Youngblood hawke, p.89
Youngblood Hawke, page 89
"Jeanie, Jim isn't eating for the same reason that you were yelling at him. You must give him time."
"I know, I know, Arthur, I should be all sweet reasonableness. I'm not in good shape. I overestimated my strength today, obviously. Hodge Hathaway was hell. I don't know if I can ever go back there."
It had been bad enough, she said, to confront Karl's heaped desk in the office they had shared, so full of memories: things he had said, private jokes they had had, scribbled notes in his handwriting, the smell of the Turkish cigarettes he had been smoking in the past year. But there was also the damned Judd review! One after another the people of the staff had come in to talk about it as word spread that Jeanne Fry was back. Within an hour she had had three calls from literary columnists, demanding interviews and probing at her. She had fled, leaving both desks in total disorder. "I've never left a desk looking the way mine did in all my life," she said, "but I was on the verge of a screaming fit, and it seemed the better part of wisdom to pull out." She glanced shyly at him. "I don't know if this will surprise you, or what. I've been thinking that I ought to pick up and go home for a while. Just take Jim and stay with mama in the California sunshine through the worst of the winter, and sort of pull myself together. What do you think?"
Hawke was startled and cast down, but he said as cheerfully as he could, "Whatever you think best, Jeanie."
She was eager to explain. The words began to tumble out. "I'm utterly shot, my dear, that's the plain fact. I realized it for the first time today. I guess you just saw a small proof of it. It's out of the question for me to go back to work at the office, for months anyway. This apartment gives me the horrors. Jim does very poorly in this foul New York winter, always an earache or a sore throat, fevers spiking up to a hundred and five, midnight doctor visits and so forth. They've always passed off, but oh God, Arthur, they're fearful while they last, and I'm in no condition to endure another siege of them. I don't know what'll become of me if I see him in convulsions again, the way he was last February. It almost drove me crazy even then, when I was feeling fine. And with the disgusting Judd business, Arthur, it really does seem to me the best service I can render you right now is to disappear. Just vanish until the tempest dies down, so that nobody can corner me and make me say something idiotic." She peered at him, her face lovely and searching. "Would you mind so very much? It's you I'm worrying about. I'll do anything you say. It just seems to me I need a little time and peace to grow some skin. I'm one raw wound, no good for anybody or anything."
Hawke was thinking, as she talked, how impossible it was to foresee real events before they were upon you. He had thought many times of the possible death of Karl Fry. His mind had always moved straight from the death to a picture of Jeanne in his arms at last, black-clad and tearful, but happy, united with him forever after the long mischances. Instead, this was the way it was working out; and he thought ruefully that God was always the best at realism. He knew that Jeanne loved him and wanted him; he had not realized that when a man died he did not disappear, but took on a last burst of importance that he might even have lacked in life, before he faded to invisibility. Jeanne was having a private agony over Karl's death to which he would never be admitted. Until it was over, the marriage remained a bar between them, even more than in Karl's lifetime.
It would be no great matter, Hawke sensed, to isolate Jeanne with himself and make her come to bed. She was shattered and defenseless, and she loved him. But it would be a peculiarly grisly form of adultery while she was in this state. Having had to wait for his wife so long, he now had to wait a bit longer. That was all.
He said slowly, "Jeanne, I'm sure that's the best thing you can do."
Her face lit up with relief. "Do you honestly think so? You're not just agreeing with a shaky drunk?"
He said, "I'll miss you, I don't have to say how much, but it's sensible, it's the answer right now."
"Thank heaven!" She drained her glass. "If you knew how I dreaded saying this to you! It looks as though I'm running away from you when you're in trouble, but it isn't that. I'm absolutely yours to command, you know it, Arthur."
"Where does your mother live, again?"
"Oh, you've never heard of it, it's called Bell, it's one of the ten million flat suburbs south of Los Angeles. The smog's never too bad there, and mama has this fenced back yard where Jim can run around on the grass in the sun, and there's a dog and four cats—"
"How far is it from Beverly Hills?"
"A terrible drive, two hours or so, why?"
