mother back into the car and sat beside her again.

And I looked at Marty and realized that we were standing very close to each

other, maybe no more than three feet apart. He had his arm resting on the top

of the limo. And he was staring at me, maybe had been for some time. He was

just looking at me in a sober, detached way, his black eyes fixed, but rather

relaxed.

"Bye, Mom, it was so good to see you," Belinda said.

"Bye, darlin'."

I couldn't tell whether Marty was even listening to them.

When Belinda got out of the car, he continued to look at me, and I saw him

give the smallest little nod of his head. I didn't know what it meant. Maybe

I never would. But when he reached out to shake my hand, I tried to respond

as best I could. We looked at each other, shaking hands, and that was all.

Nothing was said.

"Thank you, sweetheart," he said to Belinda. And he pointed his finger at

her. "I promised you once I'd write a bang-up episode for you, didn't I?

Well, you wait and see."

"Don't make it too good, Marty," she whispered. "I'm on my way to Rio. I

don't want to be a TV star."

He smiled, very wide, very genuine, and then he leaned over and kissed her on

the cheek.

Then the limousine was rolling out the gates and down the canyon road through

the dappled sun and out of sight. I put my arm around Belinda, felt her lean

against me gently, felt her head against my cheek. Belinda was watching the

darkened windows, the windows we could not see through. Then she lifted her

hand as if she had seen somebody, which clearly she hadn't, and she waved.

The car was gone. Then she turned to me, and the old Belinda was suddenly

looking right at me out of her face.

"Hey, Jeremy, let's do the Rio thing," she said suddenly, "I mean, you're

coming to Rio with us, aren't you? I'm going to call Susan. I mean, this

picture is really truly on, isn't it? We're going to go!"

"You bet, baby darling," I said.

I watched her turn and all but dance up the driveway, snapping her fingers,

braids swinging.

"I mean, after, you know-what, two episodes with Mom and Marty?-then we're

off." And she vanished into the shadows of the house.

Late that afternoon came the inevitable press conference. It had to be

announced, didn't it? She had to sit in the den with G.G. beside her and give

a statement before the inevitable video cameras and lights. They were asking

as many questions about G.G.'s new salon in Beverly Hills as they were asking

about the show.

Susan had come over with Sandy Miller "to watch the circus." And Alex sat

with them out on the bricks by the pool. In pearls and summer lace Sandy sat

there with her long fingers curled around Susan's arm. A tomato, is that what

Belinda had called her? Sandy was a tomato, all right. And did she ever play

up to Alex. Susan just watched the whole thing with a patient smile.

Alex was having a wonderful time entertaining her with stories, and then

Susan kept chiding him about upsetting her "price scale" with his demands for

Of Will and Shame. He teased her back, telling her she hadn't been in this

business long enough to get him to make a deal without his agent at a

poolside table in his own backyard.

"You want to be remembered for 'Champagne Flight'? I'm offering you a movie,

Clementine, a bona fide movie like they used to make in the old days,

remember, plot, character, style, meaning, one hour and forty-five minutes

without a commercial break, you get my drift?"

I went into the living room and stood for a long time looking up at the

portrait of Faye Clementine that I had painted twenty-five years ago. It

still hung above the fireplace where I had put it myself before I left for

San Francisco on that last day. Over the years the little mistakes I'd made

in perspective had always tormented me when I saw them. But I liked the

painting. I felt good about it. I always had.

And now, as I studied it-Faye's dimpled cheek, the way her carefully modeled

hand rested on the pink fabric of her dress-I felt a gentle surge of

excitement that no one around me need know of, or try to understand. This

wasn't a great painting. It didn't have the hallucinatory vibrancy of the

Belinda works. But it had been a true beginning, one that I was only fully

understanding now that I had come full circle to stand in front of it again.

I didn't hear Alex come up behind me. Then he put his hand on my shoulder and

when I turned, he smiled.

"Go ahead," he said. "Say I told you so. You've got a right."

"You mean our old argument? Some little old talk we had about art and money

and death and life?"

"Don't leave out the word, truth, Walker. When you don't throw the word truth

into every second sentence, I get afraid."

"OK, it was about art, money, death, life, and truth. And now you're telling

me I was right."

"I just didn't know how you were so sure it was all going to turn out the way

it did."

"Sure? Me? I wasn't sure at all."

"I don't believe you," he answered. "That was Clair Clarke, your agent, on

the phone right now. She's talking to me 'cause you won't take her calls."

"Right now," I said, "I don't need her calls."

"-and you know what she wants, don't you?"

"Belinda as a client. I told Belinda. Clair can wait till Belinda decides."

"No, dear boy, though she'll want that in the bargain, too, obviously, if she

can get it. She's getting offers for your story from all over. She wants to

know if you want to sell the rights."

"To my story!"

"Yours and Belinda's-the whole kit and caboodle. She wants you to think it

over. She doesn't want somebody to rip it off because you're public figures

now. You know, the quickie TV movie. They can do that, using your names and

all. She wants to scare them off with a major package, seven-figure deal."

I laughed. In fact, I really came apart.

I had to sit down, I was laughing so hard. I wasn't laughing all that loud.

It was a different quality of laughter. It went way deep down inside me and

it was bringing the water up into my eyes. I sat there staring at Alex.

He was grinning at me, hands in the pockets of his blue-wash pants, his pink

cashmere sweater tied over his shoulders, his eyes full of mischief and pure

delight.

"Tell your wife about it, Walker," he said. "Rule of thumb in Tinseltown.

Always tell your wife before turning down a major package, seven-figure

deal."

"Of course, it's her story, too," I said, when I was finally able to catch my

breath. "Oh, you bet I'll consult her. Just wait."

"It worked out just like you predicted, gotta hand it to you. It really did.

Must have been the right dirt in the right measure after all, don't you

think?"

But then his face darkened a little. The worried look. And it was hardly for

the first time.

"Jeremy, are you really doing all right?"

"Alex, don't worry about me, seven-figure deal or no seven-figure deal, I am

just fine."

"I know you keep saying that, Jeremy, but I'm just keeping an eye out, OK?

You remember Oscar Wilde, when he'd go around with the tough young hustlers

in London, he called it 'feasting with panthers.' Remember that, hmmm? Well,

you know what this town is, Jeremy? It's 'phone calls from panthers, and

lunching with panthers, and cocktails with panthers and "catch you later,"

from panthers'-you have to watch your step."

"Alex, you're being deceived by appearances," I said. "It's not like I'm here

suddenly instead of up in San Francisco with all that Victorian trash. I

haven't swapped the kiddie books for Tinseltown, it's not like that at all.

I've come back to some fork in the road I never should have passed up the

first time around. And it hasn't got much to do with Hollywood really. It's

got more to do with time and what's directly in front of you and the way you

use it, which is why I'm perfectly all right."

"Now that sounds like the old Jeremy," he said, "I have to admit. Throw a

little truth into it for me and I'll be convinced."

He gave my shoulder a squeeze, and then he started back out to the patio,

where G.G. was sitting with the ladies by the pool. The reporters were gone

now. Belinda had come out, peeled off her jeans and shirt to reveal nothing

but that wicked little Brazilian bikini before she carefully aimed her sleek

breathtaking little body, arms first, into the pool.

Just me and Faye again. OK. I love you, Faye.

I looked up at her, and I was thinking pictures again, my kind of pictures,

full of incandescent power and gradations of darkness, burning studies of

Alex, Blair, G.G., and Belinda, yes, Belinda in some wholly new context, some

new adventure utterly transcending what had gone before.

The contour of glitz, yes, I wanted to get it, and the discovery of the

shadows that the spotlight always washed away. The color and texture of

California, all that I had to do.

But these gilded images were but a small part of what was yet to come for me.

The fact was, my world was now filled with a thousand beings of all ages,

shapes, attitudes, a thousand settings, patterns of past and present and

future unexamined and unseen before. For the first time I could do anything I

wanted.

I had passed-thanks to Belinda-out of the world of dreams into the brilliant

light of life itself.
The End

Belinda Book 2 cont..

Blair was surrounded by reporters in the lobby of the Stanford Court when I

got there. Everybody was scribbling. The old fashioned flashbulbs were really

going off.

I was blinded for a second. Then I saw G.G. getting up out of the chair

beside Blair. G.G. was all shiny in a white silk turtleneck and brown velvet

blazer, but even at six foot four he didn't outshine Blair.

Belinda had not exaggerated when she described this man. He was maybe five

feet two and had a very leathery tanned face with a big nose and huge horn-

rimmed glasses and only a crown left of gray hair. He was dressed in a

perfectly fitted suit covered all in silver sequins. Even his tie had

sequins. And the raincoat hanging off his shoulders was lined in white mink.

He was puffing on a George Burns-style cigar and socking down whiskey on the

rocks as he told everyone in a harsh, booming voice that he couldn't verify

that Belinda had had an affair with Marty, of course he couldn't, what did

they think he was, a Peeping Tom, but they damn well ought to ask why Bonnie

shot her husband and nobody called the LAPD when Belinda ran away.

I was stunned. So it had come to that-and so quickly. Oh, Belinda, I thought,

I did try to keep it clean.

"Jeremy!" Cynthia Lawrence of the Chronicle was suddenly standing in front of

me. "Did Belinda ever tell you there was something between her and Moreschi?"

"One hundred Gs!" Blair roared at me, as I tried to get around Cynthia, "for

the wedding picture of you both in Midnight Mink."

Laughter and titters from the reporters, both the old friends and the

strangers.

"Sure, if Belinda's willing," I said. "Married in Midnight Mink, why not? But

why not two hundred Gs, if it's going to be two of us instead of one."

Another volley of laughter.

"When two people marry," Blair yelled, aiming the cigar right at me, "you're

supposed to become one!"

Through the laughter the reporters were shouting out questions. "Then you do

intend to marry Belinda?"

"Is Bonnie on drugs!" Cynthia asked.

"We don't know that!" G.G. said impatiently. I could see he was finding this

as unpleasant as I found it. In fact, he looked almost angry.

"The hell we don't!" Blair said, climbing to his feet and pulling the

raincoat around him. He tapped his ashes onto the rug. "Just go down there,

have a drink in the Polo Lounge, and listen to the gossip. She's so out of it

she couldn't talk and chew a stick a gum at the same time, she'd strangle."

"Will you marry Belinda!"

"But it's just gossip!" G.G. said.

"Yes, I want to marry Belinda," I answered. "I should have asked her before."

I still couldn't see straight from the flash. More questions. I couldn't

follow.

"Let's get out of here," G.G. whispered in my ear. "Belinda wouldn't want all

this to happen. Blair's out of his mind."

"Jeremy, are you happy with the response to the paintings?"

"Jeremy, were you at the preview?"

Blair seized me by the arm. Amazingly strong little man.

"Was it a long affair between Marty and Belinda?"

"They were like glue in Hollywood," Blair said. "I told you. Ask Marty about

that."

"G.G., was it Bonnie and Marty that ruined your business?"

"Nobody ruined my business, I told you. I decided to leave New York."

"That's a fucking lie," Blair said. "They spread their rumors all over town."

"G.G., will you sue?"

"I don't sue people. Blair please-"

"Tell them what happened, damn it!" Blair roared. He had G.G. on one side and

me on the other and he was shoving us across the lobby. I almost laughed it

was so ridiculous. The reporters were following like bugs around a porch

bulb.

"The rumors about the salon started when they came looking for her," G.G.

explained with obvious difficulty. "But by the time I sold the business we

had things well in hand. I did get quite a price for the business, you know-"

"They ran you out of New York!" Blair said.

"And what were the rumors?"

"Did you know she was living with Jeremy Walker?"

"I knew they were friends and he was good to her and he was painting her

pictures. Yes, I knew."

"Jeremy," Cynthia almost tripped me. "Did Belinda ever tell you Marty had

been carrying on with her?"

"Look," I said, "the important thing is the exhibit opens tomorrow. That is

exactly what Belinda and I both want, and I hope, wherever she is, she will

hear about it. Her movie Final Score was stopped, but no one will stop me

from showing the paintings I did of her."

We had reached the elevators. G.G. pushed me inside after Blair. Then G.G.

blocked the reporters as the doors closed.

"Ah ha!" Blair roared. He stuck the cigar between his teeth and rubbed his

hands together.

"You're saying too much!" G.G. said. "You're going overboard. You really

are." Even as upset as he was, he kept his soft tone, and his face showed

worry as much as anger.

"Yeah, that's what my aunt Margaret told me when I bought out her little [bad

scan] the middle of Vogue. Don't look pale, Walker. I'm going to crucify that

Hollywood wop, that Gruesome Statistic, that Awful Fact." Reporters were

waiting when the doors opened.

"You guys get out of here," Blair said, leading us past them, "or I call the

front desk." He was puffing cigar smoke ahead of us like a little locomotive.

"Jeremy, is it true the family knew she was with you? That Bonnie came here

herself?"

What? Had I heard that right? I turned, tried to focus on the reporter. That

part of the story I'd told to no one, no one-except those closest to us, G.G.

and Alex and Susan. But they would never have told.

The reporter was a young man in a windbreaker and jeans, nondescript, steno

pad, ballpoint, portable tape recorder clipped to his belt. He was

scrutinizing me, must have seen the blood rushing to my face.

"Is it true," he asked, "that you met with Bonnie at the Hyatt Regency right

here in San Francisco?"

"Look, leave us alone, please," G.G. said politely. Blair was watching me

intently.

"That true?" Blair asked.

"Listen to this!" the reporter said, as he stood between me and the door to

the room. He was flipping through the steno pad. I noticed the little tape

recorder was running. The red light was on.

We were ringed in by inquisitive faces, but I couldn't see them. Nothing

registered.

"I have a statement right here from a limousine driver who says he drove

Bonnie and Belinda to the vicinity of your house on September 10, that, after

Belinda got out of the car, Bonnie waited three hours in front of your

Seventeenth Street house before you came out, and then he picked you up at-"

"No comment!" I said. "Blair, have you got the key to this damned door?"

"Then she knew you were living with Belinda!"

"Bonnie knew where Belinda was!"

"Why the hell no comment!" Blair shouted. "Answer his questions, tell him.

Did Bonnie know the whole time?"

"Did Bonnie know about the paintings?"

"Open the door, Blair," G.G. said. He grabbed the key out of Blair's hand and

unlocked the door.

I went inside behind Blair. G.G. shut the door. He looked as exhausted as I

felt. But Blair sprang into life immediately.

He tossed off the mink-lined raincoat, stomped his foot, and rubbed his hands

together again, the cigar between his teeth.

"Ah ha, perfect! And you didn't tell me she came here. Who's side are you on,

Rembrandt?"

"You keep this up, Blair," G.G. said, "and they'll sue you. They'll ruin you,

the way you keep telling people that they ruined me!"

"They did ruin you, what the fuck are you talking about?"

"No, they didn't!" G.G. was clearly exasperated. The blood was dancing in his

cheeks. But still he wouldn't raise his voice. "I'm here because I want to

be. New York was over for me, Blair, I left because it was over. The worse

part is, Belinda doesn't know that. She may think it's all her fault. But

they'll go after you with their big guns if you don't stop."

"So let them try. My money's in Swiss francs. They'll never get a cent of it.

I can sell furs from Luxembourg just as easy as from the Big Apple. I'm

seventy-two. I got cancer. I'm a widower. What can they do to me?"

"You know you can't live anywhere but New York," G.G. said patiently, "and

the cancer's been in remission for ten years. Slow down, Blair, for God's

sakes."

"Look, G.G., the thing's out of control," I said. "If they nailed down that

limousine driver-"

"You said it," Blair said at once. He picked up the phone, punched in a

single digit, and demanded in a loud voice that the hall outside his room be

cleared immediately.

Then he shot past me into the bathroom, looked in the shower, came back out.

"Look under the bed, you strapping nitwit?" he said to G.G.

"There is no one under the bed," G.G. said. "You're dramatizing everything as

usual."

"Am I?" Blair went down on all fours and lifted the spread. "OK, nobody!" he

said. He stood up. "Now you tell me about this meeting with Bonnie. What did

she know?"

"Blair, I don't want to fight their dirt with more dirt," I said. "I have

said everything that needs to be said."

"What a character! Didn't anybody ever tell you all great painters are

pricks? Look at Caravaggio, a real bastard! And what about Gauguin, a prick,

I tell you, a first-class prick."

"Blair, you're talking so loud, they'll hear you in the hallway," G.G. said.

"I hope so!" he screamed at the door. "OK. Forget about Bonnie for the

moment. What did you do with the letter Belinda wrote you, the whole story?"

Blair demanded.

"It's in a bank vault in New Orleans. The key is in another vault."

"And the photographs you took?" Blair asked.

"Burned all of them. My lawyer kind of insisted on that." Excruciating,

burning all those prints. And yet I had known all along the moment would

come. If the police got the photographs, the press would get them, and

everything would change with the photographs. The paintings were something

else.

Blair considered. "You're sure you vaporized every one of them."

"Yes, what didn't burn went down the garbage disposer. Not even the FBI could

get their hands on that."

G.G. gave a sad little laugh and shook his head. He'd helped me with the

burning and grinding, and he'd hated it, too.

"Oh, don't be too cocky, sonny boy!" Blair shouted at him. "Didn't anybody

ever tell you transporting a minor over the state lines for illegal purposes

is a federal crime?"

"You are a madman, Blair," G.G. said calmly.

"No, I'm not. Listen, Rembrandt, I'm on your side. But you were wise to torch

that stuff. Ever hear of Bonnie's brother, Daryl? He'll be on your tail in no

time. And United Theatricals is already getting calls from the Moral

Majority-"

"You know that for sure?" I asked.

"Marty himself told me!" he answered. "In between gypsy curses and gangster

threats. All through the Bible Belt they're calling the affiliate stations.

What's this bullshit, they're asking, about Bonnie letting her daughter run

away from home? You go home and make sure there's nothing to connect you with

her but art and that romantic slop you wrote in the exhibit catalog."

"I've already done all that. But I think G.G. is right. You're not being very

personally careful."

