I Could Go on Singing

by John D. MacDonald

  “No jury will ever convict,” Ida said firmly. “I’m buying myself a drink. Any objections anybody?”

  “A fast one for everybody,” Jenny said. “We’ll drink to crime, sin, Rugger scrums, Pinafore and my favorite color.”

  At Amen Court off Cheapside, Lois Marney said, “This stone?”

  “Yes.”

  She touched it. She closed her eyes for a moment. “I made a wish. Is that against the rules?”

  “No. That’s what I did. Sort of a simple-minded ordinary wish. I wished I wouldn’t get killed.”

  She turned and looked speculatively at him. “That isn’t too entirely different from what I wished. But I can’t tell you, of course.”

  They walked slowly along the narrow walk and out of the court. A shabby woman stared at them with a look of bleak suspicion.

  “All stones are very old, of course,” she said.

  “But not many walls are old.”

  “How did you look then?”

  “Thinner A little adenoidal. Sort of hazy, I guess. Unfocused. There was a captain who kept complaining to the sergeant about the way I looked in a uniform. They all gave up, finally. They’d walk away from me, kicking at the ground and muttering.”

  “Were you a good soldier?”

  “Except for the way I looked.”

  “Did you have a girl?”

  “As a matter of fact, I had one right here in London. Jocelyn. And after I’d rejoined the company, she was killed here. Cued up for a movie, her father told me later, and a buzz bomb landed in the street right in front of the theater.”

  “How horrible!”

  “By then it seemed … sort of remote. I told you, I was as yet unfocused. Not that I’m aimed any too damned well now.”

  “Did you love her?”

  “I thought so.”

  “Do you think so now?”

  “I needed her then. And she needed me. We felt very small in the middle of a war, and we tried to act as if we were born to it. But nobody is. That’s sort of how I got to writing, I think. Trying to put down the essence of Jocelyn because there wasn’t anything left of her. Nothing at all except what was in my mind, and that didn’t seem to be enough.”

  “Can I read what you wrote?”

  “I could never make it work.”

  “Will you try again some day?”

  “I never thought I would. But now I think I might.”

  “I want to read it when you do.”

  “You will.”

  “We’ll have to hurry to get you back at four, Jason.”

  In the taxi on the way back to the Mayfair section she seemed pensive and remote. “What are you thinking about?” he asked.

  “Something you said. Twisting it around, sort of. Thinking of people feeling small in the midst of life, and trying to act as if they were born to it. But nobody is. There could be a book about that.”

  “Most of them are about that, Lois.”

  She turned and smiled at him, her mouth wry. “I get the feeling everybody is full of this terrible competence, and I’m the only one not sure of anything. But it’s the same way with everybody. Even that Sam Dean. Even Jenny. But we do hearten each other, don’t we? Like after Sam Dean left, everybody trying to make everybody feel things were going to be all right. And yet everything is so … precarious. There must be records someplace somebody could dig up. Or that doctor or Jenny could be trapped into saying the wrong thing. And then they would all come swooping down on the doctor and the boy and Jenny with their strobe lights and tape recorders, all asking questions at once, sneering and excited, and make the whole thing sickening and dirty. Then all the self-appointed moralists would write letters and make speeches about Jenny Bowman. That’s the thing that would shame her and break her, because she never could explain it to them. Maybe because she can never explain it to herself, really.”

  He studied her. “Then what Jenny did was wrong?”

  Lois scowled at him. “Of course it was wrong! You know it. She knows it. If I had a child, I would never let it go. That doesn’t make me a better person. It makes me more primitive, I guess. You talk about all the pressure they put on her. The career and all. And what was best for the baby. That’s all rationalization. The guilt is still in her, Jason. And that’s what is driving her now. Oh, she was very good with Sam Dean, but maybe without even realizing it, she wants it all to come out. Maybe she’s waited long enough for punishment.”

  “But she would be punishing the boy too.”

  “Has she thought it out that far?”

  “She doesn’t think things out. She rides on instinct, Lois.”

