And this, he thought sourly, would be the result of a certain quality of decency over thirteen years ago. If Wegler had anything to do with it at that time, he could imagine the pressure on Jenny to fly to Sweden or Japan and have the pregnancy terminated. Jenny Bowman, he decided, had never been in the habit of making small mistakes. Her errors were as vast as her talents.
He struck west from Regent Street, got lost once, and then came out on Argyll Street not far from the Palladium. It was just dusk and the marquee lights had not been turned on, but he could read her name. Jenny Bowman. A recognition, as valid in Cairo as in Buenos Aires. It was a name that picked up a little corner of everyone’s mind and riffled that stack of memories. And for everyone they were good memories. Maybe that was the key to her. Dozens of journeyman movies and a few, a very few great ones, but who has ever had many of those? And those songs she had made her own, had stamped so permanently and indelibly with her personality and the cadence and tone and heart of her that any other singer attacking them sounded at once imitative, shallow and apologetic.
Jason Brown stepped out of the cool wind on Argyll Street to relight his pipe and heard the faint music from inside, a big band coming down solid and hard on “When You’re Smiling.” The music broke off and, after a hesitation, took it again from the top. He grinned and thought of George Kogan in there, man of all talents, working hard with the leader, doing the final smoothing of the beat and tempo, while in some hotel suite Jenny would be stretched out, a little more pallid than usual, staring a hole through the ceiling as she ran all the lyrics through her mind and fretted, as she always did, about her voice.
He turned away. After two blocks he remembered the name of an East Indian place where he and Joyce had eaten a curry so savage the tears had run down their cheeks. He hailed a cab. The driver knew the place and said it was still open. As soon as he walked in, Jason Brown knew it was a mistake. The memories were too strong, the years too mercilessly swift. But he stayed and ate, as though it were a penance. This memory—all memories of Joyce were linked to Jenny Bowman. One love conditions you for the next. Somehow, with Jenny, he had become hooked on that feeling of simulated strength, the needed man syndrome. And, in rebound from Jenny when she was whole again, he had almost consciously sought a woman who would need him. Joyce had been lovely, sensitive, intelligent, ardent, adoring, amusing. And she had been a drunk. What greater need? And in the first genuine binge after Bonny was born, she had failed to make that curve south of San Clemente. God only knew where she was headed. The police following her said nobody could have made it at a hundred miles an hour. But almost five years ago they had been at that corner table, and she was three months pregnant, six months sober, and she had been fruitful, luminous, loving, the shade of her dress turning her eyes to pure lavender.
He walked again and it was almost eleven when he reached the Palladium. The big cars were waiting, the chauffeurs in small groups, smoking and talking. There were flocks of taxis and London policemen waiting to take care of the mass exodus. When he was fifty feet away, he heard that sudden explosion of sound which meant she had finished a number. It was a rushing, roaring sound and it seemed to have, as always, a depth of tone and a resonance other entertainers seldom called forth. The great animal called Audience bayed with all its thousands of throats and made the back of his neck and the backs of his hands tingle. He found the stage door. He rattled the latch and the commissionaire opened it a half foot and looked out at him dubious and questioning, a stately old gentleman of vast dignity.
“Miss Bowman’s party,” he said and handed the man his card.
“Please wait one moment, sir.” The door closed, and two minutes later it swung open. “Down this corridor, sir. Then to your right. Watch the steps. Mr. Kogan is there in the wings.”
“How many encores?”
“This, I believe, would be the seventh, sir. They completely refuse to let her leave stage.”
“They never do,” he said, and he walked toward the sound of that marvelously flexible and powerful voice. He knew there would be an eighth encore, because this time she was turning the pressure down with a ballad, “Almost Like Being in Love,” done in a throaty yet limpid and effortless style.
