Read Online Westlake, Donald E - Novel 50 by Sacred Monster (v1.1) - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Sacred Monster (v1.1)
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of Porsche.
Marcia
collected the plastic dry-cleaner bag, which had been draped over the back of
the passenger seat, then climbed from the car, and went through the connecting
door and through the kitchen and the corner of the living room and down the
hall, the dry-cleaner bag held over her shoulder like Frank Sinatra’s jacket.
Walking down the hall, Marcia glanced leftward and saw, in profile, Jack.
Still there. In the same old cowboy hat and fringed jacket
and high decorated boots, he sat in his favorite canvas chair at the deep end
of the pool, seated well down and back so his head and knees were at the same
height, cowboy hat pulled low over his eyes to shade them from the afternoon
sun, booted legs stretched far out in front of him over the redwood deck with
ankles crossed, hands folded casually in lap. From a cigarette in the corner of
his mouth, a slender pale tendril of smoke wavered upward past his ear and the
brim of his hat.
Marcia
did not break stride. Her eyes narrowed slightly, she gazed steadily at that
self-absorbed profile out there, and she kept walking, on down to the end of
the hall, where she faced front again at last, moving through the doorway into
the master bedroom.
Clean
laundry stood in neat folded piles on the bed. Nodding as though to say her
expectations had been fulfilled, she walked around the bed to the wall of
closets and hung the dry-cleaning bag on the rod. Then she turned, looked again
at the laundry on the bed, took a long, slow breath, and glanced across the
room at her reflection in the dresser mirror there. No expression showed in the
face looking back at her.
Marcia
stepped through the sliding glass door to the outside, slid it shut behind her,
and stood at the shallow end of the pool, looking down across the water at
Jack, who hadn't moved. An almost inaudible sigh parted her lips, which then
pressed shut again. Deliberately she strode around the pool; he finally—as she
was halfway to him—lifted his head and lifted his hand to lift his cowboy hat
away from his eyes to watch her. Nothing else on him moved.
Marcia
stopped in front of him. They looked at each other for a long silent moment,
and then, with a kind of grim fatalism, she said, "Get off your dead
ass."
"Hi,
honey," he said mildly, a happy smile playing at the corners of his lips.
"How'd things go today at the studio?"
She
shook her head, pushing that aside, saying, "What did you do today?"
He
considered. "Well," he said, "the laundry."
"Jack,"
she said, "you've got to get out of this house, you've got to get moving, you've got to get your life going again. Do you want to spend the rest of your life as a kept man?
He considered that question, giving
it careful thought, and then a sunny smile glowed all over his face and he
looked up at her and said, "Yes!"
"No!"
she told him, and pointed a rigid finger at his nose. "You," she
said, "are going to get a job."
Mildly,
the smile still faintly lighting his features, he gazed up at her, blinking.
12
Marcia
got me an appointment with her agent, Irwin Sandstone, a man who had guided
lots of fellas just like me to movie stardom.
FLASHBACK 10
The
views were magnificient, or would have been, if Los Angeles had anything magnificent to look at. From
this corner office high in one of the silvery godless megaliths of Century
City, one view was northward across the smog and over the boxy little houses in
peach and coral toward the low but steep hills serving as the only redan
against the proles of the Valley, while the other view was westward over
flatter and peachier but less
Marcia
collected the plastic dry-cleaner bag, which had been draped over the back of
the passenger seat, then climbed from the car, and went through the connecting
door and through the kitchen and the corner of the living room and down the
hall, the dry-cleaner bag held over her shoulder like Frank Sinatra’s jacket.
Walking down the hall, Marcia glanced leftward and saw, in profile, Jack.
Still there. In the same old cowboy hat and fringed jacket
and high decorated boots, he sat in his favorite canvas chair at the deep end
of the pool, seated well down and back so his head and knees were at the same
height, cowboy hat pulled low over his eyes to shade them from the afternoon
sun, booted legs stretched far out in front of him over the redwood deck with
ankles crossed, hands folded casually in lap. From a cigarette in the corner of
his mouth, a slender pale tendril of smoke wavered upward past his ear and the
brim of his hat.
Marcia
did not break stride. Her eyes narrowed slightly, she gazed steadily at that
self-absorbed profile out there, and she kept walking, on down to the end of
the hall, where she faced front again at last, moving through the doorway into
the master bedroom.
Clean
laundry stood in neat folded piles on the bed. Nodding as though to say her
expectations had been fulfilled, she walked around the bed to the wall of
closets and hung the dry-cleaning bag on the rod. Then she turned, looked again
at the laundry on the bed, took a long, slow breath, and glanced across the
room at her reflection in the dresser mirror there. No expression showed in the
face looking back at her.
Marcia
stepped through the sliding glass door to the outside, slid it shut behind her,
and stood at the shallow end of the pool, looking down across the water at
Jack, who hadn't moved. An almost inaudible sigh parted her lips, which then
pressed shut again. Deliberately she strode around the pool; he finally—as she
was halfway to him—lifted his head and lifted his hand to lift his cowboy hat
away from his eyes to watch her. Nothing else on him moved.
Marcia
stopped in front of him. They looked at each other for a long silent moment,
and then, with a kind of grim fatalism, she said, "Get off your dead
ass."
"Hi,
honey," he said mildly, a happy smile playing at the corners of his lips.
"How'd things go today at the studio?"
She
shook her head, pushing that aside, saying, "What did you do today?"
He
considered. "Well," he said, "the laundry."
"Jack,"
she said, "you've got to get out of this house, you've got to get moving, you've got to get your life going again. Do you want to spend the rest of your life as a kept man?
He considered that question, giving
it careful thought, and then a sunny smile glowed all over his face and he
looked up at her and said, "Yes!"
"No!"
she told him, and pointed a rigid finger at his nose. "You," she
said, "are going to get a job."
Mildly,
the smile still faintly lighting his features, he gazed up at her, blinking.
12
Marcia
got me an appointment with her agent, Irwin Sandstone, a man who had guided
lots of fellas just like me to movie stardom.
FLASHBACK 10
The
views were magnificient, or would have been, if Los Angeles had anything magnificent to look at. From
this corner office high in one of the silvery godless megaliths of Century
City, one view was northward across the smog and over the boxy little houses in
peach and coral toward the low but steep hills serving as the only redan
against the proles of the Valley, while the other view was westward over
flatter and peachier but less
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