Mario Puzo - Fools die

“They did it for God,” Janelle said. “Not for a gold album.”

Doran shook his head. “Please stick to the point. I have to convince the kid and his mother and father, that’s going to be a hell of a job.”

Janelle laughed. “You really are crazy. I won’t help you, and even if I did, you’ll never convince one of them.”

Doran smiled at her. “The father is the key. I was thinking you could be nice to him. Soften him up for me.”

It was before Doran had acquired the creamy, sunlit, extra smoothness of California. So when Janelle threw the heavy ashtray at him, he was too surprised to duck. It chipped one of his teeth and made his mouth bleed. He didn’t get angry. He just shook his head at Janelle’s squareness.

Janelle would have left him then, but she was too curious. She wanted to see if Doran could really pull it off.

Doran was, in general, a good judge of character, and he was really sharp on finding the greed threshold. He knew one key was Mr. Horatio Bascombe. The father could swing his wife and son. Also, the father was the most vulnerable to life. If his son failed to make money, it was back to going to church for Mr. Bascombe. No more traveling around the country, playing piano, tickling pretty girls, eating exotic foods. Just his worn-out wife. The father had most at stake; the loss of Rory’s voice was more important to him than anyone.

Doran softened Mr. Bascombe up with a pretty little singer from a sleazy Nashville jazz club. Then a fine dinner with cigars the following evening. Over cigars he outlined Rory’s career. A Broadway musical, an album with special songs written by the famous Dean brothers. Then a big role in a movie that might turn Rory into another Judy Garland or Elvis Presley. You wouldn’t be able to count the money. Bascombe was drinking it all in, purring like a cat. Not even greedy because it was all there. It was inevitable. He was a millionaire. Then Doran sprang it on him.

“There’s only one thing wrong,” Doran said. “The doctors say his voice is about to change. He’s going into puberty.”

Bascombe was a little worried. ‘His voice will get a little deeper. Maybe it will be better.”

Doran shook his head. “What makes him a superstar is that high, clear sweetness. Sure he might be better. But it will take him five years to train it and break through with a new image. And then it’s a hundred to one shot he’ll make it big. I sold him to everybody on the voice he has now.”

“Well, maybe his voice won’t change,” Bascombe said.

“Yeah, maybe it won’t,” Doran said and left it at that.

Two days later Bascombe came around to his apartment. Janelle let him in and gave him a drink. He looked her over pretty carefully, but she ignored him. And when he and Doran started talking, she left the room.

That night in bed, after making love, Janelle asked Doran, “How is your dirty little scheme coming?”

Doran grinned. He knew Janelle despised him for what he was doing, but she was such a great broad she had still given him her usual great piece of ass. Like Rory, she still didn’t know how great she was. Doran felt content. That’s what he liked, good service. People who didn’t know their value.

“I’ve got the greedy old bastard hooked,” he said. “Now I’ve got to work on the mother and the kid.”

Doran, who thought he was the greatest salesman east of the Rockies, attributed his final success to those powers. But the truth was that he was lucky. Mr. Bascombe had been softened up by the extremely hard life he had led before the miracle of his son’s voice. He could not give up the golden dream and go back to slavery. That was not so unusual. Where Doran got really lucky was with the mother.

Mrs. Bascombe had been a small-town Southern belle, mildly promiscuous in her teens and swept off her feet into matrimony by Horatio Bascombe’s piano playing and Southern small-town charm. As her beauty faded year by year, she succumbed to the swampy miasma of Southern religiosity. As her husband became more unlovable, Mrs. Bascombe found Jesus more attractive. Her son’s voice was her love offering to Jesus. Doran worked on that. He kept Janelle in the room while he talked to Mrs. Bascombe, knowing the delicate subject matter would make the older woman nervous if she were alone with a male.

Doran was respectfully charming and attentive to Mrs. Bascombe. He pointed out that in the years to come a hundred million people all over the world would hear her son, Rory, singing the glories of Jesus. In Catholic countries, in Moslem countries, in Israel, in the cities of Africa. Her son would be the most powerful evangelist for the Christian religion since Luther. He would be bigger than Billy Graham, bigger than Oral Roberts, two of Mrs. Bascombe’s saints on earth. And her son would be saved from the most grievous and easiest-to-fall-into sin on this earth. It was clearly the will of God.

Janelle watched them both. She was fascinated by Doran. That he could do such a thing without being evil, merely mercenary. He was like a child stealing pennies from his mother’s pocket book. And Mrs. Bascombe after an hour of Doran’s feverish pleading was weakening. Doran finished her off.

“Mrs. Bascombe, I just know you’ll make this sacrifice for Jesus. The big problem is your son, Rory. He’s just a boy, and you know how boys are.”

Mrs. Bascombe gave him a grim smile. “Yes,” she said. “I know.” She darted a quick venomous look at Janelle. “But my Rory is a good boy. He’ll do what I say.”

Doran heaved a sigh of relief. “I knew I could count on you.”

Then Mrs. Bascombe said coolly, “I’m doing this for Jesus. But I’d like a new contract drawn up. I want fifteen percent of your thirty percent as his co-manager.” She paused for a moment. “And my husband needn’t know.”

Doran sighed. “Give me some of that old-time religion all the time,” he said. “I just hope you can swing it.”

– -

Rory’s mama did swing it. Nobody knew how. It was all set. The only one who didn’t like the idea was Janelle. In fact, she was horrified, so horrified she stopped sleeping with Doran, and he considered getting rid of her. Also, Doran had one final problem. Getting a doctor who would cut off a fourteen-year-old kid’s balls. For that was the idea. What was good enough for the old Popes was good enough for Doran.

It was Janelle who blew the whole thing up. They were all gathered in Doran’s apartment. Doran was working out how to screw Mrs. Bascombe out of her co-manager’s fifteen percent, so he wasn’t paying attention. Janelle got up, took Rory by the hand and led him to the bedroom.

Mrs. Bascombe protested, “What are you doing with my boy?”

Janelle said sweetly, “We’ll be right out. I just want to show him something.” Once inside the bedroom she locked the door. Then very firmly she led Rory to the bed, unbuckled his belt, stripped down his trousers and shorts. She put his hand between her legs and his head between her now bare breasts.

In three minutes they were finished, and then the boy surprised Janelle. He pulled on his trousers, forgetting his shorts. He unlocked the bedroom door and flew into the living room. His first punch caught Doran square in the mouth, and then he was throwing punches like a windmill until his father restrained him.

– -

Naked on the bed, Janelle smiled at me. “Doran hates me, even though it’s six years later. I cost him millions of dollars.”

I was smiling too. “So what happened at the trial?”

Janelle shrugged. “We had a civilized judge. He talked to me and the kid in chambers, and then he dismissed the case. He warned the parents and Doran they were subject to prosecution but advised everybody to keep their mouths shut.”