Miller pushes open the iron gate that opens onto a downward drive lined with gravel and heavy flat stones the color of cigarette ash. The front yard is a hillside, wild and dark with twisting rose bushes and exposed roots. The house is barely visible from the road. The white moth returns to strafe my face and I wonder if I’m glowing. I try to catch it in my fist, to kill it. But the little bastard is too fast for me and I clutch at the air like a spastic. I lower my head before it decides to fly down my throat. Miller starts down the slope and I follow him.
The house of Miller is bewildering, and much larger than it looks from the outside. He gives me a rapid tour of the lower level, telling me there are nineteen rooms in all. The house is primarily constructed of stone, but some of the walls are made of glass. The house is cold and dark and I imagine it is cold and bright by day. There are three floors, or levels. The house is not vertical, but staggered. It clings to the hillside like a giant spider. Two massive trees come up through the back of it, like twin spines. A complex series of wood platforms is built around these trees, with rope ladders connecting the various levels. The kitchen door opens onto level two. I stand in the doorway, a goofy smile on my face.
It’s like something out of a fairy tale, I say.
Miller is pouring tall glasses of bourbon and soda.
Yeah, he says. I think the guy who designed it was out of his mind, however.
How’s that?
Miller shrugs. You can feel it. There’s madness in the walls.
Ah, yes. Madness in the walls. I hate it when that happens.
Miller stirs our drinks with what appears to be a bright blue chopstick.
Do you live alone? I say.
Not exactly. He hands me a drink, very strong.
The kitchen is black tile and bright steel. Harsh white light. Functional, cold, a surgical theater. I imagine myself laid out on the island with a mask over my face and tubes running in and out of my belly, surrounded by a crew of silent men in dark red gowns. I doubt there’s anything in the refrigerator but olives and French mustard and spare plasma.
Come on, says Miller. Let’s go to the lizard room.
A long, windowless room that glows from the light of twenty-two terrariums. These contain lizards, iguanas, chameleons, and various snakes. Obviously. I walk the perimeter and look them over. I am fond of reptiles, generally. Because they can sit on a rock for two days without moving. Because they are untroubled by the loss of a limb and more than likely will grow another one. Because they methodically seek out sources of heat, but will not necessarily perish without it. Their chances of survival on this planet seem so much better than ours and I think Miller is wise to be friendly with them. The last terrarium along one wall houses a very large boa constrictor, coiled and sleeping. I stare at him for a while and I think I would like to hold him, to close my eyes and wonder at his strength.
It’s too bad you didn’t come yesterday, says Miller.
Why is that?
It was feeding day, he says. The boa put on quite a show.
Does he have a name?
I’m sure he does, says Miller. But I don’t know it.
There are two black leather chairs at the far end of the room. Miller sits in one of them, his legs stretched out and his feet up on a round coffee table of solid, roughly cut glass that looks like a block of ice. The wood floor is stained the color of black cherries and down the middle of the room runs a narrow Turkish rug, green and gold. The rug comes to an end under the glass table and the colors melt and magnify. The walls are painted a dark, faintly metallic green.
Miller tells me to sit down. He doesn’t sound like he’s asking.
I take a sip of whiskey and suddenly feel strange, almost happy. This place smells of Dr. Moreau’s island and there may be much mischief in store for me, but I don’t care. Miller is an excellent host and I like it here. I am wary of telling him so, however, and I have to remind myself who he is and what he did to Jude. I have to steel myself against his charm. The house feels empty but for the reptiles and ourselves. The house has been utterly silent since we entered but now I imagine that I hear music, the soft lament of a solitary cello. The same few notes over and over, stretched and groaning. They stop and start, as if there is someone practicing upstairs. It’s a mournful tune and the only explanation for this sort of thing is that my brain is full of poison. I sink into the chair across from Miller and put my feet up.
He smiles at me and promptly the cello resumes, urgent now.
Okay, I say. Do I hear music? Or am I fucking nuts.
The cello stops. Miller lights a cigarette.
Beethoven, he says. Piano Trio number 4, in D Major. The love song for Anna Marie.
Who is playing, though?
I don’t hear anything, he says. Perhaps you’re nuts.
Uh huh. Give me a cigarette, please?
Miller pushes a pack of Dunhills across the glass table. I light one and we blow smoke and stare at each other. I wait for the cello to resume but it never does. The player is self-conscious, maybe. He heard us talking about him.
I feel like I’ve seen you before, says Miller.
I have that kind of face.
It’s a good face, he says. Not too handsome, but interesting.
Thanks, I guess.
Miller leans forward, pours two fingers of whiskey into my glass.
Have you ever tried acting? he says.
The whiskey burns my tongue. I light another cigarette, vaguely uneasy. Miller smiles at me and I wait for him to tell me what I’m thinking. But he doesn’t.
I can become someone else, I say. If that’s what you mean.
Interesting, he says. I’m talking about regular drama, however.
Only as a child, I say. In the fourth grade I had a non-speaking role in Great Expectations. I was beggar number nine. And one Christmas I was an anonymous shepherd in the nativity scene.
Miller laughs.
Why do you ask?
I’m interested in making a film, says Miller.
I am a thousand miles from home and once in a while I have to remind myself that I have no home. This is California and on any given Thursday there could be a nuclear sunset. And it’s earthquake country. The earth could come apart beneath my feet, any day now. Jude is waiting for me in a hotel room but I am prepared for the possibility that she may not be there when I return.
I won’t like it.
But I will sit down on the bed and take off my shoes. I will breathe the recycled air that may or may not smell of her hair. I will read the newspaper and smoke a few cigarettes and eventually I might take a nap. There will be no one to hear me if I speak in my sleep.
What sort of film? I say.
I finish off my bourbon and consider shooting Miller.
Do you know anything about snuff films? he says.
Urban legend, I say. But probably true.
Why do you say that?
Anything you can imagine is probably true. And the worst you can imagine is probably worth money.
How philosophical, he says.
Fuck you. People tend to kill people. And they do it every twenty-nine seconds. In the time it takes me to smoke this cigarette, eleven people will be murdered in this country.
Where do you get these statistics?
I make them up.
Excellent, he says. What else?
Everything is on videotape. Vacations, weddings, birthdays, dogs and cats doing tricks. Every time you go to a
