by Rex Baron
“Hey, Honey... can you come on over here, so that I can have a closer look at what ya got on,” a buyer from Oklahoma shouted out to her from across the room.
Helen tried to ignore the fat, sweaty man who persisted in wearing his straw boater hat inside the salon showroom, and gracefully made her way to the other end of the elevated runway, extending her arms out at her sides, in order to show off the luxurious drape of the sleeves of the dressing gown she modeled. The fat man called out for her again, but she continued to ignore him, and glided along the walkway, making lovely fanned hand gestures in time to the music of a stringed quintet playing on a hidden gramophone.
Fortunately, the man contented himself with the attentions of another girl who had caught his eye. He called the girl down from the runway and sampled the feel of the nearly transparent, silken fabric of her négligée by placing his hand directly on her abdomen, with the tips of his fingers touching her breast. A shiver of disgust ran up Helen’s back, as she noticed the man slip a scrap of paper into the girl’s hand, which she surreptitiously transferred to a hiding place behind the sash at her waist, before she remounted the stairs and exited for her next ensemble.
When she had first taken the job, Helen was well aware that it was a much sought-after position, and that dozens of girls had interviewed but failed to get hired at Countess Du Prey, lingerie to the elite. Some of them had been offered positions as sales girls, but only a handful had made the grade to become one of the “beautiful live mannequins.”
Helen soon learned that the Countess was, in fact, a man who tended to wear as much lip rouge as any of his girls, and had plucked out his eyebrows and replaced them with a fine line, penciled in above the natural arch of the brow. She also discovered that the Countess was susceptible to flattery, and that if she complimented his shiny silk waistcoats or implied, ever so subtly, that he was reminiscent of the silent picture star Pola Negri, she was more likely to be given the most beautiful or expensive-looking nightgowns to wear.
She had made no friends amongst the handful of ambitious girls who worked the runway for the hungry-eyed out-of-towners... not because she felt that she was more beautiful or superior, but because she felt they aimed their sights too low, and only aspired to eliciting a bottle of moderately priced perfume or a free steak dinner in exchange for a sample of the flesh below the fabric.
She was not making judgment on these girls by keeping her distance and not associating with them socially. After all, she had come from what she had always mysteriously referred to as total obscurity, and had no social foundation upon which to build a circle of important friends. All she had was her dark, lustrous hair and an intensity that was, more often than not, mistaken for sexual desire. She was only twenty but she had discovered, as early as age fourteen, that her unwavering stare and the little twist to her smile sent a message of mystery that many men wanted to interpret as passionate expectation. She had received many small gifts and even what one might call “good jewelry”, but most of the men she had met were already married, and she seldom engaged in more than what was popularly known as second base hits, because the men usually turned out to be all the same... needy. Or worse yet... sincere.
There was the occasional good-looking man amongst the rows of department store buyers that leered up at them from the gilded chairs in the showroom at Du Prey’s. But there was never anyone that Helen could take seriously, until one afternoon, as she was modeling an apricot-colored translucent lounging robe with marabou stork feathers, she peered out over the balding heads of the first row of seats to see a familiar face sitting in the second row. The face was not familiar because it was anyone with whom she had made an acquaintance, but rather because it was the face of an important film star, Richard Barthelmess, who she had seen only weeks before in a film called Way Down East with Lillian Gish.
She could not believe that he was actually here, and that his eyes seemed to lock onto her and followed her as she moved along the runway, glancing in his direction as nonchalantly as possible, without appearing indifferent. Helen had read all about this man in Photoplay and Silver Screen magazines and knew that he had come from a theatrical family and that his mother had given elocution lessons to the glamorous Russian film star Nazimova, who had launched his career by introducing him to the famous Director, D.W. Griffith. She had seen dozens of pictures of the dazzling twenty-five year old, and found him to be even more exciting on the screen than Wallace Reid.
As she made her turn on the runway and started back toward the curtain that separated the showroom from the dressing area, she stole a glance in the direction of the beautiful man, only to discover that he was no longer there. Her heart sunk in her chest, and she closed her eyes in order to savor the fleeting moment and fix the feeling of excitement in her memory. But as she crossed through the curtain, she was amazed to see that he was standing there, waiting. Without a word, he stepped out of the shadows and offered his hand in greeting.
“Hello,” he said, not offering his name, as if he expected that everyone in America was certain to know who he was, which was the case.
“Hello Mister Barthelmess,” she replied softly, as she lowered her gaze to peer out at him from under dark mascaraed lashes.
He smiled, an indication that he understood her ploy of showing herself off to her best advantage. He nodded approvingly.
“I’d like to invite you out to dine with me,” he informed her, with a slight bow.
“We’re not permitted to fraternize with the customers,” she replied with a playful smile.
“Not even a really good customer?” he asked coyly.
“I’m sure the Countess would approve of a respectable order, and would have no complaints if I accept a dinner invitation from a good customer,” Helen replied, in what she hoped sounded more like a sociable acceptance than a professional solicitation for a sale.