There were three people in the wings, in silhouette against the bright spot that shone on the dark hair and the glittering gown of Jenny Bowman as she sang to the people, turning their hearts over. He knew the silhouettes of George Kogan and Ida Mulligan, her dresser and companion. When he came up behind them he saw that the third one was a sandy-haired young man he did not know.
When he touched George on the shoulder, George swiveled around, looked blankly at him, gave him a crushing handshake and said in a tense husky whisper, “She’s great! My God, she’s great!” He turned back. Ida stepped to him, hugged him hard, kissed his cheek.
“George will remember to say hello a little later,” she whispered. “For me, hello Jase. We’re really glad to see you.”
At the last skilled note the great roar came again. George Kogan jumped up and down and banged Jason on the shoulder with his fist. “London restraint!” he yelled. “British reserve! Listen to ’em! Just listen to ’em!”
Jenny swooped up an armful of bouquets, bowed and bowed, her smile brilliant, and the curtain came down and she came swiftly toward them in that remembered walk. It was a dancer’s walk, with a dancer’s grace, but it had a small flavor of gamin about it, as though at any moment she could walk a fence, play stickball, imitate a punchy fighter. She came toward them with the tension of rapport in her face, that listening look. She could not belong to them in any sense until it was ended, and she stopped belonging to the audience. Jason moved back into the shadows. The heavy curtain smothered some of the sound but it kept coming in great waves. She thrust the bouquets into the arms of the sandy young man and said, “Open a store, Gabe.”
The young man revealed his calling by dumping the flowers into Ida’s arms, and touching Jenny’s hair very swiftly and deftly, tucking stray strands into place.
“A blast!” George said. “You better talk them down, or we can have breakfast sent in.”
“Shall try,” she said and went back out, more slowly, and positioned herself at the microphone, waited a few moments, then nodded toward the far wings. As the curtain went up the sound of the audience strengthened, smashing against the stage in the way that made Jason Brown think of heavy surf. She held her hands up, palms out, and slowly she silenced them. Jason marveled at how small she seemed out there, how small and yet how indomitable.
In a totally conversational tone of voice she said, “You are wonderful people, and I love you every one, and I would love to stand here and sing to you all night long.” The applause and shouts started but she silenced them again. “But my manager is standing back there with his whip and the leg irons, and he says this is absolutely the last one. This a warm and wonderful welcome to London. I’ll never forget you.” She aimed a finger at the band leader, like pointing a pistol. “Now here we go!” The band hit the intro to her arrangement of “Chicago.” She moved, keying herself to the beat and the brass, and went into it, taking the tempo and seeming to lift it, giving herself with all the little turns and struttings of her effort, yet making it all seem without effort, making it seem a total enjoyment. Jason Brown felt it take him as completely as it was taking the big audience, shallowing his breath, running his blood faster. It was the essence of professionalism, but it was also something more, something you could never quite put your finger on. It was the same thing, perhaps, which made her sing to friends with all the skill and care and effort she would give to a great audience. It was her communication, her projection of her spirit and her love.
(Once, after the pool lights were off at the Americana, and it was a rare moonlight, they had swum then sat close on the low board, and she had sung “Stormy Weather” for him, muting all the power of that voice down to a small and wondrous clarity of tone, audible only to him, her pale strong throat throbbin
g in the silver fall of tropic moonlight, making of that song a love offering so sweet the tears in his eyes had blurred the image of her.)
Again came the great crashing sound of applause. She gathered up more of the flowers. She bowed and smiled and bowed. George Kogan signaled the stage man and the curtain came down, and George walked out to her. He grabbed her and hugged her, full of excitement. “Great! Great! Great! Great!” he said. “You’re great!”
She stood there, barely aware of him, head tilted, wearing her listening look. Jason Brown heard the applause finally begin to diminish, and he saw her give a small nod. Now she could let the long and exhausting contact with them fade, and she could come back to herself, to the private Jenny Bowman. The hairdresser was picking up more flowers. Jenny handed the ones she held to George, and he said, “Listen to them, they’re going out of their skins!”
