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Tuesday 25 October 2011

A Case Of Composition

William Todd was drunk again, sitting in King Cole’s Bar and having himself a couple of beers along with a brandy or two. As he was tipsy enough to pretend to feel a little too numb to remember the recent quarrel, he ordered another drink and smiled a bitter grin of self irony. He munched on a piece of bread and ate a steak, order a dessert and another drink, but still the memory of the loud fight came back to haunt him in spite of that gluttony.

He had his notepad with him, where he would note a phrase or two that he could use in a song.
The reality of the situation, though, was that he almost never ever really used the phrases that he wrote down on his notepad. The notepad had become famous and everyone knew that composer Gerald Brown’s lyricist and second part of Broadway’s number one musical team always went to King Cole’s and had a beer and tried to come up with good stuff for their next show.

Liz Smith would go there at times just to see if he was in the establishment and then there would be column in next day’s newspaper about William Todd being in his searching mode. She had first set the standard for calling him an Errol Flynn look-alike. Gerald then became Michael Caine. When a show flopped it became the Flynn/Caine Mutiny.

So what was the deal with Gerald?
Why was he so choleric?
He was a perfectionist.

Gerald was as gay as it was possible to be and had a relationship with a German dancer named Tim Schneider, who was notoriously unsuccessful but got to dance in all Todd and Brown shows. He mostly lived at the couple’s ranch, where the maid Rosita kept a serious look out over Tim’s drinking habits. Of course, there had always been rumours that William Todd also was gay. William always tried to disprove the press by being seen with a different dishy blonde at every reception. He tried to spread the word about his own erect manhood by being a womanizer.

That day, the womanizer William, also known as Errol Flynn, was between women. The visit to the bar had been completely spontaneous and had been triggered by a ferocious fight between the lyricist and the composer over something as silly as a pen.

The pen had been a gift from William’s ex-girlfriend, a famous Broadway singer named Marilyn Jones. She was celebrated as the new Patti LuPone and was now playing Fantine in Les Miserables on Broadway.

William and Marilyn had broken up years ago, because Marilyn had been having wild and quite extravagant sex with William’s accountant in the couple’s own bedroom.
William and Marilyn were two stubborn artists and William had never forgiven Marilyn, although he still loved her and they kept on phoning each other regardless of their former hatred. She had kept asking his forgiveness and he kept on telling her to go fuck herself. It was a difficult situation.

The pen was a lucky charm and William’s only link to a lost cause. William signed every contract with that pen and he wanted to have it with when he wrote an autograph. It was always in his Gucci blazer pocket.

Well, that evening the unthinkable happened. He phoned Marilyn from Gerald’s Park Avenue flat that evening to discuss her participation in the new Todd and Brown show An Orchid Washed Ashore. It was a show about a rich widow that fell in love with a black servant and caused massive racial controversy in 1950’s Maryland. Marilyn was up for the role of the widow Jennifer.

As always William was nervous when talking to Marilyn. After the phone call he forgot the pen in Gerald’s big study. It lay there on Gerald’s massive mahogany desk under Gerald’s reproduction of Rubens’ masterpiece of Maria of Medici’s arrival on shore. When William went back to Gerald’s music room, the composer was sitting by his white Steinway grand piano. He was punching some keys on his keyboard connected composition computer programme. It was a version of the lead song It will never be the Same from the upcoming show An Orchid Washed Ashore. The song was Jennifer’s hymn and was intended to show off Marilyn’s three octave range. It had about three different rhythms and was written in four different keys. The problem was that William and Gerald had completely different views on how the song should end.

William said that it should segue into tender love scene with a low note and a pianissimo dynamic. Gerald, being the true British Elgar, Holst and Britten fan he was, felt that the scene really should end with a loud high G on forte. Nobody coming to a musical would want to hear the title song end softly.

The atmosphere was tense and the two men got to fighting, when Gerald suggested they drop the subject and sign Cameron MacIntosh’s contract for eventual CD – releases going to his company. William couldn’t find his pen and Gerald called him a boring git for being so dependant on the pen. William insisted he could only sign the contract with his pen and Gerald told him that he only couldn’t let Marilyn go. How could he, Gerald had answered? He was working with her all the time and so the memories were always there. The quarrel reached a climax and ended with William throwing foul words over Gerald’s massive amount of baroque art on the walls, telling him that Gerald wasn’t gay. He was just in love with Rubenesque fat ladies, because his hefty mother had raised him to become a sissy.