"Oh, you're a sweetheart, you really are." He started pacing, hands in his

pockets, the cigar between his teeth again. Then he whipped it out of his

mouth. "But let me tell you something, I love that little girl. No, don't

look at me like that, and don't say what's on the tip of your tongue. You

think I hate Bonnie 'cause she snubbed me. You damned right, but hating her

is like hating bad weather. I love that little girl. I watched her grow up. I

held her when she was a baby. She's sweet and kind like her daddy, and she

always was. None of that other bullshit ever touched her. And I'll tell you

something else. There were times in my life when every single connection I

had was bullshit, crap I'm talking, business, lies, major filth! And you know

what I'd do? I'd get on the phone and call her. Yeah, Belinda. She was just a

kid, but she was a person, a real person. At parties on Saint Esprit we would

go off together, her and me, we'd ride her goddamn motorcycle. And we'd just

talk to each other, her and me. She got screwed by those bums. And it was

damned near inevitable. Somebody should have looked out for her!"

Blair took a long drag off his cigar, spewing all the smoke into the room,

and then he sank down into a little chair by the window and put the heel of

his silver tennis shoe up on the velvet seat in front of him. He was lost in

his thoughts for a second.

I didn't say anything. The sadness came over me again, the sadness I'd felt

so strongly back in the kitchen at the house and in the little cottage in

Carmel. I missed her so much. I was so afraid for her. The exhibit was a

triumph, that was the word the most cautious of men had used, a triumph, and

where was she to share it with me? What the hell did all of this mean till

she came home?

Blair was watching me through the cloud of smoke from his cigar.

"Now you gonna tell me what happened when Bonnie came up here?" he demanded.

"You gonna give me all the dirt or not?"

There was a loud knock on the door suddenly. Then another knock and another,

as if more than one person was out there.

"No, Jeremy," G.G. said, looking straight at me, "don't do it."

I looked into his eyes and I saw Belinda again. And I saw this overgrown

sweet kid who meant just what he said.

The knocking got louder. Blair ignored it. He continued to stare at me.

"Blair, don't you see?" I asked. "We're past all that. I don't have to tell

anybody anything else. And neither do you."

"G.G., open that fucking door, damn it!" Blair said.

The reporters, crowded into the corridor, were holding up the morning papers.

They had the new editions of The World This Week in their hands, the early

morning Los Angeles Times, and the New York tabloid News Bulletin.

"Have you see these stories?" Do you have any comment?"

NURSE TELLS ALL.

BONNIE, DAUGHTER, AND HUSBAND IN LOVE TRIANGLE.

KIDDIE PORN PAINTINGS OF BONNIE'S DAUGHTER.

BONNIE'S DAUGHTER RUNS FROM STEPFATHER TO TRYST WITH SAN FRANCISCO PAINTER.

BONNIE, STAR OF "CHAMPAGNE FLIGHT," ABANDONS TEENAGE DAUGHTER FOR PRODUCER

HUSBAND.

BELINDA STILL ON THE RUN.

"Well, Rembrandt," Blair said over the noise. "I think you gotta point."

All morning long as people lined up for two blocks before the Folsom Street

gallery, the news came in, through television, radio, telegrams at the front

door, and calls from George and Alex on a private line that had just been

installed.

Three more lines had been added to my regular number also, but, now that the

tabloids had the story, the situation was worse than ever with the hate calls

coming in from as far away as Nova Scotia. Dan's secretary, Barbara, was at

the house now full-time, answering as fast as the machine.

It was all coming out. Nurses, paramedics, a chauffeur who had been fired by

Marty, two of my neighbors who had seen Belinda with me-those and others had

apparently peddled their stories. Film critics dragged out their old notes on

the Cannes showing of Final Score. The TV and radio people were too cautious

to use the tabloid accounts verbatim, but one medium fed upon another with

ever-increasing confidence. News of fire, flood, political events-all this

continued as before-but we were the scandal of the moment.

The morning network news showed live coverage in LA of United Theatricals

executives disclaiming all knowledge of the alleged disappearance of Bonnie's

daughter, Belinda, insisting that they knew nothing about the distribution of

Final Score.

"Champagne Flight" would air this week as scheduled, said network spokesmen.

They had no comment on reports that affiliates all through the South were

dropping the program.

Again and again "modest" portions of the paintings were flashed across the

screen: Belinda's head in the Communion veil, Belinda in punk makeup on the

carousel horse. Belinda in braids dancing.

Televison cameras stopped Uncle Daryl's car as he tried to leave the Beverly

Hills Hotel. Through the open window he said: "I can tell you right now, as

God is my witness, my sister, Bonnie, knew nothing about her daughter living

with this man in San Francisco. I don't know why the exhibit has not been

closed down."

The late edition of the morning Chronicle ran a picture of G.G. and me and

Blair taken in the lobby of the Stanford Court. DID BONNIE KNOW OF WALKER'S

PAINTINGS. Two kids in the Haight claimed to have known Belinda, they called

her "wild, crazy, lots of fun, just a really beautiful spirit" and said she'd

disappeared off the street in June.

When the noon news came on Channel 5, I saw my own house live on the screen,

got up and went to the front windows and looked out at the video cameras.

When I went back to the kitchen, they had switched locations to the Clift

downtown and the reporter on the scene was talking about the closing of G.G.

's salon.

I flicked the channel. Live from LA the unmistakable face and voice of Marty

Moreschi again. He was squinting in the southern California sun as he

addressed reporters in what appeared to be a public parking lot. I turned up

the volume because the doorbell was ringing.

"Look, you want my comment!" he said in the equally unmistakable New York

street voice, "I wanna know where she is, that's what I wanna know. We've got

eighteen pictures of her naked up there, selling at half a million a pop, but

where is Belinda? No, you don't tell me-I tell you!" The loaded .38-caliber

finger again aimed at the reporter. "We've had detectives scouring this

country for her. We've been worried sick about her. Bonnie had no idea where

she was. And now this clown in San Francisco says she was living with him.

And she consented to these pictures. Like hell!"

"I knew he'd take this tack," Dan said. He had just come into the kitchen. He

was unshaven and his shirt was a mess. Both of us had slept in our clothes

listening to the answering machine and the radio. But he wasn't angry

anymore. He was concentrating on strategy instead.

"-come right out and say she was missing?" Marty yelled. "And have some guy

kidnap her? And now we find out this world-famous children's artist was busy

painting every detail of her anatomy? You think he didn't know who she was?"

"He is slick, he is real slick," Dan said.

"It's a dare," I said. "It's been a series of dares from the beginning."

Marty was getting in the car, the window was going up. The limousine was

pushing through the flash of silver microphones and bowed heads.

I hit the remote control again; the anchor woman on Channel 4: "-of the LAPD

confirms that no missing persons report was ever filed on fifteen-year-old

Belinda Blanchard. Belinda is seventeen now, by the way, and her whereabouts

are still completely unknown. Her father, internationally known hairstylist

George Gallagher, confirmed this morning that he does not know where she is

and is eager to find her."

The door bell was now ringing incessantly. There was a knocking. "How about

not answering it?" Dan said.

"And suppose she's out there?" I asked. I went to the lace curtains.

Reporters on the steps, the video cameraman right behind them.

I opened the door. Cynthia Lawrence was holding an open copy of Time, which

had hit the stands less than an hour ago. Had I seen the article?

I took it from her. Impossible to read it now. The questions were coming not

only from her but from the others farther down on the steps and on the

sidewalk. I scanned the scene, the crowd across the street, the teenagers on

the corner, people on the balconies of the apartment house. There were a

couple of men in suits next to the phone booth by the grocery store. Cops?

Could be.

"No, she hasn't contacted me," I said in answer to a question I'd hardly

heard. "No idea at all where she is," I said to another. "Yes, she would, I

can say that with absolute conviction, she approved of the paintings and she

loved them."

I shut the door. Cynthia could always buy herself another magazine. I ignored

the ringing and pounding and started in on the Time article. They had run

full-color pictures of The Carousel Horse Trio and the one I secretly loved

most of all, Belinda in the summer suit, standing with her back to the river

titled simply Belinda, My Love.

"Why would this man, who is a household word to millions, risk his reputation

as a trusted and admired children's artist for such an exhibit?" asked the

writer. "No less unsettling than the frank eroticism of these paintings, each

one faithfully rendered in a five-by-seven color photograph in the expensive

exhibit catalog, is a narrative of ever-deepening madness as we see Belinda

subjected to the artist's bizarre fantasies-Belinda with Dolls, Belinda in

Riding Clothes, Belinda on the Carousel Horse-before she is finally

transformed into the most enticing of women, Belinda in Mother's Bed-only to

be victim of stunning violence in the carefully rendered Fight of Artist and

Model in which the painter strikes his muse cruelly across the face, causing

her to sink to the floor against a backdrop of stained and broken wallpaper.

This is not merely a children's author's attempt to commit public suicide, it

is not merely a tribute to a young woman's beauty, it is a self-indicting

chronicle of a lurid and conceivably tragic affair. To learn that Belinda

Blanchard was in fact a teenage runaway when these pictures were painted, to

learn that she is again missing, is to arouse speculation that is perhaps

best pursued by law enforcement officials rather than artistic critics."

I closed the magazine. Dan was coming down the hall. He had a steaming cup of

coffee in his hand.

"That was Rhinegold on the phone, he said four guys from the SFPD just went

through the exhibit."

"How does he know that's what they were? Surely they didn't show their badges

to him-"

"That's exactly what they did. They didn't want to stand in line like

everybody else."

"Holy shit," I said.

"Yeah, you can say that again," he said, "and I've called in a criminal

lawyer name of David Alexander and he'll be here in two hours and I don't

want to hear another word on that score." I shrugged. I gave him the Time

article.

"Does this say what I think it says?"

I went to the private line in the kitchen and dialed Alex: "I want you to

leave now. Go back to LA. This is too ugly already."

"The hell I will," he said. "I was just talking to the girls at

'Entertainment Tonight.' I told them I've known you since you were a kid.

Look, George and I will bring you some supper around six o'clock. Don't try

to go out. They'll ruin your digestion. G.G. is down in the lobby talking to

them, by the way. One of Marty's lawyers came here personally this morning,

but I'll tell you something about G.G., he's sweet, but he's not dumb, no,

not at all, he just slipped around that guy like a feather in a draft. You

never saw such beautiful evasion. Hey, hold on. OK, that was this nice boy

who's been getting me cigarettes and things. He says he thinks the guys

talking to G.G. down there are plainclothes policemen. My lawyer's on the way

up from LA to give G.G. a hand."

The phone rang almost as soon as I put it down. Dan answered, and all I heard

was mumbling and yes and no for about ten minutes.

The doorbell was ringing again. I went back to the curtains. Kids all over

out there, some of them neighborhood teenagers I'd seen at the corner store

or just walking around on Castro or Market. Couple of very wild punk types

from the Cafe Flore a block away, one with pink hair, and the other with a

mohawk. But no Belinda.

I saw my neighbor Sheila wave as she went by. Then someone approached her.

She was trying to make a clean getaway, but other people were asking her

questions. She was shrugging, backing off, almost stumbled off the curb. Then

she sprinted towards Castro Street.

How would Belinda look if she tried to come to the door?
I went back into the kitchen. Dan was off the phone.

"Look, Uncle Daryl has just called the district attorney's office

personally," he said. "The SFPD wants to talk to you and I'm trying to stall

them till Alexander's on the case. Uncle Daryl is on his way up from LA by

plane, and Bonnie has just been checked into a hospital."

"I'll talk to them anytime," I said. "I don't want a criminal lawyer, Dan, I

told you that."

"I'm overruling you on that one," he said patiently. "We'll reconsider when

Alexander gets here."

I went down the back steps and into the garage and had the car out and

roaring up Seventeenth Street to Sanchez before the crowd on the street could

make up its mind what was going on.

When I got to the Clift, the police had just left. G.G. was sitting on the

couch in the suite with his elbows on his knees. He looked tired and puzzled,

pretty much the way he'd looked last night. Alex was in that gorgeous satin

robe of his, pouring drinks for both of us and having room service send up

some lunch.

"I figured it this way," G.G. said quietly. "I wasn't under the oath, so it

didn't have to be the whole truth, just the truth, if you know what I mean.

So I told them about her coming to New York and about my hiding her on Fire

Island and the mean way those Hollywood men acted, but I never told them the

things that she said. I told them about her leaving for San Francisco, and I

told them how happy she was when she called with the news about you. I told

them she loved the paintings. She really did."

He stopped, took a little of the wine Alex had given him, and then he said:

"I'll tell you what worries me, Jeremy, they kept asking about the last time

I'd heard from her, they kept saying 'Are you sure the call from New Orleans

was the very last time?' It was as if they had some fixed idea in their

minds. Do you think they know something about her whereabouts that we don't?"

The crowd in front of the house was even bigger when I got back. I had to

honk my way through the garage door. Then a couple of reporters came into the

garage after me. I had to lead them out into the street and close the door

and go up the front way, or they would have been all over the backyard.

"Jeremy, is it true you found Belinda in a hippie pad on Page Street?"

someone shouted. "Did you tell a San Francisco policeman that you were her

father?... Hey, Jeremy, have you seen Final Score yourself?"

I shut the front door.

Dan came down the hall. He'd shaved and cleaned up, but the expression on his

face unnerved me.

"The police are really putting the pressure on," he said. "Alexander is

trying to stall them, but you're going to have to talk to them sooner or

later, and Alexander thinks that voluntarily is the best way to go."

I wondered suddenly if you could paint in prison. Idiot thought. How the hell

was I going to protect her from all this if I was in prison? No, things just

wouldn't move that fast.

When I came into the back office, Barbara handed me an open telegram. There

was a pile of them in front of her, they'd been coming almost nonstop. The

phone machine was recording the incoming voices at low volume. I think I

heard someone whisper: "Pervert!" I took the telegram.

"CONGRATULATIONS ON THE NEW SHOW. SAW CATALOG. STUNNING. WOULD BE THERE IF I

COULD. ON WAY TO ROME TO GET INTERPOSITIVE OF FINAL SCORE. WILL CALL ON

RETURN IF I CAN GET THROUGH. SUSAN JEREMIAH."

"Ah, beautiful," I whispered. "That means she's making more prints of the

movie. When did this come?"

"Probably yesterday," Barbara said, "there's fifty of them here. Twenty more

were delivered this morning. I'm going through them as fast as I can."

"Well, they're the best line of communication at this point," I said, "so let

the machine answer the phone while you check them out."

"Call the number this was phoned from," Dan said. "It's an LA number. See if

we can reach Jeremiah there later on."

"I've got other news for you," Barbara said. "From Rhinegold. He was here

while you were gone. A Fort Worth millionaire named Joe Travis Buckner is

furious that the museums have first right to the paintings. He wants two

paintings now. But the representative from the Dallas Museum has made the

first solid and unequivocable offer: five hundred thou for Belinda with

Dolls. Rhinegold has asked for two weeks in which to evaluate the offer. And

oh yeah, this other guy," she stopped to glance at her note pad, "this Count

Solosky? Is that it? Solosky? Well, anyway he's from Vienna, and he settled

on four of the paintings, paid already. Do you know how much money that is?

Rhinegold seems to think he's as important as a museum or something. Pretty

terrific, right?"

She looked at me. And I knew I ought to say something, just to be polite to

her, because she was so nice, and she was tired from working so hard. But I

didn't say anything. I couldn't. I went into the kitchen and sat down in my

usual chair.

So Count Solosky had put his signature to the check. And he was only the

collector Rhinegold had courted for three decades, the man he considered the

premier art collector in the world today. And this right on top of the first

sale of my work to any museum in America. It was "pretty terrific," all

right. At least it was to the guy I'd been six months ago on the Memorial

weekend day that I met her at the ABA convention, the guy who said, "If I

don't go over the cliff, I'll never be anything." How she had smiled at that.

Impossible to put it in focus for anyone else. Impossible to sharpen the

focus myself. It was all at a great remove, like a landscape done by an

impressionist: color, line, symmetry, all indistinct, having more to do with

light than what was solid.

"This isn't going to help, you know," Dan said.
[4]

The police were due at nine thirty a.m. Tuesday morning. David Alexander

arrived about two hours before that. He was a slender blond-haired man,

perhaps fifty, rather delicate of build with ice-blue eyes behind gold-rimmed

aviator glasses. He listened with his fingers together making a church

steeple, and I vaguely remembered reading something about that particular

mannerism, that it denoted feelings of superiority, but that didn't mean much

to me.

I didn't want to talk to him. I thought about Belinda, what she said about

telling her whole story to Ollie Boon. But Alexander was my lawyer, and Dan

insisted I tell him everything. OK. Set your emotions on the table like an

envelope of canceled checks.

The morning news was hellish. G.G. and Alex, who had come over for break

fist, refused to watch it. They were having their coffee in the living room

alone.

Daryl in a somber charcoal gray suit had read a prepared statement last night

to network reporters:

"My sister, Bonnie, is in a state of collapse. The year of searching and

worrying has finally taken its toll. As for the paintings on exhibit in San

Francisco, we are talking about a deeply disturbed man and a serious police

problem as well as a missing girl, a girl who is underage and may be herself

disturbed. These paintings may well have been done without her consent,

possibly without her knowledge, and certainly they were done without the

consent of her only legal guardian, my sister, Bonnie Blanchard, who knew

nothing about them at all."

Then "feminist and anti-pornography spokesperson" Cheryl Wheeler, a young New

York attorney, had been interviewed regarding the obscenity of my work. She

stated her views without ever raising her voice.

"The exhibit is a rape, plain and simple. If Belinda Blanchard did live with

Walker at all, which has not been established by the way, she is one of the

increasing victims of child abuse in this country. The only thing we do know

for certain at this moment is that her name and likeness have been ruthlessly

exploited by Walker, perhaps without her knowledge."

"But if Belinda did approve the exhibit, if she consented, as Walker says-"

"For a girl of sixteen there can be no question of consent to this kind of

exploitation any more than there can be consent to sexual intercourse.

Belinda Blanchard will be a minor till the age of eighteen."

But the network program had closed with a capper: kids in the town of

Reading, Alabama, led by a local deejay in a public burning of my books.

I'd watched that one in stunned amazement. Hadn't seen anything like it since

the sixties, when they burned the Beatle records because John Lennon had said

the Beatles were more famous than Jesus. And then, of course, the Nazis had

burned books all during the Second World War. I don't know why it didn't

upset me. I don't know why it seemed to be happening to someone else. All

those books burning in the little plaza before the public library of Reading.

