Mitla Pass - Leon Uris [37]
Val had turned on me when I walked out of the studio after von Dortann put on a writer behind my back. Hell, I was back at work two days later. I was the bad guy for not cooperating with the studio. It was my fault for standing up to Gold.
Val didn’t want me to fight about anything that would endanger my jobs with the studios. It hurts to say it, but she was an out-and-out appeaser. Val was happy down there, sterilized by the good life. “Don’t Rock the Boat” might as well have been done in petit point and hung over the fireplace.
I didn’t want to commit to writing a full-time screenplay until I completed my second novel, so I took short doctoring jobs. There comes a moment in the life of every screenplay when the writer has to take a stand or give away a piece of his soul. When you’re dealing with the swollen egos of actors, actresses, and directors, you’ve got to try to remember that they are the boss—even though they can’t read a script, even though their arguments are moronic. They’re the boss. When the inevitable showdown came, Val raised purple hell with me for playing it tough.
She really was livid when I turned down a project, a flat-fee screenplay for Columbia for fifty thousand dollars. The project was a piece of trash. Not one bloody word of understanding from her.
I don’t know what it was with Val. I’d never seen this in her before. Maybe it was because she had been raised in the Navy where you obey orders and don’t make problems.
“What’s the difference, Gideon,” she argued. “Nobody remembers the name of the screenwriter. You recall what Sal told you the first day. What you’ve written is between covers of a book and can’t be changed. I know screenwriting runs against your grain, but you get paid a hell of a lot for your discomfort.”
A lot of nights I drove out to the Holiday House past Malibu when I’d had a fight at the studio. I’d walk over to Paradise Cove, rent fishing gear, and fish from the pier. I was just too damned beat to go home and have her blast at me. Well, you know what follows. I started taking women out to the Holiday House. Lots of them.
What troubled me about the other women was that I felt less and less guilty about it after each brawl with Val.
After Sal drove off, I returned to my office. I dialed home a half-dozen times. The line was busy. Obviously Sal had headed for the first pay phone. That son of a bitch had gotten to Val first. He was chewing her ear off.
Belle came in with tea. I remained on the couch and she took my chair behind the desk and kept dialing my home.
“Still busy.”
“You liked Faulkner an awful lot, didn’t you?”
Belle smiled. “Secretly, I suppose I loved him. He was a great man, very genteel and soft-spoken. Yes ma’am, Miss Belle, no ma’am, Miss Belle. He always called me Miss Belle.”
“How was he able to take Stanley Gold?”
“I sat in to take notes on quite a few story conferences. It became apparent early on that Mr. Faulkner’s project would never get off the ground. But Gold kept him on, much like a pet dog. I think the Colonel got off on the very notion that he had control over the mind of a great writer like Mr. Faulkner. He loved to berate Mr. Faulkner, the same as he does von Dortann. The same as he does with anyone who’s afraid of him. Mr. Faulkner would go to pieces. He was always at one of three or four bars along Ventura Boulevard. George and I would find him, take him to his apartment, and sometimes we’d have to put him to bed.”
“The resolution of fear is one of the writer’s greatest reasons for being,” I said.
Belle smiled again. “That’s from his Nobel acceptance speech.”
She answered the phone and covered the mouthpiece. “It’s Stanley Gold.”
“Hello, Colonel,” I said.
“Zadok. I was thinking that it might be time to pop some bubbly. I’d love to give a little dinner party for you over at my place. How about Friday?”
“Sorry, I can’t. One of my daughters