Who Killed the Pinup Queen?

by Kelner, Toni, L. P.

  Hoyt just rolled his eyes.

  “We’re still working out some of the details,” Miss Barth said diplomatically.

  Tilda nodded, wondering if she should suggest a compromise position of a Western-themed miniature golf place instead.

  Tucker said, “Now we know people don’t exactly associate Massachusetts with cowboys, but Hoyt’s been doing some market research, and we figure people around here like playing cowboy just as much as anybody.”

  “Maybe more, since they don’t know what it’s like to actually have to muck out a stable!” Hoyt put in.

  Tucker grinned. “Anyways, if we build something around here, we’re going to have both the Boston area and New York City to draw people from, plus the whole rest of New England. We’re expecting big things.”

  “I don’t think you need to sell Tilda,” Jillian pointed out.

  Hoyt smiled apologetically. “It’s hard to stop a salesman from selling, but I’ll try to rein myself in. In order to get people excited about the resort, we’ve been talking to Entertain Me! about doing some articles about the show and our fans. Jillian here tells us you’re just the person to write them.”

  That explained Nicole’s irritation. She hated anybody other than herself getting a byline, and was particularly unhappy when the byline was Tilda’s.

  “Don’t forget the roundup!” Tucker put in.

  “Hold on to your horses. I was getting to that,” Hoyt said. “You know, most of our regular cast members have passed away—”

  “God rest their souls,” Miss Barth said with just the right amount of feeling.

  “But when the show was running, we featured a whole lot of guest stars. We want to track down some of these folks for interviews, maybe scout the territory to see if they’d be willing to make personal appearances at the resort. What do you say? Are you interested?”

  “I’m very interested,” Tilda said. Then she remembered the first rule of being a freelancer: Never sound too interested. “Of course, we’ll have to talk schedules. I’m working on some other projects.” Since the second rule was to never turn down an assignment, she added, “But I’m I sure I can wrangle them all.”

  “Now you’re talking!” Tucker said.

  While Jillian looked on approvingly, Tilda and the Ambrose brothers put together a list of actors she was to track down, along with a few ideas about where to start the search. With each name, Tilda got more and more excited. Not only did the length of the list guarantee her a nice paycheck, but each actor was a potential source for future stories. After an hour or so of discussion and the ritual exchange of e-mail addresses and phone numbers for both landlines and mobiles, the Ambrose brothers and Miss Barth moseyed out.

  Jillian kept her pleased-editor expression on until they were gone, then switched back to her usual look of intense focus and demanded, “What other projects? The last thing we bought from you was that comic book movie piece the month before last.”

  Nicole smiled at that, probably reveling in the memory of two entire months without having to send Tilda a check.

  “I do have other clients,” Tilda reminded Jillian, though not as many as she wanted. Whether economists called it a downturn, a recession, or just tough times, it boiled down to magazines being less willing to use a stringer when they had staff members who were anxious enough about keeping their jobs that they didn’t dare turn down extra work. She suspected that Nicole had increased her efforts to make sure Tilda got as little work as possible from Entertain Me!, despite an agreement they’d made a few months earlier.

  “Just make sure that this is your priority from now on,” Jillian said. “I’m going to tell you something that better not be repeated outside this room. The Ambrose brothers and Miss Barth may be the figureheads for the resort, but there are other investors, including major silent partners. I’m not going to name names, but you’d find one of them on a door in our corporate offices.”

  “Oh? Oh.” Tilda had been so sold on the project that she hadn’t stopped to think that promoting a future resort was hardly the kind of story Entertain Me! was known for. “Consider it prioritized. What about payment?”

  “Usual rates and usual expenses from us, plus the Ambrose brothers will pay a bonus for every candidate you provide for personal appearances.”

  “Sounds good.” The word bonus was not one she often encountered in her line of work. “Of course, with this many people to find, I’m going to want to invoice you along the way, not just at the end of the assignment. Say a week at a time?”