“For whom may I say you are purchasing these garments?” Helen inquired casually. “I’ll have a sales clerk come out and take your order while I change into something more respectable.”
“Oh, don’t do that on my account,” Barthelmess answered, with what he considered to be his most boyish and attractive grin.
“And you are buying your chosen items for... whom?” Helen repeated her question, pretending to be impervious to his heart-stopping grin.
“Okay,” he answered, “if you insist on being professional... let’s just say I’m buying them for you. Pick out whatever you like and have it billed to me. I’ll wait for you to change and meet you in the salon.”
Helen disappeared into the back and cornered a clerk who she informed, to the girl’s utter consternation, that Richard Barthelmess, the film star, was purchasing the apricot lounger, the celadon dressing gown with the expensive embroidered peacock on the back and the sheer yellow négligée, called “spring jasmine” exclusively for her, and that they were going out for a fine meal as well. As she stepped back into the collective dressing area, she flashed a smirk of self-satisfaction at a group of her open-mouthed compatriots, as if to scorn them and say... “This is how it’s done girls.”
Helen remembered that the dinner had been hurried and less than she had hoped for. She had envisioned that a film star of the magnitude of Richard Barthelmess would be dining in only the most fashionable places, and was surprised and a bit taken aback when the taxi stopped in front of a small Italian restaurant on East Thirty-eighth Street. The meal was fast and she had been disappointed that the banter between them, which had seemed so promising back at the salon, had all but disappeared, and the conversation was less than seductive or romantic. Helen watched his face as he ate his food and continued to relate the details of his rise to stardom. He was very good looking, with his beautiful polished teeth and perfectly brilliantined hair, but she could not help but notice that his eyes were just a bit too far apart, and his eyebrows seemed to dominate the features of his face. Nonetheless, he was a famous moving picture star and those small things could
certainly be overlooked.
Within a short while, he called for the check, without even offering dessert or coffee, and suggested that they swing by his hotel room, nearby, and have a nightcap. As he slid Helen’s chair back and gave her the lady treatment, she was well aware what his intentions and his expectations might be. She had done far worse, she smiled to herself, as she stepped up into another cab for a quick trip up to Madison and Forty-third.
When they reached the hotel, Richard took her by the hand and led her up a stairway to a mezzanine level, so that they would not be seen crossing the lobby together, and called for the elevator from there. When it arrived, he asked the operator to take him to the seventh floor. He had failed to use the collective pronoun “us,” so the teenage boy, in his bellhop’s uniform, turned to Helen, as if to inquire about her destination, and she supplied the information that she was going to the seventh floor as well.
Richard allowed Helen to step out into the hallway ahead of him. But to her, he made it appear as if it were merely an act of politeness, and he waited a second, until after the doors of the elevator had closed, before he reconnected with Helen and engaged her in conversation.
“I have a lovely suite just down the hall... and if I remember correctly, some equally lovely hotel manager, a pansy, I think, who claims to be a colossal fan, has done us the service of stocking in a little private label hooch... brought in from Canada.”
Helen did not answer, but followed him down the patterned carpet to a door, emblazoned with a brass number eleven. A mystical number, she mused to herself, as she watched him fumble with the hotel key in anticipation of what he hoped lay in store for him on the other side. Perhaps something magical might be in the offing for her there as well, Helen thought.
It was an expensive and stately looking hotel suite, undoubtedly the Presidential Suite or some such designation that allowed the hotel to charge double the normal price. But Helen was certain that Mister Barthelmess was more than happy to spread his easily earned money around, and let everyone know that he was someone who was accustomed to service.
He handed Helen a highball in a tall pale blue glass, and she savored the taste of real Canadian whiskey. Alcohol of that quality had been unavailable for well over a year, because of Prohibition, and this was the first time that she had tasted anything other than the homemade moonshine or bathtub gin that was served at local parties or even some of the better nightclubs. Helen settled back on the sofa, sipping her drink while Barthelmess cranked the gramophone and slipped on a recording of an orchestra playing a soft and sensual rhythm that might have passed for a tango from Argentina. Without a word, he disappeared from the room and reemerged a few moments later, wearing a dressing gown and an ascot tied around his neck. Underneath the robe, he wore nothing but his underwear.
Helen sat forward in her seat, surprised at his boldness and the casual way in which he assumed his desires would be fulfilled. She contemplated moving toward the door, or protesting his lack of delicacy. But she decided that she would see what might happen, and how she might turn this insulting bit of behavior to her own advantage.
He approached her and held out his hands as an indication that he wanted to dance. She rose, and he took her in his arms. He pressed her body close to his and made a pained expression with his face, pursing his lips out into a sensual pout and narrowing his eyes, as if the cameras were rolling for a love scene in one of his films. Helen was more than aware that half the girls in New York, and even some of the boys, would be thrilled to be in just the position she was now. But, to her disappointment, she was not even mildly thrilled. He was nothing but an obvious bore, not even half trying to convince her that his attentions were genuine. But, in spite of that small detail, she convinced herself that she would see where this night would take her, and she envisioned that she might awake in the morning and find that she had a new world full of opportunities... quite possibly including a chance at a moving picture career of her own.
