The Swans of Fifth Avenue

by Melanie Benjamin

  It didn’t matter what he answered, of course. Babe would pay it, without question.

  —

  AND SO, RETREATING, Babe and Truman entered the house at Kiluna feeling rather like runaway children, which they were. The staff was surprised to see them but rose to the occasion, as Babe had selected and trained them to do. She and Truman had a cozy, intimate little dinner of quail and potatoes before the fire in the library, and they didn’t say much at all; Babe was content merely to be with him, after all the emotional upheaval of the day, resting her eyes on his sensitive pink face; feeling his hand reach for hers on occasion, but also rejoicing when he let it go and was lost in his own thoughts, but still, somehow—with her. That he felt that comfortable, that natural, so that he didn’t strain to impress or amuse; that was a gift.

  “Good night, dearest,” Babe told him as they went up the stairs, hand in hand; they stood in the hallway outside her room. “Everything should be ready for you in your usual room.”

  But Truman shook his head.

  “No, not tonight, Babe. Tonight, I’m sleeping with you. In your bed, next to you. It’s what I want, to be close to you in the only way I can be.”

  For a moment, Babe couldn’t think straight; a swirl of thoughts buzzed about her head and she actually swatted at them, as if they were flies. What did he mean? He’d just said he couldn’t have an affair with her. Did he mean, just to sleep? In her bed? Then she’d have to sleep in her makeup, for he could never see her without it. She’d have to keep her teeth in. She wouldn’t be able to set her hair. What would Bill say, if any of the servants whispered?

  Would Bill even care?

  “I don’t know, Truman, it’s just so—”

  “Easy. It’s just so easy. Come.” And Truman opened the door for her, held her by the hand, and led her across the threshold.

  “Oh, I—do let me, let me change in the dressing room, and I’ll be out in a jiffy, and if you want—do you need pajamas? I’m sure we have some extra, I’ll just ring for some—” Babe was pacing, lighting up a cigarette. Her hands were shaking; her skin felt tight, hot, as though a foreign substance were coating her pores, suffocating her.

  Truman shook his head. He walked over to her, the most solemn expression in his eyes; they weren’t twinkling, they weren’t lighting up with ideas and schemes and plots. They were big and blue, as solemn as a child’s. As serious as a man’s.

  “Stop.” And he took the cigarette from her, put it in an ashtray on the table next to her enormous bed.

  Trembling, she stood before him. His hands were on her shoulders; he was reaching around her back, undoing the zipper on her dress, letting the fabric fall away so that her back was exposed, and she shivered, her suffocating skin now an icy glaze. As the bodice fell away from her, she put her hands up, covering herself even though she was still in her girdle, bra, panties, and stockings.

  Truman undid his own shirt. His eyes never left her face; he was studying her, intense yet wistful. Searching for something. Babe didn’t know what. She didn’t know what to do, what to say, where to look. So she focused on his chest. She’d seen his chest before, of course: swimming, cavorting around the pool here and in Jamaica, on the Agnellis’ yacht last September. She’d even rubbed suntan oil on it, marveling at its smoothness, so unlike Bill’s torso with its clumps of hair, swirls of it dotted with odd bare patches.

  But now Truman’s chest looked like an angel’s, innocent and fair, a fine dusting of those golden hairs all over it giving him an ethereal glow. His biceps were surprisingly defined, and he would have looked like a young Adonis, with that pouty, dreamy face, were it not for his stomach, which was a tad poochy. He didn’t even try to hold it in as Babe was holding hers, drawing every inch of flesh and muscle inward toward her spine, tightening her buttocks, clenching her teeth, trying to disappear, to be nothing but wisp.

  Then Truman guided her over to the bed. “Shhh. Wait here,” he said, and he stepped out of his trousers so he was only in his boxers and his socks. Babe wanted to giggle at the red garters holding up his dark stockings; he must have sensed this, because he quickly removed them so that his muscular, perfect legs were completely exposed, and then she wanted to gasp.

  Truman went into her dressing room; she couldn’t imagine why. Was he drawing her a bath, perhaps?

  He returned with some cotton pads and a bottle of astringent.