William regretted saying that. Gerald had taken an expensive Venetian vase and thrown it against the door. It closed behind William as he stood in the hallway outside the penthouse. He kept looking at the gay icons like Celine Dion and Marlene Dietrich that hung in the white hallway. He stopped by Maria Callas and turned around to speak with Gerald, but overheard Gerald talking to himself that William was an untalented, homophobic, hidden fag with penis envy.

So, William stepped into his Rolls and drove to the bar.
There he was, drunk again.
It did not take a long time before he left for his flat. He was restless and unhappy. His flat was also a Park Avenue property, albeit a little further away from Gerald’s.

William ended up drinking a bottle of rosé and falling asleep while Bogey told Bergman that he was looking at her and called her a kid. William dreamt really weird dreams that night.
At eleven o’clock the next morning, the phone rang and woke the author up. William felt like little trolls were dancing the merengue in his shorts and spitting chilli on his cucumber.

He hoped it wasn’t neurotic Gerald calling and crying for him to come back. Actually, William realized that he himself had been rude and actually needed to apologize to Gerald. To William’s sad realization, it wasn’t Gerald. It was their lawyer George Markstein. A Jewish guy from Brooklyn that looked like Jason Alexander in Seinfeld. He took care of their legal affairs from his office on 7th Avenue and kept on arriving at every important meeting to add a little official flair to the engagement.

George said that when he had come to Gerald’s penthouse that morning to deliver a contract Gerald had already disappeared, leaving a note behind him taped to his penthouse door. It simply said that he needed a vacation and left all responsibility to his partner William Todd and their mutual lawyer George Markstein. What was strange was that the writing wasn’t his, the autograph was.

Somebody wrote the letter for him.
Quickly, still feeling dizzy from all the booze, William got dressed and walked over to the penthouse where George was waiting.
George had been right. The letter had been written by someone else. It was untypical for Gerald to let anyone else do anything for him, because he would be obsessive about control. Letting an unknown stranger take care of something as personal as a letter was almost impossible.

George and William checked Gerald’s last phone calls. He had called their agent Marvin Klein, Marilyn, Cameron MacIntosh’s office, Tim Schneider at the ranch and the last call had been this morning at 9:02 from a bar named The Russian Drag Queen in Greenwich Village. It was gay club open all hours. Gerald often went there to eat and hear new singers or look at art.

They called the bar. The owner Vladimir Fomenko said that Gerald had called the bar at nine this morning and spoken to a Russian man named Sergei Karpoff who was eating breakfast at the bar at that time. He usually lived at The George Brent Hotel on Fifth Avenue. If William wanted more information, he better come himself and bring a bottle of Ararat Brandy and some Gauloises cigarettes.

William and George knew when they were being bribed, but William insisted that he wanted to find out what this was about. They called all the other people that Gerald had telephoned this morning and not even his boyfriend Tim had known that he had been planning on going away. So, something must have happened at 9:02 that triggered Sergei Karpoff to come over to Gerald and convince him to leave.

William knew that he had to go and find out what had happened. He was going to buy the things that this Fomenko guy had wanted. George insisted on coming with him and William couldn’t say he was unhappy about that.

William went to his favourite booze retailer and got the brandy, but the cigarettes were a different matter. They had been banned in the U.S. and so getting a pack was difficult. Finally, William found a whole bunch of packs in lower Manhattan in a discount store.

George really thought William was crazy. Here was this famous guy, who spent all day looking for cigarettes.

The bar in the village was very glitzy and trashy and the perfect place for an upper ten gay like Gerald to go to. Convincing Fomenko to actually tell them what had happened this morning was not easy. He said that the man Gerald had spoken to this morning had been Russian and probably a member of the Russian art mafia. He could not promise that this was true, but he was an art collector himself and all they had been talking about for the last two weeks was art.

