It was a dog-eat-dog publishing jungle and only a major Big-Game Book Gun would do.
But I’ve got the recordings,” Lockwood explained patiently. “Five hundred hours’ worth. I will tell her life in her words. It will be her final aria.”
“Listen to me, Lockwood. I want a brand-name writer to tell her story. A real wonder boy for the wonder singer.” Holloway raised his hand to signal there was nothing else to discuss. “You’ll receive a generous kill fee. For the time you’ve spent on the project.”
“This is not about time,” Lockwood protested, weakly because Hollywood Hank had already made a grab for the project, and he didn’t know how to stop him. “It’s all about the story. Don’t you see? This a really great story I’m telling.”
“Give me directions so I can send someone to schlep your files.”
Lockwood bristled. “ ‘Schlep’? Is that agent talk for scooping up, grabbing, stealing, and surrendering?”
“Where can I pick up the interviews?” Hollywood Hank repeated in a steely tone.
“I’ll mail them to you,” Lockwood evaded.
“I’ll send a courier to your house in Anaheim.”
“I need to listen to them. Do some editing.”
“I’ll take care of the editing.”
“Some of the stuff is personal. Strictly between the Señora and me.”
“Your secrets are safe.”
The two men faced each other from opposite sides of the parlor, Lockwood standing, the agent sitting back on the red velvet couch, his arm extended along the back, his fingertips lightly caressing the upholstery. Hollywood Hank dangled one boot over the other; his foot twitched nervously. He masked his increasing frustration by breathing out a long sigh. “Do you really think Alonzo Baylor gives a shit about your secrets?”
“It’s not my privacy that is at stake here. I was entrusted by Mercè Casals with her life. Her life became my life. It was going to be her book, in her own voice. I made promises. Nothing would go into it that she did not choose to reveal. Alonzo Baylor, the Hemingway throwback, ham-fisted, bare-knuckled, coulda-been-a-contender, monosyllabic, semicolon-impaired, cliché-rich typist would like nothing better than to be able to pick over her lifeless bones.” Lockwood paused to catch his breath.
Across the glass table, Hollywood Hank slouched into the folds of the plush sofa. He looked wiry and small in his black-and-green Armani ensemble, his feet sweating inside the Tony Lamas, a blue amoeba expanding under the leaking Mont Blanc in his shirt pocket, his face reddening as if he were resisting a dark impulse to spring out like a snake. “We’ll need to talk again,” Holloway sighed. “Stay in touch.”
I SAW WHAT YOU DID.
Days after Mercè Casals’ death, Lockwood has nowhere to go. He rises later than usual, for a moment disoriented that he’s not, as on other mornings, already barreling south on I-5. While he slept, his wife, Claire, has rushed off to vague appointments and meetings. He realizes helplessly that she has been putting together a life in which he has no part. She’s evasive: a job interview, a long lunch with a friend, real estate class. He feels entitled to details, but hasn’t found the right moment to ask. She is not entirely oblivious of him—there is half a melon on the kitchen counter, coffee in a thermos—but he’s too impatient to eat breakfast. The Señora awaits.
Lockwood remembers to take a blue blazer to wear over his t-shirt and khakis. He will look presentable for the visitation at the Rossini Fratelli funeral home in San Clemente. Carlo and Frigo Rossini are two strutting crows in their black suits, white-on-white ties, patent-leather hair. They walk with a slight stoop, ready to bend into a bow, all the while rubbing their hands with fluid enthusiasm.
Everything is perfect for la diva divina, Mercè Casals. The open casket, brass overlays on silky black mahogany, the inside tufted in gray satin and lace, and the Señora herself dolled to perfection, hair coiffed to a fluffy red toque, fresh new features painted on her face. Her imposing bosom seems about to release the breathless floating Vieni!— Lady Mac-beth’s time-stopping command holding a packed house captive in deep, anxious silence before the tragedy pushes on.
Carlo and Frigo maintain order in the line that winds around the corner outside the visitation room. Fans from all over the country have gathered to view the Señora. The brothers admit ten visitors at a time along a path of red carpeting past a velvet rope on brass stanchions to the front door. For a respectful moment the mourner gazes into the casket, then moves to the back to sign the book, perhaps to write a pithy goodbye, addio, adeu, adiós, adieu, to God.
The Rossinis relish the attention. Their arched wrought-iron entrance has been on the evening news coast to coast: Rossini Fratelli Mortuary, embalmers and morticians to celebrities. In all cases, from oak to steel, undertakers who understand, the cream of cremators. What they say, they mean: “Every death is premature. Every death diminishes us all.” They went to UCLA and got MBAs in mourning. Grieving is an art. There is much to think about: calming music appropriate for different faiths, the flowers, the guest book, the smelling salts for the faint. There are memorial cards, gilt-edged and engraved, the prayer, the psalm, even the pithy message for the nonreligious. (“Men fear death, as children fear the dark”—Francis Bacon.)
“It’s a madhouse out there,” says Frigo cheerfully. He distributes coffee and cookies from a tray. Mercè Casals used to do this on cold mornings for the fans queuing up outside the Met. She would walk down the line and clasp hands, kiss an occasional youth on the cheek, and personally thank everyone for braving the elements on her account. “Gràcies, molt agraïda, amics meus,” she would say in her native Catalan. “Tonight I will sing principally for you.”
It was fitting that the tradition be continued for her last appearance. To that end she left in her will a generous amount to cover refreshments for those waiting to pay their respects. Notable guests would enjoy a lavish buffet with platters of smoked salmon, roast beef, and pâté, a cheese board with runny Camembert, fragrant Roquefort, and soft chevre, plus a bread basket and a tray of petits fours. There was a choice of good rioja and a sparkling cava from Catalonia.
Lockwood puts a handful of cookies in his pocket and holds the steaming cup by the rim. He pulls one of the Rossinis by the sleeve, discreetly murmurs a request: “Do you have a special entrance for associates and personal friends?”
“Of course,” says Carlo. “My brother has the list. If your name is on the list, then you go in through the side door.” He puts on reading glasses and takes the papers from his brother. “Give me the list, Frigo.” He flips noisily through the pages on a clipboard. “You said your name was?”
“Lockwood.”
Carlo runs his index finger down the names, hopeful at first, then simply shaking his head. Frigo looks over his shoulder. “That’s Lockwood, with an L?”
“How would you spell it?”
“Nothing under the Ls,” Carlo says, attempting to look crestfallen. “Perhaps under Wood-lock? No, nothing. Perhaps under your first name?”
“Mark.”
“Afraid not, sir.” The two brothers gaze at him; their eyes, as they travel from the soles of his
