The Dead Republic (7 page)

—Well, there ain’t that much film stock. We have to pick and choose. Understand?

I nodded.

—Just like the stories your mother told you when you were a kid, back in Dublin.

I looked at him.

—No? he said.

—No.

—Well, Jesus, you got kids of your own, right? You told them stories.

I nodded.

—All done in a couple of minutes, he said.—Between Once upon a time and Happily ever after. We’ll have two hours, max. But it’s plenty. If we do it right. We already have the story. But I need the tools. Pictures. Music. The shortcuts.
The Kerry Dances
.

—It wasn’t her song.

—We make it her fucking song.

He wasn’t angry.

—I’m having to fight, he said.—I’m making this one here—He nodded back at the fort.

—so Herb Yates - he’s the fucking producer - so he’ll give me the finance to make ours. I’m the most bankable director in Hollywood, every one a sure-fire hit. I’ve won fucking Oscars. But our picture’s set in Ireland. It’s too far way. They don’t think it’ll make them money.

He sighed.

—We’re nearly there, he said.—We’ll make it. How’d you meet her?

—School, I said.

—Sat beside each other, he said.—On the first day. It’s a bit corny, but it could work.

—No.

—Why not? he said.—What?

—She was my teacher, I said.

—That’s right, he said.—You told me she was the schoolmarm.

—Yeah.

—But you didn’t tell me she was
your
fucking schoolmarm. Jesus. You were, what? Ten, eleven?

—Eight.

—She was what, twenty-five?

I shrugged.

—Well, listen, he said.—Here goes.

He sounded like he was getting ready to sit up. But he didn’t.

—We won’t get that past the censor, he said.—They just won’t allow that.

—I met her again in the GPO, I told him.—Years later.

—There now, he said.—You’re thinking like a writer. The place is burning down, right?

—Yeah.

—Bullets in the air.

—Yeah. And—

—Go on, he said.

—The glass dome above us, I said.—It started to melt.

—Great, he said.—Drops of molten glass.

—Yeah.

—See? he said.—This is one of the shortcuts. Love and liberty in ten, fifteen seconds. Miss O’Shea—

—I rode her in the basement on a bed made of stamps.

—I’m right there with you, Henry, he said.—But we won’t shoot the fucking.

—Fair enough.

—You understand.

—Yeah, no; you’re grand. I understand.

—But what we’ll do is, he said,—we shoot two good faces. Whoever’s you, probably Hank, and whoever’s playing your schoolmarm, probably Maureen or maybe Joanne Dru.You’ll like Joanne. She’s here, somewhere.

He nodded back, at the fort.

—Two faces, he said.—Two pairs of those Irish eyes. And the eyes are saying it all. And the glass drips and the bullets fly. And cut. You can see that?

—Yeah, I said.

—This is great, he said.

I agreed with him; I believed him.

—Great, he said.—Bed of stamps, right?

—Right.

He started singing, quietly.

—OH, THE DAYS OF THE KERRY—

DANCES - What was her name?

—I don’t know, I said.

—Meta told me you’d keep saying that.

—I never knew her name.

—We’ll have to give her a name.

—No.

—We’ll see.

—No.

—We’ll fucking see. How do we get that across? The woman has no name.

—She had a name, I said.

—But you don’t know it.

I nodded.

—You didn’t want to know it.

—That’s right.

—Was it a secret agent thing or a better-fuck thing?

—Better-fuck.

—How do we tell that in a picture? Without the guy explaining, putting us to fucking sleep?

—He could put his finger in his ears just when she’s going to tell him.

—Your pal, Douglas Fairbanks.

—What about him?

—You ever see him put his fingers in his ears? Or Valentino? Or Hank Fonda?

—Okay.

—I don’t think I could even make Duke Wayne stick his fingers in his fucking ears.

