Квентин Тарантино - Once Upon a Time in Hollywood - The First Novel By Quentin Tarantino

This one too was compellingly impressive but in a completely different way. While the blond-haired man was storybook dashing and incredibly dignified, this new man was a devilishly handsome roguish-looking south-of-the-border-styled cowboy with a thick snatch of fudge-colored hair that framed his face in a way that Mirabella could only describe as dreamy . This brunette cowboy’s clothes weren’t as fancy as the blond passenger’s, but they were just as colorful and, in their own right, just as snazzy. The dark-haired passenger wore a Latin-styled sangria-red ruffled shirt with a brown leather short coat and black jeans with big silver studs down the pant leg. As he stepped out of the coach, he placed a short brown cowboy hat on his head. Which functioned not to keep the sun out of his eyes but to complement his killer look. After stretching his long silver-studded legs, the rough cowboy in the rouge-colored shirt sauntered over to Monty the stagecoach driver and asked in Spanish for him to toss down his saddle, which sat perched on top of the stage. Monty tossed the handcrafted saddle, heaving it by the horn over the side of the stagecoach roof. It fell heavy into the outstretched arms of the ruffled-shirt stranger.

The top-hatted dandy in baby blue inquired of Ramon, the shotgun-cradling second rider who sat next to Monty on top of the stagecoach, about his paisley embroidered garment bag. Top Hat received the valise from the shotgun-riding Mexican and thanked him with a gringo-accented gracias.

Now both the little girl Mirabella and the little Mexican Ernesto showed confusion on their perplexed faces. Neither of them knew, for sure, which one to approach. The little eight-year-old gave a shoulder shrug and, thinking, Oh well, here goes nothing , loudly cleared her throat to get the two handsome passengers’ attention.

“Mr. Lancer?” she inquired with a big question mark.

The men answered in unison, Top Hat saying, “Yes?” and Red Ruffles saying, “Yeah?” Each man instinctively jerked toward the other with an annoyed expression on his face.

More confusion clouded the little girl’s face, till she suddenly understood.

“Oh my goodness,” she exclaimed excitedly, “this is great! Both of you came together!”

After the two men shared another uneasy glance at each other, the one with the top hat asked the little girl, in his Harvard-educated diction, “What do you mean, ‘both of you’?”

“Well, we knew you were coming,” she explained, “but we didn’t know you’d be traveling together.”

Since Scott hadn’t any knowledge of his father’s life since his mother hightailed it to Boston, save for the fact he owned a cattle empire, he was a little slow to pick up the little girl’s implication. “You were expecting both of us?” pointing to the man at his side in the red ruffled shirt.

“Yeah,” she said happily. “You’re Johnny,” pointing her finger at the dark-haired one in the red ruffles, “and you’re Scott,” moving her finger in the direction of the blond man in blue.

Well, that was their names. The two men shared another uneasy look at the other, as the reality of the situation became obvious.

Johnny pointed his finger at the pint-sized provocateur and asked, “And who are you?”

“I’m Mirabella Lancer, and you’re my brothers!” And with that declaration, she charged like a runaway wagon at Johnny, wrapping her little arms around his waist and knocking him back on the heels of his cowboy boots.

A look of dread crossed the face of Johnny Lancer. He’d contemplated many variables when he imagined the moment he would be reunited with his father, but an apple-cheeked, ecstatic eight-year-old half sister wasn’t one of them. Before Scott could inquire about the meaning of all this, Mirabella had untangled herself from Johnny and had now wrapped her arms around Scott, squeezing his pelvic area, surprisingly strong for such a small fry. Trying to maintain some decorum and hold off, if only for a few seconds more, the inevitable conclusion of her revelation, Scott said, “Look, little girl—”

Mirabella interrupted him by clarifying her name a second time. “Mirabella.”

“Mirabella,” he continued, “my mother never had any other children.”

“No,” Johnny said, pointing out the obvious, “but apparently your father did.”

Scott turned toward Johnny and said, “You mean our father?”

Johnny answered, “Yeah, our father , Murdock Lancer. Look, I don’t know why you made the trip, Top Hat, but the old man said he’d give me a thousand dollars if I came to see him.”

“He made the same offer to me,” Scott confirmed.

“I want that thousand dollars,” Johnny said, “and after I get it, I’m going to give him a belly full.” A belly full of what, Johnny left unspoken.

Apparently, Scott had the same idea. “You and me both, brother .”

Johnny shook his head. “Don’t call me brother .”

“Are you ready to go?” Mirabella interjected pleasantly.

They both turned to her and said in unison, “Go where?” Which annoyed both of them, and they gave a dirty look to each other.

But their little sister thought it was funny, and she giggled out loud, “Where do you think? Lancer Ranch, you silly goose.”

Mirabella turned on her heels, and she and the vaquero Ernesto led the way down the street toward the wagon that Ernesto had driven ten miles into town.

Scott hooked the handle of his silver dog-headed cane through the hardwood handle of his valise and lifted it up to his free hand, while Johnny pitched the saddle over his shoulder. The two brothers followed their sister, who proceeded to paint a picture of what they could expect when they met their father. “Now, Daddy won’t act like it at first,” she warned them, “and he can be a bit of a mule head, but no matter what he says, he’s happy both of you came.”

Johnny snorted sarcastically, “Yeah, well, we’ll see if he still feels that way after our little family reunion .”

As Scott limped beside him, he concurred, “You know, brother , that’s the first thing you said I agree with.”

That fucking did it , Johnny thought, and stopped in his tracks, pointing his finger in Scott’s baby-blue chest. “I done tole’ you, don’t call me brother, Top Hat .”

Scott’s eyes went down to the aggressive finger, then rose up to the aggressive face, and he warned, “Don’t point your finger at me, Ruffles .”

“Boys?”

The two brothers turned away from each other toward their little sister, as she gestured toward the wagon and asked, condescendingly, “Can we go?”

The two men gave each other a look that suggested, To be continued , but for the sake of this little sweetheart, they’d drop their fighting stance, and Johnny gestured toward the wagon.

“Lead the way, sis .”

Chapter Nine

“Think Less Hippie, More Hells Angels”

Cliff drives Rick’s Cadillac past the front gate on the Twentieth Century Fox lot. The guard at the gate gives him directions to the Spanish-western-town back lot where the Lancer pilot is being shot: “Drive straight to the second left, make a turn at Tyrone Power Boulevard; drive past the man-made lake and the set of Hello, Dolly! Turn right on Linda Darnell Avenue, and you can’t miss it.” In the passenger seat next to him, Rick wears big dark glasses to shield his eyes from the sun and smokes down a Capitol W cigarette to shield his tongue from taste. When Cliff jerks the car to a stop, Rick knows they have arrived.

The actor glances out the passenger-side window, and through his dark glasses he sees a western town; a few horses and wagons; a film crew; some asshole director perched on top of a Chapman crane; a cowboy actor who obviously thinks he’s sexy, dressed in a bright-red Las Vegas–style shirt and short brown cowboy hat; some comically dressed fancy-pants dude in a bright-blue three-piece suit, complete with a top hat that looks like he drifted over from the set of Meet Me in St. Louis ; a period-dressed little girl; and a Mexican runt in a large sombrero. Welcome to fucking Lancer , Rick thinks. He opens the car door and steps out from the vehicle on shaky legs. Upon standing upright, he’s struck by a coughing fit that brings up some stomach acid to the back of his esophagus.