She started toward the corner of the stage and Jason Brown moved to block her way. She stared at him absently almost irritably and her face changed. “Brownie!” she said, all a sudden gladness. She squeezed him and kissed him and shook her head marvelingly. “I see you and know how much I’ve missed you.”
“You were really something tonight, Jenny dear.”
“Wasn’t I just?” she said with a mockery unlike her, tiredness in her face and an obscure look of anger. “Come along,” she said, and moved by him, ignoring the robe Ida held out for her. The four of them followed her back through the vast and shadowy dinginess of the backstage areas, all the big flats and dust, the dangling webs of heavy cables and ropes. Someone on one of the overhead catwalks, stagehand or electrician, called down, “Great show, Jenny!”
She glanced up and acknowledged with a wave.
“Twenty songs and eight encores,” George said. “Admit it, darling. There’s nothing wrong with that voice.”
She did not answer him. As some of the backstage people moved toward her, George quickened his stride and deftly waved them off, saying to Jenny, “Darling, with all honesty and sincerity, you were magnificent.”
They reached the dressing room corridor where Jason had been before, and as Jenny and Ida and the hairdresser continued on to the dressing room, George stopped and turned to the commissionaire and beckoned and said, “Hey, you—Chief!” Jason stood by, waiting for a chance to speak to George.
“Yes sir?”
“No one gets by here. Understand? No one.”
“No one. Yes sir.”
The people were already gathering, moving down the corridor and the commissionaire hastened to block their way. Jason saw two photographers in the group, one of them saying, “Let me through. Let me through. Press. One side, please.”
George Kogan said with a smiling, easy affability, “I’m sorry, boys. You’ll have to settle for what you’ve got.”
“But you promised one in the dressing room.”
“I’m sorry.”
Jason saw the orchestra leader push through the group and George moved to meet him and intercept him, saying, “Larry, Jenny asked me to …”
“Wasn’t she great!” the orchestra leader said.
“Superb. Listen, she asked me to tell you she’s a little tired now …” He turned to the insistent photographers and said with a trace of irritation, “Boys, I told you I’m sorry.”
A woman with a large bouquet was trying to edge past the commissionaire. She said, “Mr. Kogan! This man apparently doesn’t realize. I’m Mrs. Glynne. You remember me. I’m chairman of the committee.”
George stepped to her and gently took the flowers. “May I?”
“But I wanted to thank her. In the name of the Children’s Fund. Really, more than ten thousand pounds …”
“Just thirty seconds of her time,” the orchestra leader said, and then George, Mrs. Glynne, the photographers and the orchestra leader were all talking at the same time, as the commissionaire kept all the others back, saying “Sorry, madam. Sorry, sir.”
Jason Brown leaned against the corridor wall near the dressing room and watched George Kogan handle the confusion expertly, placating them, thanking them in the name of Jenny Bowman, telling them she had given so much of herself to that splendid audience she was exhausted. In a little while the confusion dwindled as Larry, Mrs. Glynne and the photographers gave up and turned away. When it was apparent the commissionaire could handle it, George came slowly toward Jason Brown. He looked wearied and thoughtful, and he shook hands again and said, “Nice to see you, Jase.” Kogan was a man of great enthusiasms and a high order of organizational skill, but at this moment he looked subdued. “What are you doing over here?”
“I came over to see Jenny.”
George was immediately alert. “Now that seems interesting. And what would you come over here to see her about, Jase?”
“Check over the script with her, when she has a chance.”
Kogan pursued his lips. “Well, now! I’m reputed to be her manager, and little things like this come through me, don’t they? Doesn’t the studio like to set up these little things properly? Wouldn’t it have been common courtesy to let us know? And isn’t this a little bit out of your normal line of work?”
Jason shrugged. “I’m on the script, George. Just say it was sort of spur of the moment. You know. Run over and check a couple of things out with Jenny.”
