So Sara was permitted to accompany Violet to “Her's next marriage,” as it was referred to around the breakfast table at Charlotte Hall.
All during the vows, spoken in English and Hebrew, Sara stood closer to Violet than to her mother, but after kissing husband number three, Claire turned to her only child.
“Sara,” she whispered into her ear. “I will always love you.” She spoke as sincerely and tenderly as if she were making her second sacred pledge of the day.
And while she didn't say “Mother” or “Mommy,” as she'd cried out an anguished year ago in Rome, Claire thought there was a glint—faint, but still a spark of some affection—in the fourteen-year-old's cold eyes. Claire promised herself she'd find a way to break through the stiff politeness that stood like a seawall against her daughter's storm of memories.
“It's like she's grown a protective shell around her, retreating in and out like a snapping turtle,” Slim whispered to Violet.
Lena Horne decided to sing, and Violet danced with Mr. Zolla to a different tune that was humming in his head. A happy Lefty made toast after toast, trying hard to get Sara to break a smile.
“She's a tough nut to crack. Maybe I shoulda invited Lucille Ball,” he said to Bernie before strutting over in his quick, jerky steps to get the kid at least to grin.
“I'd bet a young lady like you would like a backstage pass to the Elvis Presley concert. How ‘bout it?”
“No, thank you, Mr. Lefkowitz.” Sara affected the tone of Grand-mère Ophelia.
“Call me Lefty. Do you like concerts?”
“We hold season's tickets to Carnegie Hall and the Metropolitan Opera, Mr. Lefty. My family has had them for ages.”
He shrugged away her bratty disdain and unnerving gaze. “Well, maybe a smart kid like you might want to come with your mother and me to see the $64,000 Question. You get to use your brains.”
“That would be nice.” Sara smoothed the front of her skirt, looking very Eastern Seaboard in her navy Sunday suit.
Claire glanced over at Sara and Lefty—they seemed to be getting along—and then at her mother and the Aunties, and smiled to herself. She felt thankful to be alive and in the company of her newly extended family. Maybe one day they could all be happy again. Auntie Wren threw rice that stuck to Claire's ice-blue sheath, but it didn't matter, since they were all going to stay at the house for their honeymoon.
“Why would anyone want to leave paradise?” Claire asked Lefty after they'd cut the wedding cake sweetened with honey for good luck.
“I wouldn't dream of asking you to leave your family while they're all here together. Those Aunties are terrific—characters straight out of an old screenplay. The Aunties of Heavenly Falls.” He held out his hands as if he were seeing it on a marquee. “Sort of a Frank Capra–esque thing.” He winked at her. “And Sara, well, she's already quite the little character actress.”
“Oh, Lefty. How could I have gotten so lucky to have you fix everything in my life?”
“Hold on, Toots. I'm the one that should be thanking whoever fixes these kinds of things. Sending buckets of orchids to the big director in the sky.”
When Perry Como's mellow voice came on over the poolside speaker, Lefty asked Claire Harrison Lefkowitz—he loved the sound of the names together—to dance. She swayed with him, following his offbeat tilt, like Anna with the king of Siam. Claire, posture-perfect and balletic, Lefty with two eponymous feet, his bald head bobbing with vim, both of them completely contented with their happy two-step. If it couldn't be love, Claire thought, who was she to argue with contentment? After a trio of “I do”s a desire for normality seemed very, well, normal.
Out of the corner of her eye she saw Sara sup away by herself. She excused herself and followed her to the back of the pool where she found her sitting straight-backed on a drainpipe cover.
“You'll soil that pretty suit,” Claire tentatively said.
“I don't care.”
“Then neither do I.” Claire plopped herself next to her daughter, Bel Air mud staining her sheath.
“I thought clothes were all you ever cared about.”
“It's a little luxury. Not on my ten-most-important list.”
“Grand-mère Ophelia says—”
“Ophelia isn't my problem anymore. You're my concern, and I care very much about you.” Claire slipped her arm around Sara's shoulder. The girl stiffened like a cat who had been kicked.
Claire retreated. She wanted to hold Sara or smooth her hair. She wanted to touch that part of her that reminded her of Six, of the good times they'd shared along with the color of their eyes. Claire was so willing to love her, to help her through all her obvious rage and confusion. She could muster up the patience. But she couldn't help being repelled by those Ophelia-like mannerisms, that same speech, the arrogant looks that brought to mind a knuckle-rapping teacher who suspected Claire of cheating on her homework. She squashed the feelings welling up inside of her.
“I didn't know they were allowed to make such ugly houses.” Sara pointed her chin in the air toward the fake mansard roof. “And I've never seen plastic water lilies before.”
“It's Hollywood. There's fake snow for Christmas and rabbits that talk. I can't wait to take you to the studios to see all the magic.”
“You didn't really expect that I'd be comfortable in a place like this, did you?” The challenge in her voice was chilling.
“No.” Claire hugged her own knees to her chest in lieu of her daughter. “I just wanted you to know that there's one other person in the world who understands how bad you feel. And that she's always there for you.”
“She. That's what we call you at home. No one refers to you by any of your names at home anymore.”