Kids coming up and proudly dumping their books into the flames.

David Alexander showed not the slightest reaction. Dan didn't say, I told you

so, for which I was more than grateful. He merely sat there making notes.

Then the doorbell was ringing, and G.G. came in from the living room to say

the police had just come in.

These were two tall plainclothes gentlemen in dark suits and overcoats, and

they made a very polite and nice fuss over Alex, saying they had seen all his

movies and they'd seen him in "Champagne Flight," too. Everyone laughed at

that, even Alexander and Dan smiled good-naturedly, though I could see Dan

was miserable.

Then the older of the two men, Lieutenant Connery, asked Alex to sign an

autograph for his wife. The other policeman was eyeing all the toys in the

room as if he was inventorying them. He studied the dolls in particular, and

then he picked up one of the dolls that was broken and he ran his finger over

the broken porcelain cheek.

I invited them into the kitchen. Dan filled the coffee mugs for everybody.

Connery said he'd rather talk to me alone without the two lawyers, but then

Alexander smiled and shook his head and everybody laughed politely again.

Connery was a heavyset man with a square face and white hair and gray eyes,

nondescript except for a rather naturally appealing smile and pleasant voice.

He had what we call in San Francisco a south of Market accent, which is

similar to the Irish-German city street accents in Boston or New York. The

other man sort of tided into the background as we started to talk.

"Now you are speaking to me of your own free will, Jeremy," said Connery,

pushing the tape recorder towards me. I said yes. "And you know that you are

not being charged with anything." I said yes. "But that you might be charged

at a later date. And that if we do decide to charge you, we will read you

your rights."

"You don't have to, I know my rights."

Alexander had his fingers together in a steeple again. Dan's face was

absolutely white.

"You can tell us to leave any time you wish," Connery assured me. I smiled.

He reminded me of all the cops and firemen in my family back in New Orleans,

all big men like this with the same kind of Spencer Tracy white hair.

"Yes, I understand all of that, relax, Lieutenant," I said. "This whole thing

must look pretty weird from your point of view."

"Jeremy, why don't you just answer the questions?" Dan said in a kind of

cranky voice. He was having a terrible time with this. Alexander looked like

a wax dummy.

"Well, Jeremy, I'll tell you," Connery said, taking a pack of Raleighs out of

his coat pocket. "You don't mind if I smoke, do you? Oh, thank you, you never

know these days whether people will let you smoke. You're supposed to go out

on the back deck to smoke. I go to my favorite restaurant, I try to have my

usual cigarette after dinner, they say no. Well, what concerns us more than

anything right now, Jeremy, is finding Belinda Blanchard. So my first

question, Jeremy, is do you know where she is?"

"Absolutely not. No idea. She said in her letter to me in New Orleans that

she was two thousand miles away from there and that could mean Europe or the

West Coast or even New York. She was seventeen years old just about four

weeks ago, by the way, on the seventh. And she had a great deal of money with

her when she left and lots of nice clothes. If I knew where she was, I'd go

to her, I'd ask her to marry me because I love her and I think that's what we

should do right now."

"Do you think she would marry you, Jeremy?"

The words came with a strange evenness and slowness.

"I don't know. I hope so," I said.

"Why don't you tell us the whole thing?"

I thought for a moment about what G.G. had said, about them seeming to have

some fixed idea about Belinda. And then I thought about all Dan's advice.

I started with meeting her, the big mess on Page Street, her coming home with

me. Yes, the statement of the cop was correct, I did say she was my daughter.

I wanted to help her. I brought her back here. But I didn't know who she was,

and one of the conditions was that I didn't ask. I went on about the

paintings. Three months we lived together. Everything peaceful...

"And then Bonnie came here," Connery said simply. "She arrived at SF

International in a private plane at eleven forty-five A.M. on September 10

and her daughter met her there, right?"

I said I didn't know that for certain. I explained how I'd found out who

Belinda was from the tape of Final Score and all that. I described Bonnie's

coming here, and how we'd gone to the Hyatt and she'd asked me to look after

Belinda.

"Tried to blackmail you, to be exact, didn't she?"

"What makes you say that?"

"The statement of the limousine driver, who overheard her planning this with

her daughter. The car was parked. He says that the glass was not all the way

up between him and the backseat and he heard everything they said."

"Then you know it was all a sham. Besides, before I left the Hyatt, I had the

pictures back." But I felt relief all over. He knew the worst part. I didn't

have to tell him. And now for the first time I could explain with some degree

of clear conscience why Belinda and I had fought.

I told him about the fight, about Belinda leaving, and about the letter that

came five days later and why I decided to go public with the paintings right

away.

"It was a moment of synchronization," I said. "My needs and her needs became

the same. I'd always wanted to show the paintings. I wasn't kidding myself

about that anymore by the time we went south. And now it was in her interest

to show them, to get out the truth about her identity, because it was the

only way she could stop running and hiding-and maybe forgive me for hitting

her like that, for driving her off."

Connery was studying me. The Raleigh had gone out in the ashtray. "Would you

let me see the document Belinda sent you?"

"No. It's Belinda's and it's not here. It's someplace where nobody can get

it. I can't make it public because it's hers."

He reflected for a moment. Then he began to ask questions about all kinds of

things-the bookstore where I'd first seen Belinda, the age of my mother's

house in New Orleans, about Miss Annie and the neighbors, about restaurants

where we'd dined in San Francisco and down south, about what Belinda wore

when we were in New Orleans, about how many suitcases she owned.

But gradually I realized he was repeating certain questions over and over-in

particular about the night Belinda had left and whether or not she'd taken

all her belongings, all those suitcases, and whether or not I'd heard

anything, and then back to Did she pose for the photographs willingly and why

had I destroyed them all.

"Look, we've been over and over all this," I said. "What do you really want?

Of course, I destroyed the photos, I've explained that. Wouldn't you have

done it if you were me?"

Connery became immediately conciliatory.

"Look, Jeremy, we appreciate your cooperation in all this," he said. "But you

see, the family is very concerned about this girl."

"So am I."

"Her uncle Daryl is here now. He believes that Belinda may have taken drugs

on the street, that she may be deeply disturbed and not really capable of

taking care of herself."

"What did her father say about that?"

"Tell me again, you went to sleep at about seven o'clock. She was in her room

until then? And the housekeeper, Miss Annie, had taken her some supper?"

I nodded. "And when I woke up, she was gone. The tape of Final Score was on

the night table like I told you. And I knew she meant for me to keep it and

it meant something, but I was never sure what. Maybe she was saying, 'Show

the pictures.' That is what she said in her letter five days later-"

"And the letter."

"-is in a vault!"

Connery glanced at the other detective. Then he looked at his watch.

"Jeremy, listen, I do appreciate your cooperation, and we'll try not to take

too much more of your time, but if you'll excuse Berger-"

Berger got up and went to the front door, and I saw Alexander for Dan to go

with him. Connery continued:

"And you're saying, Jeremy, that Miss Annie did not see Belinda in the

house."

"Right." I heard the front door open.

Dan had come in and gestured to Alexander. They went out. "What's going on?"

I asked.

They were standing in the hallway reading what looked like a, papers stapled

together, and then Connery got up and joined Dan came back in to me. He said:

"They've got a perfectly legal and extremely detailed warrant for this

house."

"So let them," I said. I stood up. "They didn't have to get a warrant." Dan

was worried.

"With the way that thing's worded, they could rip up the damn boards," he

said under his breath.

"Look, I'll go upstairs with you," I said to Connery. But he said that wasn't

necessary and he'd see to it that the men were very careful. I said, "Go on

then, the attic is unlocked."

The look on David Alexander's face was secretive as he looked at and I

frankly resented it. If I was going to pay the guy, I wanted him convey his

secrets to me.

But the house was now teeming with detectives. There were two men in the

living room, where G.G. and Alex were standing by somewhat awkwardly amid the

dollhouse and the carousel horse and the trains and things, and I could hear

them above stomping up the uncarpeted attic steps.

Connery was just coming down when I went to the foot of the stairs. Another

detective had a couple of plastic sacks, and one of these had sweater in it,

a sweater of Belinda's that I had not even known was still here.

"Please don't take that," I said.

"But why, Jeremy?" Connery asked.

"Because it's Belinda's," I said. I pushed past the man and went to see what

was really going on.

They were going over everything. I heard cameras snapping in the attic, saw

the silver explosion of the flash on the walls. They had found a hairbrush of

hers under the brass bed, and they were taking that, too. I couldn't watch

this, people opening my closet, and turning down the bed covers.

I went back down. Connery was looking at the dollhouse. Alex was seared on

the sofa, watching him calmly. G.G. stood behind Connery at the window.

"Look, Connery, this doesn't make any sense," I said. "I told you she was

here. Why do you need evidence of that?"

The doorbell rang, and one of the detectives answered it. There were two huge

shaggy brown German shepherd dogs sitting obediently in front of two

uniformed policemen on the porch.

"Jeremy," Connery said in the same friendly manner, slipping his arm around

my shoulder just as Alex might do it. "Would you mind if we took the dogs

through the house?"

I heard Dan mutter that it was in the fucking warrant, wasn't it? G.G. was

staring at the dogs as if they were dangerous, and Alex was just smoking his

cigarette and saying nothing with a deceptively serene expression on his

face.

"But what in God's name are the dogs looking for?" I asked. "Belinda isn't

here."

I could feel myself getting unnerved. The whole thing was getting crazy. And

there was a crowd outside so large, apparently, that I could hear it. I

didn't want to look through the curtains to be sure.

I stood back watching the dogs tiptoe over the old Lionel train cars. I

watched them sniffing at the French and German dolls heaped beside Alex on

the couch. When they went to sniff Alex's shoes, he only smiled, and the

officer led them away immediately.

I watched in silence as they went through all the lower rooms and then up the

stairs. I saw Alexander follow them up.

Another plainclothesman had come down with another plastic sack. And I saw

suddenly that he had the Communion veil and wreath in it, and also Mother's

rosary and pearl-covered prayer book.

"Wait, you can't take that," I told Connery. "That book and rosary belonged

to my mother. What are you doing? Will somebody please explain?"

Connery put his arm around me again: "We'll take good care of everything,

Jeremy."

Then I saw that the two men coming down the hall from the kitchen had my

entire photograph file from the basement below.

"But there are no pictures of her in there," I said. "That's old material,

what's going on?"

Connery was studying me. He hadn't answered. Dan only watched as these things

were carried out of the house and down the front steps.

Barbara came into the hall from the back kitchen and said the phone was for

Connery, would he come this way?

"Dan, what the fuck are they doing?" I whispered.

Dan was obviously in a silent rage. "Look, don't say anything more to them,"

he whispered.

G.G. had gone to the window and was looking out. I stood beside him. The

policeman with the Communion wreath and veil was talking to the newsmen out

there. The Channel 5 truck was taping the whole thing. I felt like punching

the guy. Then I saw the guy had another plastic sack too with something in

it. It was Belinda's black riding crop and her leather boots.

Connery came in from the kitchen.

"Well, Jeremy, I went to let you know that the police in New Orleans have

just completed a legal search of your mother's house there. It was all done

proper, through the courts and all, as it had to be, but I just wanted to let

you know."

He glanced at the stairs as the dogs were being led out. I saw him look at

the uniformed man who was leading the animals, and then Connery went over to

the man and they whispered together for a minute, as Alexander slipped past

them and into the living room. Connery came back.

"Well, let's talk a little bit more, Jeremy," he said. But neither of us made

a move to sit down. And Alex and G.G. did not move to leave. Connery glanced

around, smiled at everybody. "Want to talk in private, Jeremy?"

"Not really, what more is there to say?"

"All right, Jeremy," he said patiently. "Do you know of any reason why

Belinda would not contact you at this time?"

Alexander was watching all this most attentively, but I saw that Dan was

being called into the kitchen, probably for the phone.

"Well, she may not know what's happening. She may be too far away to have

heard. She may be scared of her family. And who knows? Maybe she doesn't want

to come back."

Connery weighed this for a few seconds.

"But is there any reason why she might not know at all what's happening, or

not be able to come back?"

"I don't follow you," I said. Alexander closed in without a sound.

"Look, my client has been as cooperative as can be expected," he said in a

low cold voice. "Now you do not want us to get an injunction on the grounds

of harassment, and that is just what-"

"And you guys," Connery said equally politely, "do not want us to convene a

grand jury and move for an immediate indictment either, do you ?"

"And on what grounds would you do that?" Alexander asked icily.
"You have nothing. The dogs did not give the signal, am I right?"

"What signal?" I asked.

Dan was now back in the living room, behind Alexander.

Alexander moistened his lips reflexively before he answered, his voice as low

and steady as before.

"These dogs had Belinda's scent before they came here," he explained. "They

got it from clothing provided by her uncle. And if Belinda had met with foul

play on the premises, the dogs would have assumed a certain position over any

spot where the body might have been placed. The dogs can smell death."

"Good God! You think I killed her?" I stared at Connery. And I realized he

was studying me as clinically as before.

"Now the dogs in New Orleans did not give the signal either, did they?"

Alexander continued. "So you have no proof of foul play at all."

"Oh, Christ, this is awful!" I whispered. I went to the armchair and sat

down. I looked up and, without meaning to, looked right at Alex, who was

sitting back on the couch just watching everything, his face a perfectly

pleasant mask of his feelings. He gave me the smallest "Take it easy" gesture

with his hand.

"If you tell this to the press," I said, "it will destroy everything. It will

ruin everything that I've done."

"And why is that, Jeremy?" Connery asked me.

"Oh, good God, man, don't you see?" I said. "The pictures were supposed to be

a celebration. They were supposed to be wholesome and beautiful. They were a

tribute to her sexuality and to the love between us and how it saved me. This

girl was my muse. She woke me up from all this, damn it!" I glared at the

toys. I kicked at the train on the floor as I stood up. "She brought life

into this place, this very room. She wasn't a doll, she wasn't a cartoon

character, she was a young woman, damn it."

"That must have been very frightening, Jeremy," Connery said softly.

"No, no, it wasn't. And if you let it out that you think I killed her, then

you make it all kinky and dirty and like a thousand other aberrant stories-as

if people couldn't break the rules and love each other-without there being

something ugly and violent and bad! There was nothing ugly or violent or

bad!"

I could feel Alexander studying me as intently as Connery. He was monitoring

everything, but he was also nodding just a little, as if this of it was OK. I

was so grateful for that little nod. I wished I could tell him, would

remember to tell him.

"The exhibit was supposed to be the perfect ending and the perfect

beginning!" I said. I walked past them all into the dining room. [bad scan]

the dolls on the back of the piano. I felt like smashing them. [bad scan]

this garbage. "Don't you see? The end of hiding for her. The end of

everything for me." I turned around to look at Connery. "We were coming out

of the closet as people, don't you see?"

"Lieutenant," Alexander said under his breath. "I really must ask you to

leave."

"I didn't kill her, Lieutenant," I said, coming towards him. "You can't go

out there and say that I did. You can't make it ugly like that, you hear me?

You can't turn me into a freak like that."

Connery reached into his overcoat pocket and drew out a folded copy of the

exhibit catalog.

"Jeremy, look, you did paint this, didn't you?" He showed me the riding

picture-boots, crop, hat.

"Yes, but what's that got to do with murder, for Chrissakes."

Alexander tried to intervene again. G.G. and Alex continued to watch in

silence, though G.G. had slipped way back into the bay window, and I could

see the fear in his eyes. No, G.G., don't believe this!

"Well, wouldn't you say that was pretty kinky, Jeremy?"

"Yeah, kind of, so what!" I said.

"But this, Jeremy, the title of this picture is The Artist Grieves for

Belinda. That is the word you used, isn't it, Jeremy, 'grieves'?"

"Oh Christ."

"Jeremy, I must warn you that you are under surveillance and that, if you try

to leave San Francisco, you will be arrested on the spot."

"Don't make me laugh!" I said. "Just get the hell out of my house. Go out

there and tell your filthy suspicions to the reporters. Tell them that an

artist who loves a young girl has to kill her, that you won't settle for

anything between a man and a girl her age that was just plain wholesome and

good!"

"I wouldn't do that if I were you, Lieutenant," said Dan. "In fact, I

wouldn't say anything about suspected homicide to anybody until you talk to

Daryl Blanchard, if I were you."

"What's this about now, Dan?" Connery asked patiently.

"Daryl's heard from her?" I asked.

"Call just came in back there," Dan said. "Daryl now has official custody of

his niece and the LAPD has issued a warrant for her arrest on the grounds

that she is a minor without proper supervision, leading an immoral and

dissolute life."

Connery could not hide his annoyance.

"Oh, that's just great," I said. "If she tries to come to me, she gets

busted. You bastards, you want to put her in jail, too."

"I mean, you and I both know, Lieutenant," Dan said, "that if you go for that

indictment, well, a warrant out for the arrest of the murdered person, it's

kind of a-"

Alexander finished the sentence: "-exculpatory," he said.

"Right, exactly," Dan said, "and I mean you can hardly indict a man for

murder when you're trying to arrest the-"

"I get your drift, counselor," said Connery with a weary nod. He turned, as

if he was going to take his leave, but then he looked back to me.

"Jeremy," he said sincerely, "why don't you just tell us what happened to the

girl?"

"Jesus, man, I told you. She left that night in New Orleans. Now you tell me

something-"

"That's all, Lieutenant," Alexander said.

"No, I want to know!" I said. "Do you really think I could do something like

that to her!...

Connery opened the catalog again. He held Artist and Model in front of me. Me

slapping Belinda.

"Maybe you'd feel better, Jeremy, if you just came clean on the whole thing."

"Listen, you son of a bitch," I answered. "Belinda's alive. And she'll come

when she knows about all this, if your goddamn warrant doesn't scare her off.

Now arrest me or get the hell out of my house."

He drew himself up, put the catalog back in his pocket and, with the same

sympathetic expression he'd had all along, he said:

"Jeremy, you are suspected of foul play in connection with the disappearance

of Belinda Blanchard, and I should remind you that you have the right to

remain silent, the right to have an attorney present whenever you are

questioned, and anything that you say may be used against you if you continue

to talk."

