Authors: Dominick Dunne
“What in the world were you doing in Las Vegas, Stanford? You’re seated over there next to me, and Mimi’s on the other side. Lil, you’re over there next to Addison. If you knew how much I miss my dining room, and I can’t get that damn Ferdy Trocadero back to repaint. Don’t tell me the next terrorist attack is going to be in Las Vegas?”
“No, no, my dear Ormolu. I was visiting Elias Renthal at the federal prison. He’ll be getting out soon, a few months at most. And it’s not true what you’ve heard at all the parties, that he has massages in prison. He doesn’t. No special privileges at all, and he’s just about done his seven years, and he hasn’t complained. My hat’s off to him.”
“What a good deed, Stanford,” said Ormolu. “You are a perplexing person. Now sit down, sit down. Percy said everyone was about to leave if we didn’t sit down, and Lil Altemus has let me know that you never should wait for a late guest.”
“Sounds like Lil,” said Lord Cudlip.
Lord Cudlip didn’t tell anyone that Simon Cabot in London had suggested the trip to Las Vegas in his private plane. It would make Lord Cudlip look like a loyal friend, visiting Elias Renthal in prison, and it would make Elias Renthal look like a man who was still important.
F
ROM A
public relations point of view, it was Simon Cabot, “our man in England,” as Ruby Renthal always referred to him when talking to Elias, who more or less orchestrated Elias Renthal’s release from prison, or the facility, as Ruby insisted on calling it, sternly and quickly correcting anyone who used the word
prison
, a word she could not bear. Ruby’s persistence, as
well as a call from Baroness de Liagra in Paris on Ruby’s behalf, as well as a call from Chiquita Chatfield, as in Duchess of, changed Simon Cabot’s mind about representing someone in an American federal facility, an association he had feared that his other powerful clients in distressing situations might object to. Secrecy was part of the lucrative bargain they came to. Simon Cabot was a great one for e-mail and gave his ideas to Ruby without ever leaving England. The Renthals were most anxious that there be as little press as possible on Elias’s departure from the prison in Las Vegas. “Oh, dear me, no,” said Simon, advising Ruby not to wear the suit she described to him with the sable collar and cuffs that Baroness de Liagra had privately comissioned Karl Lagerfeld to design especially for her. “Play it down, like Perla Zacharias did at the trial of the male nurse in Biarritz after Konstantin’s murder,” said Simon. “Wear that black suit you were wearing when we met at Claridge’s, and leave your ruby bracelet home,” he said. “There’s certain to be photographers there. Don’t get out of the car to greet Elias. Don’t have any sort of a public welcome-home situation. Pictures are less likely to be published if you’re not in them. It’s you they want to see. You make the picture more valuable to the tabloids. People are beginning to talk about Ruby Renthal again. Elias should be dressed in a business suit, with a white shirt and a striped tie, as if he were going to the office. Have him walk directly to the car. Tell him not to stop to pose when the photographers call out his name. Just keep walking to the car. If they yell, ‘How was prison, Elias?,’ which they probably will, or, ‘Is it true you had to clean toilets, Elias?,’ tell Elias to ignore them and, for god’s sake, not to get angry in public. I have heard all about his temper. The driver should be holding the car door open for him, so that he can slip right into the car. It’s all right for the chauffeur to tip his hat to Elias. Kiss him inside the car, after the door is closed. Put your arms around him, in case they
shoot through the back window. It should be very discreet and proper. There may be more photographers and reporters at the airport after you leave the prison, so be forewarned. I know the
Financial Times
is sending someone. And, of course, the
New York Times
and the
Daily News
, Toby Tilden from the
New York Post
, and the
Wall Street Journal
, who have been very tough on Elias from the beginning. The driver will take the car out onto the tarmac, as close as possible to the stairs up to the plane. You get out first and walk up the steps, where you wait for Elias. Think of Jackie O and how she would have played the scene and do that.”
“I
TOLD
you Simon was brilliant,” said Ruby when Elias told her about Lord Cudlip’s prison visit. “I told you. You didn’t believe me. Was I right or was I right?”
“Lord Cudlip’s the one who’s brilliant,” said Elias. “Or Stanford, as he told me to call him. I don’t know why, but I got the feeling that he’s going to ask me to go on his board of directors.”
