Fools die

Chapter 50

Charlie had already taken Osano to St. Vincent ’s Hospital, so we agreed to meet there. When I got there, Osano was in a private room and Charlie was with him, sitting on the bed where Osano could put his hand in her lap. Charlie let her hand rest on Osano’s stomach, which was bare of covers or top shirt. In fact, Osano’s hospital nightgown lay in shreds on the floor. That act must have put him in good humor because he was sitting up cheerfully in bed. And to me he really didn’t look that bad. In fact, he seemed to have lost some weight.

I checked the hospital room quickly with my eyes. There were no intravenous settings, no special nurses on duty, and I had seen walking down the corridor that it was not in any way an intensive care unit. I was surprised at the amount of relief I felt, that Charlie must have made a mistake and that Osano wasn’t dying after all.

Osano said coolly, “Hi, Merlyn. You must be a real magician. How did you find out I was here? It’s supposed to be a secret.”

I didn’t want any fooling around or any kind of bullshit, so I said straight out, “Charlie Brown told me.” Maybe she wasn’t supposed to tell me, but I didn’t feel like lying.

Charlie just smiled at Osano’s frown.

Osano said to her, “I told you it was just me and you, or just me. However you like it. Nobody else.”

Charlie said almost absently, “I know you wanted Merlyn.”

Osano sighed. “OK,” he said. “You’ve been here all day, Charlie. Why don’t you go to the movies or get laid or have a chocolate ice-cream soda or ten Chinese dishes? Anyway, take the night off and I’ll see you in the morning.”

“All right,” Charlie said. She got up from the bed. She stood very close to Osano and he, with a movement not really lecherous, but as if he were reminding himself of what it felt like, put his hand under her dress and caressed her inner thighs and then she leaned her head over the bed to kiss him.

And on Osano’s face as his hand caressed that warm flesh beneath the dress came a look of peace and contentment as if reassured in some holy belief.

When Charlie left the room, Osano sighed and said, “Merlyn, believe me. I wrote a lot of bullshit in my books, my articles and my lectures. I’ll tell you the only real truth. Cunt is where it all begins and where it all ends. Cunt is the only thing worth living for. Everything else is a fake, a fraud and just shit.”

I sat down next to the bed. “What about power?” I said. “You always liked power and money pretty good.”

“You forgot art,” Osano said.

“OK,” I said. “Let’s put art in there. How about money, power and art?”

“They’re OK,” Osano said. “I won’t knock them. They’ll do. But they’re not really necessary. They’re just frosting on the cake.”

And then I was right back to my first meeting with Osano and I thought I knew the truth about him then, when he didn’t know it. And now he’s telling it to me and I wonder if it’s true because Osano had loved them all. And what he was really saying was that art and money and fame and power were not what he regretted leaving.

“You’re looking better than when I saw you last,” I told Osano. “How come you’re in the hospital? Charlie Brown says it’s really trouble this time. But you don’t look it.”

“No shit?” Osano said. He was pleased. “That’s great. But you know I got the bad news down the fat farm when they took all those tests. I’ll give it to you short and sweet. I fucked up when I took those dosages of penicillin pills every time I got laid, so I got syphilis and the pills masked it, but the dosage wasn’t strong enough to wipe it out. Or maybe those fucking spirochetes figured out a way to bypass the medicine. It must have happened about fifteen years ago. Meantime, those old spirochetes ate away at my brain, my bones and my heart. Now they tell me I got six months or a year before going cuckoo with paresis, unless my heart goes out first.”

I was stunned. I really couldn’t believe it. Osano looked so cheerful. His sneaky green eyes were so brilliant. “There’s nothing that can be done?” I asked him.

“Nothing,” Osano said. “But it’s not so terrible. I’ll rest up here for a couple of weeks and they’ll shoot me up a lot and then I’ll have at least a couple of months on the town and that’s where you come in.”

I didn’t know what to say. I really didn’t know whether to believe him. He looked better than I had seen him look in a long time. “OK,” I said.

“Here’s my idea,” Osano said. “You visit me in the hospital once in a while and help take me home. I don’t want to take the chance of becoming senile, so when I think the time is right, I check out. The day I decide to do that I want you to come down to my apartment and keep me company. You and Charlie Brown. And then you can take care of all the fuss afterward.”