For the next few minutes little if anything registered, except that Connery

had left, Dan and Alexander had gone into the kitchen and wanted me to

follow, and that I had sunk down into the armchair again.

I looked up. Alex was gone and so was G.G., and for a moment I felt as near

to panic as I ever had in my entire life.

But then G.G. appeared at the arm of the chair with a cup of coffee in his

hand. He gave it to me. And I heard Alex's clear voice from the front porch.

He was talking to the reporters: "Ah, yes, we go way back together. Jeremy's

one of my oldest and dearest friends in the world. Known him since he was a

boy in New Orleans. One of the nicest men I've ever known."

I got up and went to the back office and cut off the answering machine to put

in a new message.

"This is Jeremy Walker. Belinda, if you are calling, honey, let me tell you

that I love you, and you are in danger. There is a warrant out for your

arrest, and my house is being watched. This line may be tapped. Stay on,

honey, but be careful. I'll recognize your voice."

By eleven Tuesday evening every TV station in the country was flashing her

picture. And warrants had been issued for her in New York and Texas as well

as California. A big beautiful photo taken of her at the press conference in

Cannes was on the front page of the evening papers from New York to San

Diego. And Uncle Daryl had even offered a $50,000 reward for any information

leading directly to her arrest.

And it was no secret to the reporters who covered the story that Daryl

himself might not even be granted custody of Belinda if or when she was

picked up. The authorities could jail Belinda. In other words, to get

Belinda, Daryl had been willing to put her fate in the hands of the courts.

And once the courts had her, they could, if they chose, incarcerate her not

merely until she was eighteen, but until she was twenty-one.

Daryl had done this. Daryl had turned Belinda into a criminal. And he

continued to vilify her to anyone who would listen, with information he had

received from "various private investigative agents," insisting that Belinda

"had consorted with immoral and dissolute persons," "had no visible means of

support," "is known to have abused drugs and alcohol," and "might have

suffered extensive and/or permanent damage from the drugs she might have

ingested in New York's Greenwich Village and San Francisco's infamous

Haight."

Meanwhile the "torrid scenes" of Final Score were getting more word of mouth.

An LA underground paper had run stills from the picture as well as photos of

my paintings. The television stations picked them up. Final Score was

scheduled to open tomorrow at the Westwood in LA for a guaranteed two-week

run.

The phone situation worsened. The private number had apparently been leaked

to the public. It too was now ringing nonstop. And during the long hours of

Tuesday night I got as many hate calls now for Belinda as I did for myself.

"The little bitch, who does she think she is?" a female voice would hiss into

the phone. "I hope they make her wear clothes when they find her." It ran

like that.

But burning just as brightly in the public imagination was the image of

"Belinda, Teen Temptress," was the image of Belinda, victim, murdered by me.

The SFPD had given the press, as well as Marty Moreschi, everything it needed

to put Belinda in an early grave dug by the "weirdo artist" in San Francisco.

IS BELINDA DEAD OR ALIVE? The late edition of the San Francisco Examiner had

asked. The S.F. Police had indicated there was a "secret collection of

hideous and horrible paintings" in my attic, works full of "insects and

rodents and clearly the creation of a disturbed mind." The house was

described as a "madman's playground." And aside from the photographs of The

Artist Grieves for Belinda and Artist and Model, there were pictures of the

items police had taken with them-the Holy Communion "paraphernalia" and the

leather boots and whip.

On the Wednesday morning news, Marty broke down as he greeted reporters

outside the offices of the LAPD, where he had been interrogated about

Belinda:

"Bonnie is afraid she may never see her daughter alive again."

As for his sudden leave of absence from his two-million-a-year job as vice

president in charge of television production at the studio, it had nothing to

do with the cancellation of "Champagne Flight," which had in fact been

announced the night before. On the contrary, he had asked for time off to

devote himself completely to Bonnie.

"In the beginning we only wanted to find Belinda," he continued, "now we are

afraid of what we will find out." Then he turned his back to the cameras and

wept.

The press continued, however, to vilify all of us. Bonnie had abandoned her

child. Marty was the suspected cause of it. The superstar of "Champagne

Flight" had become the evil Queen from Snow White. No matter how often they

tried to throw the spotlight on me, it always came back to them for another

bow.

And though Dan kept insisting that the warrants for Belinda made it hard for

the grand jury to indict me, I could see by the morning papers on Wednesday

that something insidious was happening.

The two concepts of Belinda-criminal on the run and murder victim-were not at

odds with each other. On the contrary, they were merging with each other, and

the whole was gaining new strength.

Belinda was a bad girl who got killed for it. Belinda was a little sex queen

who got exactly what she deserved.

Even a long dignified feature in the national edition of The New York Times

took this approach. Child actress Belinda Blanchard, only daughter of

superstar Bonnie and famous hairdresser G.G., may have earned her first real

star billing in an erotic role that climaxed in her death. The LA Times made

the same connection: Had the sensuous baby-mouthed beauty of Final Score

seduced death as easily as she had seduced the audience at Cannes?

I was horrified as I watched the process. Dan was clearly more worried than

he would admit. Even G.G. seemed crushed. But Alex was neither surprised nor

upset.

He was keeping up his loyalty campaign valiantly, calling press people all

over the nation to volunteer statements about our friendship, and he was

pleased to be making his own news stories: ALEX CLEMENTINE STANDS BY OLD

FRIEND in the LA papers, and CLEMENTINE DEFENDS WALKER in the Chronicle here.

But when he came for dinner Wednesday night-when he brought the dinner, in

fact, of pasta and veal and other goodies-we finally sat down to talking, and

he told me calmly that he was not surprised by the "bad girl gets it" angle

at all.

He reminded me tactfully and gently of that discussion we'd had outside the

Stanford Court so many months ago, in which he'd warned me that people were

no more tolerant of scandal now than they had ever been.

"Got to be the right dirt in the right measure," he said again. "And I don't

care how many teen sex flicks they crank out every day down there in

Tinseltown, you're forty-five and you fucked a teenager and you won't say

you're sorry, and your goddamn paintings are selling, that's what's making

them mad. They've got to believe somebody's sorry, somebody's going to pay,

so they just love the idea that she's dead."

"The hell with them," I said. "And I want to tell you something else,

Clementine, all the votes aren't in yet."

"Jeremy, listen, you've got to take this more calmly is what I'm saying. This

link between sex and death, well, hell, it's as American as apple pie. For

years every movie they ever made about gay sex-or any kind of weird sex for

that matter-always ended with suicide or somebody getting killed. Look at

Lolita. Humbert Humbert shoots Quilty, then he and Lolita both end up dead.

America makes you pay that way when you break the rules. It's a formula. The

cop shows do it all the time."

"You wait, Alex," I interrupted. "When everything is said and done, we'll see

who was right about sex and scandal and money and death!"

"Death, please stop talking about death," G.G. said. "She's all right and

she'll get through."

"Yes," Dan agreed, "but how?"

Alex nodded. "Look what's going on out there," he said. "Those plainclothes

fellas are questioning every teenage girl that passes the house. They're

stopping them, demanding their identification. I saw them doing it when I

came in. Can't you push those fellas back a bit? And I'll tell you something

else I heard. United Theatricals said it's been getting crank calls from

girls saying they're Belinda. My agent told me that this morning. Now how the

hell would the secretaries down there know the real Belinda if she called?"

"What about Susan Jeremiah?" G.G. asked. "Anybody heard from her? Maybe

Belinda can get through to her!"

Dan shook his head. "She's renting some house on Benedict Canyon Drive in LA,

but the guy who answered the phone there this afternoon said she's still en

route from Rome. She was supposed to land in New York this morning, then go

on later to Chicago before she headed home."

"How about trying the number again?" I asked.

"Just did. Got the answering machine. The guy's out for dinner. I'll try him

again later on."

Well, Susan was busy, and who could blame her?

Final Score had opened at noon at the Westwood in Los Angeles to sellout

crowds. Posters of a bikini-clad Belinda on horseback were suddenly on sale

all over Sunset Boulevard.

I wasn't even finished eating when my LA agent got through on the private

line to tell that, if and when Belinda showed, she had a career waiting

without even lifting her hand.

"You're kidding, Clair, you had the operator cut in on the line to tell me

this!" I was furious.

"You bet, and it took me a fucking thirty minutes to persuade the phone

company to do it. I had to convince the supervisor it was life or death. Does

everybody in the continental U.S. have your number? Now listen, about

Belinda, you tell her for me I'm getting calls two a minute on her. Have you

seen that movie? Look, all I'm saying is, Jer, you find her, you marry her,

and you give her my message, OK? I'll represent her, I can cut a million-

dollar deal with her in two seconds with Century International Pictures. That

is, if-well, if-"

"If what!"

"If she doesn't end up in jail!"

"Gotta go, Clair."

"Jeremy, don't be hasty. Ever hear of the concept of public pressure? 'Free

Belinda and Jeremy, the San Francisco Two!" and all that."

"Put it on a bumper sticker, Clair. We might need it. You gotta point."

"Hey, you know your publishers are just sick, don't you? The bookstores are

shipping back your books! Let me make a deal for that exhibit catalog,

Jeremy, that's one of the hottest irons in the fire you've got."

"Good-bye, Clair. I love you. You're the most optimistic person I've spoken

to all day." I hung up.

I was dying to tell Alex about all of that, that maybe both of us had been

right in that old argument about sex, death, and money. But that would have

been premature. Later, Clementine, I kept thinking. Because I know she's OK,

and she's coming, I know she is, she's OK. And let them send back my books!

Meantime "Entertainment Tonight" was already on the air, announcing the

permanent cancellation of "Champagne Flight." Marty Moreschi was again being

questioned by the LAPD regarding his relationship with the missing teenager,

Belinda Blanchard.

As for Jeremy Walker, the New York Museum of Modern Art had just announced it

would make an offer to purchase Belinda in Brass Bed, a ten-by-twelve canvas

divided into six panels. The board of directors of the museum would make no

statement on the scandal surrounding the work.

As for "Saturday Morning Charlotte," the network was still denying rumors

that it would cancel, though the program had lost its major sponsor,

Crackerpot Cereal. "Millions of kids watch Charlotte," said the network

spokesman, "who have never heard of Jeremy Walker." Charlotte now had a life

independent of her creator, and they could not disappoint the millions who

expect to see her every Saturday morning at the regular time of nine o'clock.

Rainbow Productions was also going ahead with its development of Jeremy

Walker's Angelica, though children all through the Bible Belt were burning

their copies of the Angelica books. Rainbow fully expected the storm to blow

over. But there was some talk now of doing Angelica with live actors rather

than as a cartoon film. "We think we might have a very eerie story here,"

said the vice president of Rainbow, "a sort of Secret Garden type of story

about an adolescent girl living in an old house. We have bought a story and

theme here as well as drawings, you realize."

And speaking of live actors, "Entertainment Tonight" was on the spot outside

the Westwood to garner reactions to Final Score. The film was rated excellent

by just about everybody. And Belinda?

"Charming."

"Just beautiful."

"You can kind of see what all the fuss is about."

"Soon audiences in the Big Apple will have their opportunity to view the

controversial film," said a rather attractive female commentator. "Final

Score opens tomorrow at New York's Cinema X."

"Good for Susan. Good for Belinda," I said.

Around eight thirty David Alexander arrived. He had been with the DA all

afternoon.

"Look, they have nothing on you essentially," he assured me. "They found not

one shred of evidence in this house that proved either sexual contact or foul

play. Some blood on a sheet turned out to be menses. So she lived here. This

they already knew. But the public pressure is mounting. The pressure from

Daryl Blanchard is mounting.

"This is the deal they are offering as of now. If you will plead guilty to

several lesser charges-unlawful sexual intercourse and contributing to the

delinquency of a minor-they agree to send you to Chino for sixty days for

psychological testing and then the public will be satisfied. We have a little

room to negotiate on these charges, but frankly there is no guarantee as what

the eventual sentence may be."

"I don't like it," Dan said. "Those psychologists are crazy! You draw a

picture of her with a black crayon, they'll say the black crayon means death.

They don't know anything about what they're doing. We may never be able to

get you out."

"This is the alternative," David Alexander explained coldly. "They will

convene the grand jury and ask for an indictment on charges of murder, and

the grand jury will subpoena Belinda's letter. And when you refuse to turn

this over, you will be arrested for contempt of court."

"I'd destroy the letter before I gave it over to anyone."

"Don't even think of that. The letter is crucial. If your little girl is

never found alive-"

"Don't say it."

"Besides," Dan said, "you can't destroy the letter. The letter's in a vault

in New Orleans, right? You can't leave California. You try and they'll bust

you on the contributing thing, and they'll use the testimony of that cop you

lied to when you brought Belinda home from Page Street that night."

"That is unfortunately true," Alexander said. "And then they'll pile on

charges. They've got a sworn statement from your housekeeper in New Orleans

that Belinda did sleep in your bed. And a former waiter at the Cafe Flore

insists he saw you giving her wine to drink, though she was underage. Then

there's the kiddie-porn law in connection with the sale of the catalog in

local bookstores, the catalog, you follow me, not the paintings. Well! The

list is endless. But the fact remains, and I can not emphasize this

sufficiently, without Belinda to testify against you or without her body to

conclusively prove murder, they have nothing major that will stick!"

"When do you have to give them an answer?" I asked.

"By noon tomorrow. They want you in custody by six P.M. But the pressure is

mounting. They're getting national media attention. They have to act."

"Stall them," Dan said. "They won't make a move to arrest Jeremy without

warning-"

"No. Our communication lines are good. Unless, of course, something changes

dramatically."

"What the hell could change dramatically?" I asked.

"Well, they could find her body, of course."

I stared at him for a moment. "She is not dead," I said.

At eleven a delivery man from Western Union was there again, this time with a

dozen or more telegrams. I went through them hastily. There was one from

Susan that had come from New York.

"TRYING LIKE CRAZY TO REACH YOU, WALKER. IMPORTANT NEWS. OPERATORS WON'T CUT

IN. CALL THIS NUMBER IN LA. HEADED FOR FRISCO TOMORROW NIGHT. BE CAREFUL.

SUSAN."

I went to the phone. It must have rung ten times before a sleepy Texas voice

answered in Los Angeles.

"Yeah, man, she called from Kennedy a couple of hours ago. Says she's got

good news for you, and it's getting better and better. And she also told me

to tell you she tried every trick in the book to get through to you up

there."

"But what news, what else did she say?"

"Be careful, man, she says your wire is undoubtedly tapped."

"I'll call from the phone booth in five minutes-"

"Not necessary. All I know is what I just said. She's going on to Chicago to

set up Final Score. Then she'll be headed back here. She really tried to get

through to you, man, and so did I."

"Listen, you give her these names and numbers," I said. "Blair Sackwell,

Stanford Court Hotel, San Francisco, and G.G.-that's Belinda's father, George

Gallagher-at the Clift. She can get through to them and they can bring the

message to me."

I was excited when I hung up. Alex and G.G. were just coming in from the

Clift with G.G.'s suitcases. G.G. was taking Belinda's old room upstairs,

because he was certain now that the police had him under surveillance and

would pick up Belinda if she showed up at the Clift. In fact, they'd been

stopping young women and asking to see their identification, until the hotel

complained about that.

I knew Alex wasn't going to last long outside a five-star hotel, but he was

here for a couple of drinks and a little visit, and there was a nice fellow

back at the hotel instructed to take a cab up here immediately if Belinda

called.

"Don't get too excited about all this," Alex said when I told him about

Susan. "She's probably talking about her picture, remember she's the

director, she's got a shot at national distribution or she wouldn't have gone

to Rome and all that."

"Hell, she said news. Good news," I said. As soon as I got some extra quilts

for G.G., I called Blair at the Stanford Court and told him. He was excited.

He said he'd stay right by the phone.

Around midnight my neighbor Sheila rang the bell to tell me that my little

telephone answering machine message to Belinda was being broadcast by rock

stations all over the Bay Area. Somebody had even given it a little

background musical score.

"Here, Jer," she said, "when there's a funeral in my hometown or some big

tragedy or something, people bring things. Well, I know this is no funeral

and it's no picnic either, but I thought you could use a nice batch of

cookies, I baked these myself."

"Sheila, you'll visit me in jail, won't you?" I asked.

I watched the cops stopping her on the corner. I told Dan.

"Fucking harassment," he said. "They can't box you in like this. But we'll

wait to use that when it's best."

At three a.m. Thursday morning I lay on the floor of the attic studio, my

head on a pillow, the city lights my only illumination and the lights of the

radio at my side.

I smoked a cigarette, one of hers actually, from an unopened pack I'd found

in her bathroom when I came home. Her perfume had been in her closet still.

Yellow hairs on the pillow slip beneath the quilt.

The telephone gave its brief muffled ring. Out of the speaker came the sound

of the machine clicking on:

"My name is Rita Mendleson, I am, well never mind what I am. I believe I may

help you to find the missing girl. I see a field full of flowers. I see a

hair ribbon. I see some one falling, blood... If you want further

information, you can contact me at this number. I do not charge for my

services, but a modest donation, whatever your conscience dictates-"

I touched the volume button. Soon came the inevitable click, the inevitable

ring in the bowels of the house below, where a young stenographer hired by

Barbara sat at my desk listing each caller and each message on a yellow legal

pad.

The radio talked in the dark. A CBS commentator, coming from somewhere on the

East Coast:

"Do they chronicle the deterioration of a mind and a conscience as well as a

love affair gone wrong? Belinda begins innocently enough, in spite of her

nudity, as she gazes at us from setting after setting all too familiar to the

readers of Walker's books. But what happened to the children's artist when

his model matured before his very eyes, when his considerable talent-and make

no mistake these are masterpieces we speak of, these are paintings that will

survive even the most cruel of revelations here-but what happened when that

considerable talent could no longer confine her to the playroom and she

emerges the young woman in bra and panties lounging lasciviously on the

artist's bed? Do the last two pictures of this haunting and undeniably

beautiful exhibit chronicle Walker's panic and his eventual grief for the

irrepressible young woman whom he felt compelled to destroy?"

I fell asleep and I dreamed.

