‘Schultz while we’re on this subject and it will be the very last I’ll say about it, you’ve also, when not charging a call to me, been consistently giving the operator a false number from which you pretend to be calling thereby not only cheating the telephone company but also possibly charging to someone else.’
‘So come on. A big fucking company like that can afford it. Tell me how they’re going to miss just a few hundred quid here and there. I got no scruples cheating them. Besides I had to survive.’
‘That may be Schultz but they think it’s me who’s been doing the cheating.’
‘Hey stop. OK if they come to arrest you Til admit I did it. Does that satisfy you. I’ve got big emotional problems to attend to. Without worrying now about a few free phone calls. I mean I’m ending up in my life now lonely for Christ’s sake. Because all the fucking people who ratted and turned their backs so blatantly on me haven’t yet worked up their nerve to come crawling back on hands and knees to start kissing my ass again now that my balls are hanging jingling in happy unison with the cash register on top of the biggest smash hit grosser of them all. They were all little scaredy cats when the chips were down. Present company excepted of course. So why don’t we just both relax, forget the horrors we went through, and sure, why not, let’s throw a big sumptuous dinner party. Like I mean big. And make those other fuckers feel how small they are.’
‘Well Schultz you’re the very last person I ever thought I’d hear say he was lonely.’
‘Sure I am. Soon as I’ve checked the accounts at the box office I sometimes have to escape back to the Dorchester at night, bereft, all by myself. OK you don’t have to tell me, I know, I’m charging it to the production. But that fucking detective in some bloody disguise is always outside around my house somewhere waiting for me to show up to get evidence I’m an unfit father fucking women not my wife. So I don’t show up. And here I am when I should be utterly hysterically happy in my favourite suite at the Dorchester Hotel, and I am, since I am at last making money. Nevertheless too, I am utterly hysterically sad and fucking depressed in misery. I have some shish kebab on room service, I turn on the television, then order an Armagnac and coffee and then I can think of nothing but those windows up there in tax dodgers’ towers, and when the lights up there go off. And the idea of that crawling creep Al at that moment with his soft big belly pressed all over her young voluptuously beautiful body. It destroys me. I can’t stand it anymore. I got to do something.’
‘Rumour has it Schultz that you are in fact already doing something and are there down in the street watching the windows in tax dodgers’ towers.’
‘Jesus. Who told you that. It’s my wife’s fucking detective isn’t it, spreading that rumour to the box office staff where the fucker tried to get a pair of free tickets the other night. Maybe it’s also known I also have a stiff god damn neck from looking upwards. Plus I’m paying on top of a chauffeur and limousine for a cold freezing rented car to sit in.’ ‘Why don’t you sit to watch in the heated comfort of your own softly upholstered motorcar with your telephone available to call Tokyo when you have to.’
‘The fucking thing is one and a half inches longer than the second largest Rolls Royce in London and it’s too conspicuous that’s why. People looking at you in a car that big expect you to be going somewhere not just sitting there. And hey jesus please stop talking about my long distance telephoning will you.’
‘And of course Schultz peering out of a pair of binoculars in such a precipitously upwards direction at that hour of the night doesn’t help your inconspicuousness either. Indeed you were parked in front of a well known fish shop.’
‘Hey you know that too. Binky told you that didn’t he. Betrayed my confidence as to where I buy fish. Jesus is nothing sacred anymore.’ ‘Well Schultz you did have the nerve to telephone my legal counsel to explain your little routine when you got arrested for suspicious behaviour and you haven’t paid his bill either.’
‘Shit every one of those lawyers’ names are in the phone book. Plus he sent me an outrageously enormous bill.’
‘Schultz he happens to be one of the most distinguished lawyers in England and his time is valuable.’
‘Hey why don’t you just say outright your Lordship that you don’t like me anymore. I didn’t want to look a fool to my own legal counsel. That’s why I got yours.’
‘So that I, Schultz, could look as though I had a peeping tom fool for an associate.’
