The Agency (13 page)

However, women cling to grudges like barnacles to the belly of a ship.

Maybe it’s Felicia’s Catalonian temperament. When she was thirty, she moved to London from Barcelona, which is a move that most Londoners would find impossible to fathom. Give up sun and shore for rain and fog? Not so much. Most of us would retire to Barcelona if we had the chance. Felicia is forty now, still skinny the way Spanish women always seem to be. She has streaky brown hair and a petite mole on her upper lip that counts as a beauty mark. She smokes thirty packs a day. No, not really, but I have never seen her without a cigarette as dark as molasses dangling from her mouth. Felicia gets a bad rap for nepotism, because she is
where she is in the industry thanks to her father, who became a power broker in Hollywood in the 1960s and 1970s before retiring to his native village in Spain. She used his contacts to make inroads in Hollywood, Bollywood, Cannes, and New York and to party her way to the inner circle of marquee celebs. On any given day, she can be anywhere in the world. Make no mistake, though. Felicia is good at what she does. Cruise works only with the best.

She wasn’t crazy about accepting my apology.

“Do you think I believe a word of this crap?” Felicia asked me. “The only reason you’re calling is because you want me to push
Singularity
. Like I’m going to put Tom in a Dungeons and Dragons movie.”

“It’s not like that at all,” I said. “Have you read it?
Singularity
is a moral epic. It’s a classic.”

“So why don’t we gather all the people who bought it and put them in a phone booth and talk about what a hit this movie is going to be.”

Ouch. She was right about that.

“Yes, okay, it was a bust. We’ve all had great books go south. The publisher didn’t know what to do with it. We didn’t get reviewed. All I’m telling you is that, as Cruise’s agent, you really ought to give him this book. He’s going to love it. He’s going to want to do it.”

“Pass. Try Rowan Atkinson.”

This was the point in the conversation when I would usually scream an obscenity and hang up. I took a deep breath. I counted to ten.

“Look, Felicia, I may be the biggest bitch that ever walked the planet. You wouldn’t be the first to say so. I don’t really care. This isn’t about me. This isn’t about you. It’s not even about Oliver Howard. This is about a project that’s great for your client. I know you. You wouldn’t shortchange him because you hate me.”

Actually, she would do exactly that.

“I read
Singularity,
” she snapped. “It’s bullshit.”

“You can’t possibly mean that.”

“Like hell I can’t. The book reads like it was written by a drug
addict. Which it was, right? It’s impossible to adapt. It’s too complex.”

“The imagery is amazing. So are the characters. It’s made for film.”

“Face it, you’re backing a loser.”

“Did you give it to Tom? Has he read it?”

“No way. I’m not wasting his time. I know him. I know what he likes. This isn’t the direction he’s going.”

Okay, Felicia knows Tom, and I’ve never met him, and I probably never will, but I believed in my heart that she was wrong. Or more to the point, I believed that this had nothing to do with the book. She didn’t want to pass it to Tom because I was the one making the pitch. Even so, I kept swinging.

“Come on, we’re not talking about Ethan Hunt and
Mission: Impossible
.
Singularity
is
Born on the Fourth of July
. It’s
Vanilla Sky
. It’s
Eyes Wide Shut
. This is the stuff he wants to do because it’s good, not because it’s commercial. He can afford something that’s risky business.”

“Funny,” she said coldly.

“You know what I mean. At least ask him to read it. That’s all I’m looking for.”

“Good-bye, Tess.”

“If you ask him to read it, you’re my first call on my next six deals.”

“You don’t have anything I want. Next you’ll tell me I should put Tom in a panda suit and let him do the sequel to
Bamboo Garden
.”

“I’d put on a panda suit myself if I thought it would make a difference,” I said.

“I told you two years ago that you were persona non grata. No deals. Ever. What part of that don’t you understand?”

“Felicia, for what it’s worth, I meant what I said. I’m sorry.”

Click
. End of call.