I was in a grand house that was familiar to me. It was Mother's house and my

house in San Francisco or some beautiful amalgam of the two. I knew all the

hallways and the rooms. Yet I saw a door I had never seen before. And when I

opened it, I found myself in a large exquisitely decorated corridor. One door

after another opened on rooms I had never visited. I felt such happiness to

find this. "And it is all mine," I said. Indescribable happiness. A feeling

of such buoyancy as I moved from room to room.

When I woke, it was five thirty and there was a pale rosy light burning

through the textureless gray membrane of the sky. Smell of San Francisco in

the morning, the cold fresh air from the ocean. All impurities washed away.

The dream lingered; the happiness lingered. Ah, too lovely, all those new

rooms. This was the third time in my life I had dreamed this dream.

And I remembered coming down to breakfast years and years ago in New Orleans

when I was a boy and telling Mother, who wasn't sick then, about just such a

dream.

"It's a dream of new discoveries," she'd said, "of new possibilities. A very

wonderful dream."

The night before I'd left New Orleans with all the Belinda paintings, the

last night I had spent in Mother's bedroom before coming back to San

Francisco, I had dreamed for the second time in my life this dream. I'd woken

to the rain lashing at the screens. And I'd felt Mother was close to me,

Mother was telling me again that it was a very wonderful dream. That was the

only time I really felt Mother since I had come home.

Paintings had come into my mind then, whole and complete paintings that I

would do when Belinda and I were together again. How private and wonderful it

had been, a whole new series springing to life so naturally, as if it could

not be stopped.

The canvases were huge and grand like the rooms in the dream. They were of

the landscape and the people of my childhood, and they had the power and

scope of history paintings, but they were not that. "Memory paintings," I had

said to myself that last night in New Orleans, going out on the porch and

letting the rain wash me. The atmosphere of the old Irish Channel streets

came back to me, Belinda and I walking, the giant breadth of the river

suddenly at my feet.

I saw the old parish churches in these paintings, I saw the people who lived

in the old streets. The &lay Procession, that was to be the first of these

paintings, surely, with all the children in their white clothes and the

women, in flowered dresses and black straw hats, on the sidewalks, with their

rosaries, and the little shotgun cottages behind them with their gingerbread

eaves. Mother could be in this picture, too. A great thronged incandescent

painting, awesome as it was grotesque, the faces of the common people I had

known stamped with their sometime brutality, the whole gaudy and squalid, and

tender with the details of the little girls' hands and their pearl rosaries

and their lace. Mother with her black gloves and her rosary, too. The blood-

red sky, yes, as it was so often over the river, and maybe the untimely rain

falling at a silver slant from lowering clouds.

The second painting would be The Mardi Gras. And I saw it as clearly now in

San Francisco, lying as I was on the attic floor, as I had seen it that last

stormy night back home. The great glittering papier-mâché floats shivering as

they were pulled beneath the branches of the trees, and the drunken black

flambeaux carriers dancing to the beat of the drums as they drank from their

pocket flasks. One of the torches has fallen into a float crowded with satin

-costumed revelers. Fire and smoke rise upwards like the graphic depiction of

an open-mouthed roar.

The morning light was brighter now over San Francisco, but the fog was still

solid, and the gray walled the windows of the studio. Everything was bathed

in a cold luminous light. The old rat and roach paintings looked like dark

windows into another world.

My soul ached. My heart ached. And yet I felt this happiness, the happiness

of the paintings yet to be done. I wanted so badly to begin. I looked down at

my hands. No paint left on them after so many days of being away from it. And

the brushes there waiting, and this light pouring in

"But what does it all mean without you, Belinda?" I whispered. "Where are

you, darling? Are you trying to get through, or is anger because of your

silence, anger and the unwillingness to forgive? Holy Communion, Belinda.

Come back to me."
[6]

On the morning cable news we saw the noon lines outside the theater in New

York that was showing Final Score. The New York Times had already given the

picture a rave.

"As for the ingénue herself, she is irrepressibly appealing. The distasteful

publicity surrounding her is simply forgotten once she appears. But one can

not help but wonder at the contradictions and ironies of a legal system that

is absolutely compelled to brand this well-endowed and obviously

sophisticated young actress a delinquent child."

Cable News Network at noon carried a spokesman from the Museum of Modern Art

in New York. A very private gentleman, he seemed, bald, myopic, reading

through thick glasses a prepared statement. When he paused for breath, he

would look at some distant point high above, as though trying to pick out a

certain star. Regarding the acquisition of the Belinda paintings, the museum

recognizes no obligation to judge the personal or public morals of the

artist. The museum judges the paintings as worthy of acquisition. The

trustees are in concurrence as to the unmistakable merits of the work.

Then the New York critic Garrick Samuels, a man I personally loathed. "We

seldom see an artist break out like this with such heat and force," he said.

"Walker demonstrates the craft of what we call the old masters, and yet the

pictures are distinctly modern. This is a unique wedding of competence and

inspiration. You see this how often? Maybe once in a hundred years?"

Thank you, Samuels, I still loathe you. Conscience in order on all counts.

I walked down the hall, looked out the windows. Same crowd, same faces. But

something was different. The tour bus which usually passed without pausing on

its way up to Castro, to show the gays to the tourists, had come to a halt.

Were those people inside looking at my house?

About one, Barbara awakened me from an uneasy nap on the living room couch.

"A kid just came to the door with a message from Blair Sackwell. Please call

him at this number from a phone booth at once."

I was still groggy when I went out the front door. And when the reporters

swamped me, I could hardly even be polite. I saw the two plainclothes guys

get out of their gray Oldsmobile. I looked at them for a second, then I waved

and pointed to the phone booth by the corner store. Immediately they nodded

and slowed their pace.

"Who are those guys, Jeremy?"

"Jeremy, has Belinda called you?" The reporters followed me across Noe and

Seventeenth.

"Just my bodyguards, gang," I said. "Any of you guys got a quarter?"

Immediately I saw five quarters in five hands. I took two of them, said,

Thanks, and closed the phone booth door.

"Well, that sure as hell took you long enough!" Blair said as soon as he

answered. "Where's G.G.?"

"Asleep, he was helping with the phones most of the night."

"Jeremiah's man in LA just got through to me. Said Susan caught him on her

way out of Chicago an hour ago. He wouldn't even talk to me on the Stanford

Court line, said to go call him from someplace down the street. That's where

you're talking to me now. Now listen. Susan says knows for certain that

Belinda was at the Savoy Hotel in Florence until two days ago."

"Christ, is she sure?"

"When Jeremiah got to Rome, friends told her Belinda had been doing extra

work at Cinecittá. They had lunch with her less than two weeks ago in the Via

Veneto. She was just fine."

"Thank God!"

"Now don't come apart on me. Listen. These people said Belinda had been

living in Florence and coming down to work a few days a week. Jeremiah put

her dad's confidential secretary on it in Houston. The woman called everybody

Susan knew in Florence, friends of Belinda's, Bonnie's, the works. She hit

pay dirt yesterday afternoon. Turned out Belinda had checked out of the Savoy

on Tuesday, same day Susan left Rome, been there under her own name, paid her

bill in full in traveler's checks and told the concierge she was headed for

the Pisa airport, she was going back to the States."

I slumped against the side of the phone booth. I was going to start bawling

like a child if I didn't get a grip on myself. "Rembrandt? You still there?"

"Blair, I think I was beginning to believe it myself," I said. I took out my

handkerchief and wiped my face. "I swear to God, I mean, I think was

beginning to believe she was dead."

There was a pause, but I didn't care what he was thinking. I shut my eyes for

a minute. I was still too relieved to think straight. I felt a crazy impulse

to open the damned door of the phone booth and yell to the reporters:

"Belinda's alive! She's alive!" Then the reporters would jump up and down and

scream "She's alive," too.

But I didn't do it. I stood there, caught someplace between laughing and

weeping, and then I tried to reason things out.

"Now, we can't call TWA or Pan Am for the passenger list," Blair said. "It's

too risky. But she couldn't have gotten through Kennedy or LAX until

yesterday. And it was already front page news."

"Blair, thousands of people go through customs. Maybe she went through Dallas

or Miami or someplace where it wasn't-"

"And maybe she went to the moon, who knows? But the point is, she is probably

in California already, and she's probably given up on the damn phones. I

mean, if I can't get through to you and Jeremiah couldn't get through to you,

then nobody can get through. And I suppose you caught Moreschi this morning

when he picked up Bonnie at the hospital, telling everybody about the cruel

crank calls she'd been getting from kids claiming to be Belinda?"

"Oh, shit."

"Yeah, you said it, but Marty thinks of everything. He says the studio and

the local radio stations have been getting the crank calls, too."

"Christ, he's locking her out, does he realize that?"

"So what would you do if you were her? Come straight here?"

"Look, Blair, I have a house in Carmel. Nobody, I mean nobody knows about it

except G.G. and Belinda and me. G.G. and I were down there last week. We left

money and a note for Belinda. She might have gone there. If I were her, I

would have gone there, at least to get some sleep and make a plan. Now if

either G.G. or I try to drive down, we take these plainclothes suckers with

us-"

"Give me the address," Blair said.

Quickly I described the place, the street, the turn off, how the houses

didn't have any numbers, all that.

"You leave it to me, Rembrandt. Midnight Mink is a heavy item in Carmel. I

know just the guy to send over there, and he doesn't even have to know why

he's doing it. He owes me one for a full-length coat I delivered to him

personally just in time for Christmas for a beat-up old movie queen who lives

in a falling-down hermitage just north of there at Pebble Beach. I spent

Christmas Eve of 1984 at thirty-eight thousand feet thanks to that SOB. He'll

do what I say. What time is it, one fifteen? Call me at this number at four,

if you haven't heard from me before that."

Dan and David Alexander were just getting out of a cab in front of the house

when I got back. We went inside together.

"They want you to surrender at six P.M.," Alexander said. "Daryl Blanchard

has just issued a statement to the press in New Orleans. After speaking to

your housekeeper there and the officers who interrogated her, he says he now

believes his niece to be dead. Bonnie made a similar statement in Los Angeles

when she was discharged from the hospital. But you can still make a deal on

the minor charges. The public won't know the difference once you are in

custody. That is all they want."

"You gotta listen to me. She may be on her way here." I told him everything

that Blair had reported. I told them about the hideaway in Carmel. I also

told him about the "crank calls."

David Alexander sat down at the dining table and made that steeple out of his

fingers just under his pursed lips. The dust swirled in the rays of sun

breaking through the lace curtains behind him. He looked as if he were in

prayer.

"I say, call their bluff," Dan said soberly. "It will take them time convene

the grand jury, it will take time to subpoena her letter."

"And then we lose our bargaining power as to the lesser charges." Alexander

said.

"You've got to keep me out of jail until I make contact with her," I said.

"But how do you propose to make contact and what do you expect-"

"Look," Dan said, "Jeremy is asking us to keep him out of jail as long as we

can."

"Thank you, Dan," I said.

Alexander's face was rigid, completely concealing whatever were his true

thoughts. Then he made some little shift in expression that indicated perhaps

he'd made up his mind.

"All right," he said. "We'll inform the deputy district attorney that we have

new information as to Belinda's whereabouts. We need time to investigate. We

will argue that the warrant for Belinda may be frightening and intimidating

her, which is highly detrimental to our client's position. We will push the

date of surrender back as far as we can."

At three o'clock a bellhop from the Stanford Court rang the bell and gave me

a new number for Blair. Please call him from a booth as soon as I could.

"Look, she's been in the Carmel house. Today!"

"How can you tell?"

"Ironclad evidence. The newspapers open all over the breakfast table with

today's date. And a half-drunk cup of coffee and an ash tray full of half-

smoked fancy foreign cigarettes."

"That's it. That's Belinda!"

"But no luggage and no clothes. And guess what my man found in the bathroom?

Two empty bottles of Clairol Loving Care."

"What the hell is Clairol Loving Care?"

"A hair rinse, Rembrandt, a hair rinse. And the color was chestnut brown."

"Way to go, Belinda! That's wonderful." The reporters on the corner heard me

yelling. They started running towards me. I gestured for them to be quiet.

"You bet it is, Rembrandt! 'Cause Loving Care washes out. How the hell could

I do the wedding photo of you in Midnight Mink if her beautiful hair was

permanently dyed brown?"

I laughed in spite of myself. I was too happy not to laugh. Blair went on

talking.

"Look, my man left notes for her all over. But she's already cleared out. And

my line's tapped. And so is G.G.'s at the Clift. And what's to stop her from

ringing your doorbell and getting stopped by the cops no matter what color

hair she's got?"

"She's not that dumb, not Belinda, you know she isn't. Listen, speaking of

G.G. and Alex, I gotta get word to them about this. They went up to Ryan's

Cafe two blocks from here. I'll call you at the hotel when I get back."

I hung up and shoved my way through the reporters. Couldn't say why I yelled,

why I was smiling, really, guys, get off my back, not now! I gave a friendly

wave to the plainclothes guys, then started walking fast up to Castro Street.

I didn't realize till I crossed Hartford that the reporters were following

me, about six of them at a distance of less than three feet. Then there were

the plainclothes guys behind them.

I really started to get crazy. "You guys leave me alone," I started yelling

at the reporters. They just clumped together and looked at me, as if to say,

Nobody here but us chickens. I thought I'd go nuts. Somebody took my picture

with a little automatic camera. Finally I just threw up my hands and stalked

up the hill.

When I turned the corner, there was Alex in his fedora and raincoat and G.G.

in a denim blazer, standing like two male models out of Esquire magazine in

front of the Castro Theater looking at the playbills.

"Jeremy!" G.G. shouted when he saw me. He waved for me to come to them quick.

But I had already seen the marquee above them. The man on the long ladder was

still putting the black letters in place:

MIDNGHT SHOW TONIGHT-DIRECTOR ON STAGE IN PERSON. BELINDA IN "FINAL SCORE"

"Jeremy, break out your black dinner jacket and if you don't have one, I'll

buy you one," G.G. said, as he took my arm. "I mean, we're going, all of us,

first-class, goddamn it, even if we have to take the gentlemen with their

nightsticks with us. I am not missing my daughter's debut this time around."

"You just may see your daughter in the flesh!" I said.

I made sure my back was to the little crowd of cops and reporters as I

huddled there with Alex and G.G. and told them everything Blair's man had

found out.

"Now all I have to do," I said, "is stay out of the slammer for another

twenty-four hours. I know she's coming. She's less than two hundred miles

away."

"Yes," Alex sighed, "that's all, unless she turned around and went other

direction, as far as she could from here."

He beckoned to the reporters. "Come on, ladies and gentlemen," he said,

"let's all go into the Twin Peaks bar now and I'll treat you to a round of

drinks."
[7]

At eleven forty-five P.M., Susan Jeremiah's white Cadillac stretch limousine

lodged itself uneasily in the narrow driveway, and the reporters mobbed it,

cameras flashing, as Susan stepped out of the rear door, smiling under the

brim of her scarlet cowboy hat, and waved to us at the living room windows

just above.

G.G., Alex, and I pushed our way down the steps. We were all turned out in

black dinner jackets and boiled shirts, cummerbunds, patent leather shoes,

the whole bit.

"You're going to miss the film, ladies and gentlemen, if you don't hurry!"

Alex said genially. "Now everybody has a press pass? Who does not have a

pass?"

Dan went across the street to the plainclothesmen in the Oldsmobile. No need

for anyone to get crazy. He had four passes for them compliments of Susan,

and we were now leaving to go up to Sanchez, turn right, then go down

Eighteenth to Castro then right again and down to the theater, which was

actually only one block from here.

It seemed to be going amicably enough, but then Dan gave me the signal that

he was going on with the cops.

"Can you believe it!" G.G. muttered. "Are they holding him hostage? Will they

beat him with a rubber hose if we make a mad dash?"

"Just move on, son, and keep smiling," Alex said.

As we slid one by one into the blue-velvet-lined car, I saw Blair, cigar in

hand, opposite Susan, in the little jump seat, wearing the lavender tuxedo

Belinda had described in her letter, and the inevitable white mink-lined

cloak. The car was already full of smoke.

Susan put her arm around me immediately and gave me a quick press of her

smooth cheek.

"Son of a bitch, you sure as hell know how to launch a picture, Walker," she

said in her slow Texas drawl. Her red silk rodeo shirt had three inch fringe

on it, and a crust of multi-colored embroidery set off with rhinestones and

pearls. The pants appeared to be red satin, her boots too were red. Her

cowboy hat was resting on her right knee.

But the woman herself obscured the brilliance of the clothing. She had a

sleek dark-skinned radiance to her, a cleanness of bone and line that

suggested a perfect admixture of Indian blood. Her black hair was luxuriant

even though it was clipped short and brushed back from her face. And if

Belinda had gotten all that right in her letter, she'd left out a few things.

The woman was sexy. I mean conventionally sexy. She had big breasts and an

extremely sensuous mouth.

"Blair's told you everything?" I asked. We were still doing a bit of kissing

and handshaking but the limo was backing out.

Susan nodded: "You've got until six in the morning to give yourself up."

"Exactly. That's the max we could get. Might have been better if Bonnie and

Marty hadn't joined brother Daryl in New Orleans this evening to personally

prevail upon the New Orleans police to dig up the garden surrounding my

mother's house."

"The lying shits," Susan said. "Why the hell don't you give them both

barrels, Walker? Release Belinda's letter not to the police but right to the

press."

"Can't do it, Susan. Belinda wouldn't want it," I said.

The limousine was turning on Sanchez. I could see one car of plainclothesmen

in front of us, and the other right behind.

"So what's our strategy?" Blair said. "No one's heard from her, but that is

hardly surprising under the circumstances. Her best bet may be to show up at

the premiere tonight."

"That's exactly what I'm hoping she'll do," I said. "The announcement was in

the evening Examiner."

"Yes, and we ran time on the rock stations," Susan said, "and did handbills

on Castro and Haight, too."

"All right, suppose she shows up," G.G. asked. "Then what do we do?" We were

slowing down now that we had turned on Eighteenth. In fact, there was a heavy

traffic jam as we approached Castro. Typical late-night party atmosphere all

around. Music pumping from the bars and from the speakers of the tramp

electric guitarist on the corner and out of the window of the upstairs record

shop.

"The question is, what are you willing to do?" Blair asked, leaning forward

and fixing me with his eyes.