He glided her across the thick carpet and pantomimed at making love to her, as he nibbled at her shoulder while they danced, and dragged his lips the length of her neck to try and create a semblance of what might possibly be regarded as passion. Suddenly, as they approached the sofa, he flung her down on the cushions and lowered the length of his heavy muscular body on top of her.
Not so fast, she thought to herself. She was not going to be a ten-minute conquest, with nothing to show for it but a couple of cheap nightgowns and a spaghetti dinner. As he brought his lips in toward her mouth, she grabbed his face with both of her hands and firmly said:
“Where’s the fire? I’m in no hurry, are you? If I’m going to be ravaged by a famous movie star, I want to see it all. I want to see your body first... all of it.”
Richard Barthelmess pulled back at arm’s length and appraised the beautiful woman who lay beneath him.
“I don’t think that’s such an unusual request,” Helen continued her flattery. “After all, if I’m going to have something to brag about and tell my grandchildren, I want to have had the whole experience... not just a quick wrestle with your parlor snake and then a late night ride on the subway. If I’m expected to give you what you want, then I want to be able to enjoy it too... and take my time. That is, unless you have somewhere else to be.”
“No, no,” Richard insisted. “Sure baby... My mistake... I’d have never taken you for the fun type... more cash and carry.”
“I could tell you that being insulted by a moving picture star makes me want to have sex, but it doesn’t... so, treat me nice, and we’ll get along just fine,” Helen purred.
Barthelmess nodded his head but did not answer, as if he were a bit breathless with apprehension at the unexpected and exciting turn of events.
“Now, I’d like to see your body,” Helen whispered, “... all of it.”
Richard lifted the weight of his body up from its position on the sofa, freeing Helen to sit up and pull herself out from under him. He got to his feet and let the robe fall from his shoulders to the floor.
“Now, the union suit,” Helen said with a smirk of satisfaction on her face.
Barthelmess obeyed. He unbuttoned the length of his undershirt and the yoke of his drawers, and slipped the one-piece garment down over his broad shoulders, letting it fall on top of the robe. He stood there beautifully naked, displaying an appendage that he hoped would soon be put to good use. Helen clapped her hands together and brought them to her mouth to contain her pleasure at what she saw.
“You are certainly every young girl’s dream,” she stated in a smooth low voice. “If only your other fans could see what I see... they’d triple your salary.”
Richard plopped down next to her on the sofa and leaned forward to reach her mouth with his. Helen felt his nakedness against her body, and traced the muscles of his back with her fingertip as he kissed her. Once again, she pushed him back to a distance more suited for conversation, and baited him a bit for her own pleasure.
“What do you do, to get those great big muscles?” she asked in a voice that was almost a parody of innocence.
“The studio has a gymnasium, and I work out with Indian clubs and use a rowing machine at least twice a week.”
“You look like a Greek statue... like the ones in the Metropolitan Museum. Why, you could have easily modeled for one of those,” Helen replied, continuing to woo him with flattery.
“Well, as a matter of fact, I have modeled,” he answered with excitement. “When I graduated from the Military Academy in Nyack, I went to Europe, on a vacation. While I was in Paris, this guy stopped me and asked me if I would be willing to pose for him... with some girls. He said he was a painter... and artist or something. Well, when I got to his studio, another guy there told him that the girls couldn’t make it, so, instead of me posing for a painting, he asked if I would pose for some reference photographs. He was going to pay me so I said sure.”
Helen smiled to herself and could not believe that he
had fallen for the oldest trick in the book... the old “the other models didn’t show up” routine.
“So, he took some photographs of me, and then he asked if he could take some in the nude, so that he could see the musculature better. He took more pictures, then some action shots... straddling a bench, and one with my leg up on a table. That’s what he said he needed for his painting.”
“Did he ever do the painting?” Helen asked with feigned curiosity. “Did you ever get to see the photographs?”
“Oh, yes,” Richard answered. “I went by the studio a couple of days later and he showed them to me. At first, I was a bit concerned that he had photographs of me in the buff, and I didn’t want other people to see them. But he was decent enough to give me all of the naked ones, because he said he had already done his drawings and he wouldn’t need them anymore. I still have them. Jesus, I can only imagine what would have happened if they were still floating around and someone from the press, or worse yet, the studio got hold of them.”
“You still have them,” Helen asked with a studied tinge of real excitement. “I’d love to see them... just to see if they do you justice and capture the impressively masculine man I have in front of me.”
Barthelmess jumped up from where he sat and ran into the bedroom. He called out from the other room.
“I was almost five years younger in these pictures... but I think I still look pretty much the same.”
He returned carrying a fistful of postcard sized, slightly faded photographs depicting a younger Richard, contorted into ridiculous positions that drew focus to the ample size of his male organ or the musculature of his buttock. Helen had to suppress a laugh, when he handed them to her, and she flipped through the collection, making suitable little noises of wonderment and appreciation as she went.
“These are remarkable... beautiful,” she said, fulfilling his expectation of reassurance.