Okay, my first exercise in tact and humility did not go well. Actually, I was quite restrained, but it’s much more satisfying to savage someone with a biting retort rather than hold your tongue, if you’re not going to get what you want anyway. The chances of
Felicia Castro passing
Singularity
to Cruise were less than zero, which I suppose I knew before I picked up the phone. That doesn’t mean I’m giving up. It just means the direct approach isn’t going to work, and I have no idea yet what the indirect approach would be.

Emma hovered in my doorway.

“How did it go?” she asked.

“Send Felicia a cactus dildo, will you?” I said.

“Not good, huh?”

“Not good.”

“Dorothy called,” Emma said.

I looked up. “What?”

“While you were on the phone, Dorothy called. She wants you to call her back. She said she’d wait by the phone.”

I checked my watch. “It’s five in the morning in New York. Why on earth is Dorothy calling me now?”

“She wouldn’t tell me, but she said it’s urgent.”

Dorothy? Urgent?

This can’t be good.

IN LONDON
, when someone in publishing talks about “legal problems” for an author, that’s usually code for defamation. It’s ridiculously easy to get damages for libel over here. If I suggested in print that Elizabeth Hurley has an eating disorder or that she’s part of a sex coven in Chelsea or that she’s actually a man with the world’s most impressive breasts, well, that would probably cost me most of what I’m making by telling you my story.

I said if, Liz. If. Liz is actually a friend of my father’s, so I hope she realizes this is just a joke.

Anyway, I didn’t know what to think about Dorothy and her legal problems, which were beginning to seem like something more than a rumor. I’m not sure how you can defame someone in an animal fairy tale, but I wouldn’t have been shocked to discover that some zoo panda was suing over an unflattering characterization in one of Dorothy’s fables. Stranger things have happened in British courts.

The only thing to do was pick up the phone. Dorothy told
Emma she’d be waiting for my call, but I didn’t believe it. Dorothy never stays in one place for longer than thirty seconds, so there was no rush. Instead, I called Sally first to see if she had heard any more gossip about Dorothy on the street. I wanted to be prepared for whatever Dorothy might tell me, because part of being a good agent is knowing the answer before your client asks the question. You never, ever want to sound surprised. However, Sally wasn’t in her office and wasn’t answering her cell phone, so I was on my own.

I called Dorothy. To my surprise, she really was waiting by the phone.

“Dorothy, it’s Tess.”

I heard Dorothy take a long breath, which is never a good sign. “Oh, Tess, Tess, thank God it’s you, I don’t know what to do. I really don’t. This is the worst thing, just the worst thing. I actually drove all the way to Ithaca yesterday after lunch, because I was so upset, and sometimes when you’re upset, all you can do is drive, and it helps to be back in your hometown again. So that’s what I did, I went home, but it didn’t help at all, and so I drove around the streets and then just turned around and came back to the city. I didn’t sleep at all, not at all, I’ve been up all night, pacing. The dogs are jittery and jumpy, because they know I’m upset, and the kinkajou is running around and pooping everywhere. I can’t believe this, I simply can’t believe that anyone could say this about me. It’s cruel. It’s horrible. I may have a heart attack. I was going to call you yesterday, but I was speechless. Speechless. I even thought about driving off a bridge. You have to tell me what to do, Tess. What do we do about this?”

“I need you to slow down for me, Dorothy, because I don’t know what happened. Just tell me what’s going on.”

“What’s going on? I could lose everything! Everything! And if this winds up in the papers, people will believe it’s true—you know how people are. Of course, it’s not true. It’s not true at all.”

“I’m sure it’s not, but you still need to tell me what’s going on.”

Dorothy sighed into the phone like a bubbling teakettle. “Oh, yes, of course, I keep thinking you were there, but of course, you
weren’t—how could you be? I’m so sorry. This thing has me completely beside myself.”

I waited. She didn’t continue.

“Dorothy?” I asked.

“Yes, dear?”