Gerald had met Sergei Karpoff at an art fair that Fomenko had arranged in his bar two weeks ago. Gerald was very interested in reproductions and even bought two Rubens copies. Karpoff asked about one of the paintings that Gerald was buying and tried to convince him that he could buy it from him for a higher price.

Gerald was adamant. This got the two men to talking and it beame obvious that Karpoff was sexually interested in Gerald, but also that he had a hidden agenda. This actually told Fomenko that this man was a Russian art dealer from the mafia.

There was an instant where Gerald was eating breakfast with Karpoff and he mentioned something about special reproduction of Raphael’s School of Athens. Apparently, something clicked in Karpoff. That is what Fomenko said anyway. He had been serving them breakfast when they started talking very passionately about a Canadian reproduction of The School of Athens. Gerald had found it well made, but not special in any way. Karpoff was all ears and extremely interested in seeing the reproduction by a certain Raphael expert from Ontario.

Fomenko couldn’t really say what they had been talking about, only that Karpoff had been very agitated when he left in a hurry this morning to go see Gerald. He said: I’m gonna get that son-of-a-bitch.

That made Fomenko actually agree to tell William the truth when he called.
William and George were confused when they left the bar that midday. Then they decided to go to The George Brent Hotel and see if Gerald was there. When they arrived, they had apparently just missed Karpoff and Gerald. They had left for JFK airport just minutes ago.

A car chase began that took the two to the Aeroflot counter of airport. Yes, they had bought a ticket. No, they couldn’t buy one. The flight was full. Was there another flight to Russia? No, first in two hours and not to St. Petersburg this time. To Moscow.

William and George tried to convince the police that this was a police matter and that a man had been kidnapped. Had the matter been registered in any department? No, this was just a suspected kidnapping matter and hadn’t yet evolved. Meanwhile, Karpoff was getting away.

By the time that George had convinced the police chief of the airport to go after the kidnapper, after having said to the man that they were stars and needed special attention, the plane with Karpoff and Gerald had probably lifted off the ground. Now, after checking the countless other planes leaving for Russia they discovered that Karpoff had bought ten tickets for Russia and there was no way of knowing which one he was taking.

They ran through the airport to find out where the man was, but it was all to no avail. Karpoff had disappeared.
The next step was obvious: go to the police.
The police chief of the Central Park Precinct had an uncanny name: Thomas Jefferson.

He was a black man with a very wide smile, who told them that they were dealing with a special brand of a Russian art mafia that stole and reproduced art. They were international thieves that searched for reproductions world wide and sold them on the black markets. Their official agenda, in the form of a Russian art dealer named Mishka Jolesh, had as well been so clever about the art smuggling business that it could not be caught. The mafia boss had been smuggling diamonds inside art for years before anyone found out.

Jefferson’s guess was that Gerald somehow had acquired an art work with hidden diamonds built into the canvas. William remembered that they had bought an art work from a Polish painter in Austin. His name had been Janusz Kimilski. Gerald had apparently bought many of his paintings, but sold equally many to the Russian dealers that he came across at Vladimir Fomenko’s bar The Russian Drag Queen in Greenwich Village. It seemed that, without even finding out, Gerald had come in the line of fire in the middle of a fierce mafia war.

Jefferson supposed that Kimilski was one of the leading operatives in Jolesh’s opposing mafia team, which were searching for the same art that entailed expensive diamonds. These artworks with frames entailing stolen jewellery had by mistake been sold to many buyers. Now two opposing groups were trying to trace these paintings with Gerald’s help. What in fact had happened on that day was that Gerald had somehow found out, maybe by e-mail or a call from Russia or something, where the art had landed or which buyer had the paintings.

Sergei Karpoff found out and rushed over to get Gerald and fly
with him to Russia. Jefferson was sure that Karpoff and Gerald were
already criss-crossing the globe trying to found the lost treasure.
The C.I.A. was told about the incident and William was told that nothing could be done to stop him from going to Russian to find Gerald. He just had to know that he was endangering himself in going and that no one could stop him from going. The C.I.A. would probably take him into custody if he got in their way.