  “And dreams?”

  “Yes. But what particular dream right now?”

  There was a slightly contemptuous twist to Lois’s mouth. “A gooey one, Jason. Famous singer abandons career to marry an old love and reclaim her son, becomes wife of noted surgeon, builds happy nest, becomes ornament in London society. What a mess of delusion!”

  “Couldn’t it work?”

  She looked at him in astonishment. “Really, Jason! Because she might want to act out a part doesn’t mean he would go along with it. And she forfeited his respect a long long time ago. What would the scandal do to his career? How long could she endure the housewife role? Six months? A year, even? And, for goodness sake, what kind of a relationship could she have with a sensitive boy once he found out she had given him away as soon as he was born? He’s young enough, probably, to be hooked on the glamor, of it. It is one of the daydreams of childhood to suddenly learn you’re really the child of some famous person. But he would know she had rejected him, and he never would really be able to understand, no matter how carefully they explained it to him. He could understand superficially, but not in the heart, where it counts.”

  For a moment all the warmth of her, the capacity for indignation, compassion, understanding, was exposed, her face very alive. And then she settled back in the seat and her face became still and she retreated back into herself, as though she had spread some bright fabric before him and, when he had begun to notice it she had become aware of his attention, and had swiftly folded it, tucked it into the back of a drawer and closed it firmly and solidly.

  “We should make it on time,” she said in a small casual voice. She was back behind all her walls, crouched and safe.

  seven

  George told him she was still in a good mood. Jason waited in the sitting room until quarter after four when Ida said it was all right to go in. Ida held the door for him and closed it behind him. The draperies were drawn. Jenny lay on the shadowy bed in a bulky white terry robe, face wiped clean of makeup, dark hair on stacked pillows. She held her hands out toward him and he went over and kissed lips that tasted soft and sweet and very young, and then sat on the edge of the bed, holding her hand.

  “Recharging,” she said. “Building up the batteries.”

  “How is it going?”

  “Some of the newspaper ones are pretty fierce, Brownie. They ask questions you wouldn’t believe. They try to make you mad so you’ll say something they can use to make you look ridiculous. It’s a strain being on guard all the time without looking as if you’re on guard. Golly, it’s good to have you here!”

  “That’s what I want to talk about.”

  “Honestly, Brownie, I can’t really put my mind on that script. You know how I feel about things and you know what I do best. Why don’t you just fake it, darling? I’ll back you up on it. I love the script, really. If you see some places where you can make it fit me a little better, just change them and tell Wegler I insisted.”

  “It can be the best thing you’ve ever done.”

  She yawned, with a small cat-like sound. “That’s what they tell me about everything, dear. This time you might be right. But I don’t even want to think about it. Please.”

  “Wegler is very excited about having you do it. He’s budgeting it big.”

  “Sid is an animal. Like Sam Dean. There’s a pair! One big rocket. S
hoot them to Mars, Pow!”

  “Listen to me, honey. This isn’t easy. Sid got very nervous when he heard you were starting the tour in London. The script thing is just an excuse.”

  Her hand closed strongly on his and her dark eyes became enormous. “Are you telling me he sent you over here to … to protect his lousy interest?”

  “He boxed me, Jenny.”

  She yanked her hand away, squirmed out of the bed and stood looking down at him, her fists on her hips. “Jesus! Am I some kind of a moron? Am I some kind of an emotional incompetent? All my lousy life I get surrounded with a bunch of oily smooth-talking people, patting me on the head, telling me to be a good careful girl so they can make bigger money off me. When did you join the team, Brownie? I thought you were better than that.”

  “Sid knows we get along.”

  “Brother, we used to get along!”

  “So he trapped me into it in such a way if I said no, I could get blacklisted for refusing to work on the script. George knows. He guessed part of it and I told him the rest. And I told him that the only thing I am interested in is what is best for you. Not what’s best for me or Wegler or the industry. What is best for Jenny Bowman He accepts that. I don’t see why you can’t.”