  Jillian considered it, and Tilda tried to look blasé. Finally the editor said, “Deal. Nicole will handle the paperwork.” She started out of the room.

  Nicole must have thought Jillian was already gone because she snarled, “You may as well be on the payroll!”

  Jillian turned back, looking thoughtful. “That’s a good point.”

  “So we go back to end-of-project invoicing?” Nicole said eagerly.

  But before Tilda could gather her thoughts for a counterargument, Jillian said, “Or maybe we should bring Tilda on full time. Nostalgia isn’t going away, not while the Baby Boomers are still trying to hang on to their lost youth. Maybe it’s time to make ‘where are they now?’ stories a regular feature.”

  “Are you serious?” Tilda asked.

  “Are you interested?”

  Tilda had lost track of which freelancer’s rule she was supposed to apply, which left her with honesty. “I never thought about it.”

  “Think about it. We’ll see how this project goes, and afterward we’ll talk.” Jillian strode out, no doubt already planning something else.

  With the boss gone, Nicole didn’t even bother to hide her horror. “Oh. My. God.”

  Tilda grinned at her. “Wouldn’t it be great? You and me seeing each other every day! Gossiping in the break room, shopping on our lunch hours, exchanging presents at the company Christmas party . . .”

  “Fuck that!” Nicole snapped, and stomped out.

  Tilda waited, knowing that Cooper would be along in a minute. It was, in fact, only forty-five seconds.

  “What in the world did you say to Nicole?”

  “It wasn’t me,” Tilda said. “Jillian said it.”

  “Dirt, please?”

  “She just offered me a job.”

  Chapter 3

  First, let me make something clear: throughout the Fifties, naked did not mean nude, not in films, not in the pinup magazines, not even in the adult men’s magazines. It meant bare backs and bottoms, a lot of cleavage, and sometimes a partially exposed breast with an occasional nipple showing. And, as the public reaction to Jane Russell demonstrated, a large bosom was enough to incite imaginary nudity.

  —BETTIE PAGE RULES! BY JIM SILKE

  “WOULDN’T it be great, Tilda?” Cooper said. “We’d see each other every day! We could gossip and shop during lunch, and—”

  “You’re scaring me, Cooper. That’s almost exactly what I told Nicole.”

  “No wonder she looked like she was about to spew. Talk about having your worst nightmare come true!”

  “Being somebody else’s nightmare has always been a dream of mine.”

  They were walking up the sidewalk on Newbury Street, stepping over the piles of dirty snow left over from the previous week’s nor’easter. Knowing that she had to come to town to see Jillian, Tilda had scheduled an interview for that evening, and when Cooper heard who she was going to see, he volunteered to act as her photographer, just so he could come along. Normally he’d have been working late on a Monday—he had to get the copy for the next week’s issue finished by quitting time Tuesday—but he’d arranged to come in early the next day to make sure he made his deadline.

  “Why don’t we grab a cab?” Cooper asked the second time he nearly slipped on frozen slush.

  “Because we need the exercise,” Tilda said. “If you don’t want to go—”

  “Oh, no you don’t!” Cooper said. “Not after I missed the other intervi
ew you did with her—the one you didn’t even tell me about!”

  “Why would I take a gay man to see a former pinup queen? Jean-Paul might not mind you looking at other men, but women?”

  “Sandra Sechrest is different,” Cooper said reverently. “She’s a classic. It’ll be like meeting Bettie Page!”

  “That reminds me. Speaking of Bettie Page, don’t.”

  “Come again?”

  “Don’t mention Bettie Page. It’s a sore spot.”

  “Got it.” By then, they’d reached Massachusetts Avenue, and were heading toward the neighborhood where Sechrest lived. The sidewalk was clearer, but the January wind was considerably stronger. “Not that I’m complaining, but why are you interviewing her again? In fact, why did you interview her in the first place? I thought Jillian turned the story idea down.”