George urged William to stay put, but a week later William flew alone to St. Petersburg. He checked into the famous Grand Hotel. It was, even by his wealthy standards, the most luxurious hotel that he had seen.
He walked into his suite, threw the keys on the table and turned on the TV. The first thing he checked was the rooms. Nobody. He called room service and ordered dinner and soon enough a very nice young porter came and said that even in Russia they had heard of him and there were several people that wanted his autograph.

William was flattered and gave the man some signed photos of himself and then went back to his TV with his food.
He had finished his third glass of Krim Sekt, when a knock came on the door. William sighed and urged not to open. He was going on a hunt tomorrow for Mishka Jolesh and was going to try to find Gerald. He needed rest.
The knock on the door came again and so, irritated, he left his film and his salmon with caviar to open the door.

Outside a dishy brunette in a glitzy white dress met his eye. She introduced herself as Olinka and told him that she had been sent by an anonymous admirer of his that worked in the hotel. Olinka was a regular escort girl here and this man had decided to treat him to a nice evening with a beautiful woman, knowing that he was a connoisseur of pretty ladies.

Thinking nothing of it, William invited Olinka in and ordered some more champagne to the room. They must’ve talked for over an hour about Russian culture and American wines when Olinka suddenly began stripping naked. She was completely nude, when she began taking off William’s clothing and treated him to the most intense and glorious sexual night of his life. She had him perform from every possible position and insert his gender into every possible nook and cranny.

They had slept in each other’s arms up until the wee hours of the morning, when Olinka left the bed to fetch some more champagne. She returned to toast to his glorious manhood, but as he drank up the contents of the glass everything went black and William found himself falling asleep.
When he woke up, he was in a van tied up and with a piece of cloth in his mouth. His mouth had been taped shut with black tape.

Some men were talking in an unknown language about soccer. He heard names of athletes and what he guessed were teams of players and cup finales. William fell asleep pretty soon.

The next time he woke up he was in a plane.
This time he was not tied up and taped together.
There was a bar right across from where he was sitting and Olinka was there mixing a drink. He sat up and shook his head, trying to shake off the headache he had. Olinka turned around and smiled, happy to see him awake. She walked over to him, gave him a long tongue kiss and told him that she would get her boss.
Her boss? Was this Jolesh?

A small, white haired man with a white dinner jacket came in through the door of another cabin. He sported a red scarf in his upper pocket and a flowery silk scarf around his neck. He looked like Noel Coward and walked like Liberace.
He seemed happy to see William, but William asked him why he had been brought here. He was told that his life had been saved.
The man introduced himself as Henri Rosseau and he was an art collector and wine merchant with the biggest wine company in the south of France. His personal mission was to capture Jolesh and destroy The Velvet Rose, which was the name of the underground organization that was destroying the art world. Rosseau loved art too much for that kind of thing to happen and Jolesh was turning the whole business into smuggling and thievery.

He had known Jolesh himself when he had been working in a vernissage in Paris. Somehow, Mishka began commuting with the mafia and soon enough he was one of them.
Then William politely asked why his life had been saved. Rosseau took a long look at Olinka and then said that he knew that he could get William with a pretty woman. Olinka was told to seduce William and then put sleeping inducements into his drink. Mishka had found out that William was in town and the C.I.A. had obviously not found out when he was going to strike.

Before he did, Rosseau wanted to avoid him being shot by some mafia bounty hunter. Rosseau was rich and with his assets he had staged a mock ambulance rescue with Olinka as a good friend that paid his bill and took his luggage along.
The ambulance drove to Rosseau private plane and off to the south of France, where a real plan would be laid out to capture Jolesh and rescue Gerald.

Where was Gerald? Was he not in Russia?
No, Gerald and Jolesh were already in Switzerland. Mishka had a mansion there and the C.I.A. had already followed them there. Mishka had himself disappear to one of his many huts in the Swiss mountains in order to try to track the art through the internet.
The plane soon landed on a big airport and a limousine picked them up. Two hours they drove through exquisite countryside and all the time Olinka flirted with William. He felt that these people really wanted to save Gerald. The sex had been stupendous yesterday and maybe it was luck that they had met.