  She glowered down at him and chanted, “Don’t be rash. Don’t be foolish. Remember the stockholders. Remember your marvelous career. How many damn times have I listened to that crap?”

  “Jenny, I want you to …”

  “Let me give you a little road test, loving friend. Let me find out something. You answer one little question. Should I have gone to see the boy?”

  “If you’ll phrase it another way, I’ll answer it.”

  “How?”

  “Could you help going to see the boy? No. You had to. You couldn’t go on any longer without seeing him. And I think David sensed that too. I think he took you out there because he knew that if he didn’t, you’d find the boy on your own. And it was the only way he could hope to have any control of the situation.”

  She was tense for several moments, then slumped and sat beside him on the bed and began to cry quietly. He put his arm around her and held her close.

  “I’m sorry, Brownie,” she whispered.

  “I had to come here for the wrong reasons, but I’m here. I’ll do what I can. If I see you starting to do something that is going to give you pain, I’ll try to stop you.”

  “I can’t stop myself.”

  “I’m on your side. I always was.”

  She turned into his arms, put her arms around his neck and nestled close. “You make me feel safer, Brownie. I had a dream last night. I was making a stupid picture. I had to be a teen-ager, and I had to get into one of those little carts they race down hills, without motors. You know. And I stood around while they got everything ready, and then I got into the cart and they had the cameras going and they pushed me off and I started down the hill. They had extras lining the street, all bright and sunshiny and bands playing and I waved as I went by and they waved back, smiling and laughing and yelling my name. Jenny, Jenny. But then all the brightness began to blur as I went faster and faster and the hill got steeper, and as it went down, I went out of the sunlight. Into gray. There were no brakes. There weren’t any people or cameras or music. Just empty gray sidewalk and the hill getting steeper and steeper and no noise but the terrible noise the steel wheels made on the cement.” She shuddered in his arms.

  “We won’t let it be like that,” he said.

  “But I don’t know what I’m going to do. From one minute to the next, I just don’t know what I’m going to do. He’s a wonderful boy. I cherish him. I’ve missed so much of him. So much. Golly, I’m a mess, Brownie. Like a long time ago with you.”

  He lifted her face. Her cheeks were streaked with tears. He kissed her salty eyes and then kissed her mouth gently. Her lips stirred. He kissed her again and suddenly her arms tightened and she responded with sudden fierce hunger, lifting to him, busying herself into a hungry readiness, ruthlessly direct, breaking her mouth against his. And suddenly she pushed herself away and said, “Whoof!” and got up and walked away. She opened the draperies, went to her mirror and looked at herself and patted her hair.

  She turned and grinned at him. “Now isn’t that all we’d need? Lest old acquaintance be forgot, or something. Nothing like an additional complication.”

  He laughed. “Pavlov’s dogs.”

  “Brownie, you are a dear thing and I still love you and always will.”

  “Me too. But the Memory Lane thing can get overdone.”

  She came to him and patted his cheek and said, “And we would have felt like complete idiots. Darling, you better not come near me when I feel mimsy. You’re an old familiar reflex. Anyhow, Lois would never forgive me.”

  He stared at her. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  “Dear Brownie, you two generate enough quiet tension to light a small village. Just be terribly sweet with her, please. I’m fond of her.”

  He shook his head. “I’ve made such a life work of despoiling shy maidens, I can’t stop being cruel and ruthless at this late date.”

  “Idiot!”

  “She’s a very strange girl.”

  “She is a very sweet girl and a nice girl and a normal girl and a bright girl. She’s just a little wary. Now get out of here. I forgive you for coming here to try to keep me out of trouble. But I’m through being managed. I’ve had it. Go on. I have to change now.”

  He left and went looking for George and found him in Lois’s room, dictating a memo to the theater manager in Rome. When George finished he looked inquiringly at Jason.

  “Forgiven,” Jason said. “But a near thing for a couple of minutes.”

  “Good! Now we can all join hands and pray.”