“What’s going on?”

“Oh, haven’t I told you yet? I thought I had. I am just so scattered today. It’s David Milton, that awful boy. Remember I told you I was having lunch with him yesterday? He’s Tom Milton’s son, and Tom was a gem, so I can’t even begin to believe that his flesh and blood could do something so horrible. To lie like that! He should be ashamed.”

“What did he say?” I asked.

“He’s threatening me! Blackmailing me!”

“Over what?”

“He claims that I
stole
the idea for
The Bamboo Garden
! Can you believe that? Stole it! He says that Tom was the one who came up with the idea for the book and that when Tom died, I took it for myself. He says I read Tom’s manuscript and then adapted it and put my name on it. It’s absurd! It’s ludicrous! I mean, yes, I knew Tom, and he was an aspiring writer, and I remember him showing me some of his work, but it was nothing like my stories. Nothing at all, no one would think that. Tom was a dear, but he was no writer, and I only tried to encourage him. But now his son says he’s going to sue me, and I need to pay him or he’s going to ruin my reputation. He says he has things I wrote to his father, but he couldn’t possibly have that, because it’s not true, none of it is.”

I closed my eyes. This was much worse than defamation.

“Did he show you anything?” I asked. “Did he have any of the documentation with him?”

“He had a note!” Dorothy told me breathlessly. “A note I wrote Tom! But it wasn’t what I meant at all.”

“What did the note say?”

“I thanked Tom for letting me read his manuscript, and I told him he should keep trying and I was sure he would get it
published. Which wasn’t true, but you have to be kind to a friend, don’t you?”

“So the note was authentic?” I asked.

“Well, yes, I think so, but it was a long time ago. Years! This was back in Ithaca, and it was before Tom died, so it must be twenty or more years ago now. We were both librarians. I don’t remember writing the note, but it was my handwriting, so I must have, and it’s the kind of thing I would do. To be nice, dear—you know what I’m saying?”

“Did you actually read a manuscript that this Tom Milton gave you?” I asked.

“Yes, I believe I did.”

“What was it about? Was it a children’s novel?”

“I’m pretty sure it was, yes, because Tom and I were both fans of children’s literature. Baum, Milne, Silverstein, and all the others who created such marvelous fantasies, we could read their books over and over.”

“What do you remember about Tom’s book?”

“Well, nothing at all, really—that’s why this is so crazy.”

“I understand.”

Actually, I was hoping that Dorothy remembered
exactly
what Tom’s book was about. If she didn’t remember it, there was an outside possibility that she really did take parts of her panda book from an old manuscript written by a friend without ever meaning to do so. I know Dorothy. She has a grasshopper’s mind and a memory like a sieve that lets everything but her actual spongy brain matter drain away. I hoped to hell she hadn’t accidentally stolen Tom Milton’s idea, because it would be the most expensive mistake either one of us had ever made.

But there was no point getting her even more frantic than she was.

“Don’t worry, Dorothy, we’ll get this sorted out,” I assured her.

“This has me scared to death, Tessie, just scared to death.”

“I understand, but let me take care of this. Okay? I’ll fly to New York tomorrow and see you, and we’ll talk over the whole thing.”

“Oh, would you do that? I would feel much better if you were here.”

“I’ll catch a flight tomorrow afternoon and be there for dinner.”

“Thank God, that’s a huge relief.”

“In the meantime, I don’t want you worrying, all right? Authors face this kind of nonsense all the time. As soon as they become successful, someone wants to get a piece of the pie.”

“I just can’t believe it. Tom was a dear, dear friend, and he must be spinning in his grave to have his son doing something like this. I even mentioned Tom in the acknowledgments of my book, that’s how close we were!”

That’s really not what I wanted to hear.

“Go play with your kinkajou, Dorothy. Or take the girls for a walk. Then pour a glass of wine and get some sleep.”

“You’re an angel, Tessie. I don’t know what I would do without you.”