"Well, it occurs to me that Travis Jablock isn't returning until April. I can still go back to his place to work, and drive over to see you now and then, and sort of get to know Jim, and your mother too, a little better. And we could see each other, Jeanne, go swimming and to restaurants and such, without the New York columnists carrying along the Judd fantasy." He smiled. "That doesn't sound too bad, does it?"
Her eyes were shining. "It sounds unbelievably wonderful. Will you really do it?"
"Sure I will."
She jumped to her feet. "I'm going to fry up those tacos. I'm suddenly ravenous." She turned back at the kitchen doorway. "It's chicken, I'm afraid. We're fresh out of turkey." And at this ancient secret joke, so like the standard joke of a long-married couple, both of them laughed in tones not untinged with sadness. She hummed as she moved here and there in the tiny kitchen, pulling out utensils and food with swift sure motions. "How about a beer while I do this? I'd like one."
"Sure."
"In the freezer," she said, gesturing over her shoulder with a knife she was using to shred lettuce. "By the way," she added very casually, as he punched open the icy cans, "whatever did become of Frieda Winter?"
"I believe she's in Jamaica."
"You believe? Don't you know?"
"Ferdie Lax told me he saw her there around Christmas time."
"When did you last hear from her?"
"I saw her for the last time, Jeanne, when I gave her back that letter of Paul's. It must have been a week or so after the funeral."
"And she doesn't write, and you don't write? Nothing?"
"Nothing."
She glanced at him over the rim of her conical beer glass, a flash of the old mischief in her eyes. "Well, it was a long siege."
Hawke said, "A spiking fever, you might say."
"Yes indeed. A very bad case of the New York crud. I often thought it would be the death of you. Well, stand clear for the spatter of frying oil and the like."
They were eating tacos and salad in the dining room when the phone rang. Jeanne answered it. "Hello? Oh, hello, Gus. Why I'm fine. Yes, he's here. Good guess." She held out the receiver to Hawke. "The legal mind."
Adam sounded very hoarse and tired. "Hello, Arthur. I've just finished with Newton Leffer."
Hawke looked at his watch. It was a quarter past nine. He said, "Long session."
"Yes. A long session."
"How do we stand?"
"Well, it could be worse. We have to talk right away. I'm sorry to disturb you and Jeanne."
"You want to meet tonight?"
"Right now."
"Where?"
"Any place you say."
The telephone was on a little table at the bend of the L into the living room. Jeanne said, "Does Gus want to talk about your finances?"
"Yes, Jeanne."
"Tell him to come up here."
Hawke looked doubtful. He said to Adam, "Jeanne wants us to talk here, at her place."
There was such a long silence that Hawke said, "Gus, are you there?"
The lawyer said in a strained tone, "I'm here. As a matter of fact, if she isn't too tired, I imagine it would be a wise thing to include Jeanne."
4
Soon the lawyer sat in the living room in his shirtsleeves at Jeanne's insistence, his tie off, eating tacos from a tray. He needed a shave, and his hair was unkempt. Hawke noticed that the bristles on his face were reddish rather than blond. He looked more tired than Hawke had ever seen him, but the food and the beer brought him to quickly. "Why, these things are marvellous! What do you call them, Jeanne, tacos? I've never eaten anything like this. Delicious! Is there a restaurant in town where I can order these?"
She said, pleased, "Well, if you can find a lowbrow enough Mexican joint they'll probably have tacos, but I wouldn't endorse the contents, Gus. Better ask me, when you feel like having them again. They're easy to make."
"Why, I'll certainly take you up on that. Thank you."
Hawke felt a twinge of jealousy, to see Gus Adam eating Jeanne's tacos in a chair under the picture of Karl Fry. These little hot fried corn meal pouches of chili-soaked meat and vegetables were part of his own long romance with her, and for the moment Adam seemed a most unwanted intruder. But the swollen briefcase was Adam's passport into the scene. It lay on the floor beside his armchair like a ticking bomb.
