Belinda (66 page)

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.

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 our 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 hack, 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.