Rosseau’s mansion was huge. The gate gave way to a large forest split apart by a road that lead to vineyards. Eventually, the 17th century mansion could be seen on the top of a hill overlooking the grounds. There were stables nearby and horses running around behind a fence under trained riders.
The castle itself was huge from the inside. The hallway had chequered floor with chandeliers hanging over white marble staircases and portraits of what obviously were ancestors.

Rosseau took Olinka and William to their rooms, that lay next to one another, while a servant brought in the luggage. A butler would come in two hours and bring them to the dining room for supper. After that, Rosseau had something to show William.
The rooms of his suite were exquisite. It had a complete new set of towels in the bathroom and a TV with DVD functions and a small selection of films. The furniture was a nice blend of blue rococo and red baroque. The paintings were mostly Rubens and Van Eyck reproductions, judging by what he could differentiate.

William was unpacking when again a knock came on the door of his small suite in the mansion. It was Olinka and she asked him if she could enter. He said yes and she came in and sat down.
Very quickly, she explained that she really hadn’t wanted to fool him and that she was no hooker. She really had been told to seduce him, but not as a prostitute but as someone needing to save someone’s life. She had known Rosseau when she had worked in a gallery with Mishka and Rosseau had also saved Olinka when Mishka wanted to kill her. She had fled Russia back then as a young girl and now she was working with Rosseau very closely and managing his financial affairs and trying to bring the mafia to its’ knees.

We sat there for quite a while just talking about how Mishka had become greedy and how Rosseau now cared more about catching him than taking care of his vineyards. After all, he had many people taking care of his company. There was only one person competent enough to stop Mishka. Rosseau himself.
The butler came and led them into a large room with wooden panels. A very hefty oak table was there and a renaissance chandelier with candle like light bulbs hung from the ceiling. Behind the dinner table was a group of brown leather couches between which a glass table stood. There were art books on the table and a stone terrace with the balcony door open.
The table was set with four sets of cutlery. Fish soup, Escargot, Filet Mignon with Sauce du Vin and Croquettes and Creme Brulée. To this he served his own red wine, which he had to say was the best he had ever tasted.

After supper, Henri Rosseau poured them all a Remy Martin on ice and led them to a large hall down the corridor. The red carpet and the large hallway paved the way. It was a dance hall used only in rare occasions, but the amazing painting here was collection to envy. There were originals by Tizian here and even a Picasso or two. An original Caspar David Friedrich and a Boucher. The rest were reproductions.
The hall looked like one of the dance halls from 19th century Vienna. Five chandeliers lining a thirty meter room with parquet floor and six balcony doors with golden curtains.

In between every door was a painting and it all pointed one direction: to the stage where many chamber quartets and waltz orchestras had played and one can imagine many jazz bands as well.
When the assembled arrived in front of a reproduction of Alexander Roslin’s The Lady with the Veil, Rosseau pointed out that this painter had been the royal artiste of sorts during the political unrest in the country of Sweden. The kings of Sweden had little power during the 18th century, before Gustav III took over. The two parties the hats and the caps fought over the power until Gustav took over much like Friedrich der Große did in Germany. The royalty before Gustav had time to spare and Roslin was given grand access to paint to his heart’s delight.

This painting in question was of his wife Marianne and really was his best and had been modeled after the Mona Lisa and other painting of the kind. The original hung in Stockholm.
This reproduction was special. It had diamonds in the frame and embedded into the painting itself. This reproduction had been the start of the entire criminal issue with reproductions in the first place. Rosseau, Olinka and Mishka had been colleagues of sorts in the gallery in Montmartre in Paris a decade ago. Rosseau at that time had big business in Paris, before his business began concentrating more on the Riviera. He cruised the galleries in search of high quality paintings that he could buy and finally found this posh gallery called Boucher et tres ami a few kilometres away from Sacre Coeur.

Mishka and Olinka at the time were lovers, but she was being abused by him. Rosseau saw this and tried every time he was there persuading her to come to his mansion and work for him as an art consultant.
Rosseau started sponsoring the gallery heavily and soon the gallery was pretty much dependant on Rosseau’s money. So much that Rosseau on day could buy the gallery from Mishka, who at that time actually had discovered the lure of the art mafia and the commencing trade with reproductions in the black market.

