Michael Deane bristles at the mention of his autobiography, which his editor and ghostwriter turned into a how-to-pitchin-Hollywood primer. He spins back to Claire. “What did the Italian say . . . exactly?”
“Like I told you on the phone,” Claire says. “Not much.”
Michael Deane looks at Shane again, as if there might be something in the translation that Claire has missed.
“Uh, well,” Shane says, glancing at Claire, “he just said that he met you in 1962. And then he told us about this actress who came to his town, Dee—”
Michael holds up his hand to keep Shane from saying the whole name. And he looks back to Claire to pick up, as if, in this verbal relay, he might find some answers.
“At first,” Claire says, “I thought he was pitching a story about this actress in Italy. He said she was sick. And I asked with what.”
“Cancer,” Michael Deane says.
“Yeah, that’s what he said.”
Michael Deane nods. “Does he want money?”
“He didn’t say anything about money. He said he wanted to find this actress.”
Michael runs a hand through his postnaturally plugged and woven sandy hair. He nods toward the bungalow. “And he’s in there now?”
“Yes, I told him I was going to come get you. Michael, what’s this about?”
“About? This is about everything.” He looks Claire over, all the way down to her heels. “Do you know what my real talent is, Claire?”
Claire can’t imagine a satisfying answer to a question like that, and thankfully Michael doesn’t wait for an answer.
“I see what people want. I have a kind of X-ray vision for desire. Ask some guy what he wants to watch on TV and he’ll say news. Opera. Foreign films. But put a box in his house and what’s he watch? Blow jobs and car crashes. Does that mean the country is full of lying degenerates? No. They want to want news and opera. But it’s not what they want.
“What I do is look at someone”—he narrows his eyes at Claire’s clothing again—“and I see straight to her desire, to what she truly wants. A director won’t take a job and insists it isn’t about the money, I go get him more money. An actor says he wants to work in the States to be near his family, I get him a job overseas so he can get away from his family. That ability has served me for almost fifty years—”
He doesn’t finish. He takes a deep breath in through his nose and smiles at Shane, as if just remembering he was there. “Those stories of people trading their souls . . . you don’t really understand them until you get a little older.”
Claire is stunned. Michael never reflects like this, never describes himself as “old” or “older.” If there is one remarkable thing about Michael, Claire would have said an hour ago, it is that for someone with such a rich history, he never looks back, never mentions the starlets he’s had or the movies he’s made, never questions himself, never bemoans the changing culture, the death of movies, the sorts of things she and everyone else here whine about constantly. He loves what the culture loves, its sheer speed, its callous promiscuity, its defections and deflections, its level-seeking ability to always go shallower; to him, the culture can do no wrong. Don’t ever give in to cynicism, he is always telling her, believe in everything. He is a shark ceaselessly swimming forward into the culture, into the future. And yet here he is now, staring off, as if he’s looking directly into the past, a man stricken by something that happened fifty years ago. He takes another deep breath and nods at the bungalow.
“Okay,” he says. “I’m ready. Let’s go.”
Pasquale Tursi narrows his eyes and stares at Michael Deane. Can this possibly be the same man? They are sitting in Michael’s office, Michael sliding easily behind his desk, Pasquale and Shane on the couch, Claire in a chair she’s dragged in. Michael has kept his heavy coat on, and his face is placid, but he squirms a bit, uncomfortable in his chair.
“Good to see you again, my friend,” Michael tells Pasquale, but it comes across as oddly insincere. “It has been a long time.”
Pasquale simply nods. Then he turns to Shane and asks quietly: “Sta male?”
“No,” Shane says, and tries to think of how to tell Pasquale that Michael Deane is not sick but has had numerous procedures and surgeries. “Molto . . . uh . . . ambulatori.”
“What did you tell him?” Michael asks.
“He, uh . . . he said you look good and I just said you take care of yourself.”