  “You guys keep forgetting that I do sell to other markets. The full interview was for a magazine for senior citizens with attitude, and shorter versions went to a men’s magazine that targets older men, a women’s studies journal, a nostalgia magazine, and a newsletter for amateur photographers.”

  “Nothing for the children’s market?”

  She ignored him. He knew as well as she did that the only way to stay afloat as a freelance entertainment reporter was to rewrite the same article for as many markets as possible. The number of pieces she’d sold about Sandra wasn’t even close to her record. “When I first interviewed Sandra, I told her how other former celebrities have been using the Internet to take advantage of their former fame, and back in November she and her niece put up a site to sell autographed pictures, T-shirts, and so forth. She’s doing really well with it, and today I’m talking to her about running a Web-based business so I can write a how-to piece.”

  “Is there a market for that?”

  “Yes, but not a high-paying one, which is why I don’t want to take a cab. The fare would eat up most of my profits.”

  “Just wait!” Cooper said with gleeful anticipation. “You won’t have to worry about rewriting every story umpteen times, or scrimping on expenses for very much longer. You’ll just have to write one story per topic. And you’ll have an expense account. Company plastic!”

  “Geez, Cooper, can we hold off on counting chickens? Jillian hasn’t exactly made a formal offer, and I don’t know that I’ll take it if she does.”

  “Jillian wouldn’t have said anything if she wasn’t serious! And why wouldn’t you take the job? No more scrounging for assignments, no more sending out query letters to every magazine in the known universe, no more pitching a dozen stories to get one lousy assignment.”

  “It’s not that bad!”

  “Oh yeah? Then why is it we’re not taking a cab?”

  There was no real answer to that, so Tilda didn’t bother to devise one as they continued their trudge.

  “We’ve got to go shopping,” Cooper said suddenly.

  “Why?”

  “You know how Jillian is about the clothes we wear in the office. If you can’t be high fashion, you at least need to be stylish.”

  “Thanks for the self-esteem.”

  “Let me rephrase that. You have amazing style, but it’s not exactly working-in-an-office style.”

  Tilda glanced at her reflection in the plate-glass window they were passing. She was currently wearing lace-up black Doc Marten boots and a thigh-length black parka, along with a red knit hat with rhinestone skulls to cover her black, curly hair with a matching scarf around her throat. The outfit concealed by her winter gear—a well-worn pair of black jeans and a dark purple tunic-length sweater—wasn’t exactly corporate wear either. And that was what she’d worn to a business meeting.

  “You may have a point,” she conceded.

  “Now if you put aside a bit of each paycheck to spend on clothes—”

  “Cheep, cheep, Cooper.”

  “No, don’t buy cheap—buy classic.”

  “I meant that you’re counting unhatched chicks again. Can we change the subject?”

  “Sorry. I’m just so excited for you.”

  Tilda was leaning toward excited, too, but she wasn’t sure if she was as excited as she should be. Sure, a steady paycheck and actual benefits had definite appeal. Then again, setting her own hours and picking her own stories was nothing to sneeze at, either, let alone spending most of her time in a Nicole-free environment. She was just as glad she didn’t have to make a decision right away.

  Finally they arrived at their destination, an elderly but well-maintained building in the South End. They stepped into the paneled entryway, and a few seconds after pushing the buzzer, a young woman already bundled up for outside came to the door to let them in.

  “Hi, Tilda,” she said.

  “How’s it going, Lil? Lil, this is my friend Cooper Christianson. He’s my photographer.” Actually, Cooper was no better with a camera than she was, and it was her camera anyway, but Tilda felt the excuse sounded more professional than, “He’s planning to dine out on the story of having met a real-life pinup queen for the next six months.”

  “Pleased to meet you, Cooper. Aunt Sandra’s waiting for you in her place. I hate to rush off, but I want to get back home before the snow starts.”

  “You’re in Bedford, right?”

