Humboldt's Gift (1976 Pulitzer Prize) - Saul Bellow [242]
“And is it the same? Are you certain?”
“Polly and I went to see it in New York and we both remembered what you described to us in Chicago. You don’t have to take my word for it. You can see it yourself.”
“Is it showing in Madrid?”
“No, you’ll have to fly back to Paris with me.”
“Well, Caldofreddo is the name we gave our protagonist all right. He’s one of the survivors of the crash of Umberto Nobile’s dirigible in the Arctic?”
“Eats human flesh! Exposed by the Russians as a cannibal! Goes back to his Sicilian village! An ice-cream vendor! All the kids in town love him.”
“You mean someone made something of such a farrago?”
Cantabile cried, “They’re crooks, crooks, crooks! Those fuckers have stolen you blind! They’ve made a film out of your idea. How did they ever get it?”
“Well,” I said, “all I know is that Humboldt gave the outline to a man named Otto Klinsky in the RCA building. He had an idea that he could reach Sir Laurence Olivier’s hairdresser through a relative of some scrubwoman who was the mother of a friend of Mrs. Klinsky. Did they actually reach Olivier? Does he play the role?”
“No, it’s some other Englishman, like the Charles Laughton or Ustinov type. Charlie, this is a hell of a good picture. Now, Charlie, if we can prove your authorship, we’ve really got those guys. I told them, you know, I’m ready to slaughter them. I’m in a position to throw their balls into the Osterizer.”
“You can’t have many equals when it comes to threatening,” I said.
“Well, I had to put heat on them if I didn’t want a long business in court. We’re looking for a fast settle. What kind of proof have you got?”
“What Humboldt did,” I explained, “was to send himself a copy of the scenario by registered mail. This has never been opened.”
“You’ve got it?”
“Yes, I found it among the papers he left me with a note that tells all.”
“Why didn’t he copyright the idea?”
“There is no other way in these cases. But the method is perfectly legal Humboldt would have known. He always had more lawyers than the White House.”
“Those movie bastards didn’t have the time of day for me. Now we’ll see. Our next move is this,” he said. “We fly to Paris. . . .”
“We?”
“I am advancing expense money.”
“But I don’t want to go. I shouldn’t even be here now. After lunch I generally sit in my room.”
“What for? You just sit?”
“I sit and withdraw into myself.”
“A hell of an egotistical thing to do,” he said.
“On the contrary, I try to see and hear the outer world with no static whatever from within, an empty vessel, and completely silent.”
“What is that supposed to do for you?”
“Well, according to my manual, if you sit quiet enough, everything in the outer world, every flower, every animal, every action, will eventually unveil secrets undreamed of—I’m quoting.”
He stared at me with venturesome eyes and dagger brows. He said, “Damn it, you’re not going to turn into one of those transcendental-type weirdos. You don’t enjoy that, do you, just sitting quiet?”
“I enjoy it deeply.”
“Come to Paris with me.”
“Rinaldo, I don’t want to come to Paris.”
“You put your back up in the wrong place and you’re passive in the wrong place. You’ve got everything arsy-versy. You come along to Paris and look at that picture. It’ll only take a day or two. You can stay at the George V or the Meurice. It’ll add strength to our case. I hired two good lawyers, one French and one American. We’ll have to open that sealed envelope before witnesses under oath. Maybe we should get it done in the US Embassy and have the commercial attaché and the military attaché. So come on, pack your bag, Charlie. There’s a plane in two hours.”
“No I don’t think I will. It’s true I’ve got no money left, but I’ve been doing better without money than I ever did with it. And I don’t want to leave the kid.”
“Don’t act like a granny about that kid.”
“Anyway, I don’t like Paris.”
“You don’t like Paris? What have you got against Paris?”
“A prejudice. For me Paris is