“Not even Grandfather? How is he doing?”
“Just grand. Almost fully recovered.” Sara wasn't about to tell Mrs. Lefty Lefkowitz that Grandfather Harrison still defended her to the rest of the family and insisted on keeping a little photo on his study desk of himself with Sara, Six, and Claire taken a few weeks before the tragedy.
“No. No one ever speaks of you. As you know, we only discuss people of accomplishment and who excel in public service.”
Claire was glad Lefty was calling her in his small, nasal voice. She didn't feel like having her heart broken on her wedding day.
A look that could have been construed as contrite softened Sara's stormy eyes. “What are you going to call this house?” asked the child who had grown up in houses with names instead of numbers.
“I was thinking of calling it home.” Claire stood on her high heels and went back to the music.
Lefty had saved her, repotted her in fresh soil so that she could survive, so in return Claire set about smoothing the texture of Lefty's life. She made sure their home on Alamedo Drive was always filled with plumped pillows and flowers. Suddenly it was if an outdoor garden had moved indoors. Apricots, peaches, and lemon-colored draperies and cushions covered the chairs, and sectional couches were arranged like avant-garde fruit.
And the blooms could be expense-accounted, the once-again-thrifty Claire was pleased to note, because the agency's offices were on the newly decorated first floor. With the house now refurbished, Claire Harrison Lefkowitz invited the A-list clients to join Lefty's roster. First they came out of curiosity, to meet the society dame who had murdered her husband, killing him with a speargun for sharks, but as Lefty's PR people massaged the story, her legend became more intriguing. This beautiful friend of the restrained Princess Grace as well as a wild Evita, with the same liberal leanings as Hollywood's “in” crowd, had killed a Nazi. So what? She only did what Sam Goldwyn had ordered and John Wayne had carried out a hundred times on the screen. The stars came to gawk at the lady who had killed her husband and lunched with the pope, but they stayed when the hardworking, well-connected Lefkowitzes got them the juiciest parts. They also got them the best press. Claire became a stickler for this part of the business. She protected her clients with a mother hen's feroc
ity, and woe to the gossip columnist who back-stabbed one of Lefty and Claire's clients. Anita Lace was banned from all film openings and any star's news that Lefty had anything to do with. If possible, Grant Publications always received the studio press release a day later than anyone else.
“Tant pis for you,” Lefty hollered into the phone at U.S. Week's editor in chief. He had picked up a little French from his wife.
Throughout the first year, Claire threw herself into Lefty's business with relish. He had thrown her a life raft, and she would return the favor by saving the agency that had been more loss than profit when she'd become his bride. Once she learned Lefty's craft, being an agent was easy labor for Claire. It wasn't unlike the work she'd done as the hostess of Palazzo Duccio. Introducing the players, bolstering their egos, and closing the deal—Claire had been doing that for Duccio in three different languages. Here everyone spoke English, more or less. Plus she got paid. Claire had tasted poverty and had felt the helplessness of a woman alone without a job title or even the means to support her child. This time, Violet's daughter turned around her husband's business and then took fifty percent for herself. It was so much more satisfying man being the decorative dinner-giver and jewelry model.
Still, her hostess skills came in handy. An invitation to Lefty and Claire's was considered a social coup. After all, their living room was now where Judy Garland belted out her songs at the piano, where Lauren Bacall and Bogey stayed up till three A.M. talking politics in a haze of their own cigarette smoke, and Fred Astaire danced on the terrace with Auntie Slim, who declared herself a “Hollywood extra” after a few deftly executed spins around the flagstones. The only guarantee that you'd be on this coveted list was to sign a Lefkowitz contract. Claire even took Ingrid Bergman to lunch at Chasen's, where they girl-talked over chili about Rossellini, whom Claire had known in Italy, just so that everyone who mattered could see her with the elusive actress. That lunch alone attracted three more clients to the firm.
Building up Lefty's business was part of the package, and although bringing people to the table for movie deals was fun, Claire itched to recapture the feeling that she was truly achieving a goal close to her heart, as she had with Eleanor House.
The idea for the documentary came to her one evening after dinner while she was reading a McCall's story on Eleanor Roosevelt's life. Her bare feet were propped on Lefty's lap. Husband and wife both in their matching Sulka robes, their Sunday-dinner trays arranged in front of the TV. Ed Sullivan's show was turned on low.
“This is so unfair!” Claire railed into Lefty's good ear. “Millions of women who read this fluff are going to think Eleanor was just a busybody housewife who charged around the world uninvited. She revolutionized domestic policy at home. She invented the issues. Day care, civil rights, equality in education—that all came from her!”
Lefty loved it when she talked like this, as if exposing her liberal sentiments were akin to talking dirty. He egged her on. “Yeah, fix it, Toots. And get me a buttermilk while you're up.”
“Seriously, dear. I want to shake everyone by the shoulders so they'll understand this wonderful woman. Franklin won the war but Eleanor reformed this country. She was the one who opened the military to minorities, gave women jobs with real pay, fought against child labor.”