  “Look at me,” he said, settling next to her on the bed. “Look at me, only at me. And let me look only at you, Babe. You, just as you really are, beautiful. Real. Mine.”

  Dabbing a pad with the astringent, he reached toward her face. She sucked in her breath, tears filling her eyes, and she began to protest, squirming.

  “Oh, Truman, no, no, please, no—”

  “Yes.” And he dabbed at her right cheek, taking away. Taking away her makeup, her mask. Exposing—everything. All the ugliness.

  She turned away, letting him, but unable to look at him, unable to bear the expression in his eyes when he saw, finally, all she had to hide. She felt him trace her scar, the one along her jaw, tenderly, lovingly.

  “It happened,” she replied, to the unasked question, “when I was nineteen. A car accident, with some boy. Do you know, I can’t even remember his name? We were talking, he was drinking from a flask, and suddenly the car left the road and slammed into a tree. That’s what they told me, after. I don’t remember; it happened so fast. That’s what people always say, don’t they? That it happened so fast? Well, it’s true. We were driving and then there was a loud bang, like an explosion, and then I woke up in the hospital. My parents—my father, even—they were there, and my face was completely smothered in bandages. I couldn’t move; there were harnesses, straps, and rods holding my head and neck completely still. My arms, even my chest, were strapped down. And my mother kept saying, ‘Your face! Your face! Your perfect face! What on earth will you do now, my darling, without that face?’ ”

  Babe swallowed as gingerly as she used to back in the hospital, completely immobile, a captive of her looks, of her future. Truman had stopped dabbing and was holding his breath, the astringent in one hand, the cotton pad in the other. Babe found herself staring at his pooch of a stomach, slightly overhanging his plaid silk boxers.

  “Do you know, it was the most attention my father ever paid to me?” She laughed, but it sounded, even to Babe’s own ears, insincere. “For the first time in my life, my father was with me day and night, bringing in all the best plastic surgeons, ones who had learned from the war. And it was all because of my face. Never mind all those years when I yearned for him to pay attention to me because of my grades, or a funny joke, or simply because I loved him. Finally, I had him, all of him, and it was only to save my face. My ‘calling card,’ Mother kept saying. And I thought—I really did think this—that if, when the surgeries were done and the bandages removed and I didn’t have this face anymore, they wouldn’t love me. They’d leave me there in the hospital forever, if I didn’t have ‘that face.’ ”

  “Darling Babe,” Truman breathed, and she finally looked into his eyes; they were beautiful and full of tears and pity and love for her, scars and all.

  “The surgeries were so painful,” she continued, emboldened now to tell him all, tell him everything, because he wouldn’t leave her, he wouldn’t hurt her, no matter what she looked like, no matter what imperfections she confided. She had never told her sisters about all of it, had never mentioned it to Serge or to Stanley, her first husband, or, God forbid, Bill, who had no patience for anyone’s troubles but his own, who did not care about the provenance of anything except for the paintings he collected. “Little surgeries, one at a time. Tiny little stitches sewing me back together. Some without anesthesia, so my face wouldn’t go slack, so the scars would be minimal. I couldn’t move for months; I had to lie flat on my back and not stir, not laugh or cry or anything at all, while they restored my face, my perfect face. And my teeth—” Here she did hesitate, still so ashamed that
her hand flew to her mouth. “I have false teeth,” she said simply. “My own had to be removed.”

  “Oh, sweetheart!”

  “At least I don’t have to worry about cavities,” Babe replied with a smile. But then she didn’t know what else to say; she felt odd, half exposed, with one side of her face made up, the other not. And she was still only wearing her underclothes.

  Truman must have sensed this, because he continued his dabbing, swiping away the rest of her mask. Exposing the other scars: The one near her upper lip. The tiny one at the corner of her right eye.

  And when he had finished, he turned her toward him. She lifted her head and steeled herself to see her reflection—unadorned, unaltered—in Truman’s eyes.

  “You are beautiful,” he said. “Beautiful. I don’t see scars. I only see you. Babe. Perfect—not just because you still are absolutely gorgeous without all the makeup. Good God, those cheekbones! Those eyes! But you are perfect because of who you are, inside. I love you, Babe. I love you for that. For who you are, not for what you look like.”