One day, when Mishka had become just an employee, he was taking a walk with Olinka and Rosseau and looking for new art. In an art gallery near Foquet’s at the Champs Elysée Mishka saw this reproduction that now hung on Rosseau’s wall.
The curious thing about it was that a rich man had hired an artist to paint it for his brother. He had fallen in love with Marianne and wanted to make her more valuable just to make the painting more attractive. So he had diamonds built into the frame and two more diamonds stuck into Marianne’s fan and suddenly the painting became worth a million francs.

Mishka vowed to buy it one day. Rosseau heard that Mishka kept contacting every underground elite chief he knew in order to steal away the thing. By that time, the three former colleagues had split up and had nothing to do with one another.
Rosseau bought the reproduction for its’ valued million francs. Mishka never found out who had bought the painting, but vowed to kill the man who did. He started the entire business in smuggling art and creating priceless reproduction because of this painting.

Rosseau knew that he would have to confront Mishka if he told him that Marianne was in his possession. The time had come to bring him down and the way to crush The Velvet Rose and the entire operation as well as get back Gerald was actually to fool Mishka into revealing himself. He would send anyone to get art anywhere, but for this painting he would come himself.
All that Rosseau had to do was to stage an auction. A rich man was selling his art. That was the story. The mansion along with all the things would be sold to the highest bidder.
Rosseau explained that he had a whole cellar full of old art and an extra mansion a few miles from here that could be used as a mock auction site. It was all planned. The people to play the buyers and the sellers were ready. The contacts with the C.I.A., the Interpol and the local police were taken. Jefferson was contacted. The premiere date for An Orchid Washed Ashore was not set, so there was no stopping them from staging the auction.

Meanwhile, Gerald was travelling the globe sometimes tied up and sometimes in a limousine. Mishka was always by his side in order to retrieve the lost art.
Gerald and Mishka were in Sydney of all places when one of his operatives told him that a posh art magazine had announced a complete last auction of a mansion in the Provence. Among the things being sold was a famous diamond studded reproduction of Alexander Roslin’s The Lady with the Veil.
Mishka left Sydney so fast that Gerald almost was left behind.

Back in the Provence, Olinka and William were turning into an enthusiastically copulating, conversing, gourmand love couple. They enjoyed the good life at the mansion to such a degree that the servants really had more work with them than with the master Rosseau. The cold October weather didn’t really invite to long picnics, so they spent most of their time together inside the mansion. They gained weight, although their extra flesh was sweated out during their amorous extravaganzas of their physical activity. Long breakfasts, late suppers, lengthy stays in Rosseau’s extensive library leafing through art and theatre books, cinematographically tremendous experiences in the mansion’s digital cinema, painting pictures in the basement art studio and making love in front of the fireplace on a bear fur. These were the scenes from a life of bliss at Chateau Rosseau.

The whole thing was heavenly and like a scene from a Bond movie. William found himself so much in lust and in love with this Russian bimbo that he woke up with an erection and went to sleep with one and in between found himself deep into philosophical discussion. It seemed to him he was at a ski resort for philosophers.
Then the day came when the auction was to take place. Mishka, who officially was a respected St. Petersburg gallery owner, had already announced that he was coming to the auction. The C.I.A. and the Interpol had been notified and were positioning out operatives along the sidelines of the house.

Now, the Chief of Police Reinforcement at the Central Park Precinct in New York had been notified what was going on. His close cooperation with the secret agents had led him to visit the auction himself and knew that Gerald had a real chance of being saved now.
What the agents wanted was to have real proof of Mishka’s purchase of the painting. That would maybe lead them to a vault of some kind and maybe even receive proof that these painting actually went to other buyers in exchange for drugs.

These diamond studded reproductions were a real gamble for the international drug cartels. Their South American bosses bought these reproductions and gave away kilos of drugs for them. That meant that Mishka could make tons of money when he bought a painting. The drugs he got for them was something he could double at the black markets. If the secret service could prove his participation in international crime, they could bring down an entire operation.
William, Olinka and Rosseau would of course be protected. As of yet, The Velvet Rose knew nothing of their cooperation.
William had grown a beard and changed his hair colour. He wore fake glasses and came with a cane and cowboy hat to the auction. Olinka posed as his wife Olina Mayakowskaya – Hunt. William was the eccentric oil millionaire Roy James Hunt.