“Oh, my god, Elias. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?” said Ruby. “That would show New York that you were back in the big time. His board of directors has some of the swankiest people in New York, London, and Paris on it. The Infanta of Spain. People like that. I’m sure that was Simon Cabot’s idea too.”
“Cudlip’s like a real intellectual. He’s writing a biography of Benedict Arnold, at the same time that he’s running his empire. He’s bought all the family papers from Benedict Arnold’s descendants. Twelve million bucks he paid for the papers. It’s going to be eight hundred sixty pages long. I don’t know where he gets the time to write it, running that media empire of his.”
“Just between us, Elias, you name me three people we know
who are going to read eight hundred sixty pages about Benedict Arnold,” said Ruby. “Who gives a shit?”
They both roared with laughter.
G
US WAS
at the office of Lance Wilson, his editor of many years at
Park Avenue
, handing in his prison interview with Erik Menendez, whose trial for the murder of his parents Gus had covered for the magazine years earlier. Erik and his brother were currently doing life without the possibility of parole in different California prisons, where Gus had visited him.
Stokes Bishop, hearing that Gus was in the building, popped into Lance Wilson’s office. Lance stood up and welcomed Stokes back from his holiday in St. Bart’s on Larry Yelster’s three-masted schooner built for him in Germany. Stokes raved about the yacht.
“How’s the case going, Gus?” asked Stokes. “Do you like your new lawyer?”
“I want to settle,” said Gus. “I kid you not when I say I’m afraid of a heart attack.”
“Don’t settle, Gus. Take it all the way,” said Stokes. “What a trial that will be. Christine Saunders, every big news person will cover it. Cramden doesn’t have a chance in a New York courtroom. You saw his interview with Christine Saunders. He was a creepy little disaster.”
Gus had stopped asking about Stokes’s promise to cover his legal fees. He had long since realized that this matter was out of both of their hands.
G
US
B
AILEY WAS SEATED AT HIS REGULAR CORNER
table in the back room of Swifty’s with Bobby Vermont, whom he always described as his oldest New York friend. Their wives had gone to the same school. Their offspring had known one another as children. They had worked together in the early days of television. Bobby was one of the few people Gus discussed his slander suit with.
“You must know that everyone’s afraid to ask you about your lawsuit,” said Bobby.
“Is everyone talking about it?” asked Gus.
“You know they are,” replied Bobby. “With concern, I might add.”
“I get pity letters from friends,” said Gus. “Especially after that shit Toby Tilden wrote in the
Post
that I was hiding out in the country as much as I could, only attending the social events I have to, afraid to see anyone, and worried about money. I know they mean well, but I can’t stand to read the letters, even though I do worry about money. ‘Dickie and I are so sorry to hear of the terrible predicament that you find yourself in.’ That sort of thing.”
“The word is out that you don’t want to see anybody. Who was it who gave you the false information about Diandra
Lomax’s disappearance?” asked Bobby. “How did he get to you?”
For some reason, Gus found it difficult to talk about the man, whose real name was Cal Hornett. Their last conversation had taken place in England. By that time Gus had known he was a fraud who had told him a false story and cost him an enormous amount of trouble and money. Their phone call in England had been ugly. Gus had grown to feel fearful of him.
“Dear God,” said Gus, momentarily diverted from the horse trainer with the powerful Middle East connections by someone he noticed across the room.
“What’s the matter?” asked Bobby.
“Perla Zacharias just came in. She’s not fond of me. I haven’t seen her since the trial in Biarritz. I hope there’s not a scene.”
“Sable coat? Face-lift to the max? That one?” asked Bobby.
“That’s Perla. God, look what she’s done to her face. The left eyelid droops more than the right. She looks like she’s in the witness protection program. I can’t believe Robert’s going to seat her right next to me on the banquette, but he is,” said Gus. “I guess he doesn’t read my diary in
Park Avenue
or the gossip columns.”
“Just keep talking. Don’t look,” said Bobby.
“I
CAN’T
believe I’m sitting directly next to that odious Gus Bailey,” said Perla after she had greeted Addison Kent, kissing him on both cheeks.
“He doesn’t notice. He’s deep in conversation,” reassured Addison.
“He noticed,” said Perla.
“Aren’t you going to take off your sable coat, Perla?” asked Addison.