‘Hey who’s peeping. I go wait there just to make sure the girl’s not suffering at that geriatric’s hands.’
‘Ah Schultz. To use your parlance, you do take the fucking cake sometimes. And may I ask you a personal question.’
‘Sure shoot.’
‘Why must you want to fuck every woman you see.’
‘Jesus that’s exactly what Al that creep was always asking. But qualify that your Lordship by saying every fuckable woman and I’ll answer it.’
‘Consider such qualification made.’
‘Because how else can I find if the girl has a beautiful mind that’s why. It takes the embroilment of uninhibited intimacy to discover that. And that’s what I’m looking for. Not exactly the embroilment but the uninhibited intimacy. And by trying to fuck them that’s how I find out and that’s how, one totally unpredictable night I found the present girl I love. And now on principle I don’t want any woman near me who doesn’t sincerely love me.’
‘Schultz, if I may respectfully suggest, you have a long way to go in learning about women. A while back you were trying to get rid of every woman who claimed she loved you. However I’m delighted to know you now seem totally and utterly obsessed by this present signorina. You who have left desolate dozens of ladies in the wake of your sexual appetite having been temporarily satisfied.’
‘Hey what’s this morality about sex suddenly. You guys have already tried to frighten the sexual wits out of me with fatally incurable disease stories. Every girl I have ever been with has cost me emotionally plenty and always financially a fortune. While this girl hasn’t cost me one fucking penny yet. Which I would pay gladly even if it was a fortune. In fact she gave me the most delicious meal followed by the most fantastic fuck of my life.’
‘You make me sigh Schultz.’
‘Why because I’m straightforward honest about my emotions. Hey shit I know I ain’t no saint, but jesus your Lordship don’t drive me out of this room with virtuousness. Please. This is such bliss. Hey and you’re right. This whisky. Wonderful. Here let me pour you some more too. Change the subject. Before we end up establishing the world museum dedicated to morality and ethics. Let’s talk about the Australian rights we got an offer for. Where this show’s vulgarity will be a virtue and could clean up from Wagga Wagga to Walla Walla.’ ‘Your spouse’s lawyers will be pleased to hear that.’
‘Your lordship, I love you very much. I know that you occasionally take my interests at heart. But please don’t make this wonderful occasion into a parody of my problems. What I got to know is can a wife really do this to me. Take me to the cleaners.’
‘In a nutshell, Schultz, yes. But I suspect from the sound of things you may find yourself taken to the laundry where you are to be dipped and boiled in bleach in various vats. Then taken out, dried thoroughly and then pressed into finely sharpened pleats.’
‘Jesus don’t say things like that. Can’t you say something as if there’s hope. I mean she’s got her gorgeous looks.’
‘That could only mean the price being higher still for your using them in marriage as long as you have.’
‘Hey I mean after we got an amicable divorce she could still marry guys in this town who make me look like a pauper. And take them to the cleaners. Or fucking laundry.’
‘Of course Schultz that’s precisely what she may do as soon as she secures from you as much of your assets as her lawyers can get.’
‘Hey that would be fucking unfair for Christ’s sake. Jesus here you are in all this wonderful peace and tranqui
llity, I mean how did you escape.’
‘By making adequate provisions Schultz, under a legal separation.’ ‘Adequate. How big the fuck is that.’
‘The normal requisites Schultz. House in London. House in the country. Skiing flat in Switzerland. And a cottage in the Bahamas with a small sailing yacht for her boyfriend to amuse himself with. And the principle is to at all times always give to a woman slightly more than she ever asks for.’
‘I won’t do it. Never. Right for a start you can take that misguided English gentleman’s principle and let me shove it right up her lawyer’s ass. Jesus put on some beautiful music like Ave Maria, will you. O god don’t say anymore. I can’t take it. Plus I know what you’re going to say. That you provide her with an income to keep her and her boyfriend in the manner in which they both got accustomed in each other’s fucking company.’