Osano was staring at me intently. “You don’t have to do it,” Osano said.

I believed him now. “Sure, I’ll do it,” I said. “I owe you a favor. Will you have the stuff you need?”

“I’ll get it,” Osano said. “Don’t worry about that.”

I had some conferences with Osano’s doctors, and they told me he wouldn’t leave the hospital for a long time. Maybe never. I felt a sense of relief.

– -

I didn’t tell Valerie about anything that had happened or even that Osano was dying. Two days later I went to visit Osano at the hospital. He’d ask me if I would bring him in a Chinese dinner the next time I came. So I had brown paper bags full of food when I went down the corridor and heard yelling and screaming coming from Osano’s room. I wasn’t surprised. I put the cartons down on the floor outside another patient’s private bedroom and ran down the corridor.

In the room was a doctor, two nurses and a nursing supervisor. They were all screaming at Osano. Charlie stood watching in a corner of the room. Her beautiful face freckles startling against the pallor of her skin, tears in her eyes. Osano was sitting on the side of the bed, completely naked and yelling back at the doctor, “Get me my clothes! I’m getting the fuck out of here.”

And the doctor was almost yelling at him, “I won’t be responsible if you leave this hospital. I will not be responsible.”

Osano said to him, laughing, “You dumb shit, you were never responsible. Just get me my clothes.”

The nursing supervisor, a formidable-looking woman, said angrily, “I don’t give a damn how famous you are, you don’t use our hospital as a whorehouse!”

Osano stared at her, “Fuck you,” he said. “Get the fuck out of this room.” And stark naked, he got up off the bed, and then I could see how really sick he was. He took a lurching step and his body fell sideways. The nurse immediately went to help him, quiet now, moved to pity, but Osano struggled erect. Finally he saw me standing at the doorway and he said very quietly, “Merlyn, get me out of here.” I was struck by their indignation. Surely they had caught patients fucking before. Then I studied Charlie Brown. She had on a short tight skirt with obviously nothing underneath. She looked like a child harlot. And Osano’s gross rotting body. Their outrage unconsciously was aesthetic, not moral.

The others now noticed me too. And I said to the doctor, “I’ll check him out and I’ll take the responsibility.”

The doctor started to protest, almost pleading, then turned to the supervisor and said, “Get him his clothes.” He gave Osano a needle and said, “That will make you more comfortable for the trip.”

And it was that simple. I paid the bill and checked Osano out. I called up a limousine service and we got Osano home. Charlie and I put him to bed and he slept for a while and then he called me into the bedroom and told me what had happened in the hospital. That he had made Charlie undress and get into bed with him because he felt so bad that he thought he was dying.

Osano turned his head away a bit. “You know,” he said, “the most terrible thing in modern life is that we all die alone in bed. In the hospital with all our family around us, nobody offers to get in bed with somebody dying. If you’re at home, your wife won’t offer to get in bed when you’re dying.”

Osano turned his head back to me and gave me that sweet smile he sometimes had. “So that’s my dream. I want Charlie in bed with me when I die, at the very moment, and then I’ll feel that I’ve gotten an edge, that it wasn’t a bad life and certainly not a bad end. And symbolic as hell, right? Proper for a novelist and his critics.”

“When can you know that final moment?” I said.

“I think it’s about time,” Osano said. “I really don’t think I should wait anymore.”

Now I was really shocked and horrified. “Why don’t you wait a day?” I said. “You’ll feel better tomorrow. You still have some more time. Six months is not bad.”

Osano said, “Do you have any qualms about what I’m going to do? The usual moral prejudices?’

I shook my head. “Just what’s the rush?”

Osano looked at me thoughtfully. “No,” he said. “that fall when I tried to get out of bed gave me the message. Listen, I’ve named you as my literary executor, your decisions are final. There’s no money left, just copyrights and those go to my ex-wives, I guess, and my kids. My books still sell pretty well, so I don’t have to worry about them. I tried to do something for Charlie Brown, but she won’t let me and I think maybe she’s right.”

I said something I would not ordinarily say. “The whore with the heart of gold,” I said. “Just like in the literature,” I said.

