Frank_ The Voice - James Kaplan [214]
“Ava, honey,” Frank said. “It doesn’t really matter to me. We’ve all fallen into the wrong bed at one time or another. Just tell me the truth and we’ll forget all about it.”
She thought for a moment. She tapped the cigarette on the ashtray, though she didn’t need to.
All right, she said, since he wouldn’t leave it alone. Once. One mindless night. She’d been drunk—she didn’t really even remember it.
Once, Frank repeated, dully.
The next day Sanicola rented them a gleaming new Chris-Craft so Frank and Ava could go for a picnic cruise on the lake. Hank came along to steer the boat; Ava’s maid, Reenie, brought sandwiches and champagne. It was perfect early-September weather, crisp and sparkling, a light wind blowing across the steel blue water. Frank and Ava sat on the back deck drinking champagne while Hank drove. The big engine thrummed as Sanicola steered into a quiet inlet. Ava lifted her face to the sun, her eyes closed.
“I suppose you wish you were out here with Howard Hughes,” Frank suddenly said.
Reenie cleared her throat and slowly shook her head.
“Why the fuck should I wish I were out here with Howard Hughes?” Ava said.
“I bet he’s got a bigger boat than this, doesn’t he? That guy’s got enough bucks to buy ten boats the size of this one.”
Up on the bridge, Sanicola looked back at them.
“I don’t care if he owns the fucking Queen Mary,” Ava said. “I’m not sorry I’m not with him. So shut up.”
“Don’t tell me to shut up.”
Sanicola looked pleadingly at Reenie. She shrugged.
“Then don’t tell me I’m thinking about Howard Hughes when I’m not thinking about Howard Hughes.”
“I’ll t——” Frank stopped in mid-utterance as the boat jerked and shuddered to a halt with a terrible grinding noise. They all were nearly knocked out of their seats. The boat had struck a large, mostly submerged rock in shallow water about a hundred feet out from the shore. They were already beginning to list to starboard.
The water was only around four feet deep. Hank helped Reenie climb down the ladder, then descended himself. They both splashed toward shore. Frank was next. Ava stayed put.
“Get off that fucking boat while there’s still time, you fucking fool,” Frank called from the water.
“Go fuck yourself,” she said. “I’m staying here.”
And there she sat, sipping champagne.
“It was about that time that I discovered that this fancy boat was stocked with a monstrous amount of toilet paper,” Ava recalled.
Why in the name of God the owners had decided to store so much on one boat I’ll never know. But all the champagne I’d drunk convinced me that this wealth must be shared with the world. So I unwrapped roll after roll and floated them all off in the general direction of Frank. His rage was now off the charts, and he screamed a variety of curses in my direction that even I found impressive, but nothing he said deterred me from my appointed rounds.
Eventually, the boat began to sink in earnest, and I carefully joined Frank on the shore, carrying with me, with perfect survivor’s instincts, the last bottle of champagne and two glasses. We managed to get the bottle open and sat down to regard the scene. What was a little rumpus between lovers, anyway? We clinked glasses, laughed and made up.
This is breezy and funny, a memoir written to amuse when the reality cannot have been so amusing. Both Frank and Ava had become serious drinkers by this point: in his case, he needed more and more alcohol to blur his worsening career and family problems; Ava just liked to drink. During the recent shoot of Lone Star, a dog of a Western that Metro had forced her to make, she had been loaded much of the time. And when the two of them were together, alcohol was as apt to loosen their tongues as their libidos. “Just a few nights later, when we both had drunk so much, Frank made an offhanded remark that hurt me so deeply that I didn’t stop to argue or shout back, I just left,” Ava wrote.
I ran out into the darkness, my bare feet heading toward the lake … Then I heard someone running