Innocent Blood

‘What’s it all come to, Rufus?’

The elevator chimed its arrival at the seventh floor. ‘The lowest common denominator,’ said Rufus. ‘You want art, go to the Getty.’

He led Frank into his office. At Fox, Rufus had been notorious for his untidiness, and his ‘den’ had been littered with scripts, photographs, unanswered letters, magazines, TV awards and half-eaten sandwiches. Here at Star, he had a large desk covered with gray leather on which stood nothing more than a telephone, a laptop, a digital clock, and a silver-framed photograph of his wife, Natasha. Outside the window there was a view of Century City, with the traffic crawling along the Avenue of the Stars.

Rufus picked up his phone and asked his secretary for two espresso. ‘You still drink that horseshoe stuff, yes?’ The clock on his desk showed it was four eleven. Frank could feel the gun weighing down the left side of his linen coat, and hoped that it wasn’t too noticeable.

‘You’re really happy, then, working here?’ he asked Rufus.

‘You mean do I like Charles Lasser? What can I say? Charles Lasser gives people what they want, even if it isn’t good for them. To be honest, I hardly ever see him, and I don’t think he even knows who I am.’

‘Do you think that he could have been behind this bombing campaign?’

Rufus stared at him, taken by surprise. ‘What?’

‘Think about it. They bombed almost every TV network except HBO and Star.’

Rufus looked dubious. ‘I don’t know, man. The way I heard it, it’s a group of psychos – child-abuse victims, trying to get their own back on society.’

‘Somebody has to be financing them. Somebody has to be pulling the levers.’

‘And you think that could be Charles Lasser?’

‘I don’t know. I’m asking you.’

Rufus stood up, went over to the door, looked up and down the corridor, and then closed it. ‘It’s a hell of a thought, isn’t it? I mean, I see where you’re coming from. Ever since the other networks canceled their soaps, our daytime Nielsen ratings have shot through the roof. Advertising revenues . . . I don’t know . . . they’ve just about tripled. And we’re picking up the talent, too. We’ve already had approaches from Bill Katzman and Gerry Santosky – people who swore that they wouldn’t work for Charles Lasser even if you threatened to cut their dicks off.’

He sat down. ‘Do you remember the TV Drama Awards, the year before last? When Lance Seelbach made that speech about Rats-TV? “Like Star-TV, only not so backward.” Charles Lasser never forgave him for that, and he never forgave anybody at that ceremony who laughed at him – not Fox or Disney or NBC or CBS or UPN or anybody.’

Frank said nothing. After a while, Rufus leaned back in his swivel chair and there was a look on his face which Frank had never seen before. He looked troubled, but he looked beaten, too. ‘I reckon you could say that Charles Lasser is a very vengeful man. But as for blowing up innocent people . . . I don’t think so.’ He paused, and then he said, ‘I sure hope not, anyhow.’

There was a knock at the door and Rufus’s secretary came in with two cups of espresso and some chocolate-chip cookies. Rufus said, ‘You can leave the door open, Thelma.’ When she had gone, he turned to Frank and added, ‘Company rule, leaving the doors open. John calls it the Anti-Plotting Policy.’

The clock now said four seventeen. Frank sipped a little coffee and then said, ‘Sorry – do you mind if I use the restroom?’

He walked quickly along the corridor until he reached the elevators. He jabbed the call button and waited, glancing back toward Rufus’s office in case Rufus came out and wondered why he had taken the wrong turning. But at last an elevator car arrived. He stepped inside and pressed the button for the penthouse.

The elevator stopped at the next floor and a man with Clark Kent glasses and an armful of folders stepped in. ‘How’s it going?’ he asked, as if he had known Frank for years. ‘Good,’ said Frank. Three floors later the man stepped out again, and said, ‘Take care of yourself.’ Frank said, ‘You, too.’

At last he reached the penthouse. The thickly carpeted corridor was silent. He waited until the elevator doors had closed behind him, and then walked quickly along to the receptionist’s office and pushed his way through the double doors. There was a different girl sitting there today – a pretty Vietnamese girl in a shiny turquoise blouse.

‘Excuse me, sir,’ she protested, as Frank came in. ‘Mr Lasser isn’t seeing any more visitors today.’

‘Oh, he’s going to see me.’

‘No, no. He give strict instruction.’ The girl rose from her seat but Frank walked around her triangular glass desk and pushed her gently but firmly back down.

‘Stay there. Don’t say a word and don’t call anybody, you got me?’

‘You can’t go into Mr Lasser’s office! Mr Lasser will be so angry!’

‘Look at me,’ said Frank. ‘You don’t think I’m angry? I’m very angry. Compared to me, Mr Lasser is Mr Sunny Personality of the Year.’

‘Please – if I let you in, I will lose my job here.’

‘In that case, I’ll be doing you a great favor, believe me.’

He reached across her desk and ripped the cord out of her phone. ‘You don’t call anybody and you stay right here, OK?’

Then he went to the doors of Charles Lasser’s office and threw them wide open.

Twenty-Eight

Charles Lasser was standing in the middle of the room in his shirtsleeves, his shoulders hunched, grasping a golf club. His head was wreathed in cigar smoke, so that it appeared for a moment as if he didn’t have a head at all. Then he looked up, and the smoke swirled away, and he was staring directly at Frank with eyes that glittered like nail heads.

‘Who the hell let you in?’ he demanded. ‘Kim Cu’c!’

‘Mr Lasser, please, I try to stop him.’

‘It’s not her fault,’ said Frank. He took a few steps toward the window so that his back was covered.

Charles Lasser lowered his head again, hesitated, and then putted his golf ball under his desk. ‘You’re going to have to leave, Mr Bell. I have nothing to say to you. Besides, you’re putting me off my stroke.’

‘You may not have anything to say to me, but by God, I have plenty to say to you.’

‘Oh, yes? I thought you would have been far too busy writing funeral speeches for your friends.’

‘Jesus, you’re twisted. If it hadn’t been for you, my friends wouldn’t be dead.’

‘You’re out of your mind, Mr Bell. You think I killed them? What on earth makes you think that?’

‘Because you’re a goddamned sadist and you know damn well who was financing Dar Tariki Tariqat – it was you. And you bombed my office right after I came here and warned you about Astrid. You didn’t bomb any of the studios; you didn’t bomb the executive cottages – no, you bombed my office, and if I hadn’t stepped out for a minute you would have killed me, too.’

‘You want me to go bring security, Mr Lasser?’ asked his receptionist.

Charles Lasser shook his head. ‘Don’t worry, Kim Cu’c. I can deal with Mr Bell. Mr Bell is suffering from delusions, that’s all.’

He walked back to his desk, which was a huge mahogany construction with carvings of satyrs’ heads and bunches of grapes and fluted pillars. He parked one substantial buttock right on the edge of it, and sat there smiling at Frank, occasionally slapping the shaft of his golf club into the palm of his hand.

Frank said, ‘Why don’t you admit it? You bombed my office, didn’t you? You organized all of these bombings. This was nothing to do with child-abuse victims getting their revenge, not really. This was you getting your revenge on the entertainment business.’

Charles Lasser grinned. He seemed to have too many teeth, and even though they were perfect, they were yellowed by nicotine. ‘That’s a great theory, Mr Bell. I have to give you ten out of ten for creativity. I can’t say that Star-TV hasn’t profited from this terrorist campaign, and we’ve been very lucky so far that they haven’t targeted us. But you’re giving me far too much credit. I never would have had the brains to think of it, myself, and I certainly wouldn’t have had the courage to carry it out.’

‘You had the courage to break Astrid’s nose.’