Osano closed his eyes. “You know, one of the things I liked best about you, Merlyn, is that you never said the word ‘whore’ and maybe I’ve said it, but I never thought it.”

“OK,” I said. “Do you want to make some phone calls or do you want to see some people? Or do you want to have a drink?”

“No,” Osano said. “I’ve had enough of all that bullshit. I’ve got seven wives, nine kids, I got two thousand friends and millions of admirers. None of them can help and I don’t want to see a fucking one of them.” He grinned at me. “And mind you, I’ve led a happy life.” He shook his head. “The people you love most do you in.”

I sat down beside the bed and we talked for hours about different books that we had read. He told me about all the women he had made love to, and for a few minutes Osano tried to remember fifteen years ago, the girl who infected him. But he couldn’t track it down. “One thing.” he said, “they were all beauties. They were all worth it. Au, hell, what difference does it make? It’s all an accident.”

Osano held out a hand and I shook it and pressed it and Osano said, “Tell Charlie to come in here and you wait outside.” Before I left, he called after me, “Hey, listen. An artist’s life is not a fulfilling life. Put that on my fucking tombstone.”

I waited a long time in the living room. Sometimes I could hear noises and once I thought I heard weeping and then I didn’t hear anything. I went into the kitchen and made some coffee and set two cups on the kitchen table. Then I went into the living room and waited some more. Then not a scream, not a call for help, not even grief-stricken I heard Charlie’s voice, very sweet and clear, call my name.

I went into the bedroom. On the night table was the gold Tiffany box he used to keep his penicillin pills in. It was open and empty. The lights were on, and Osano was lying on his back, eyes staring at the ceiling. Even in death his green eyes seemed to glitter. Nestled beneath his arm, pressed against his chest, was Charlie’s golden head. She had drawn the covers up to cover their nakedness.

“You’ll have to get dressed,” I said to her.

She rose up on one elbow and leaned over to kiss Osano on his mouth. And then she stood staring down at him for a long time.

“You’ll have to get dressed and leave,” I said. “There’s going to be a lot of fuss and I think it’s one thing Osano wanted me to do. To keep you out of any fuss.”

And then I went to the living room. I waited. I could hear the shower going, and then, fifteen minutes later, she came into the room.

“Don’t worry about anything,” I said. “I’ll take care of everything.” She came over to me and put herself into my arms. It was the first time I had ever felt her body and I could partly understand why Osano had loved her for so long. She smelled beautifully fresh and clean.

“You were the only one he wanted to see,” Charlie said. “You and me. Will you call me after the funeral?”

I said yes, I would, and then she went out and left me alone with Osano.

– -

I waited until morning, and then I called the police and told them that I had found Osano dead. And that he had obviously committed suicide. I had considered for a minute hiding the suicide, hiding the pillbox. But Osano wouldn’t care even if I could get the press and authorities to cooperate. I told them how important a man Osano was so that an ambulance would get there right away. Then I called Osano’s lawyers and gave them the responsibility of informing all the wives and all the children. I called Osano’s publishers because I knew they would want to give out a press release and publish an ad in the New York Times, in memoriam. For some reason I wanted Osano to have that kind of respect.

The police and district attorney had a lot of questions to ask as if I were a murder suspect. But that blew over right away. It seemed that Osano had sent a suicide note to his publisher telling him that he would not be able to deliver his novel owing to the fact that he was planning on killing himself.

There was a great funeral out in the Hamptons. Osano was buried in the presence of his seven wives, nine children, literary critics from the New York Times, New York Review of Books. Commentary, Harper’s magazine and the New Yorker. A bus load of people came direct from Elaine’s in New York. Friends of Osano and knowing that he would approve, they had a keg of beer and a portable bar on the bus. They arrived drunk for the funeral. Osano would have been delighted.

In the following weeks hundreds of thousands of words were written about Osano as the first great Italian literary figure in our cultural history. That would have given Osano a pain in the ass. He never thought of himself as Italian/American. But one thing would have pleased him. All the critics said that if he had lived to publish his novel in progress, he would have surely won the Nobel Prize.

A week after Osano’s funeral I got a telephone call from his publisher with a request that I come to lunch the following week. And I agreed.