"Yeah, that's what me and this guy here have been talking about," Susan said

gesturing to Blair. "Like we're down to the wire now, you're facing jail in

the morning. Now, are you willing to make a run for it, Walker, if it comes

to that?"

"Look, I've been sitting in the living room of my house for the last five

hours thinking about nothing but that very question. And the answer is

simple. It's just like the exhibit. My needs and Belinda's needs are in total

synchronization. We've got to get hold of each other and get out. If she

wants a divorce later she can have it, but right now she needs me just about

as much as I need her."

I could see Susan and Blair exchanging glances. Alex, who had taken the other

jump seat opposite, was watching too.

And strangely enough I was getting nervous, upset. I could feel my hand

shaking. I could feel my heart accelerating. I wasn't sure why this was

happening just now.

"You have anything to say, Alex?" G.G. asked a little timidly. "I've got her

birth certificate in my pocket. It's got my name on it, and I'm ready to do

whatever Jeremy wants me to do."

"No, son," Alex said. He looked at me. "I realized in New Orleans that Jeremy

was going down the line with this thing. As I see it, his getting away

somewhere long enough to marry Belinda is the only chance he's got. I think

those lawyers would admit that, too, if one of them wasn't so cold-blooded

and the other one wasn't so scared. I just don't see how you're going to do

it. You need anything from me, you can have it. I'll be all right no matter

what happens. At this point I'm just about the most famous innocent bystander

involved."

"Alex, if any of this winds up hurting you-" I started.

"It hasn't," said Susan offhandedly. "Everybody in Tinseltown's talking about

Alex. He's coming out of it a hero, and real clean. You know the old saying,

'Just so long as they spell his name right... ' "

Alex nodded, unruffled, but I wondered if it was that simple.

"I love you, Alex," I said softly. I was really on the edge of losing it

suddenly, and I wasn't sure why.

"Jeremy, stop talking like we're going to a funeral," Alex said. He reached

over and gave my shoulder a nudge. "We're on our way to a premiere."

"Listen, man," Susan said, "I know what he's feeling. He's going into the

slammer at six A.M." She looked at me. "How do you feel about splitting out

of here tonight whether Belinda shows or not?"

"I'd do anything to get to Belinda," I said.

Blair sat back, crossed his legs, folded his arms, and looked at Susan in

that clever knowing way again. Susan was sitting back, her long legs

stretched out as far as they could go in the limo in front of her, and she

just smiled back and shrugged.

"Now all we need is Belinda," she said.

"Yeah, and we've got cops to the left of us and cops to the right of us,"

Alex said casually. "And at the theater cops in front and back."

We had rounded the corner onto Castro, and now I could see the line, three

and four deep, all the way back from the theater to Eighteenth.

Two enormous klieg lights set out in front of the theater were sweeping the

sky with their pale-blue beams. I read the marquee again, saw those lights

flickering all the way up on the giant sign that read Castro, and I thought,

If she isn't here, somewhere, just to see this, my heart is going to break.

The limo was crawling towards the theater entrance, where a roped walkway had

been made, to the left of the box office, leading to the front doors.

It might damn well have been an opening at Grauman's Chinese Theater, the

crowd was so thick and making so much noise. The limousine was turning heads.

People were obviously trying to see through the tinted glass. G.G. was

searching the crowd, I could see that. But Susan was sitting there like

someone had said, "Freeze."

"Oh, Belinda," I whispered. "Just be here for your own sake, honey. I want

you to see this."

I was really losing it. I was coming apart inside. Up till now the whole

thing had been endurable moment by moment, but after so many days shut up in

the cocoon of the house, this spectacle worked on me like sentimental music.

Yes, really, coming unglued.

Susan picked up the phone and spoke to the driver:

"Listen, you stay out front till we come out. Double-park, take the ticket,

whatever-OK, OK, just so long as you're there when we come out the doors."

She hung up. "This is a fucking mob scene all right."

"Worse than New York?"

"You better believe it, look."

I saw what she meant. The side of Castro Street opposite the theater was

packed. The oncoming traffic wasn't moving at all. A couple of cops were

trying to loosen up the jam ahead of us. Another pair were trying to keep the

intersection clear. Everywhere I saw familiar faces, waiters who worked in

the local diners, the salespeople from the local shops, neighbors who always

said hello when they passed. Somewhere out there was Andy Blatky and Sheila

and lots of old friends I'd called this afternoon. Everybody I knew would be

there actually.

We were moving closer inch by inch. There was no air in the limousine. I felt

like I was going to start bawling on the spot. But I knew the worst hadn't

come yet. It would when Belinda appeared up there on the screen. That is,

unless Belinda appeared right here first.

And it was happening at the Castro, of all places, our neighborhood show, the

elegant old-fashioned theater where she and I had seen so many films

together, where we'd snuggled up together in the dark on quiet week nights,

anonymous and safe.

The limo had angled to the curb. The crowd was really pushing on the red

velvet ropes. The box office had a big sign saying SOLD OUT. The local

television stations had been allowed to set up their video cameras just

beyond it. And a little group of people were arguing at the far right door,

where a hand-lettered sign read PRESS ONLY. And somebody was shouting. It

looked like a woman in spike heels and an awful leopard skin coat was getting

turned away, but not without a noisy fight.

People looked bewildered as the plainclothesmen got out of the car in front

of us and went straight towards the lobby door. Dan was right behind them. He

turned when he got to the video cameras and watched as our driver got out of

the limo and came around to open the door.

"You go first, darlin', this is your audience," Alex said to Susan. Susan put

on her red cowboy hat. Then we helped her to climb over us and get out.

A roar went up from the young people on either side of the ropes. Then cheers

went up from everywhere, in the intersection up ahead and across the street.

Camera flashes were going off all around.

Susan stood in the brilliant light under the marquee waving to everybody,

then she gestured for me to get out of the car. The flashes were blinding me

a little. Another cheer went up. Kids were clapping on either side of us.

I heard a chorus of voices shout: "Jeremy, we're for you! ... Hang in there,

Jeremy!" And I gave a little silent prayer of thanks for all the liberals and

crazies, the gentle freaks, and the plain ordinary tolerant San Franciscans

here. They weren't burning my books in this town.

There were screams and whistles coming from everywhere. G.G. got his big

round of applause as he stepped out. Then I heard a shrill voice:

"Signora Jeremiah! Eeeh, Signora Jeremiah!" It was coming from our right. In

a thick Italian accent it continued: "Remember, Cinecittá, Roma! You promise

me a pass!"

Then an explosion went off inside my head. Cinecittá, Roma. I turned from

right to left trying to locate the voice. The coat, the awful leopard coat I

just saw, it was Belinda's! Those spike heels, they were Belinda's. Italian

accent or no Italian accent, that was Belinda's voice! Then I felt G.G.'s

hand clamp down on my arm. "Don't make a move, Jeremy!" he whispered in my

ear. "But where is she?"

"Signora Jeremiah! They won't let me into the theater!"

At the press door! She was staring right at me through big black-rimmed

Bonnie-style glasses, the dark-brown dyed hair slicked straight back from her

face. And it was that ghastly leopard coat. Two men were trying to stop her

from coming forward. She was cursing at them in Italian. They were pushing

her back towards the ropes.

"Hold on there, just a minute there," Susan called out. "I know that gal,

everything's OK, just calm down, it's OK."

The crowd erupted suddenly with a new explosion of cheers and shrieks. Blair

had gotten out of the limousine and was throwing up both his arms. Whistles,

howls.

Susan was striding towards the men who were shoving Belinda. G.G. held me

tighter. "Don't look, Jeremy!" he whispered.

"Don't move, Jeremy!" Blair said under his breath. He was turning from right

to left to give the crowd a good view of the lavender tuxedo. They were

really eating it up.

Susan had reached the scene of the ruckus. The men had let go of Belinda.

Belinda had a steno pad in her hand and a camera around her neck. She was

talking like crazy to Susan in Italian. Did Susan speak Italian? The

plainclothesmen from the car behind us were glancing over as they went to

join the first pair, who were standing behind the video cameras right by the

doors. Dan was watching Belinda. Belinda let loose with another loud, shrill

riff of Italian, obviously complaining about the people at the press door.

Susan was nodding. Susan had her arm around Belinda, was clearly trying to

calm her down.

"Move forward," G.G. said between his teeth. "You keep looking and the cops

will be all over her. Move."

I was trying to do what he was telling me, trying to put one foot before the

other. Susan was there. Susan would handle it. And then I saw Belinda's eyes

again, looking right at me, through the little knot of people around her, and

I saw her beautiful little babymouth suddenly smile.

I was paralyzed. Blair shoved right past me and G.G. He was throwing more

kisses to the crowd. He let the cloak swirl around him.

"Five minutes till midnight, ladies and gentlemen, time to put on your best

Midnight Mink."

More screams, catcalls, whistles. He beckoned for us to follow him now.

"Jeremy, go to the door," G.G. whispered.

Another roar went up as Alex stepped out of the car. Then there was solid

applause, respectful applause, moving back from the ropes all through the

people on the sidewalk on both sides of the street.

Alex nodded his thanks in all directions, took a long slow bow. Then he put

his hand on my arm and gently propelled me forward as he greeted those who

pressed in.

"No, darlin', I'm not in the movie, just here to see a really good film."

"Yes, sweetheart, good to see you." He stopped to sign an autograph. "Yes,

darlin', thank you, thank you, yes, and you want to know a secret? That was

my favorite film, too."

The plainclothesmen were watching us. Not her, us. Two of them turned and

went on into the lobby. Dan hung back.

Belinda and Susan were at the press door. Belinda gave Susan a peck on the

cheek, then went inside.

All right, she was in! I let G.G. practically shove me into the lobby, too.

Dan and the last two plainclothesmen brought up the rear.

I was as close to heart failure as ever in my life. The lobby too was jammed,

with ropes marking off our path to the doors. We couldn't see over to the

right side, where Belinda had gone in.

But within seconds we were inside the theater proper. And I saw the very back

row of the center section had been marked off for us. The plainclothes guys

sat down across the aisle from us in the back row of the side section. Dan

stayed with them. The three rows in front of us, clear across the center,

were already full of reporters, some of whom had just been outside my house.

There were columnists from all the local papers, several beautifully turned

out socialites, and a number of other writers and people connected with the

local arts, some of them turning to nod or give a little wave. Andy Blatky

and Sheila, who'd gotten their special passes, were already down front.

Sheila threw me a kiss. Andy gave a right-on fist.

And there was Belinda standing over on the right side, chewing a wad of gum

as she scribbled like mad on her steno pad. She looked up, squinted at us

through the glasses, then started across the center section through the empty

row right in front of the roped-off seats.

"Mr. Walker, you give me an autograph!" she screamed in the Italian accent.

Everybody was looking at her. I was petrified. That's it, I thought. My heart

is going to give out now.

Alex and Blair had gone on into the row ahead of me. So had G.G., and I could

see him watching her, blank-faced, probably as scared as I was. Susan was

standing in the aisle with her thumbs in her belt.

Belinda came right up to me, her mouth working fast with the gum, and shoved

the exhibit catalog in front of me along with a ballpoint pen.

For a second I couldn't do anything but look right at her, at her blue eyes

peering out from under the brown eyelashes and brown eyebrows and the slick

brown hair. I tried to breathe, to move, to take the pen, but I couldn't.

She was smiling. Oh, beautiful Belinda, my Belinda. And I could feel my lips

moving, feel my own smile coming back. The fucking hell with the whole world

if it was watching.

"Sign the kid's autograph, Walker," Susan said. "Before they let in the

thundering herd."

I looked down at the catalog and saw the color print of Belinda, Come Back

circled in red. Under it was written: "I love you." Her unmistakable script.

I took the pen out of her hand, my hand shaking so badly I scarcely control

it, and I wrote: "Marry me?" the pen skittering like skates on ice.

She nodded, winked at me, then let loose in Italian again to Susan. The

plainclothesmen weren't even looking at her. What the hell was she doing?

Suddenly Susan broke up. She threw back her head and let go with a loud, deep

laugh and, doubling her right hand into a fist, she hit me the arm: "Sit

down, Walker!" she said.

The doors to the lobby were being opened. I moved into the seat next to G.G.

as Susan took the aisle seat next to me. And then Belinda sat down in the

aisle seat across from us, right in front of the plainclothesmen, utterly

oblivious to them, and flashed another great big smile.

"Susan!" I whispered in panic.

"Shut up," she whispered back.

The crowd was already streaming down all four aisles.

My heart was so loud I wondered if the plainclothes guys could hear it.

Belinda, when I could catch a glimpse of her through the people passing us,

was scribbling again.

"Now what do we do?" G.G. whispered to me.

"How the fuck should I know?" I asked.

I couldn't tell whether Alex had recognized her or not, he was charting with

the ladies in front of him, and Blair had a similar conversation going with a

young reporter I recognized from the Stanford Court.

Susan sat there, with her red hat on, and her long fingers spread out on her

knees, just watching the people stream in.

It didn't take long for the theater to fill. Pretty soon only a few were left

combing the place for seats together, then splitting up to take the last

empties on the far aisles. The lights went dim. Somebody tapped Susan on the

shoulder. And she started slowly down the main aisle towards the stage.

Belinda was staring right at me, but I didn't dare look directly at her. Then

I saw that G.G. was looking at her and she was beaming at him. "G.G., she

doesn't know the cops are behind her!" I whispered.

"The cops are everywhere, Jeremy," he whispered back. "Just try to keep very

calm."

Then Belinda turned and asked one of the cops very loudly in that accent if

it was OK to smoke in the theater, and he said no, and she threw up her hand

in exasperation, and then I heard him lean forward and say something in

Italian to her, very apologetic in tone.

Suddenly she was talking to him in Italian. And he was talking to her.

"Christ, G.G." I whispered. "The fucking cop is Italian."

"Just take a deep breath, Jeremy," G.G. said. "Let her handle it. She's an

actress, remember? So she's going for the Academy Award."

All I could catch were a lot of place names, Firenze, Siena, si, si. North

Beach. North Beach! I was going to lose my mind.

But Susan had just gone up the little steps to the stage. The spotlight hit

her, setting her red satin clothes beautifully on fire. The theater was alive

with enthusiastic applause.

Susan smiled, took off her cowboy hat, got another big volley of whistles and

claps, and then she gestured for quiet.

"Thank you all for coming out tonight," she said. "This San Francisco

premiere of Final Score is kind of a special event for us, and I know we all

wish Belinda could be here, too, to see the show."

Loud applause. Everybody was clapping, even the cool people in the press rows

in front of us. Everybody that is, except the cops, and Belinda who was again

scribbling on her pad.

"Well, I'm just here to remind you of what I think you really do know... that

there are lots of other people in this movie, lots of people who helped to

make it a special experience, including actress Sandy Miller, who is really

the star." More applause. "Sandy would be here tonight if she wasn't in

Brazil scouting locations for a picture. And I know she thanks y'all for your

warm applause. Now y'all will pay close attention to the credits, won't you,

because all of these people did a fine job, but I can't leave this microphone

without thanking Belinda's mother, Bonnie Blanchard, for financing this

picture. Because without Bonnie it would never have been made."

She didn't wait for the crowd's reaction on that one, but left the stage

immediately, and there was only one beat, maybe two, of hesitation before the

crowd applauded again.

The lights were out by the time Susan reached her seat. The theater fell dead

silent. Final Score had begun.

I could scarcely see the first few scenes-or hear them. I was sweating under

the boiled shirt and hot dinner jacket. I rested my head in my hands.

And then I was jolted suddenly by Blair pushing his way out of the row,

whispering, "Stay where you are," as he went by.

Susan waited a couple of seconds, then followed him.

Belinda took out her cigarettes and her lighter, glanced back at the cop and

shrugged, and went out to the lobby, too.

"We're going to sit here like two little birds on a perch," G.G. whispered.

I started watching the movie just so I wouldn't start yelling and screaming.

Then Susan came back. But Blair and Belinda did not.

"So what's happening?" I whispered to her.

She made a little gesture for me to be quiet.

By the end of the first forty-five minutes of the movie, two things were

clear. Blair and Belinda were flat out gone. And this movie was a viable

commercial hit.

Of course, I knew every syllable of it from watching it during those drunken

days in New Orleans right before G.G. and Alex had come down. But no

videotape is a substitute for the theater experience. Only here could I feel

the pace, the responsiveness of the audience, the way the timing and the

humor, which was considerable, worked.

When Belinda finally appeared on horseback, the audience broke into

spontaneous applause. Then the crowd went dead quiet during the love scene in

the white bedroom of the little house. I felt a frisson all through my body

when the moment came, the moment I had painted, Belinda's head back, Sandy's

lips on her chin.

As soon as the scene was over, the applause broke out again.

Then I got up and I went out into the lobby. I couldn't stand it a moment

longer. I had to at least get up and move my legs. And damn it, Susan had to

get her ass out here and tell me something. I was going to drag her out if

she didn't come.

I went to the candy counter and asked for some popcorn. The little knot of

people talking on the balcony stairs had gone quiet.

Two of the plainclothesmen came out and passed behind me over to the ashtray

by the men's room door.

"The popcorn's on us, Jeremy," said the girl behind the counter.

"You remember Belinda?" I asked. "All the times we came in together?"

The girl nodded. "I hope it works out all right."

"Thanks, honey," I said.

Susan had just come out. She went to the one door that was open to the street

and stood there looking out. She had her hat pressed down really low, and her

thumbs were hooked in the back of her pants.

I came up beside her. I saw the limo out there. I saw one of the

plainclothesmen tense, like we were going to run.

"Congratulations, lady, it's a bang-up film," I said. "Should have been

released a long time before now."

She smiled at me, nodded. She was almost as tall as I was. We were almost eye

to eye. But, of course, she had on those high-heeled cowboy boots.

Then, without her lips even moving, she whispered: "Reno or bust, OK?"

The chills went down my arms and back. "When you say the word."

She looked outside again. I pushed the popcorn at her. She took a handful,

ate it.

"You're sure?" she whispered. "Belinda wants you to be really sure! She said

to say Holy Communion to you and Are you sure?"

I smiled and looked out at the limo gleaming like a big white opal in the

lights of the marquee. I thought of my house only two blocks around the

corner, the fortress of the past two decades, all choked with dolls and toys

and clocks and things that had not meant anything for years and years. I

thought of Belinda smiling up at me through that lovely disguise.

