Stan Mason - Entanglement

Title Page

ENTANGLEMENT

by

Stan Mason

Publisher Information

Published in 2014 by

Andrews UK Limited

www.andrewsuk.com

The right of Stan Mason to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998

Copyright 2014 Stan Mason

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. Any person who does so may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Chapter One

The nightmare used to come at least once every month... stark, agonising, terrifying! In the deepness of sleep, I screamed out some kind of mumbo-jumbo which stopped sharply at the moment of terror. I opened my eyes to awaken in pitch-black darkness saturated with perspiration. My body felt like a wet rag... as thought every ounce of energy inside me had been sapped. Worse still, my brain felt tormented and abused which affected my morale and enthusiasm and all the decisions I made. Murder, mystery and intrigue lay at the root of the world; ordinary people like myself were mere pawns in the game to be moved around at will. Now, once again, I was sitting up in bed bathed in sweat. The nightmare had returned! Closing my eyes tiredly, I let my mind drift all the way back to the beginning.

***

I had driven out of Hollywood on a fine morning, taking off in the direction of Nevada. On this particular day I felt that I could touch the sky, seduce nature, and reflect the colours of the rainbow. I had awakened to the real world of sense and sensitivity but my ego drove my mind to greater heights. After clearing Los Angeles, the car sped swiftly through miles of parched desert until I spied a large rock in the distance and made towards it. I stopped the car beside it and rested there in the heat of the sun thrashing out reason and fancy. Reason told me to forget the whim and go back to work; fancy suggested that if I didnt leave now I would never go at all. As a film writer, I was responsible for hundreds of characters in film scripts over the years. With my skill, they carried out daring deeds, adventurous exploits, devious plots, fugitive escapes, political activities, community-inspired pursuits, and popular romantic interludes. On this occasion, however, it was a decision affecting my personal life in the real world. To someone who thrived on nostalgia, and acted on impulse, it was unacceptable to stifle along-life desire. I was a free spirit. I had to be free to go where I wanted. But there was always a barrier... a hurdle... in the way. This time it was twofold. Firstly, there was Ellie... beautiful Ellie! Twenty-three years my junior and nearly eight months pregnant.

What do you mean youre going to England? she demanded. Im almost eight months pregnant. How can you even think of it? Is that all I mean to you? Someone to share your bed! Someone to have your child while youre out of the country!

Its just for a few days. Ellie, I explained weakly. Just a few days. I was raised there during World War Two. You know that.

But Im almost eight months pregnant! It could happen at any time!

Youre over-reacting, honey, I told her. If I dont go now, I never will. I mean, once the kids born...

Kid! she riposted sharply. Kid! Her hackles rose.

In that moment I realised that all reasonable discussion had ended. When Ellie got mad, all logic flew out of the window.

Im not buying it! she shouted. Youll get hung up over there for weeks... maybe months! You may not even come back!

The golden rule was never to argue with Ellie when she was in such a mood, so I walked out of the house to avoid further conflict. Maybe she was right. She was having a baby. I ought to stay... at least until after the baby was born. However everyone has their own needs and mine was to go back to my roots while I still had the chance.

The second factor in the way was the contract I had signed with Cross-Atlantic Films to write a provocative film script. Harry Badella was the most miserable, heartless, meanest film director in the business. He leaned heavily on everyone. It was in his nature to place everyone under severe pressure to get the best out of them If I told him I was going to England on a vacation, he would go crazy.

Mike, he had told me as I put my signature to the contract, He always called me Mike even though it wasnt my name. This movies gonna be one of the greats like Casablanca. You wait an see! He said the same about all his movies but success always eluded him.

Sure... sure! I responded casually, humouring the man.

So get me that script by yesterday. You got it! I knew his next words by heart I wanna low-budget, low-cost feature, worked in tight short-time schedules. And, I repeat, get me the script by yesterday.

That was always the problem, I had become a robot script writer for second-rate films. There was no time for excitement or fun any more. After so many years had passed by without notice, I had to get to Cornwall before I was too old to care.

Unlike anyone else in Hollywood at the time, I had experienced war in its raw state. I was five years old when German bombers invaded by night and I still recalled the moment when the bombs fell all around me in London. My mother had carried me to a public shelter that night and when we returned the whole street had been flattened by the Luftwaffe. Fires blazed everywhere. Some people were dead; others were screaming for help trapped under tons of bricks, mortar and other rubble. It was no place for a child. The authorities realised this and sent all the children to remote parts of England for the duration of the war. I ended up in the far south-west... in Cornwall... and I vowed to return some day to visit my foster parents and their son Patrick.

Cornwall was beautiful! I reflected the rugged coasts, the wonderful beaches, and the huge rocks with rising precipices which towered like great grey giants as well as the relentless rushing waves ebbing and flowing constantly with the tide along an enormous range of coast. There were the quaint winding lanes and extensive lush green pastures and the honest farming and mining folk with simple ambitions and no pretensions who devoted their lives to an elementary way of life in the towns and villages. It was far removed from the plastic world of charades in the film-making business of Tinseltown in California.

I remained on the rock until the sun reached its zenith. The glow hung across the sky for a long time and I perspired in the heat with a strange feeling in my heart. What had happened to those people who had taken such great care of me during the war? They had been so generous to have accommodated someone elses child., accepting me warmly into their home in a period of national crisis. Deep inside, I felt ashamed. It had taken me forty-five years to spur myself into action. Nostalgia had surfaced on many occasions, but something had always prevented me from making the journey. In my minds eye, I could see the tiny old cottage at Ponjeravah built of solid granite blocks, capped by a well-worn slate roof. A Cornish wall surrounded the property on three sides; the fourth was bounded by a fresh water stream well-stocked with fish. Life was extremely basis. There was no mains water or electricity. An old water pump, halfway down the lane, served the cluster of four houses and an infants school. At night, the only light available was from a paraffin lamp which filled the tiny parlour with a strange pungent smell. Appliances were non-existent with the exception of an old radio, served by two accumulator batteries filled with acid which had to be taken to the local hardware shop each week to be recharged. My foster father, Tom Laity, grew his own vegetables, kept his own chickens, caught rabbits in the fields with ferrets, and fished the stream for trout and eels. The family was pretty much self-sufficient. Ration books were used sparingly. We never used coupons for clothing or furniture. As poor farming folk it was necessary to make do and mend. Best of all times was the summer. In those days, the weather could be trusted... glorious June, warm July, hot August and an Indian Summer in late September... I revelled in it!