Arcania Publishing House was considered one of the classy, most literary publishing houses in the country. On its backlist were a half dozen Nobel Prize winners and dozens of Pulitzer and NBA winners. They were famous for being more interested in literature than best-sellers. And the editor in chief, Henry Stiles, could have passed for an Oxford don. But be got down to business as briskly as any Babbitt.

“Mr. Merlyn,” he said, “I admire your novels very much. I hope someday we can add you to our list.”

“I’ve gone over Osano’s stuff,” I said, “as his executor.”

“Good,” Mr. Stiles said. “You may or may not know, since this is the financial end of Mr. Osano’s life, that we advanced him a hundred thousand dollars for his novel in progress. So we do have first claim to that book. I just wanted to make sure you understood that.”

“Sure,” I said. “And I know it was Osano’s wish that you publish it. You did a great job publishing his books.”

There was a grateful smile on Mr. Stiles’s face. He leaned back. “Then there’s no problem?” he said. “I assume you’ve gone through his notes and papers and you found the manuscript.”

I said, “Well, that’s the problem. There is no manuscript; there is no novel, only five hundred pages of notes.”

Stiles had a stunned, horrified look on his face and behind that exterior I know what he thought: Fucking writers, hundred-thousand-dollar advance, all those years and all he has is notes! But then he pulled himself together. “You mean there’s not one page of manuscript?” he said.

“No,” I said. I was lying, but he would never know. There were six pages.

“Well,” Mr. Stiles said, “it’s not something we usually do, but it has been done by other publishing houses. We know that you helped Mr. Osano with some of his articles, under his by-lines, that you imitated his style very well. It would have to be secret, but why couldn’t you write Mr. Osano’s book in a six-month period and publish it under Mr. Osano’s name? We could make a great deal of money. You realize that couldn’t show in any contract between us, we could sign a separate very generous contract for your future books.”

Now he had surprised me. The most respectable publishing house in America doing something that only Hollywood would do, or a Vegas hotel? Why the fuck was I surprised?

“No,” I told Mr. Stiles. “As his literary executor I have the power and authority to keep the book from being published from those notes. If you would like to publish the notes themselves, I’ll give you permission.”

“Well, think it over,” Mr. Stiles said. “We’ll talk about it again. Meanwhile, it’s been a pleasure to meet you.” He shook his head sadly. “Osano was a genius. What a pity.”

I never told Mr. Stiles that Osano had written some pages of his novel, the first six. With them was a note addressed to me.

MERLYN:

Here are the six pages of my book. I give them to you. Let’s see what you can make of them. Forget the notes, they’re bullshit.

Osano

I had read the pages and decided to keep them for myself. When I got home, I read them over again very slowly, word by word.

“Listen to me. I will tell you the truth about a man’s life. I will tell you the truth about his love for women. That he never hates them. Already you think I’m on the wrong track. Stay with me. Really-I’m a master of magic.

“Do you believe a man can truly love a woman and constantly betray her? Never mind physically, but betray her in his mind, in the very ‘poetry of his soul.’ Well, it’s not easy, but men do it all the time.

“Do you want to know how women can love you, feed you that love deliberately to poison your body and mind simply to destroy you? And out of passionate love choose not to love you anymore? And at the same time dizzy you with an idiot’s ecstasy? Impossible? That’s the easy part.

“But don’t run away. This is not a love story.

“I will make you feel the painful beauty of a child, the animal hominess of the adolescent male, the yearning suicidal moodiness of the young female. And then (here’s the hard part) show you how time turns man and woman around full circle, exchanged in body and soul.

“And then of course, there is TRUE LOVE. Don’t go away! It exists or I will make it exist. I’m not a master of magic for nothing. Is it worth what it costs? And how about sexual fidelity? Does it work? Is it love? Is it even human, that perverse passion to be with only one special person? And if it doesn’t work, do you still get a bonus for trying? Can it work both ways? Of course not, that’s easy. And yet–

“Life is a comical business, and there is nothing funnier than love traveling through time. But a true master of magic can make his audience laugh and cry at the same time. Death is another story. I will never make a joke about death. It is beyond my powers.