Adam said, "Well! Thank you, Jeanne, that was a real treat, and I needed it." He began to fill his pipe. "Unfortunately, Arthur, our deadline for action is tomorrow morning at nine, so we'll have to keep going."
"By all means."
Jeanne sat on an ottoman, hugging her knees, glancing from Hawke to the lawyer, her eyes sharp and bright once more. The traffic noises were loud in the street as Adam lit his pipe: honks, motor roars, and squeals of brakes. The room was lit a warm amber by two floor lamps, and seemed very peaceful. Karl's picture glowed in the upward flare of the lamp beside Adam.
He said, "To begin with, Arthur, did you read the booklet?"
"Yes. It looks to me like I'm a Chapter Eleven type rather than a bankrupt, at worst." At this a small grin wrinkled the lawyer's mouth, and his eyebrows arched. Hawke went on, "Except I guess if Newt wants to get technical, my paying ten thousand dollars to the advertising people day before yesterday was an act of bankruptcy. I sure was insolvent, and on notice that Newton wanted his money. But hell, Gus, that bill was due."
"Very good Arthur, really! A plus. Technically that payment probably was a preference, and Newton could file on that basis. But if all goes well he's not going to file, and there won't be any need for Chapter Eleven. That's the aim here, let's be clear, to keep Youngblood Hawke out of bankruptcy court entirely. The damage to your prestige would be fearful, and I don't care if Twain survived it, the fact is he never was the same afterward. I'm going to recommend some drastic steps here, so let's never forget that aim."
Jeanne said, "Bankruptcy court! Are things that bad?"
Hawke said, "I'm not sure."
Adam's face turned sober. He picked up his briefcase, set it on his knees and rasped it open. "Well. Let's go." He pulled out the HAWKE folder and deliberately removed from a sheaf of papers in a fastener two government forms, one of ordinary size and one a short slip. Without a word he passed them to Hawke, who sat forward, elbows on knees, and looked at them in the light of the floor lamp. Jeanne scanned Hawke's face nervously. His expression did not change. He studied the papers for a minute or two. Then he glanced up at Adam, and an ironic smile compressed his broad mouth. "If I understand what I'm reading, Gus, this is it. This puts me under."
"Well, now does it? That's what we have to figure out. I don't think so. I believe you can still squeak through."
Hawke shook his head. "No. Another ninety-three thousand dollars! I just don't know where it can come from."
"What are those papers?" Jeanne said.
The lawyer said, "It's a jeopardy assessment, Jeanne, an Internal Revenue instrument, and a rough one." He stood and paced, talking about the documents that Hawke was holding. He had known the assessment was coming for a week, and had been fighting it off up to high Washington levels. Internal Revenue had the power, he said, to decide that a man's finances were deteriorating very badly, and that it must protect the government's tax claims by taking quick action. The bureau could proceed without further ado to seize all his property, or enough to satisfy the claim.
The agents looking into Hawke's recent tax returns, Adam said, had scanned the Paumanok Plaza financing and had reported to the district director that Hawke was exposed to huge impending losses. The director—Adam knew him well—had called the lawyer in, questioned him severely about Hawke's financial picture, and at last said he was going to make a jeopardy assessment of the $80,000 deficiency from the movie sale of Chain of Command, plus $13,000 interest; and another jeopardy assessment for the deficiency arising from the contract which had put the royalties of the Oblivion play into Scotty's shopping center. Adam had argued with him for days, had telephoned all the high officials he knew in Washington over and over, and had at last won the concession that only the first assessment would be made now. The District Director felt that this was an extraordinarily soft-hearted decision, and would not budge further. "He admires you personally, Arthur," Adam said, "but of course the New York districts have had a lot of bad experiences with actors, writers, and such. Speaking fiscally, he said, artists are confirmed tax-dodgers, squanderers, and potential bankrupts."
Hawke said, "Speaking fiscally, I'd call that a reasonable description."
"So, he feels that his responsibility is to grab while the grabbing's good," Adam said. "The jeopardy assessment is a formidable thing. Its force is absolute. You can't appeal from it. I know of no recourse in law against it, neither an injunction nor any other stay. The government seizes your property. Then you go to court. If we win—I think we have a good chance of winning both disputes, as I've told you—the bureau hands back the money and says, 'So sorry.' That's how it works."
