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to Eva as Robin dragged him
forward. “Aesthetically,” imagine.
    On the drive to the Silvermans’ house
Robin explained how it was that she had become so intoxicated: Thursdays were
“not-eating” days for her. On Mondays and Thursdays she would take no solid
food, though she allowed herself fluids — that they might be alcoholic was no
matter. Elliot didn’t bother offering that booze, in any variety, was not
particularly slimming.
    So little did Robin care about getting
smashed during her fasts that she invited Elliot in for a drink.
    â€œI would love to,” he said, on the off
chance that Lucky Silverman was at home and that Elliot might finally shake his
hand, give Lucky a face to remember. Everything went through six or seven
page-one rewrites, minimum, these days; having your name rattling around the
consciousness of a producer as busy as Silverman increased your chances of
joining the queue of eligible hacks. Elliot had been on a conference call with
Silverman once but knew that Lucky would never remember it. Even he couldn’t
recall what that one had been about. That Lucky would’ve known that the
scribbler on the phone also had something to do with a winery of which he owned
a piece was unlikely. Lucky Silverman had bigger fish to fry. Men in such a
hurry only learned the dimensions of their holdings when the courts were seizing
them.
    Elliot pulled up to an iron gate at the
bottom of a long, steep drive. Robin stuck her head out the window, waving to an
invisible camera, and the security barrier opened. Parking was under a
twelve-car pergola.
    The interior of Casa Silverman was
decorated in an Asian tropical theme. There was a preponderance of
coffee-coloured wooden furnishings, the grain and heft of which said endangered
and illegally logged. Indosamnesian? Javanuatan?
    Once onto the rattan matting of the
living area, Robin gave a kick of each leg, launching her high heels toward the
far end of the room, a punt for the help to return.
    â€œDo you only drink wine?” she asked,
making for a credenza the length of a Cadillac.
    â€œNo. I’ll —”
    â€œHow about a vodka?”
    â€œSure,” Elliot said, though he didn’t
really care for vodka. “You know, I’ve been meaning to come by. I guess you know
that Mr. Silverman is one of a number of investors in my —”
    â€œLucky’s overseas. Toronto, I think.”
She turned around with an offering of four ounces of clear spirit on ice for her
guest.
    â€œThat’s a shame.” Out of habit Elliot
swirled the liquid in the glass and sniffed its contents. Next to nothing. Maybe
vague grassiness.
    â€œShame. Shame on me? Sorry?
Nooo . . . I’m sooo high. I should sit. Sit with me.” Robin
took a place on a couch, one of three distributed seemingly willy-nilly
throughout the place. She patted a space next to her as if beckoning a puppy.
Elliot sat. He gave the place another once-over to avoid eye contact. It looked
not like a home but like a furniture showroom. Over a concert Steinway hung a
Warhol of his hostess. Elliot did the math. The painting, if genuine, would have
to have been executed in the early ’80s at the latest, when, judging from
appearances, Robin would have been only in her teens. Unless she was mainlining
formaldehyde . . .
    â€œNice Warhol,” he said, fishing.
    â€œYeah, looks like me, hey?”
    â€œVery much.”
    â€œIt’s Lucky’s second wife, Melinda. It
was in storage. I thought, she looks just like me, what the hell. It’s a Warhol,
right? And where, like, Warhol’s dead, this is the closest I’m going to come to
getting him to do me.”
    Thinking she was correct in her
assessment of the situation, “It’s a great place you have here” was all Elliot
could think to say.
    â€œUsed to belong to some old Hollywood
director. You know, the communist. Pissed everybody