‘You are quickly getting the idea Schultz. Of course too, this gentleman of my wife’s has an expensive hobby, he fancies himself as an inventor. And when he’s not inventing something, he fancies himself as a chef. And you might find too there is the odd occasion when the boyfriend with too much to drink of an evening is ringing you up at midnight suggesting an added amount of emolument.’
‘What. Asking more.’
‘Yes. More. Because his latest invention that he’s spent ten thousand pounds on of money I’d placed recently in my wife’s account, has failed.’
‘Holy shit you didn’t give new money, did you.’
‘Well Schultz, one preferred he continue his inventing. Because he was in fact contemplating opening up a restaurant called the Lady Nectarine, named after my wife and therefore me.’
‘Holy jeez. Your Lordship. So you do have a few troubles after all and here I am shouting my mouth off and unloading mine. Jesus I’m sorry. But you see I never ever heard you talk of troubles before.’
‘Well I repeat them Schultz only to illustrate what you might find yourself encountering.’
‘But hey what did the guy invent.’
‘It was in fact an alarm which goes off when the toilet flush is leaking.’
‘Holy shit that’s fucking brilliant. World water shortage is a fucking serious thing. Think of the number of toilet bowls there are already and the water that could be saved, especially in Los Angeles. Hey this guy sounds like something. I mean once you started teaching backward countries to shit in toilet bowls you got a massive global market on your hands. Think of Africa, the Sahara desert, India, China. Flush. Flush. Leak. Leak.’
‘And think too Schultz of a fucking alarm going off day and night all over the world shrill, shrill, when someone was peacefully trying to defecate. Leading to world wide constipation.’
‘Well then you could sell ear muffs to deaden the sound which was driving people crazy. Then we buy stock in the laxative market. It all adds up to a profitable special situation. Jesus I got to have another whisky. My own bowels are moving but my emotional life is at a fucking bereft standstill. Previously I was able to obsess myself worrying about money. Now with money it makes me feel even worse. Without the woman I love. Hey by the way, jesus who is that next door. That’s my idea of a real soignee female.’
‘Schultz don’t think for one second I’m going to have you next going philandering in my proximity. She happens to be, as far as I can perceive, happily married. Of course they do have late night parties. And one can on Sundays after lunch hear strange sounds reaching through the walls.’
‘Holy shit he whips her. Jesus you know that’s what I really want to do. I did once on this sylph of a girl with the neatest little ass you ever saw who asked me to but the buckle of the belt landed first and she screamed ouch and she jumped up and started fighting me.’
‘Dear me Schultz sometimes I do believe you do think women are nothing but fuck objects to be abused in your spare time.’
‘Hey your Lordship, you can afford to romanticize women. Jesus because every one of them is fawning all over you. I mean christ for a start if they marry you they end up with a list of titles as long as your arm, with butlers, maids, chauffeurs and palaces. It makes you think women are all saints. Well let me tell you what I heard over the tannoy.’
‘Schultz so it is true.’
‘What’s true.’
‘That you are eavesdropping on the cast now.’
‘I was trying out an electronic device. Plus it’s my fucking cast in the theatres I rent. I got to know what’s the mood back stage and who’s plotting to fuck up.’
‘Well if you continue to spy on their members like that Equity will fuck you up by closing us up if you’re not careful.’
‘I’m not spying. Hey all I did was to have a bug put in certain dressing rooms so I could hear if anyone was unhappy and then I could run to the rescue.’
‘Pure pish and pother. I think you’re becoming a strange type of auditory voyeur Schultz.’
‘Hey do you want to hear what the women said or don’t you.’
‘Well I suppose in the interests of the personal privacy of the cast I don’t. But clearly your eagerness is such to tell me Schultz that I feel you might perhaps explode if you don’t.’
‘I’m not going to explode don’t worry, but those girls were. With their enthusiasm. They were talking, three of them, about sucking pricks.’
‘I’m reluctantly listening.’
‘Yeah now you are.’
‘Must I remind you Schultz that I have money in this show, and a vested interest in the cast. But I most heartily disapprove of eavesdropping.’