  Babe realized she was no longer covering her half-naked torso with her hands; her skin no longer felt cold, raw, unsheathed. She was completely relaxed. Comfortable, for the first time since she was a little girl, in just her own skin. Literally. Because of Truman.

  Truman put the astringent and pads on the nightstand. He turned off the light, and they both pulled back the bedcovers and got into bed. They lay on their backs, side by side, for a long time not saying anything, not even when Truman guided her head toward his shoulder and put his arm about her.

  Babe held her breath, listening to his heartbeat, so sturdy, so faithful. Finally she heard him begin to breathe deeply, and she knew he was asleep.

  But Babe was wide awake; despite the comfort of being held so closely by someone she trusted so completely, her body still ached for more. She knew she’d never have that gift, not from him, and the loss did sting, although not like the rejection with which she was so familiar, from Bill.

  But mostly, she was grateful for this moment. Because tomorrow, she would put on her makeup again, strive to find just the right outfit, organize Bill’s days and weeks and years, live up to her mother’s expectations, her father’s very conditional love. “That face” would be hers once more, to put on, hide behind, wield like a weapon, use like the sun, coaxing and beguiling and charming and turning to stone those who could not believe its perfection.

  But there would always be one person who knew what she looked like, without it. Who had seen her scars and loved her, anyway. Who would never wound her with his words, like Bill, or with his absence, like her father.

  And that person was now, and would be forever, Truman.

  CHAPTER 10

  …..

  Things with the Paleys were getting complicated, he mused. And interesting; oh, so deliciously, delightfully interesting!

  Truman still gasped whenever he first saw Babe after time away from her. Her beauty did not fade; it only became more finely honed with each passing year. His obsession with her still burned, for he craved beauty as he craved love and approval, and if he could have both in one gorgeous, glamorous package, then what more could he ask for?

  And her vulnerability, her touching confessions; he could—and sometimes did—weep at the memory of that day they spent together, that night in her bed when he had lain beside William S. Paley’s wife and known her more completely than her husband ever would. He’d meant it when he said that she was the one woman whom he wished he could love physically. But even as he’d said it, part of him—the part he despised when he was hungover and regretful on certain mornings after—had suppressed a laugh, hearing himself already rearranging the story so he could tell it to those who appreciated his stories, especially the ones about the rich and famous, just like them. Cecil, perhaps—Cecil Beaton, to the masses; or Margaret—that is, Princess Margaret, to most people.

  But they were just Cecil and Margaret to him. As were Liz and Grace and Marlon and Marilyn and Audrey and Humphrey and Betty.

  “Well,” he’d begin, as he always began, that southern drawl that never failed to hypnotize, like a snake charmer’s tune. “You will not believe what happened to me the other day! Me, the queen of the fairies! Propositioned by a woman—and not just any ol’ woman, mind you. But the fabulous, the one and only, Babe Paley!”

  Oh, it would be a delicious story! He could dine out on it for simply weeks—years, even! But he did feel an uncomfortable stab of loyalty for Babe, a rush of love and protection—feelings so unfamiliar that he scarcely knew how to process them—except for the fact that somehow, he knew he couldn’t do that to her. Not to Babe. He couldn’t expose her that way, after she’d so trustingly exposed herself to him. He couldn’t humiliate her vulnerability, her despair.

  But Bill—well, that was another matter. And where things began to get complicated.

  He liked Bill Paley. Most people didn’t, actually. Oh, sure, Slim was always very loyal to him, when the girls began dissecting one another’s husbands—although Babe never played that particular game. But oh, God, poor Slim! Oh, the poor dear—but Truman couldn’t think about her right now. No, Bill was the more pressing problem.

  Bill Paley was a wily chameleon, warm one minute, dangerously coiled and unpredictable the next. He had no patience, none at all! The way he barked at Babe whenever he wanted something; it did make Truman’s blood boil. Truman knew how heroically Babe worked, he knew how desperate she was to be loved and appreciated, and to see how churlishly Bill treated her stirred up the most inconveniently uncomfortable feelings in him. He actually hated Bill at times, for the hurt, the neglect, he heaped upon exquisite, treasured Babe, whom Truman loved. And who loved him back.