Lefty looked up from Sullivan. “You got my attention. If you could take the passion you feel and put it on the screen, you'd have something. And you were there …” He ran his tongue over his lower lip. “Go for it. Call up Eleanor and negotiate the film rights. Go for greatness.” His eyes shot her an adrenaline hit through his windowpane lenses.
“Do you think I could? Could I rescue her reputation?” For a moment Claire wondered if someday someone would do the same for her. She asked Lefty her own sixty-four-thousand-dollar question. “Lefty, will this town take me seriously? Eleanor Roosevelt as remembered by me? People may not even want to work with Claire Harrison Lefkowitz.” A blush colored her high cheeks.
“Well, it won't be easy. But this town loves a comeback. It won't be the first time somebody came to town and changed their reputation. Norma Jean was just a pretty girl with a lot of problems, but Marilyn Monroe's a big star. You won't know unless you try. But give the audience a break, Claire, and bring Max Factor into the movie. I know she's a hell of a dame, but Mrs. Roosevelt could use a little mascara.” Lefty toasted her with his buttermilk.
Truth be known, Claire liked him even better on their first anniversary than on their wedding day. She gazed fondly at the cross-hatched lines etched on the road map that was his face, as if a chicken had run across it in a panic. She wondered why she hadn't noticed how handsome he was before now.
Certainly, he was pint-sized. But then again, so were most of the leading Hollywood players. Claire towered over the likes of a petite Liz Taylor, and even the voluptuous Marilyn Monroe, who liked to kick around without her shoes, came up only to Claire's clavicle. Claire often wore Capezio flats to client dinners once she realized that she was like a skyscraper over Spencer Tracy, young Paul Newman, and Eddie Fisher in the buffet line.
Eleanor, on the other hand, was a towering figure, larger than life, and Claire knew it wouldn't be a simple task to bring her to the big screen. Or to do her justice. The project was ambitious, but in her new California can-do environment, and with Lefty's encouragement, so was Claire.
She assembled a list of all of the people she would need to contact: Anna; wounded soldiers whom Eleanor had visited in the hospitals; Mary McLeod Bethune, the director of NYA's Division of Negro Affairs; Secretary of State Stimson; and all the grandchildren. She didn't dare contact Harrison. As she reviewed the old newsreels, though, she discovered that now she had an opportunity to play the black-and-white movies costarring the man she loved. She hadn't seen him in two years, but when she caught her first glimpse of Harrison on the news footage, her pulse raced as if it had been only yesterday. She felt a secret thrill each time she saw him climb the steps of the Sacred Cow to fly away with Franklin, or trim the sails with Eleanor at Campobello, his shirt open at his tanned throat.
Violet, however, had reservations. There was a note of concern in her voice as she expressed her doubts about the Eleanor project to her daughter.
“You can't spend all day sitting in a dark projection room. You already have two full-time jobs.”
Claire was fidgety. Her fingers tapped on the turquoise poolside phone as she waited for a potential documentary director to call back.
“You are helping run your husband's agency, and doing a fine job, dear.” Violet paused, then plunged ahead. “And then there is your real job. Raising your child.”
Claire turned to look at her daughter. Sara was standing poised on the edge of the diving board. The lanky fifteen-year-old kept racing out on the board and then back as if she couldn't decide whether or not to jump. Sara hung her toes over the edge, swinging her skinny arms out over her head, and then abruptly caught herself before pacing back again. The springboard bounced over and over. It made Claire nervous. But she had been tense ever since her mother and Sara arrived in L.A. for Easter break.
“Sara, come over here and I'll put some lotion on you. You're getting too dark!” Claire called through the old-fashioned megaphone Lefty had bought for her. PRODUCER was painted on it in big bold letters.
Sara ignored her mother.
Claire turned to Violet. “Honestly, Mother, I don't know what to do. She never listens to me. Look at her skin. She's as dark as the yardman!”
Violet cleared her throat as she continued pulling the thread through her needlepoint. “Sara's suntan is the least of your worries. She's on the edge, you know, and I don't mean of the diving board.”
Both women turned to look as the young girl finally sprang from the board and expertly jackknifed into the water, setting off a series of rippling circles in the cold, smooth surface.
“Claire, your daughter needs you.”
Without seeing, Claire could tell that her mother's eyes
were leveled directly at her own.
“But they've only let me see her a few times this year.”
“Look at her. She's wound up as tight as a mummy. Each time one of her wounds has started to open and ooze, Ophelia has just slapped on another bandage and told her people of their class don't display emotion. I fear that one day soon it will all be too much to hold inside and she'll just unravel.”
“But what can I do if they don't let me near her? I can't mother her by mail!” The word brought back memories of her own childhood and a father who existed only in a handful of postcards. “It practically takes an act of Congress just to arrange these little visits.”
“I know you do your best, and I know you had to sign away your rights in Rome. But with you out here in make-believe land, as nice as it is, dear”—Violet coaxed all the honey she could into her worried voice—“and Sara living in Wuthering Heights”—Violet had adopted Sara's nickname for Charlotte Hall—“she's not getting the old-fashioned graham-cracker-and-milk kind of parental love and stability she craves.”
The Chameleon Page 40