‘OK, you may hate what I heard even worse. One didn’t like to suck pricks. The other two loved to. So the two who like sucking pricks were graphically and I mean graphically describing to the one, trying to convince her, who didn’t like sucking pricks what was so wonderful about sucking pricks.’
‘Won’t you have another spot of tea Schultz. You sound quite outraged.’
‘Yeah I am. Holy fuck I mean they were talking as if all guys are to women are just anonymous pricks good only for sucking. Especially ones they thought would spurt a lot of semen. One had three sixteen year old boys lined up like wonderful flavours at a soda fountain or something. And how the different taste could be relished. And I mean relish. Like accomplished wine tasters talking about vintages.’
‘This sounds like more of your pish and pother Schultz. But surely you Schultz should be the last to suggest that women be denied a little of what they fancy.’
‘Hey come on there’s no more liberal mind in the world than me. So OK they’re just actresses. But it’s the cold blooded attitude. Accompanied I may add by belly laughter. And you wouldn’t believe what else they said. Even I, with my low moral profile, was offended. Let me tell you I learned things I never knew. Plus I felt god damned demeaned as a man.’
‘I suggest Schultz that you remove those bugs immediately before you are more demeaned. And I would adore to go on with our little discussion but I fear it’s time for me to dress as I’ve got to dine before going to the theatre.’
‘Hey you’re not going to see an enemy show.’
‘Well as a matter of fact it’s Shakespeare. Hardly on the level of Kiss It Don’t Hold It It’s Too Hot.’
‘Hey now don’t go demeaning the show. You’re nearly making as much money out of it as I am. But boy I’m glad of one thing. That fucker Binky sold his share of the show to Gayboy when he thought it was a flop. Then bought it back, then sold it again.’
The chimney piece clock chiming five. A distant rumble of thunder. His Lordship putting down his tea cup and distinctly clearing his throat.
‘I’m afraid I have bad news for you Schultz. Binky did sell his share of the show to Gayboy but Gayboy was so shaken and demoralized that Binky bought it back at less than half the price. Then Gayboy thought it had a chance. Bought it at a third more than he first paid for it, lost his nerve again and Binky bought it back again for a fifth of the original price.’
‘Jesus that shrewd son of a bitch, Binky
. Like he’s always there waiting to sink in his fangs. What a partner to have. One day I’m going to give him a demonstration of his own urbane back stabbing.’
‘Well Schultz, why don’t you take that whisky with you. Just peeking out through the curtains here there must now be a couple of inches of snow.’
‘Hey come on, I don’t mind waiting a few minutes, my car’s outside your Lordship. I’ll give you a lift wherever you’re going.’
And let
Me tell you
That was some fucking
Gorgeous tea
Thanks
2
‘Good morning Schultz. You’re looking elegantly tall dark and quite attractively Semitic this morning. Adding complement to this fine old show biz firm of Sperm Productions.’ ‘Good morning Binky.’
‘And dear me, what brings you Schultz rushing, as one assumes you did, by the beads of perspiration on your forehead, to the dead centre of town at the ungodly hour of twelve p.m., a foot of snow all over London. Ah, what two lovely black eyes.’
‘I’m taking over those two rooms down the hall. Once those useless guys you keep saying are brilliant intellectuals assisting you, leave.’ ‘Those two gentlemen, let me remind you Schultz, were double firsts in Mental and Moral Science at Oxford and Cambridge respectively.’ ‘Yeah well I don’t have time for that crap.’
‘And dear me, then, is it any wonder, that I, with so many of these heartlessly ruthless show biz deals raging about one, try to keep a mind to the scholarly world in which one contemplates the more perplexing moral questions of the day, involving as they do a search for any serene sweet reason which may lie locked hidden in the spiritual minefields of polemics, logic, bibble babble and your general chaotic fuckology. Ah but does one sniff the smell of the sudden emergence of the Schultz global empire along with an air of invincibility, this morning.’