He turned his chair to face the set again and he was suddenly surrounded by busy men, and he was up and gone, into the phoney fort. I turned my own chair. I heard the accordion -
Bringing in the Sheaves
. There were horses - I was suddenly hearing them - kicking up the red dust, and men in blue uniforms trying to stay in their saddles. I could see dirt settle and sink into the sweat on the horses and men. There were other men rushing around, off to the sides. And voices, above and through the chaos of the horses. And the louder voice of a man I couldn’t see.

—Hold those fucking horses!

There was a dog asleep, in front of the horses’ angry feet. I waited for the big voice -
Move that fucking dog!
But it didn’t come. And I realised something: the dog was supposed to be there. The dog was part of the story. The dog was a cavalry dog and someone owned the dog and probably loved the dog. Ford had put the dog there, and I thought that was fuckin’ brilliant. I laughed. The little touch, the bit extra; the horses and men weren’t enough. They were the story but I’d always remember the dog. Because the dog made them human. I knew now why Ford kept digging at me, and I knew I’d come up with my own dogs.

Ford walked up to the lines of horses. He was looking at their feet. He stepped over the dog and kept going. He stopped and patted one of the horses.

—This one, he said.

A lad with a brush and a tin of paint got down on one knee and painted the horse’s feet. They suddenly looked blacker, too black, even from where I sat, through a screen of rolling dust. Ford examined the feet.

—Great, he said.

I couldn’t see him now. I could see no one who wasn’t in uniform. But I heard him.

—This will be picture.

Even the horses were waiting.

—Everybody ready? We are rolling.

It was simple and fast. I heard the accordion under the hooves and voices. The dust was now deliberate.

—AROUND HER NECK—

SHE WORE A YELLOW RIBBON—

The men on the horses were singing, going past me, with the dog trotting along beside them.

—SHE WORE IT IN THE SPRINGTIME—

AND IN THE MONTH OF MAY—

There were other voices. Everyone, in front of the camera and hidden, was singing.

—AND IF YOU ASKED HER—

WHY THE HECK SHE WORE IT—

SHE’D SAY IT’S FOR MY LOVER—

WHO’S IN THE CAVALRY—

The dust blew over me. I could still hear the horses. They hadn’t gone far. The filming was over. The hidden men were back. shifting the lights, painting, sweeping, making it all new again. And the dog was still lying there.

Ford walked towards me. I picked up my chair, so we both had our backs to the fort.

—The dog on the ground, I said.

—What about him?

—I saw him going off with the horses.

—Different dog. You killed men, right?

I nodded.

—Yeah.

—Tell me about one of them. Ready, Meta?

She was behind us, sitting on an Indian blanket, under her huge hat. I couldn’t see her eyes.

—Ready, she said.

—I shot him in the back of the head, I said.

—Provoked.

—No.

—You had to have a reason for killing the guy.

—I did, I said.—I was told to.

 

 

 

I slept that night in a tepee. There were two of them outside the perimeter fence of the fort. The tepees were real, but just there for background. I crawled into one, with a thin grey blanket I’d found in the back of a truck - it had been folded around a case full of lightbulbs. It was dark now, hours since the last of the film people had gone to their rooms at the trading post, somewhere off on the other side of the dust.

I lay down.

I wasn’t alone. I knew it like I used to know it, with the fast, smooth certainty that had often kept me alive.

I saw eyes. I waited for them to shift or blink. They didn’t. I held my leg beside me, ready.

I whispered.

—Navajo?

—Yes.

—Irish.

—Okay.

I must have slept.

There was a thin pillar of light coming from the hole above me where the prop-sticks met and leaned into each other. My Navajo pal was gone but there was someone else there, sitting back on his blanket.

—You shot the poor fuck in the head, said Ford.

—He wasn’t a poor fuck. He was a cop.

The light missed his canvas fedora by inches. He was sitting right beside it.

—Got his just deserts, right?

—Yeah, I said.—Probably.

He watched me strap the leg on.

—We can do that, he said.—We can show him doing some of the bad things that earn him his bullet. That’s doable.

I folded my blanket. I pushed it in under the deerskin wall of the tepee.

—I’ve an oul’ lad’s bladder, I said.—I’ll be back in a minute.