“I am always alert for death. He doesn’t fool me. I spot him right away. He loves to come in his country-bumpkin disguise; a comical wart that suddenly grows and grows; the dark, hairy mole that sends its roots to the very bone; or hiding behind a pretty little fever blush. Then suddenly that grinning skull appears to take the victim by surprise. But never me. I’m waiting for him. I take my precautions.

“Parallel to death, love is a tiresome, childless business, though men believe more in love than death. Women are another story. They have a powerful secret. They don’t take love seriously and never have.

“But again, don’t go away. Again, this is not a love story. Forget about love. I will show you all the stretches of power. First the life of a poor struggling writer. Sensitive. Talented. Maybe even some genius. I will show you the artist getting the shit kicked out of him for the sake of his art. And why he so richly deserves it. Then I will show him as a cunning criminal and having the time of his life. Ah, what joy the true artist feels when he finally becomes a crook. It’s out in the open now, his essential nature. No more kidding around about his honor. The son of a bitch is a hustler. A conniver. An enemy of society right out of the clear instead of hiding behind his whore’s cunt of art. What a relief. What pleasure. Such sly delight. And then how he becomes an honest man again. It’s an awful strain being a crook.

“But it helps you to accept society and forgive your fellow-man. Once that’s done no person should be a crook unless he really needs the money.

“Then on to one of the most amazing success stories in the history of literature. The intimate lives of the giants of our culture. One crazy bastard especially. The classy world. So now we have the poor struggling genius world, the crooked world, and the classy literary world. All this laced with plenty of sex, some complicated ideas you won’t be hit over the head with and may even find interesting. And finally on to a full-blast ending in Hollywood with our hero gobbling up all its rewards, money, fame, beautiful women. And…don’t go away-don’t go away-how it all turns to ashes.

“That’s not enough? You’ve heard it all before? But remember I’m a master of magic. I can bring all these people truly alive. I can show you what they truly think and feel. You’ll weep for them, all of them I promise you that. Or maybe just laugh. Anyway, we’re going to have a lot of fun. And learn something about life. Which is really no help.

“Ah, I know what you’re thinking. That conning bastard trying to make us turn the page. But wait, it’s only a tale I want to tell. What’s the harm? Even if I take it seriously, you don’t have to. Just have a good time.

“I want to tell you a story, I have no other vanity. I don’t desire success or fame or money. But that’s easy, most men, most women don’t, not really. Even better, I don’t want love. When I was young, some women told me they loved me for my long eyelashes. I accepted. Later it was for my Wit. Then for my power and money. Then for my talent. Then for my mind-deep. OK, I can handle all of it. The only woman who scares me is the one who loves me for myself alone. I have plans for her. I have poisons and daggers and dark graves in caves to hide her head. She can’t be allowed to live. Especially if she is sexually faithful and never lies and always puts me ahead of everything and everyone.

“There will be a lot about love in this book, but it’s not a love book. It’s a war book. The old war between men who are true friends. The great ‘new’ war between men and women. Sure it’s an old story, but it’s out in the open now. The Women’s Liberation warriors think they have something new, but it’s just their armies coming out of their guerrilla hills. Sweet women ambushed men always: at their cradles, in the kitchen, the bedroom. And at the graves of their children, the best place not to hear a plea for mercy.

“Ah well, you think I have a grievance against women. But I never hated them. And they’ll come out better people than men, you’ll see. But the truth is that only women have been able to make me unhappy, and they have done so from the cradle on. But most men can say that. And there’s nothing to be done.

“What a target I’ve given here. I know-I know-how irresistible it seems. But be careful. I'm a tricky storyteller; not just one of your vulnerable sensitive artists. I’ve taken my precautions. I’ve still got a few surprises left.

“But enough. Let me get to work. Let me begin and let me end.”

And that was Osano’s great novel, the book that would cinch the Nobel Prize, restore his greatness. I wish he had written it.

That he was a great con artist, as those pages showed, was irrelevant. Or maybe part of his genius. He wanted to share his inner worlds with the outside world, that was all. And now as his final joke he had given me his last pages. A joke because we were such different writers. He so generous. And, I, I realized now, so ungenerous.

I was never crazy about his work. And I don’t know whether I really loved him as a man. But I loved him as a writer. And so I decided, maybe for luck, maybe for strength, maybe just for the con, to use his pages as my own. I should have changed one line. Death has always surprised me.