She slipped out of her coat and placed it on the banquette between herself and Gus, as if to build a sable wall between them. She never looked in his direction. They had not seen each other since the last day of the male nurse’s trial in Biarritz, where they had also never looked at each other. Their last interaction had been when she called him at his house in Prud’homme. But Perla Zacharias was finished trying to appeal to that bastard. She had other avenues to pursue, and she would absolutely pursue them. Gus Bailey was but a minor speed bump on her rise to the top.
She raised her voice slightly as she said to Addison, “The Prince of Wales said to me the other night at Clarence House, when I told him I had bought so many things belonging to the Windsors at the auction, he said to me, ‘My great-uncle was not a good man, a most peculiar individual.’ Don’t you think it’s amazing that he made such a personal revelation to me?”
“How much did it cost to sit next to him?” asked Addison. Perla quietly gasped. She preferred to have people think she had been
invited
to Clarence House as the personal guest of the future king and his duchess, not that her exalted philanthropy to the prince’s charity had earned her the best seat at the table. Addison Kent still had much to learn about being the walker of the third richest woman in the world.
G
US STAYED HOME THAT
W
EDNESDAY NIGHT TO
watch his television show,
Augustus Bailey Presents
. He usually watched rough cuts and final cuts of his shows before they went on the air, but this night the producer and editor had been working up to the last minute, making changes, and there hadn’t been an advance screening. Gus’s introduction and narration of the show had been shot only the day before at his home in Prud’homme, Connecticut. He felt a bit of anxiety, as he personally knew the imprisoned Elias Renthal, whose story of financial malfeasance was the subject of that evening’s episode. It was Gus who had persuaded the president of the Butterfield Club to speak on camera about the reasons why Elias Renthal had been asked to resign from the prestigious men’s club on Fifth Avenue before the trial that sent him to prison for seven years. It was Gus who had persuaded Lord Deeds, the delinquent, drugged, and disinherited son of the Duke and Duchess of Chatfield, Bunny and Chiquita, to say on camera that the fabulous social climb of the Renthals had had much to do with the new acre of roof for Deeds Castle, which Elias had paid for at a cost of over a million dollars, assuring him a permanent invitation to the famous shoots at Deeds Castle.
It was Gus who had gotten Max Luby to speak on camera in defense of his imprisoned friend.
Gus, seated in front of a bookcase in the living room of his house in Prud’homme, addressed the television audience:
“Social climbers get a bad rap. I dabbled myself in the art of it, so I know. They are fascinating to watch. Many fall by the wayside, but others go the whole way and end up as old guard to everyone except the real old guard. Elias Renthal is a massively noticeable presence in whatever circumstance he finds himself, even prison. Stout, beautifully dressed in English bespoke suits and shirts and ties and shoes before his incarceration, he drew people in society to him with his welcoming smile and jolly manner, as if proximity to him would bring them the vast riches that he made for himself. By his side always was the beautiful red-haired Ruby Renthal, who divorced and remarried Elias when he was in prison. Elias took to the grand life as if he were born to it. He chartered large yachts for Mediterranean cruises with the swellest cast of characters you ever heard of. Elias became a part of that world. If you could have seen him in his shooting clothes from Huntsman in London at Bunny and Chiquita Chatfield’s shooting party at Deeds Castle. He belonged. He was funny. He told wonderful stories. He was generous. He had given the new roof for the castle in a confidential agreement with the duke, which everyone eventually heard about. He created good times for the grandest people in the world.”
O
VER AT
the Butterfield Club, Percy Webb turned to Herkie Saybrook, when they were playing backgammon, and said, “Elias is going to be pissed off at Gus Bailey about this show when he gets out of prison.” And, the next day, during lunch at the Rhinelander Hotel, Lorcan Styne turned to Perla Zacharias
and said, “Elias Renthal is not going to be happy about that show of Gus Bailey’s last night.”
And Lil Altemus, who was having her dreaded lunch with her stepmother, Dodo Van Degan, at the corner table in the back room of Swifty’s, mentioned in passing that she’d heard someone had brought two TV sets into the dining room at a dinner party to watch the Elias Renthal story on Gus Bailey’s show. But Dodo didn’t seem very impressed, so Lil changed the subject, slightly.