  But it was not in Truman’s nature to openly despise people of wealth and taste and privilege. And he had to admit that Bill possessed all of these. The wealth—well! The man ran an empire! Television, radio, CBS records; he invested in Broadway plays, he owned buildings, he shaped the way people thought. The taste—God, what taste! For a man who sometimes had the unraveled edges of a New Orleans pimp, he had an exquisite eye for art and beauty.

  Well, the man had picked Babe, hadn’t he? That alone elevated him in Truman’s eyes.

  And power. Back to the empire again. And the political connections; he’d had Truman’s—the other Truman, the president—ear. Eisenhower’s, too. His brother-in-law, Jock Whitney, Babe’s sister’s husband, was the ambassador to Great Britain. But power is always tied most directly to money. Bill Paley knew that.

  So did Truman Capote.

  When Bill asked him to perform that particular—function—the first time, Truman had hesitated. Out of loyalty to Babe, he’d stammered, pretending not to understand the question. Bill retreated hastily, changing the subject to boxing, a sport they both enjoyed.

  But the very next night, Bill invited Truman out for a drink at the Links Club. Truman, always eager to invade these hidden bastions of overt masculinity, had accepted. And he’d not been disappointed. The Links Club was a testosterone riot of leather and wood paneling and pictures of golf, golf, and more golf—golf courses, golf clubs, men in ridiculous golf gear. It was full of small rooms where hushed games of backgammon were being conducted, or phone calls to brokers being made. The drinks were all strong and neat, no garnishes. No less than three shoe-shine men—darkies all—waited patiently just outside the lounge.

  Truman spied a couple of men he had last encountered in different kinds of clubs, farther—much farther—downtown. One had been dancing with a swarthy Puerto Rican boy dressed like Carmen Miranda in the back room of one of those clubs. He saw the man pale at his entrance, but Truman didn’t break a smile, didn’t raise an eyebrow, didn’t slow his stride at all as he followed Bill to a cozy corner of the main room, decorated in a Scottish nightmare of dark paneling and painting after painting of men in kilts gripping large wooden clubs.

  No, no compensation here, not at all.

&
nbsp; “Truman, I need you to do me a favor.”

  “Anything, Bill,” Truman had replied with a sinking heart. One didn’t refuse—or pretend not to understand—Bill Paley twice in a row.

  Bill pressed a hidden buzzer beneath the table between them, and from a concealed panel in the wall, out popped a liveried waiter. Bill ordered two whiskey and sodas and drummed his fingers against the mahogany tabletop; the chairs were well-worn leather, comfortable, with high backs, giving at least an illusion of privacy. After the drinks were delivered, Bill sipped his, then placed it down on the table. He immediately saw the water ring it left, and grinned a suddenly charming, boyish grin.

  “Babe and her coasters. At home, every table has dozens. She thinks I’m a slob if I don’t use them.”

  “Women!” Truman grunted and pretended to spit on the floor. Bill guffawed.

  “Yes. Women. Here’s to them all.” And Bill raised his glass in a toast. Truman did the same. “Now, to the point. You know that little blonde, that Carol something, a friend of yours? I think she’s just a terrific little gal. I bet she’s a real tiger in bed. I’d like to find out, at any rate. Could you arrange it?”

  As he had been before, Truman was shocked by the directness. No prevaricating, no warming up to the subject. But he also admired Bill’s methodology. Here was a man who knew what he wanted, and didn’t see the need to waste any time in getting it.

  “Bill. I’m flattered that you’d think I’d have any sway over the wonderful women in my life.”

  “Cut the crap, Truman. Will you or won’t you? I can get anyone I want, you know.” Bill’s legs were jangling now; he was always restless, always in search of more. At the house, he’d pace and roam. On the plane, he couldn’t sit still, either, always drumming his fingers, crossing and uncrossing his legs, pacing the aisle, driving Babe and Truman to distraction. His big hands were always clasping and unclasping, scratching, rubbing, drawing doodles on pads of paper.