"Honey, you can't know how sure I am," I said. "Holy Communion, she said it.

Reno or bust."

She was satisfied. She turned to go back in. "Nice sitting in the back row,"

she said in a normal voice, "I can keep my hat on, for a change."

Dan was suddenly standing next to me. He had lighted a cigarette already, and

I could see it shaking between his thumb and middle finger as he tapped the

ash onto the rug. The plainclothesmen were still over by the ashtray, their

eyes on us.

"Client-lawyer privilege," I said.

"Always," Dan said. But he sounded as if he had no more stamina left in him.

He leaned his shoulder against the door.

"You're one of my closest friends in the whole world, you know that, don't

you?" I asked.

"You asking my opinion on something?" he asked. "Or are you saying good-bye?"

I could see his teeth biting into his lip.

I didn't answer for a moment. I ate some of the popcorn. In fact, I realized

I'd been eating the popcorn ever since I bought it. It was probably the first

thing I'd really eaten with any gusto in days. I almost laughed. "Dan, I want

you to do something for me," I said.

He looked up as if to say, What now? Then he glanced at me and gave me a

warm, but very worn smile.

"Give all the toys to an orphanage or a school or something," I said. "You

don't have to say where they came from. Just see they go to some place where

kids will enjoy them, OK?"

His lip was trembling, and he drew up his shoulders like he was going to

yell. But he didn't. He took another drag on the cigarette and looked out the

open door again.

"And Andy's sculpture, you've got to get that out of my backyard and out

someplace where people can see it."

He nodded. "I'll handle it." Then I saw his eyes glass over.

"Dan, I'm sorry about all this as far as you're concerned."

"Jer, save it. At least until you get my bill." But then he gave me another

of his rare and very genuine smiles. So quick maybe nobody else would have

caught it. "I just hope you make it," he said, as he looked out the door

again.
[8]

Two seconds after the last shot faded, after the applause started, Susan was

out the doors with me and G.G. right behind her, striding through the lobby

and across the pavement to the limousine.

Alex had not followed, and I knew this was deliberate. But I saw the

plainclothesmen just coming out, with the crowd flowing right behind them, as

I slid after G.G. into the backseat.

I don't think I realized until the motor started that Susan was at the wheel.

The driver was gone. The bars on Castro hadn't closed yet, the streets were

relatively deserted, and the limousine moved forward very fast around the cop

car in front of it and made a smooth right onto Seventeenth, just as if we

were going home.

I glanced back. The cops had not even unlocked the door of their car. Dan was

talking to the one with the keys in his hand.

Then we were off, roaring past Hartford, G.G. and I thrown forward, the limo

gaining speed as it ran through the stop sign on Noe and went on past my

house and screeched into a left-hand turn at Sanchez Street. "Jesus, Susan,

you'll kill us," G.G. whispered.

I could hear the sirens suddenly screaming behind us, and then I looked out

and saw the flashing light.

"Hell, damn!" Susan said. She slammed on the brakes, and we skidded into the

intersection, barely missing an old man crossing the street, who had

obviously made Susan stop. He turned, yelled at us, gave us the finger. The

cop car was blazing across Noe.

Susan swerved left on Sanchez and raced ahead.

"Fuckers saw us turn, damn it, hang on," Susan said.

She threw us into a left turn on Market and then a sharp right, roaring into

another left.

I saw the lights of the Golden Bear Motel above us, the balconies. She had

driven us around back, out of sight of the street, and come to a stop in a

parking slot.

"Move it, both of you!" she said.

The sirens were multiplying. But they were racing down Sanchez. They hadn't

made the turn on Market Street.

A big silver Lincoln Continental had pulled up right behind us, and Susan

opened the passenger door. G.G. and I slid into the back. Blair was driving,

wearing a red baseball cap over his bald head.

"Get down, all of you," he said in that ferocious voice of his.

Sirens were screaming past on Market now, right out front.

I could feel the car rolling steadily out of the driveway then turning right

as if we had all the time in the world. We were cruising back towards Castro.

A squad car roared by, light revolving. I didn't dare look, but I thought it

turned left.

"So far, so good!" Blair said. "Now Walker, how the hell do I get to Fifth

and Mission from here? Fast!"

I glanced up over the back of the seat and saw squad cars all over Castro.

The crowd was pouring out of the theater still.

"Let's get the fuck out of here," I said. "Go straight up the hill, up

Seventeenth."

There were so many sirens now it sounded like a five-alarm fire.

But Blair went up the hill at old-geyser speed until I told him to take a

right again, and then led him back down again on Market up near Fifteenth.

Within minutes we were in the early-morning glare and waste of downtown, away

from the sirens and away from the Castro, and nobody was the wiser. Nobody

had even seen Susan make that lightning turn into the motel.

When we finally turned off Mission into the big multistory parking lot

opposite the Chronicle Building, Blair said, "Get ready for another change."

This time it was a big cushy silver van we piled into, the kind with shaggy

upholstery and tinted glass. Susan took the wheel again, Blair rode shotgun

beside her and, when I opened the side door of the van, I saw Belinda in

there, and I climbed up inside and into her arms.

I squeezed her so tight I might have hurt her as we pulled out. For this one

second I didn't care about anything in the world-people chasing us, looking

for us, it didn't matter. I had her. I was kissing her, her mouth, her eyes,

feeling her kisses just as heated and crazy as mine, and I'd defy the whole

world to separate us now.

The van was back on Mission. Sirens again, but they were blocks away.

Only reluctantly did I let her go and let her turn towards G.G. and embrace

him, too.

I sat down in the backseat, winded, anxious, and deliriously happy and just

feasted my eyes on her and G.G. hugging, those two who looked more like twins

than father and daughter, enjoying their own version of the moment I was

feeling right now.

"All right, gang," Susan said, "we ain't home free yet. The Bay Bridge, where

is it? And if you see a squad car or any funny-looking car for that matter,

get down!" I saw she'd taken off her cowboy hat-in fact, she had on one of

those baseball hats just like Blair. Two nice vacationers, they looked like.

And nobody could see us on account of the tinted glass.

"Straight ahead, Susan, you'll see the sign, last on ramp by the East Bay

Terminal," Belinda said.

"Hey, talk to me," I said, pulling her back against me. "Just talk to me. Say

anything, say anything at all."

"Jeremy, you crazy guy!" she said. "I love you, you crazy guy. You did it.

You really did."

I held her with no intentions of ever letting her escape again. I held her

face tightly, kissing her mouth a little too hard perhaps, but she didn't

seem to mind at all. Then I started taking the pins out of her shiny brown

hair. And she shook it all out. She put her hands on the side of my face, and

then she looked like she was about to cry.

G.G. stretched his legs out on the middle seat in front of us, lit a

cigarette, and shut his eyes.

"OK, gang, four hours till Reno," Susan said. We were going up the ramp to

the bridge. "And when we hit the open freeway, this van's gonna fly."

"Yes, well, please crash-land at the first liquor store you see past

Oakland," G.G. said. "I need a drink even if I have to stick the place up."

Everybody laughed. I was positively dopey suddenly. I was so happy with

Belinda against me and her arm around me. I was floating.

I looked out the deep window at the silver rafters of the Bay Bridge above.

The van was rocking with a hypnotic rhythm as it went over the seams in the

bridge beneath us, and in the early morning there was not another car to be

seen.

It felt odd to me, like the first time I had come to California when I had

been very young and I had everything that mattered to me in one suitcase and

dreams of pictures in my head.

Dreams of pictures. I could have seen them now if I shut my eyes. Out of the

radio came a country-and-western song real low, a lady singing one of those

preposterous lyrics, like the washing machine broke down after you broke up

with me, and I started to laugh. My body felt tired and light and full of

energy, the way it hadn't since Belinda left.

Belinda snuggled closer. She was looking at me very intently, eyes even bluer

on account of the dark lashes. Her hair had fallen down free over the collar

of the horrible leopard coat. I realized there was luggage piled in the van

behind us, tons of luggage, and there were boxes and tripods and cameras in

black cases and other things.

"Mink coats," she said, as she watched me. "You don't mind getting married in

a mink coat?"

"You damn well better not mind!" Blair said over his shoulder. Susan gave a

deep-throated laugh.

"I love it," I said.

"You madman," she said. "You really did it all right, and what happens when

you realize what you did?"

Then I looked down at her and saw she was afraid.

"You think I don't realize?" I said.

"They're burning your books, Jeremy," she said with a little catch in her

voice. "All over the country they're taking them out of the libraries and

burning them in the town squares."

"Yeah, and they're hanging him in the New York Museum of Modern Art, aren't

they?" Blair yelled. "What the hell do you want?"

"Take it easy, Blair," G.G. said. His voice seemed to capture exactly anxiety

I saw in Belinda's face.

"I'm scared for you, Jeremy," she said. "I was scared for you all the way

back on the plane from Rome. I was scared for you every moment till saw you

tonight, and even now I'm scared scared scared. I tried to call from every

phone booth between here and Los Angeles, you know that, don't you? I'd never

expected you to do it, Jeremy, not really, and been scared ever since I found

out you did."

"Belinda, this is the happiest day of my life. It's the happiest day I can

ever remember," I said. "I might break into laughter and never be able stop."

"You wouldn't have done this," she said, "if I hadn't run out on like that."

"Belinda, it is too late for this foolishness!" Blair said.

"Be quiet, Blair," G.G. said.

"Belinda, what do I have to say to get that expression off your face?

Belinda, I did this for both of us. Both of us, don't you see? Now you have

to believe me, and don't you ever forget what I've said. The first time I

ever painted you, I knew I was using you. I told you so. Now what do you

think has changed? The fact that now you need me, too?"

I think my smile was convincing her. My manner was convincing her, the fact

that I was sitting there so calmly, holding her and trying to drain the

anxiety away. But I could see she couldn't quite understand it. She couldn't

quite accept that I knew what I was doing and saying and that I was all

right. Either that or she was simply too frightened herself.

"There's one thing that bugs me," I said. I stroked her hair away from her

face. She didn't look bad with brown hair. She looked beautiful actually. But

I couldn't wait to see it washing off.

"What's that?" she asked.

"Marty and Bonnie being hurt so much. The tabloids are crucifying them, the

program's nixed. G.G. didn't want them ruined. Neither did I."

"You're out of your head, Rembrandt," Blair bellowed. "I can't listen to this

madness. Turn up that radio, Susan."

"Blair, just pipe down!" G.G. said. "Susan, we've got ten minutes to find a

liquor store. Everything shuts down at two a.m."

"OK, gang, we aren't even out of the fucking Bay Area and I'm stopping for

liquor, can you believe it?"

She rolled off the freeway into downtown Oakland-or something that looked

like downtown Oakland. Then we stopped at a real dirty little place on a

corner, and G.G. went in.

"Belinda," I said, "I want you to know I told who you were and who I was, I

told our story as best I could without bringing them into it, without

slinging any mud."

She looked amazed, absolutely amazed. I don't think I'd ever seen her look so

taken off guard.

G.G. came back out with a sackful of bottles and some plastic glasses. He

climbed back into the middle seat.

"Take off," Blair said. Back on the freeway, back on to 580 rolling out of

Oakland.

I sat back, taking a deep breath, waiting politely for G.G. to open one of

those bottles, whatever they were. Belinda was watching me. She still looked

absolutely amazed.

"Jeremy," she said finally, "I want to tell you something. When I got off the

plane at LAX yesterday, the first paper I picked up had my picture on the

front page and the news that Mom was in the hospital. I thought, What is it

this time, pills, a gun, razor blades? I ran to the phone, Jeremy, I ran.

Even before I tried to call you, I called Mom. I called Sally Tracy, Mom's

agent, and I got her to call the hospital, to get me through to the phone

right by Mom's bed. And I said, 'Mom, this is Belinda, I'm alive, Mom, and

I'm OK.' Do you know what she said, Jeremy? She said, 'This is not my

daughter,' and she hung up the phone. She knew it was me, Jeremy. I know she

did. She knew. And when she checked out the next morning, she told the

reporters she believed her daughter was dead."

Nobody said a word. Then Susan made a long low sound like a disgusted sigh.

Blair gave a little ironic laugh, and G.G. just smiled sort of bitter and

looked from Belinda to me.

We were out of Oakland now, going north through the beautiful rolling hills

of Contra Costa County under a dark yet cloudy sky.

G.G. leaned over and kissed Belinda. "I love you, baby," he whispered.

"You want to open one of those bottles, G.G.?" Blair said.

"Right on. You hold the glass there for me, Jeremy," he said, as he lifted

the bottle out of the sack. "I think this flight calls for a little

champagne."
[9]

It was six a.m. when we rolled into Reno, and everybody was asleep or drunk

by that time, except Susan, who was neither. She just kept pushing on the

accelerator and singing to the country-and-western music on the radio.

Then Blair checked us into the MGM Grand, into a two-bedroom suite that had

the right colored walls so that he could take our pictures after Belinda had

washed the dye out of her hair.

G.G. went to help her with the shampooing, and Blair started setting up his

Hasselblad camera and tripod and draping sheets over things to make the light

absolutely right.

Belinda had to wash her hair five times to get all the brown out, then G.G.

went to work on it madly with the hair dryer, and finally we shot the first

roll of film against a perfect dark background, Belinda and I both in full-

length white mink coats.

I felt perfectly ridiculous, but Blair assured me that merely standing there,

looking blank-faced, exhausted, and slightly annoyed worked out just fine.

Twice he called photographer Eric Arlington-the man who took most of the

Midnight Mink pictures-at his house in Montauk to get advice from him, then

he plunged ahead himself.

Meantime Susan was on the phone to her daddy in Houston, making sure his

Learjet was on the way. Her daddy was a high-roller in both Las Vegas and

Reno, and his pilot made the run all the time. The plane ought to be at the

Reno airport anytime.

G.G. then called Alex in LA. Alex had remained at my house in San Francisco

until Dan assured him that the police were no longer in "hot pursuit," that

we had apparently gotten out of San Francisco without incident and only then

did Alex get on the plane for home.

They had issued a warrant for my arrest, and therefore we ought to get

married this minute, Alex said, and then why not all come to his house down

south?

When I heard about the warrant, I agreed with Alex. Let's get out of this

room and get married right now.

The wedding was a scream.

The nice little lady and her husband in the twenty-four hour chapel had never

heard of us obviously, though we were on the front pages of the papers just

down the street. The nice lady thought G.G. looked awfully young to be

Belinda's father, however. But G.G. had the certificate which proved it. And

then the lady and her husband were all too pleased to do the wedding with

organ music and flowers in less than twenty minutes. Just step right in.

And then we all got a little surprise. Not only would the chapel sell us a

nice pack of polaroid pictures of the ceremony, they would videotape it for

ninety dollars more. And we could have as many copies of the videotape as we

were willing to buy. We ordered ten.

So while Blair shot more film with the Hasselblad, Belinda and I, up to our

earlobes in white mink, said the words to each other while the camera rolled.

But when the moment came, when we exchanged the vows, nobody else was there.

The little chapel faded, Blair and Susan faded-even G.G. faded. The ugly

artificial lights faded. There was no little man reading from the Bible to

us, no little lady smiling from behind her polaroid camera as it made its

strange spitting and grinding sounds.

Just Belinda and I stood there in the moment, and we were together the way we

had been in the loft in Carmel with the sun shafting through the skylight and

in New Orleans with the summer rain coming through the French doors as we lay

on Mother's bed. Even the weariness gave a lovely luster to her eyes, a

sharpness to her expression that was faintly tragic. And the sadness of the

separation-the sadness of the violence and the misunderstandings-was there

too, woven into the moment, giving it a softness and a slowness and mingling

the happiness with pain.

We looked at each other in silence when it came time to kiss. Her hair was

streaming down over the white fur, and her face was naked of all paint and

indescribably lovely, her eyelashes golden as her hair.

"Holy Communion, Jeremy," she whispered. And then I said, "Holy Communion,

Belinda." And when she closed her eyes and I saw her lips open and I felt her

rise on tiptoe to kiss me, I took her in my arms, crushing her in all this

white mink fur, and the world was gone. Simply gone.

So it was done. And now she was Belinda Walker, and we were Belinda and

Jeremy Walker. And nobody was going to take her away from me. Then I saw G.G.

crying. Even Blair was moved. Only Susan was smiling, but it was a very

beautiful and understanding smile.

"OK, it's a wrap," she said suddenly. "Now out of this place. Y'all need a

director, you know it? And this director's starving to death."

We had a wonderful eggs and bacon breakfast in a big shiny American

restaurant while [bad scan] Courier and sent the tapes by messenger to the

three networks in Los Angeles, and to local stations in New York, San

Francisco, and LA. Belinda sent a tape to Bonnie's house in Beverly Hills and

another to her uncle Daryl's private secretary in Dallas. The polaroids we

sent to newspapers in the three important cities, too. I sent a copy of the

tape along with a polaroid shot to Lieutenant Connery in San Francisco, with

the hasty note that I was sorry for all the inconvenience and I thought he

was a nice man.

These things would arrive at their destinations within several hours. So

there wasn't much more we could do.

We got a bottle of Dom Perignon and went back to the MGM Grand. G.G. fell

asleep before anybody could decide where to go, what to do next. He was

suddenly sprawled out on the sofa and completely unconscious with the empty

champagne glass still in his hand.

The next to go was Susan. One minute she was pacing back and forth with the

phone in her hand, talking a print of Final Score into the right theater in

Chicago. Next time I looked, she was sprawled out on the carpet with a pillow

mashed under her face.

Blair got up, packed his things and told us all to stay as long as we wanted

on his nickel. Nobody on the hotel staff had even seen us. Just relax. As for

him, he had to be in a darkroom in New York with Eric Arlington right now!

I helped him pile his stuff in the hallway for the bellhop so that nobody

need come into the room. Then he came to kiss Belinda good-bye.

"Where's my hundred Gs," Belinda said softly.

He stopped. "Where the hell's my checkbook?"

"The hell with your checkbook, good-bye." She threw her arms around him and

kissed him.

"Love you, baby," he said.

He took the film and left.

"Does that mean we don't get the money?" I asked.