—Your turn to piss on a dead man.

—If I see one.

—Plenty of ’em out there, he said.

I didn’t go far. But Ford was gone when I got back. The day was well on. The sun was up and biting, and the ground looked like the horses had been across and back across it.

—What date is it? I asked a guy who was passing.

I’d seen him before - I remembered - in the little studio desert, carrying a cactus, when they were making
Fort Apache
.

—Date?

—Yeah, I said.

—Well, he said.—I’m not sure. Say, Duke?

A big guy—

I was big - I suddenly remembered that. I pulled back my shoulders and tried not to let the pain get loud.

This big guy was some kind of an officer. His hat was different, his moustache was well looked after. He’d been made up to look older than he was. The grey in his hair wasn’t real. I wasn’t sure the hair was even real.

—What can I do for you? he said.

He was huge but it looked like he’d been cut in half; a bigger top was balanced on the legs and arse of a smaller man.

—What date is it? asked the cactus guy.

—Ah Jesus, said Duke.—I don’t have to know things like that. That’s someone else’s job.

I watched Duke step over the dog.

—Is that Duke Wayne? I asked.

I remembered the name. Ford had said it, often.

—Sure is, said Cactus.

I watched Wayne go up some steps. There was a swagger but he got up the steps like a lighter, careful man. He’d have done well in a flying column in 1920.

Now I saw someone I did know.

—How’s it going, Gypo?

It was the guy I’d seen in
The Informer
. Gypo Nolan. He was older and wider, but it was him. He was hung-over, still half-pissed. He stared at me like he was trying to see through deep water.

—Say, Vic, said Cactus.—What’s the date?

—Fuck off now, said Gypo.

He sounded Irish. But he didn’t - he was pretending to be Irish. It was the accent he’d had in
The Informer
. He kept going, kicking dust, up the same steps Wayne had danced up. But Gypo tried to smash them as he went. He followed Wayne through an open plank door. There was nothing behind it, only more of the desert.

—What’s Gypo’s name? I asked.

—Vic, said Cactus.—Victor McLaglen.

—He’s not Irish.

—No, said Cactus.—But he thinks he is. Pappy told him he was and Vic believed him. He’s English, in actual fact. I think.

I heard the accordion behind me. There was a young-looking skinny lad coming across the dirt and Danny Borzage was walking ahead of him, squeezing out
The Streets of Laredo
. Ford came through the door to the desert and it was as if the accordion had been shot dead and brought back to very quick life;
The Streets of Laredo
became
Bringing in the Sheaves
. Danny went to meet his master coming down the steps. Ford stopped in front of the skinny kid. He pushed the kid’s cap up an inch, looked at it and left it like that. The kid’s forehead was burnt and his red hair matched it.

—Ready? said Ford.

—Yes, Uncle Jack, said the kid.

—Got your lines?

—Yes.

—That’s the idea, said Ford.

The accordion was sucking in and shaping the dust. The red air danced around Ford. The noise, the sudden space in front of the camera, the blast of white light, the concentration on all the wet, dirty faces - they were ready to roll, just waiting for the go-ahead from Ford.

He stopped in front of me.

—It can’t be in the head, he said.

—That was how it was.

—Fuck how it was. It’s a story, not the Gospel according to fucking Luke.

Then he shouted, straight into my face.

—I’ve changed my mind!

But he wasn’t talking to me. The lights went quickly out, and hidden men appeared from behind walls and fences.

—Come on, said Ford.

He was quick on the feet; I hadn’t seen him move like this before. He charged out the front gate of the fort, past my tepee. I couldn’t keep up; my leg didn’t like the broken ground. Danny still played but the song, the rhythm, was breaking up the further Ford strode from the fort. He was on the small hills now, marching over them. I was passed by the crew and stuntmen, the horses and, now, the trucks pulling generators and huge propellers - the wind machines - and men clinging, hanging from the backs and sides of the trucks. I could feel the dirt, between the wood and the meat of my leg, scouring, cutting.