Sixty percent of the guests were posing as buyers. The rest really were interested in the art and there were plenty of things that could be considered valuable. Mishka did come and he stuck around until the very end of the auction. The agents that were there analyzed the team that Mishka had brought and looked into their computer archives to find the operatives. They did find four of the seven. All four men were suspects of criminal activity, one of them had a criminal record and the rest were not proven guilty.
Where Gerald was no one knew. Mishka was suspected of having Gerald with all along just to track down all the lost art that Gerald had sold, but no one knew. The Interpol had all the cars traced and checked, but Gerald was obviously not there. Maybe he had been left in Australia, maybe in Russia or Switzerland.

Mishka did buy the reproduction of Alexander Roslin’s The Lady with the Veil. William was able to push up the price to an amazing two million francs. Mishka finally bought it for slightly more. Now the agents had to work in tracing the art.
Important was not to disturb them until they traded the art for cocaine. The cars drove all the way to Nice unseen, when one of Mishka’s assistants met with a someone in an alleyway and gave him money. The C.I.A. filmed the unknown man coming out with Gerald and handing him over to Mishka’s man. Together they drove off to the next airport and flew over to Bogota by way of three flights.

It was a long flight and Olinka was very tired. She had the flu and William spent most of the time taking care of her. Rosseau sat with Jefferson and some secret service agent in the back trying to decipher what was going to happen next.
The entire entourage had actually managed to follow the mafia all the way to the exchange of the painting for drugs, when Mishka himself saw the flashing of a camera lens behind foliage.
A battle began between the Interpol, the C.I.A., the drug cartel and the Russians that killed twenty people. Olinka, Gerald, Jefferson, William and Rosseau escaped into the Columbian jungle aided by guerrillas that were assisting the agents.

In the middle of the jungle they discovered that Mishka’s men were following them. The only thing that was their link to success were the films that the C.I.A. had filmed and already had sent via internet to the office in Washington.
Unfortunately, the mafia caught up with them and seized Olinka and promised to kill her if the films were not returned.
A helicopter came overhead and dropped agents down into the jungle that killed Mishka and left Olinka bruised and ready for the hospital. Mishka was gone, but his assistants had escaped and so it wasn’t clear if the operation would continue.

To protect William and Gerald, the entire kidnapping incident was treated with utmost secrecy. There was some small interest by a few people to make it public, but the agents knew that if they did William and Gerald would be gone again.
Olinka was back in the Provence and missed William, but knew that her life was in France. She also felt safer with Henri Rosseau.
Marilyn was now rehearsing the finished score for the role of Jennifer and a young black tenor named James Charlton Douglas was hired. Under Cameron’s supervision the Minskoff theatre was booked for April 4th the following year and auditions were being held. The young soprano Kristin Chenoweth was hired to sing Jennifer’s rival Eleonore and her coloratura singing would match Marilyn’s belting.

Something amazing happened that spring. Tim Schneider started getting bored with Gerald and Gerald with Tim. Some Hollywood agent had seen him perform and actually thought there was potential there. Tim was assigned to dance in An Orchid Washed Ashore and was already training for it. However, it was obvious that Gerald had changed. He had been captured by an international terrorist and dragged across the world. He carried a secret with him that made him much more reserved than before.
William and Gerald had really become a great deal closer since finding each other again somewhere in the Colombian wilderness. Tim had been very happy to have Gerald again, but it became obvious that Gerald wasn’t the same man as before and neither was William.

What brought them together was that no one else knew what they had gone through. The C.I.A. had told everyone involved to keep absolutely quiet about it. No words to the press. They could not talk about The Velvet Rose or the art mafia or the South American drug conspiracy or someone would find out and lock them up.
Gerald told Tim about it, but the gap was widening and the quarrels were worse and more in number.
An Orchid Washed Ashore opened that spring to full houses and the press were over excited. They called the musical. "The Showboat of the 21st Century" and "The old musical reborn". It made Todd and Brown world famous over night. Not only on Broadway were their tunes sung, but also in Stockholm and Johannesburg.

