The Deer Park Read Online Free PDF Page B

don’t know that I would tell it to you, sir.
    C HAIRMAN N ORTON : We’ll have you up for perjury if you don’t watch out.
    C RANE : To return to a point of questioning. I’m curious, Mr. Eitel. In the event of war, would you fight for this country?
    E ITEL : If I were drafted, I wouldn’t have much choice, would I? May I say that?
    C RANE : You would fight without enthusiasm?
    E ITEL : Without enthusiasm.
    C HAIRMAN N ORTON : But if you were fighting for a certain enemy, that would be a different story, wouldn’t it?
    E ITEL : I would fight for them with even less enthusiasm.
    C HAIRMAN N ORTON : That’s what you say now. Eitel, here’s something we have in our files on you. “Patriotism is for pigs.” Do you remember saying that?
    E ITEL : I suppose I did.
    I VAN F ABNER (Counsel for the Witness): May I interrupt on behalf of my client to state that I believe he will rephrase his remarks?
    C HAIRMAN N ORTON : That’s what I want to know. Eitel, what do you say about it now?
    E ITEL : It sounds a little vulgar as you repeat it, Congressman. I would have put it differently if I had known some agent of your Committee was reporting what I said at a party.
    C HAIRMAN N ORTON : “Patriotism is for pigs.” And you make your living from this country.
    E ITEL : It’s the alliteration of the
p
’s which makes it vulgar.
    C HAIRMAN N ORTON : Not responsive.
    C RANE : How would you put it today, Mr. Eitel?
    E ITEL : If you ask me to go on, I’m afraid I’ll make a subversive remark.
    C HAIRMAN N ORTON : I order you to go on. Just how, in what language, would you word it for the Committee today?
    E ITEL : I suppose I’d say that patriotism asks you to be ready to leave your wife at a moment’s notice. Possibly that’s the secret of its appeal. (
Laughter
.)
    C HAIRMAN N ORTON : Do you usually think with such noble sentiments?
    E ITEL : I’m not accustomed to thinking on these lines. The act of making motion pictures has little to do with noble sentiments.
    C HAIRMAN N ORTON : I’m pretty sure the motion pictures industryis going to give you plenty of time to think noble thoughts after this morning’s testimony. (
Laughter
.)
    F ABNER : May I ask for a recess?
    C HAIRMAN N ORTON : This is a subversive committee, not a forum for half-baked ideas. Eitel, you’re the most ridiculous witness we’ve ever had.
    When I finished reading, I looked up at Faye. “He must have lost his job in quick-time,” I said.
    “He certainly did,” Faye murmured.
    “But why is he staying in Desert D’Or?”
    Marion grinned out of his private humor. “You’re right, man. This is no place to stay when you’ve lost your loot.”
    “I thought Eitel was rich.”
    “He used to be. You don’t know how anything works,” Faye said dispassionately. “You see, along about this time they started looking at his income-tax returns. By the time they got done, Eitel had to strip himself to pay the back taxes. All that’s left is his house here. Mortgaged, of course.”
    “And he just stays here?” I asked. “He doesn’t do anything?”
    “You’ll get to meet him. You’ll see what I mean,” Faye told me. “Charley Eitel could be worse off. Maybe he needed a kick in the pants.”
    By the way Faye said this, I had a clue.
    “You like him,” I said again.
    “I don’t dislike him,” Faye said grudgingly.
    At the Yacht Club, a few days later, Marion introduced me to Eitel. By the end of a week, I suppose I was making a point of going to see him every day.

CHAPTER FIVE
    T HE OPEN - AIR CAFÉ of the Yacht Club wandered around the cabañas and the swimming pool, its peppermint-striped tables and chairs another throw of color against the hotel foliage and the mountains beyond Desert D’Or. Almost always, I could find Eitel seated at a table for the siesta, a paper-bound manuscript open before him. Yet it was hard to believe the script could be important. No sooner would I come by than he would close the pages, order a drink, and