"We have the coats, don't we?" she said. She scrunched down in the white mink

and giggled. "And we've got the Dom Perignon, too. And I'll betcha Marty's

making a fat deal for 'Champagne Flight' with cable television-'The story

continues uncensored... blah, blah, blah.' "

"You really think so?"

She nodded. "Just wait and see." But then her face went dark. A shadow fell

over her soul.

"Come here," I said.

We got up together, taking the champagne and glasses with us, and crept into

the bedroom and locked the door.

I closed the heavy draperies till there was only a little sunlight coming

through. Everything pure and quiet here. Not a sound from the streets below.

Belinda put the champagne on the night table. Then she let the white mink

coat drop to the floor.

"No, spread it out on the bed," I said softly. I laid mine out beside it. The

bed was completely covered.

Then we took off our clothes and laid down on the white mink.

I kissed her slowly, opening her lips, and then I felt her hips against me,

and the white fur of the coat was stroking me and so were her fingers, and I

could feel her hair all over my arm. Her mouth opened, became hard and soft

at the same time.

I kissed her breasts and pressed my face into them and rubbed my rough

unshaven beard against them, and I felt her move closer under me, arching her

back and pushing against me, her little nest of nether hair prickling and

moist against my leg, and then I went in.

I don't think we had ever made love this fast, the heat rising to combustion

this quickly, not even the very first time. I felt her rocking under me and

then I was coming, and I thought, This is Belinda, and when it was done, I

lay there entwined with her, her cheek against my chest, her hair flowing

down her naked back, and high above the noise and bustle of Reno in this warm

silent room we slept.

It was late afternoon when Susan knocked on the door. Time to blow this town.

They were showing the videotapes of the wedding on TV.

All I had to wear was the dinner jacket and rumpled boiled shirt, so I put

all that on again and came out into the living room of the suite. Belinda

came after me, hastily dressed in jeans and sweater and looking as beautiful

as any tousled bride ought to look.

G.G. was on the phone to Alex, but he hung up when we came in. Susan told us

her daddy's jet was ready to take us to Texas. And Susan said that was

absolutely the safest place to go. We could wait out the storm there and

nobody, absolutely nobody, was going to hassle us on the Jeremiah ranch.

But I could see by Belinda's face that this was not what she wanted to do.

She was biting at one of her fingernails, and I saw the shadow again. I saw

the worry.

"Running again? All the way to Texas? Susan, you're trying to cast a movie in

Los Angeles. You're trying to get a distributor for Final Score. And we're

going to hold up in Texas? What for?"

"The marriage is legal," I said. "And everybody knows about it by this time.

Plus there was no warrant out for me when I split, you know. There's no

question of aiding and abetting."

"It would be kind of interesting," Belinda said, "to see what they'd do."

"We can go to LA," G.G. said. "Alex is ready for us. He says he's got your

regular room ready for you and Belinda, Jeremy. You know Alex. He'll let the

cops and the reporters in and serve them Brie on crackers and Pinot

Chardonnay. He says we can stay in Beverly Hills forever if we want."

"Either way you want to play it," Susan said. "We got a Lear jet waiting for

us. And I got plenty of work in LA to do."

Belinda was looking at me. "Where do you want to go, Jeremy?" she asked. Her

voice was fragile and scared again. "Where do you want us to be, Jeremy?" she

asked.

It hurt me, the expression in her eyes.

"Honey, it doesn't make any difference," I said. "If I can buy some canvas

and some Windsor and Newton oils, if I can settle into a place to do some

work, I don't care if we're in Rio de Janeiro or on a Greek island or a

satellite out in space."

"Way to go, Walker!" Susan said. "Let's high out of here for LA."

I fell into a half-sleep when we were way up there in the clouds. I was

sitting back in a big leather recliner, and the champagne was working on me,

and in a half-dream I was thinking of paintings. They were developing in my

mind like pictures in a darkroom. Scenes from my entire life.

Belinda was telling G.G. in a soft voice about being in Rome again and how

lonely it had been but that working at Cinecittá had been OK. She had a nice

room in Florence just a block from the Uffizi, and she'd gone there just

about every day. On the Ponte Vecchio when she saw all the glove stores she

thought of him and how he'd bought her her first pair of white gloves there

when she was four years old.

Then G.G. was assuring her it didn't matter about his New York business

closing. He could have stayed, fought it out, probably won. He never would

know how the rumors started. Maybe it was not Marty, but Marty's men. But now

he and Alex "had something," something that was better than it had been with

Ollie, and maybe G.G. would set up shop on Rodeo Drive.

"You know, I'm forty years old, Belinda," he said. "I can't be somebody's

little boy forever. My luck should have run out before now. But I'll tell

you, it's wonderful having one last go at it with Alex Clementine, with the

guy I used to watch up there on the screen when I was twelve years old."

"Good for you, Daddy," she said.

It was a real possibility, a Beverly Hills G.G.'s, why not? He had really

cashed out in New York, rumors or no rumors. If he sold the Fire Island

house, he would have a small fortune. "Oh, but you know," he laughed, "G.G.

on Rodeo Drive would make Bonnie sooo mad."

The clouds were just like a blanket outside the window. The late-afternoon

sun hit them in a fan of burnt golden rays. The rays came through the window.

They struck Belinda and G.G. together, their hair seeming to mingle as it

became light.

I was half-dreaming. I saw my house in San Francisco like a ship cut adrift.

Good-bye to all the toys, the dolls, the trains, the dollhouse, goodbye to

all the roach and rat paintings, good-bye to the china and the silver and the

grandfather clock and the letters, all the letters from all the little girls.

Awful to think that the little girls felt hurt. Awful to think they were

disappointed in me. Please don't let them feel a dark feeling of betrayal and

unwholesomeness. Please let them come to see that the Belinda paintings were

supposed to be about love and light.

I tried to think of something I wanted from home, something I would ache for

later. And there was nothing at all. The Belinda paintings were going all

over the world. Only four were not going to museums-they would go to the

august Count Solosky, which was almost the same thing.

And nothing called to me from the house in San Francisco. Not even Andy's

wonderful sculpture, because I knew Dan would move it to the right place.

Maybe Rhinegold would take it with him when he went back to West Fifty-

seventh Street. Now that was a fine idea. I hadn't even shown it to

Rhinegold. What an inexcusably selfish thing.

But the paintings, now the paintings, that was where my mind, half in sleep

and half-awake, really wanted to go. The May Procession, The Mardi Gras, I

envisioned them again. I could see every detail. But I could see other works,

too. I saw those big shaggy police dogs sniffing at the dolls. Dogs Visit the

Toys. And I saw Alex in his raincoat and fedora walking through Mother's

hallway, looking at the peeling wallpaper. "Jeremy, finish up, son, so we can

get out of this house!"

Got to paint a picture of Alex, terribly important to paint Alex, Alex who'd

been in hundreds of movies, and never been painted right. The dogs would

become werewolves sniffing through the porcelain babies and, yes, I'd have to

deal with all that darkness again in that one, but it had an inevitable feel

to it, and Alex walking through Mother's house, too, all right. But Alex,

important to move him out of the dark house. Alex at the garden gate on that

morning twenty-five years ago when he had said:

"You stay with me when you come out west."
III. THE FINAL SCORE

The long weekend at Alex's quiet sprawling canyon house in Beverly Hills was

dreamy and slow. Belinda and I made love often in the undisturbed silence of

the bedroom. I slept twelve hours at a stretch, deeper than I had ever slept

since I was a kid. The eternal southern California sun poured through the

many French windows onto vistas of thick carpet, and down on gardens as well

-kept as interiors, the stillness unbroken except by the noise of an

Occasional car on the distant canyon road.

Susan's plane had gotten us back without incident. For the first twenty-four

hours at least nobody had known we were here.

And by Monday morning the tabloids had the story:

BONNIE'S DAUGHTER MARRIES ARTIST.

JEREMY AND BELINDA MARRY IN RENO.

BELINDA ALIVE AND WELL AND MARRIED. And the video tape of the wedding had

been shown by a thousand news outlets all over the world.

The big local news, however, was Blair Sackwell's full-page insert

advertisement in the San Francisco Chronicle and the national edition of The

New York Times: BELINDA AND JEREMY FOR MIDNIGHT MINK.

It was just about the first shot of us that Blair had taken. I was unshaven,

shaggy headed, a little puzzled in expression, and Belinda, wide-eyed,

babylips jutting slightly, had the unselfconscious seriousness of a child.

Two faces, blankets of white fur. The lens of the Hasselblad and the size of

the negative gave it a startling graven quality-every pore showed, every hair

was etched. And that is what Blair had wanted. That was what Eric Arlington

had always delivered to him.

The picture transcended photography. We appeared more real than real. Of

course, Blair knew he did not have to spend another cent to publicize his

picture. By evening, newspapers all over the country had reprinted it. The

news magazines would inevitably do the same. Everybody would see Blair's

trademark. Midnight Mink was news, the way it had been years ago, when Bonnie

had been its first model with the coat half-open all the way down her right

side.

Nevertheless, the advertisement would appear in Vogue and Harper's Bazaar

eventually as well as in a host of other magazines. Such was the destiny of

those who posed for Midnight Mink.

Dozens of long-stemmed white roses began to arrive on Monday afternoon. By

evening the house was full of them. They were all from Blair.

Meantime the news around us was comforting. The LAPD had dropped its warrant

for Belinda. Daryl Blanchard claimed "profound relief" that his niece was

alive. He would not contest G.G.'s consent to the marriage. The age-old power

of the ritual was recognized by this plainspoken and rather confused Texas

man. Bonnie wept heartrending tears on network and cable. Marty broke down

again.

The San Francisco police decided not to pursue their warrants for me. Quite

impossible to press me for crimes against a delinquent minor who was now my

legal bride. And I had not been under arrest at the time I had "flown" from

San Francisco. So Susan could not formally be charged for her part in the

escape.

The lines continued outside the Folsom Street exhibit. And Rhinegold reported

that every painting was now spoken for. Two to Paris, one to Berlin, another

to New York, one to Dallas, the four to Count Solosky. I had lost track.

Time and Newsweek, hitting the stands at Monday noon with a load of obsolete

garbage about the "disappearance" and "possible murder," nevertheless gave

enormous coverage to the paintings, which their critics begrudgingly praised.

As early as Monday afternoon Susan had a national distributor for Final

Score. Limelight was taking it over, and the labs were working overtime on

the prints, and Susan was in there with the cinematographer making sure that

Chicago and Boston and Washington each got a jewel. The papers already

carried their ads for a weekend opening in a thousand theaters nationwide.

Susan also had the go-ahead from Galaxy Pictures for Of Will and Shame with

her script and Belinda, if Belinda was willing, and Sandy Miller was back

from Rio with the lowdown on locations. As of the first of the year, Susan

was ready to go to Brazil.

As for Alex, he was hotter than ever, as far as we could tell. His champagne

commercials were running on schedule, and there was renewed interest in the

television miniseries to be based on his autobiography. Would he consent, the

producers were asking, to play himself? He had two other television films in

the works, and the talk shows were calling him, too.

Susan wanted Alex for Of Will and Shame and was trying desperately to get the

studio to meet his price, which was enormous, and he was promising to throw

up the television offers for a real picture "if the agents could just work

things out."

All Alex wanted to do at the moment, however, was lie on the sun-drenched

redbrick terrace and turn browner and browner as he talked to G.G. And G.G.

insisted he was having the time of his life. The work of opening the Beverly

Hills salon would come all too soon, as far as he was concerned.

When the word got out that G.G. was in Beverly Hills, friends of Alex started

calling. G.G. could start free-lance any time he chose.

The shadow in paradise was Belinda.

Belinda had not said absolutely go ahead to the movie, which was making Susan

a bit nervous, but Belinda was not entirely all right.

There was something tentative about Belinda's every gesture, something

clouded and uncertain in her gaze. There were moments when she reminded me

uncannily of Bonnie and the brief time I'd known Bonnie in that Hyatt Regency

room.

Over and over she asked me if I was certain that everything was OK with me.

But I came to realize as I repeatedly reassured her that she was the one who

was agitated and tense. She was the one who could not take a deep breath.

She read every article in the papers about her mother. In silence she watched

her mother and Marty scrambling to salvage their reputations and their

positions on the evening news.

The tabloids had not let up on Bonnie and Marty. There was talk of "Champagne

Flight" being revived on cable, but nothing firm had been announced.

Meantime Belinda had also spoken to her uncle briefly by phone on Sunday

afternoon. Not a very pleasant call. The man had not believed her when she

said she had called her mother at the hospital several days ago.

Then I took the phone. I explained to Daryl that Belinda was all right now,

we were married, and that maybe the best thing was to let all this simmer

down. Daryl was confused, plain and simple. It was obvious Bonnie had been

lying to him about everything, and so had Marty. He told me that he had

pushed for the warrant for Belinda against their wishes, in a desperate

effort to find his niece, if she was still alive. Now he didn't know what to

do exactly. He wanted to see Belinda. But she would not see him. The call

ended with uncomfortable pleasantries. She would write to him. He would write

to her.

She was quiet and withdrawn after. She was not all right at all.

She was happiest in the evening when we all sat around the supper table

together and Susan was storyboarding Of Will and Shame in the air. Sandy

Miller, Susan's lover, was constantly with Susan now, throwing in little

stories about her madcap adventures in Rio, and Sandy Miller was indeed a

voluptuous young woman, every bit as seductive as she had been on the screen.

The Rio picture sounded terrific, I had to admit. The relationship between

the teen prostitute, to be played by Belinda, and the female reporter who

saves her, played by Sandy, was quite good. And I liked the idea of going

with them on location. I wanted to see the majestic harbor of Rio de Janeiro.

I wanted to walk the alien and frightening streets of that old city. I wanted

to paint pictures by Brazilian light.

But this was Belinda's decision. And Belinda obviously could not make it.

Belinda kept saying she needed to think it over. And so I waited, watched,

tried to fathom what was holding Belinda back.

Of course, there was one very obvious answer: Bonnie was holding Belinda

back.

Tuesday night we all piled into Alex's black Mercedes and went down to Sunset

for dinner at Le Dome. Susan was in black satin rodeo finery. Sandy Miller

was the ripe starlet in beautifully draped white silk. Belinda, in the

classic little black dress and pearls, picked up Blair's floor-length mink

coat and threw it over her shoulders and kept it on all night long, letting

it hang off the chair like a rain poncho. Alex and G.G. went black tie again,

because the black dinner jacket and pants were the only decent clothes I had,

other than jeans and sweatshirts that Alex's man had bought for me, and Alex

and G.G. said we should all match.

So there we all were together in the soft romantic gloom of Le Dome. And the

wine was flowing, and the food was delicious and lovely to look at before we

ate it. And nobody busted us or bothered us, and lots of people saw us. And

Belinda looked gorgeous and miserable, the mink coat hanging on the floor,

her hair a cloud of gold around her soft and tortured little face. Belinda

just picked at the delicious food. Belinda wasn't getting better. She was

getting worse.

So we bide our time. We wait.

Early Wednesday when I awakened, I went out into the fresh air of the garden

and saw Belinda slicing back and forth through the clean blue water of the

long rectangular pool. She had on the tiniest black bikini in the Western

world which Sandy Miller had brought her from Rio. Her hair was pinned up on

the top of her head. I could hardly stand to watch her little bottom and

silky thighs moving through the water. Thank God, Alex was gay, I thought.

If the old familiar Los Angeles smog was there, I could not smell it or taste

it. I smelled only the roses and the lemons and the oranges that grew in

Alex's garden all year round.

I wandered into the green house off the cabana, a large cool empty place of

whitewashed glass and redwood timbers where Alex had set up my easel for me,

the same one I'd left with him twenty-five years ago. He'd had his man,

Orlando, go all over Los Angeles to find really big and properly stretched

canvases, with just enough give in them, and plenty of brushes, turpentine,

linseed oil, paints. Alex had rounded up a lot of old china plates for me to

use as palettes and given me the old silver knives-the ones banged up by the

garbage disposer-to use as I chose.

An artist never had it so good, it seemed to me. Except for the Muse being

silently and uncomplainingly miserable. But that just had to change.

Two days ago I had started The Mardi Gras on a huge eight-by-ten canvas. And

the great shadowy oaks above the torchlighted parade were already painted in,

along with two of the glittering papier-mâché floats crowded with revelers.

Today was the day of the drunken black flambeaux carrier, and the torch

tipping forward, its oily fire catching the garlands of papier-mâché flowers

that skirted the high floor of the float.

It felt so good to be painting again, to be racing over this utterly new and

different territory, to be drawing in the simplest little things that I had

never created in any form before. Men's faces for one thing, almost never had

I done them. It was as if I could feel parts of the circuitry of my brain

flooded with life for the first time.

The light poured gently through the opaque white panes of the glass roof. It

fell on the purple flags and on the few potted geraniums and callas in this

place that smelled of freshness and earth even in the months of winter. It

washed over the white canvas, and fell on my hands, making them warm.

Beyond the open doors I saw the low-pitched roof of the rambling white house,

and the comforting sight of others talking, moving about. G.G. was just going

out to swim with Belinda. Susan Jeremiah had come over from her place on

Benedict Canyon Road. She was in beat-up jeans and blue work shirt, and the

scuffed snakeskin boots and the dusty white hat that were her true clothes.

I started right in to work. I started in big fast strokes of burnt sienna to

do the head and the back of the flambeaux carrier. I was suddenly on "soul

control," trusting that somehow a man who could paint a little girl perfectly

could do a grown man's muscular arm and knotted hand.

But even as I painted, another picture was obsessing me, something that had

come to me in the night. A dark somber portrait of Blair Sackwell in the

outrageous lavender tuxedo sitting on the jumpseat of the limo with his arms

folded and his legs crossed. Incandescent Blair. If I could just get that

mixture of vulgarity and compassion, that mixture of recklessness and magic-

ah, this was Rumpelstiltskin, wasn't it, but this time he saved the child!

There were many pictures to be done. So many. Alex had to be done first,

really, before Blair. I was certain of that, and then Dogs Visit the Toys-

that one would haunt me till I finally gave in to it, and went back to the

Victorian mentally, just long enough to get it done. Now for the flambeaux

carrier, for the lurid glint of the flames against the trees above.