After that, Resnick nearly didn’t notice Diane Woolf at all. She tapped him on the shoulder as he backed past her, standing near the head of the queue balancing a plate of salad, a low-fat banana yoghurt and a black coffee.
“Shall we take this somewhere else?”
“Please.”
He followed her out through the doors and along the broad corridor, up a flight of stairs and into a small room that overlooked a section of the car park. There were several pieces of editing equipment, two television monitors and a double stack of VHS cassettes that Resnick eased back along the table so that Diane could set down her lunch. He assumed it was lunch.
“Here,” she said, pushing the coffee towards him. “It’s black. Is that all right?”
“It’s yours.”
She shook her glorious head of red hair. “I drink too much of the stuff. It’s just easier to buy it and pour it away than walk past the coffee point. Besides, if you drink it, I won’t have to go on murdering the house plants the company so thoughtfully provides.”
Resnick was staring at her.
“Well, what they don’t provide are receptacles for unwanted coffee.”
That wasn’t why he was looking at her. She knew it. Delicately between forefinger and thumb, she lifted some alfalfa sprouts towards her mouth. She had one of her long legs crossed over the other, the white dungarees that she was wearing were loose across the hips, less so where the bib was strapped over a satiny blouse, electric blue.
“I take it Robert was having another of his little fits.”
“It’s happened before?”
“Like clockwork. Robert’s more pre-menstrual than me and any dozen of my friends put together. He just doesn’t bleed, that’s all.”
“Not like Mackenzie.”
“Ah, so this isn’t merely a social call.”
Wishing that it were, Resnick shook his head. “Did you see what happened? Clearly, I mean.”
“Ringside seat.”
“And was there provocation?”
“When the wind’s in the right direction, Mac could provoke the Buddha into going ten rounds.”
“How was the wind on this occasion?”
“North-north-westerly.”
“Force nine?”
“All cones hoisted.”
“He asked for it, then?”
“Doesn’t he always?”
“You’d make a statement to that effect? If it came to it.”
Diane made a little moue with her mouth. “There’s my salary to think of. And expensive shoe obsession to support.” Today they were white Nikes with a yellow stripe; perhaps she kept the rest under glass, lock and key.
“It probably won’t come to that.”
“You won’t charge him?”
“It’s a little early to say, but …”
“That isn’t the point of it, you know.”
Resnick lifted the coffee mug but didn’t drink any. “What is?”
“Mac wants him out.”
“Of the job?”
“The job, the building, everything.”
“Didn’t he hire him?”
“Hire ’em and fire ’em, that’s the name of the game. Harold’s been at it long enough to know the risks. They’ll pay him what he’s due, slip him a few promises to keep him sweet. His name stays on the credits, he won’t lose his residuals.”
“His what?”
“Oh, repeats, overseas sales. They’ll love this in Australia.”
Resnick, in his mind, was loving her mouth, the lower lip that looked as if it were just slightly swollen.
She ate a piece of celery, taking her time about it. “Do you always ogle your witnesses?”
Resnick almost fell for saying something sticky and smart like, only when they look like you. Thankfully, he didn’t. He had the grace to blush a little instead.
“You want some of this?” she asked, sliding the plate towards him.
Resnick shook his head.
“You should.” She smiled. “You really should think about your carbohydrates.”
Before Resnick could suck in his stomach and straighten his back they were interrupted by a loud shouting from outside.
At the end of the short corridor, Harold Roy had Mackenzie backed up against a door and was threatening to deafen him with accusations. The most frequent amongst those seemed to concern what was going on at the other side of the door.
“If I’ve got it wrong,” screamed Harold, “get the fuck out of my way and let me see what’s going on in there.”
“What’s been done in there is none of your business, Harold.”
“Like hell it isn’t!”
“Harold …”
“Out of the way, you chicken shit …”
“Harold …”
Harold caught Mackenzie by the forearm and managed to swing him far enough aside to make a grab at the door handle possible. It budged, but not by more than an inch.
“It’s locked.”
“Of course it’s locked. With you running amok, what d’you expect? You shouldn’t even be in the building.”
“You shouldn’t be producing the God-slot for five-year-olds.”
“Harold, now you’re being petty and vindictive.”
“When it comes to being vindictive …”
“I know, I know,” said Mackenzie, showing every sign of becoming bored, “I wrote the book.”
“No, Mac,” said Harold Roy, “you stole the book.”
“Up yours, Harold!”
It might have petered out there, just another slagging match between middle-aged prima donnas with nothing better to do on their lunch break, if Freeman Davis hadn’t chosen that moment to unlock the door from the inside and poke his head out to see what all the commotion was about.
Harold barged past the younger man almost as if he weren’t there. Only seconds later he was back in the corridor and bearing down on the producer.
“Couldn’t wait, could you, Mac? Couldn’t wait to let this jumped-up fuck-up start re-editing my footage. Cutting the fucking stuff to bits!”
If Resnick hadn’t stepped in quickly, Harold Roy’s fist might have done more damage this time than last. All those early years directing angry young men were coming home to roost.
“Uh-uh, Harold,” Resnick said, the fingers of his right hand tight around the director’s wrist, his left closed around Harold’s best punch, “not a good idea in the circumstances. This time the provocation might be harder to prove.”
“Let him go,” said Mackenzie, but without a great deal of conviction. “He won’t catch me twice and get away with it.”
Resnick stared into Harold Roy’s face until the latter looked away and the tension had seeped from his arm. “We have to talk, Harold and I,” Resnick said to Mackenzie. “If you could make somewhere available.”
“Sure,” Mackenzie said, backing off. “Of course. You want anything? Anything else?”
Resnick shook his head. Down along the corridor, Diane was leaning against the wall, finishing her salad with her fingers. There was a smile in her eyes, brightening the corners of her mouth. How could she stand there dressed like a house painter, thought Resnick, and be so sexy?
For herself, Diane Woolf was still thinking how quickly for a big man Resnick had moved, how fast. Maybe there was something about him after all; something more than those eyes that didn’t want to let her go.
Twenty-six
Harold Roy clenched his fists and stared at his knuckles until they were quite white. If ever there’d been any chance of salvaging his future with this particular company, the last half-hour had blown it. Once the rumors made their rounds, the usual vindictiveness, more than usual exaggeration-couldn’t finish the series, couldn’t keep to schedule, boozed up on the set, taking swings at the producer-he’d be lucky to get a job directing sixty-second promos for satellite TV. Some men in his situation might have somewhere warm and comforting to crawl; someone to hold their hands and pour their vodka, lick their wounds. What he had was a shrew of a wife who was in the process of rediscovering her sexuality in the company of a professional criminal with a semi-permanent hard-on. What he had was a blade-wielding drug dealer who would joyfully slice him down the middle at the first hint of betrayal.