"God Almighty," said Jeanne, "I didn't know such a thing existed."
"It's a sad day for anybody who has to be informed that it does," the lawyer said.
"Amen," said Hawke, staring at the forms.
Jeanne said, "Karl ought to be alive. We'd have another lecture on the status of the artist in Russia."
Adam said, "Well, I'll admit the jeopardy assessment smells of confiscation without due process, it's the heavy hand of government at its heaviest, and I have some abstract doubts about its morality. But it's obvious why it exists. The government is a very slow and bumbling legal mover. When you deal with frauds and bankrupts—against whom this procedure is typically used—fast motion is the one thing you need. Grab first, argue later. I think the use of it against Arthur at this point is not only unlucky but punitive. However, there it is, and the question is, what next?"
Hawke said, "Is this all the bad news, now, Gus?"
"All that I know of," Adam said. "I'm coming to my deal with Newton, but that's not a fresh obligation."
Hawke said thoughtfully, "I own about a hundred fifty thousand in stocks and bonds, don't I? Money that I can immediately lay my hands on. There's the fifty thousand Ross offered me today, that makes two hundred. I have about forty thousand in real estate syndication units, but those damned things can't be turned into cash. I might be able to borrow something on them, not much. The printing bill, the other Haworth House bills, this assessment, and the Leffer note add up to nearly half a million dollars. I don't see how I can close the gap by borrowing, Gus, and I don't think even the earnings of my next book will get me clear. If Leffer really calls that whole note, I go down."
"I managed to convince Newton of that," Adam said. "If you agree to certain conditions, he's not going to call the note. The conditions are stiff."
"All right," Hawke said. "Let's hear them."
Adam again carefully removed from the folder three sets of clipped sheets in blurry carbon-copy typing, and handed a set to Hawke, and another to Jeanne. Memorandum of Proposed Agreement Between Y. Hawke and von Fisken Fabrik, Incorporated, was the heading on the first page. Jeanne found the legal language hard going, but she saw Hawke turn the sheets rapidly. Then he said, calmly enough but with an edge in his voice that hurt her, "Well, this is kind of stiff, at that. On the whole I guess it's acceptable."
Adam said, "It's not unlike a Chapter Eleven arrangement, Arthur. Of course we're going to have to clear your other debts before we go into this. A special arrangement with one creditor while you're insolvent is a statutory act of bankruptcy."
"Well, then, Gus, I don't see daylight. If I pay the printer and the jeopardy assessment that more than cleans me of cash. I haven't got the seventy-five thousand for Newton that this calls for."
The lawyer said, "I think you can muster it. There's Hodge's advance of fifty thousand. Of course you'll have to pay taxes on that eventually. But we're fighting for oxygen at the moment. Always remember that you have a large stake in Paumanok Plaza, and its potential is good. You have to survive until Scotty pulls it through. Scotty is a cheerful fraud, but he knows this business and his interest lies in finishing that shopping center and selling it. He'll do it sooner or later."
Meantime Jeanne was beginning to puzzle out the memorandum. These four flimsy sheets of paper, she perceived with dismay, were the four stone walls of a jail with heavy bars, in which Hawke would live shackled until the debt was paid. He was even limited in his personal spending money! She flung the papers to the floor with a crackle, midway through the third page. "My God, Gus, is this the best you could do? Arthur, you can't sign this. Why, you're bound hand and foot as though you were a convicted embezzler!"
The lawyer said, expelling a long breath, "You may be getting a little too upset at a lot of legal boiler plate. Have you ever read an ordinary mortgage instrument?" He waved his spread loose fingers at the tumbled papers on the floor, a typical Adam gesture. "In effect Arthur will just have to go on writing at top speed, which he's doing anyway, and not engage in other business activities, which is a damned good idea, and not spend large sums without consulting Newton, which is also a good idea right now. It's a humiliating instrument, I grant you, but Arthur's posture at the moment is not one that will support your indignation."
