James thinks (and Winnie thinks too) that someday, something bad is going to happen to Tanner. It has to. He’ll get arrested or (Winnie hopes) he’ll fall in love and the woman won’t fall in love back, or (James hopes) he’ll do three bad movies in a row and his career will be over. But it never does happen. Instead, Tanner keeps getting richer and more successful. He makes bad blockbuster movies, and the critics are beginning to take him seriously. He dates female movie stars and has affairs on the side. He plays golf and skis. He smokes cigars (and does drugs whenever he wants). He supports the Democratic Party. He makes at least twenty million dollars a year (and maybe more). For doing (James thinks) nothing.
James would like to hate Tanner, but he can’t. He would, however, hate him if he were not his friend. He would probably agree with Winnie—that Tanner is the product of a misguided, badly educated, shallow society that elevates people solely on the basis of their looks, and if the public really knew what Tanner Hart was like, they wouldn’t shell out seven or eight or nine dollars to see him in a movie.
On the other hand, they probably would.
And if they didn’t, they would probably want Tanner to do something worse. Much worse. Like lead an army and rape and pillage.
This is, James thinks, the thing that Winnie doesn’t understand about men. And never will understand. It is, James thinks happily, the thing that will prevent Winnie from ever really becoming a threat to his masculinity. It is what allows him to stay home and visit porn sites on the Internet or play chess against his computer, or even hang around with his boy, playing violent computer games (James does feel a little guilty about this, but he tells himself he’s preparing his boy for the real world, and besides, the boy is so good at them, quick and clever) while Winnie goes to work in a high-rise office building. (She thinks she’s a man, but she’s not, James thinks, even if she does wear suits, and, when he met her, shirts with straps that tied around the neck like a bow tie.)
This is the thing that James knows and Winnie doesn’t: Men can’t be tamed.
Men are by nature violent.
Men always want to have sex with lots of different females.
James has always known this (don’t all men know this, and haven’t they been telling women for the past thirty years, but the women haven’t been listening?). But now, he thinks, he knows it in a different way.
James has been reading up on chimpanzees.
He’s been studying everything he can about chimps.
Chimps are violent. They sneak off in the middle of the night and raid other chimp tribes. The big chimps (the alpha males) pick out a small chimp (a beta male) and kill him mercilessly while the small chimp screams in pain and terror. Then the alpha chimps steal a few female chimps and have sex with them.
At first, James began looking into this chimp business (as he’s begun to think of it) to get even with Winnie. (He can’t remember what he was planning to get even with her for.) But then he got into it. Lately, he’s been looking up scientific articles on the Internet. E-mailing researchers. He isn’t sure how all this information adds up, but he knows there’s a piece in there somewhere. An important piece.
James has a theory: Tanner is an alpha male.
This is why Tanner can get away with whatever he wants, and James can applaud him. (Hell, James can be bad with him and get away with it.)
“Winnie,” James says, when she gets home from work and has taken off her shoes (she always takes off her shoes as soon as she gets home. She says they hurt, even though her shoes tend to be sensible one-inch loafers). “I think I’ve got an idea for a new piece.”
“Hold on,” Winnie says.
“Winnie,” James says. He follows her. She has gone into their son’s tiny bedroom, where he is trying to read a book about dinosaurs to the Jamaican nanny.
“Pur . . . pur. . .” the boy says.
“Purple,” Winnie says. (Impatiently, James thinks. Winnie has no patience for their son, has no patience for children in general.)
“You should let him figure it out for himself,” James says. Knowing by the expression on Winnie’s face that he has said the wrong thing. Again.
“James,” Winnie says. “If I waited for everyone around me to figure it out on their own, I’d be waiting for the rest of my life.”
“I suppose you’re talking about me,” James says.
“I don’t know what I’m talking about anymore,” Winnie says. Lying. She just wants to avoid a fight.
James follows Winnie into the kitchen. Winnie takes off her earrings and puts them on the kitchen counter. She opens the refrigerator door and takes out three carrot sticks.
“I think I’m going to do a piece on chimpanzees,” James says.
Winnie says nothing. She raises her eyebrows and bites a carrot stick in half.
“There are all these new theories,” James says. “Theories than can apply to humans. For instance, Tanner is an alpha male.”
“Did you talk to Tanner?” Winnie says.
“No,” James says. “But I’m going to talk to him. About this theory. I could even write about him. Use him as an example.”