The Tony Awards were coming up and the duo were nominated in four of the categories. Tim was spending more and more time in Hollywood, working on film choreographies. He had evidently met someone there and was not really keen on coming back. His understudy did most of the shows, so when he did come back to do a show the theatre was not really interested in keeping him for another season.
That was okay by him.
In September of that year he broke up with Gerald and moved to Hollywood to another mansion, that of gay single film star Josh Sanders on Venice Beach.

It really didn’t take long for William to change. He had been so disappointed by women. Olinka had his mail address and his phone number. No mails. Nothing.
Gerald had a anniversary bash in his penthouse that October 18th. His lawyer George Markstein was there, Police Chief Thomas Jefferson joined in, Marilyn Jones had brought her new boyfriend and co-star James Charlton Douglas along, Todd and Brown’s agent Marvin Klein came with his dog, Cameron MacIntosh came alone, Michael J. Fox brought his entire family and Shirley MacLaine happened to be in town so she brought her brother Warren.

Gerald had cooked tomato soup and very spicy Beef Stroganoff with Gratin de Pommes. French wine and Irish whiskey was poured into dozens of glasses and the CD-ended up being very hot at the end of the day. When Mike Fox went home to join his wife and kids, who had left earlier, everyone talked about how well his dopamine was working and that he hadn’t had a Parkinson’s attack all night. Warren announced he was flying to Paris in the morning and Shirley was having brunch with an editor at ten.
William and Gerald were talking by themselves after Markstein and Jefferson left together. Marilyn and James were still in the corner kissing. Soon they left, throwing the men a soft good bye before hitting the hay.

So, there they were. The former womanizer and the former choleric perfectionist. William thought about Marilyn and how it really hadn’t mattered a bit that he’d seen her kiss James. In fact, there was not even that familiar sting in his crotch.
Was William Todd turning...
Gerald turned to William and said in his upper-class, British voice: "You mind Marilyn fondling Jim?"
William shook his head. "No, I don’t. I’m surprised to say that, but I don’t."
Gerald sighed. "Bill, I haven’t told you this, but I am eternally grateful for what you have done for me. I would probably not be here if it weren’t for you."

William laughed softly. "No problem."
Gerald giggled. "You must’ve suffered."
"You were the one stolen away to join the demons of hell," William added. "Not me."
There was a long silence between them. They looked at one another for a long time and knew that they were feeling the same thing. William had known this man for twenty years, ever since he gave him the first chance to write lyrics for his Off-Broadway songs and hold lectures at the University about writing books. Gerald had never believed it, but he was in love with someone he had despised during times in his life.

Their lips met to the sounds of Glenn Miller’s Moonlight Serenade. The CD had been playing over and over for the last hour or so. Automatically, the couple started dancing in the kitchen to the soft sounds of an ancient big band. Without opening his eyes and maybe not daring to, for fear of facing himself, William said:
"You know hat, Gerald. I don’t where my lucky pen is and I don’t care at all."
Gerald laughed and kissed William again.

The fuzz was driving back and forth on Park Avenue that evening, searching some thief, their loud sirens flashing. At King Cole’s Bar some poor drunk was leaning against the posh table drinking gorgeous Irish whiskey and crying.
In Greenwich Village, Vladimir Fomenko was talking to professional killer Sergei Karpoff on the phone and inviting him to an art exhibition next month. Marilyn was making love to Jim. In the Provence, France Olinka was embracing Rosseau. On Times Square a homeless man named Robert met his old girlfriend again for the first time in six years, who turned his life around and giving him a home. At a restaurant near Central Park two laboratory assistants, a new couple named Jack and Carrie, were discussing cloning and kissing their way through a bottle of wine.

There were auditions and singing and laughter and tears and love and sex and marriage and children and theatre.
In a very expensive penthouse on Park Avenue there was another oasis as well. There was music and wine and romance. A new couple, that had known each other for twenty years, danced to a soft melody and the guy that had thought he was straight didn’t care what the press would be saying.
He was in love and that was all that mattered. After all, Liz Smith needed something to write about in her column.