George nodded. “Spur of the moment. I like that. Sid Wegler never did anything on impulse in his whole life, pal.”
Jason sighed. “Okay, okay. I’ve never been any damned good at conspiracy. Wegler added two and two, and he got a little nervous. Believe me, George, I didn’t want to come over, but I got mousetrapped. Maybe Wegler thinks I can be a steadying influence or something. Let me ask you this way, George. Is there any cause for alarm?”
“You have to answer a question first, Brown. Whose side are you on?”
Jason thought it over. “You get a compound answer. I will go through the motions for Wegler. But basically I’m on Jenny’s side. You should know that.”
“I make a career out of suspicion. You’re right. I should know that. Yes, Jase, we have some cause for alarm. She’s been moody, blue, defiant, unpredictable. I had to book us into London or she would have blown the whole tour. She said it and meant it.”
“What is she after?”
“I don’t think she knows.”
“Has she made contact?”
“She’s been trying ever since the moment we got here. I’ve tried to tell her it is potentially a very damaging situation, but she’s at the state where she doesn’t seem to give a damn. If you can make her realize that, I’m going to be grateful to Sid Wegler for the first time in my life.” He hesitated. “You know how shrewd she is. She senses things. I better tell her I knew somebody was coming and forgot to tell her. It will set better. Come on, let’s go on in.”
“Should I wait and see her later?”
“She’ll want to see you now.” He reached to rap on the dressing room door and turned, frowning. “I wasn’t with her then. My tour of duty is ten years so far. But Ida was. Anyway, I never heard any mention of Wegler. And damned few people know.”
“He was in on it, from the studio end. He helped hush it up.
George nodded. “I can understand more why she hates the guy. He wouldn’t have the slightest idea of what it meant to her.”
“And he probably exerted the deciding pressure that made her give up the child. She hinted as much to me.”
“Sometimes,” George said, “it’s a very cruddy profession.” He gave a single rap on the door and opened it and went in, Jason following him. It was a sizable dressing room. Jenny sat at the dressing table, wearing a robe. The hairdresser was pouring Jenny a drink.
Jenny turned and said, “Brownie, you look great. And it’s been too long. George, what am I stuck with?”
George tossed Mrs. Glynne’s bouquet into a chair and said, “Absolutely nothing. You don’t have to see anyone.”
“You are a dear man,” she said.
George roamed o
ver and parted the curtains and looked out the window, back toward the stage door. “It’s started to rain hard,” he said wonderingly, “and there must be five hundred of them milling around out there. London loves you, sweetie.”
“Oh sure,” she said. She sipped her drink, made a grimace of pain and rubbed the side of her face and throat. The hairdresser moved in behind her and began combing and fixing her hair.
“Why don’t you lie down?” Ida Mulligan said. “You’ll get in a state.”
“I’m in a state. Make the call again.”
Ida shrugged and picked up the phone, placed the call. George poured a drink for himself and one for Jason and took Jason’s over to him. Jason could sense the tension in the room.
“Doctor Donne, please,” Ida said into the phone. Jenny turned her head sharply and stared at Ida, her expression tense and expectant. After a pause, Ida shook her head at Jenny and she relaxed. “Then when do you expect him?… Yes, it’s Miss Bowman again.” Jenny got up quickly and began to pace. The hairdresser stood waiting patiently for her by the bench, comb in hand. “Well, can he be reached?… Yes, it is an emergency. Thank you. I’ll wait. What’s that? Well, when you do, have him call Miss Bowman. Thank you.” She hung up. “He’ll call,” she said.
“Where is he?” Jenny demanded.
“In the country.”
“Call the country!”
“They’re calling the country.”
George said, “Larry was wondering about …”
Jenny whirled on him and said, “I tell you I’m losing my voice!”
“So we notice,” Ida said quietly.
“And I want a doctor!”
I Could Go on Singing Page 3