  “If you need any historical perspective,” Lois said, “Jason will take you where you can touch a lucky stone.”

  “If I need historical perspective,” George said, “I will get quietly stoned. Sign my name to that, dear one, and get it in the mail. I’m off. You two types have yourself a fun evening.”

  And it was a good evening. They had quiet drinks and a good dinner, and he took her walking through the cheap neon turmoil of Soho, the narrow streets and stalls and sleazy clubs, the merged blare of rock and roll. He found to his pleasure that she was a confirmed people-watcher. She walked with her arm in his, and she would give a little squeeze with her hand when they came across the very special types. It was a good evening and an early evening, because they were both quite tired. He said good night to her in the lobby of the hotel, and watched her into the elevator until the door closed on her parting smile.

  Wednesday and Thursday were busy, the tempo of appointments and interviews continuing. When Sam Dean and his companion left on Thursday, George Kogan sighed as though a yoke had been lifted from his neck. George began to give Jason small chores to do.

  On Thursday, Herm Rice and Jorgenson flew back from Paris, and the whole team, including Larry, the orchestra leader, twenty-eight musicians, sound technicians and lighting technicians, stagehands and managers worked at the Palladium to put the finishing touches on the final setup.

  Herm Rice, an agile, excitable gnome of a man explained it to Jason. “What we use is dynamics. Varying intensities of sound. We could go with the normal acoustics, but it cuts down on the effects you can get, right? So we set those mikes up here and three right in the band. Jenny has a walk-around mike. We get the right mix from her and the band and then blow it out of those big clusters of speakers, right? Then she can roam the whole stage and come out anyplace on the runway and it doesn’t spoil the balance. And those hardwood flats under the band, they bounce it right at her to keep her timing on the button. What it is, it’s live and augmented, right? We get the right mix and we get rid of any feedback anyplace she might roam to, and in the back row we can blow them out of the seats without distortion. Of course now it will sound lousy because it’s pushed high on account of there’ll
be twenty-five hundred people soaking it up.”

  Jorgensen made some major changes in the runway lighting, sending Jenny back and forth, having the crew follow her with the spots. The band made the little tweedles, twangs and oomphas of tuning. Jenny wore turquoise slacks, a green sweater, white loafers and dark glasses.

  Jason sat halfway back in an aisle seat beside Lois Marney. Jenny seemed very somber and intent. The way she acted reminded him of something, and when he remembered, he told Lois. He had once seen Arnold Palmer taking his first look at a golf course prior to his first practice round before a tournament. Palmer had roamed around moodily, kneeling to feel and examine the grass of fairway, rough and green, fingering the sand in the traps, throwing pinches of it into the wind, thoughtfully measuring the slopes and distances with a steady eye.

  When they gave her the mike she blew into it and said, “Happy greetings to all you out there in limey land.” Her voice sounded vast and hollow in the empty auditorium. “Larry, did Herm tell you ‘When You’re Smiling’ gives him a good check off? You’re set up on that? Good. Wake up the boys and tap your little foot, sweetie. Don’t give me a strip-tease tempo because it’s sweater weather in here. Anyhow, I don’t do it. I only talk about it. Say, I like the blonde saxophone. He laughs at my jokes. Enough on voice, Herm? Okay, let’s go and I’ll keep moving.”

  The first smashing blast of the music nearly lifted Jason out of his seat. She sang. She moved, turned, roamed, strutted, her voice soaring clear and true over the slamming beat of the big band. When she finished there were conferences and discussions. Then she did “If Love Were All.” And that was it. The next note she would sing on that stage would be to a full house. And to her son, and to a man she had loved.

  Larry and Herm kept the band there, running them through things, checking for rough spots. Lois went back to the hotel. George sent Jason off on some minor errands. They took longer than he expected.

  It was after seven when Jason returned to the Park Lane. He found George in his room, stretched out on the bed, talking on the phone. As soon as he hung up it rang again. Jason stood and looked out the window until the long conversation was over. Then he reported success with the errands. George thanked him.