  Lil nodded. “I don’t think my street has been decently plowed since the last snow, so I figured I better head home now or I’ll never make it.”

  “Good luck,” Tilda said, as the younger woman braced herself to step into the cold air.

  As she and Cooper walked down the hallway toward Sandra Sechrest’s apartment, Tilda said, “Lil has been handling the Web design and whatever coding Sandra needs. She does a good job, too.”

  The former pinup queen herself was waiting in the doorway. In her heyday, Sandra Sechrest had been known as Sandy Sea Chest and had specialized in nautical themes: skimpy sailor dresses, mermaid costumes, and revealing pirate outfits. These days, she usually wore some variation of her current ensemble: a mauve velour jogging suit that nobody would ever wear to jog in.

  “Tilda! Good to see you!” Though the sea chest for which she’d been famous was no longer so generously filled as it had been when she’d been a photographer’s model, her hair was the same color of red that had contrasted so nicely with the copious amount of fair skin she’d displayed in countless magazine spreads. Only her hands, badly twisted with arthritis, betrayed her true age.

  “Sandra, this is my friend Cooper Christianson. He’s a longtime admirer of your work.”

  “Work, she calls it. For years it was dirty pictures, but now I’ve got a body of work.” Sandra winked at Cooper. “It’s a shame I don’t have the body for the work anymore! Come on in, kids.”

  Like many older Boston dwellings, Sandra’s condo included oddities that revealed that it had started out life as part of a larger home but had subsequently been chopped up into bite-sized living spaces. Sometimes the unusual shapes that resulted were awkward, but fortunately for Sandra, her long, narrow stretch of rooms was just eccentric enough to be charming, especially with the clean-lined wooden furniture that kept it from looking cluttered, and a scattering of mirrors which provided the illusion of space.

  “Have a seat,” she said, and settled herself on the couch while Tilda and Cooper divested themselves of their coats, scarves, hats, and other cold-weather accessories.

  “How’s business?” Tilda asked as she sat next to Sandra, and pulled a pad out of the black leather satchel she used as both purse and briefcase.

  “Booming,” Sandra said with a big smile. “And I’m not just saying that for the article. We had to reorder T-shirts three times to meet the Christmas rush, and once more since then. Plus we’re selling eight-by-tens as fast as I can sign them.” She looked at her hands ruefully. “Which isn’t as fast as I’d like it to be. But I can’t complain. We’re doing great, and this is in a bad economy!”

  “That’s awesome,” Tilda said, and they got down to the formal part of the interview. H
er previous conversations with Sandra had been focused on the modeling itself, with a good dollop of gossip about sex to sweeten the pot. This story was about the nuts and bolts of running a Web business: getting eyeballs to the site and keeping them coming, taking advantage of search engines and eBay shops, and the use of PayPal. Of course, the fact that the product being sold was sex wouldn’t hurt this piece, either.

  Meanwhile, Cooper took shots of Sandra, the miniature brass and teak sea chest on her coffee table, and even the computer and scanner that Lil used to keep Sandra’s website up and running. Tilda would rather have had Lil there as well, but knew from earlier meetings that the Web designer was camera shy, which was ironic, given her aunt’s claim to fame. As for Sandra, the camera loved her as much as it ever had, and she had a knack for being able to keep the conversation going while still managing to present her best angles to Cooper’s lens.

  They were discussing the online community that had developed around her site’s bulletin board when Sandra said, “You wouldn’t believe the people who’ve come out of the woodwork since I started the site. I’ve gotten e-mail from models and photographers I hadn’t heard from in decades.”

  “Really?” Tilda said, eager to add more names to her database. Of course, it might not be worth the effort if she was going to take the job with Entertain Me!. Since Jillian had already turned down her pitch about pinup queens, she wouldn’t be able to try another for a while. Then she firmly reminded herself that nothing was definite yet. “Anybody I might have heard of?”

  “A few,” Sandra said. “I hoped some of them might want to join in on the business—more people means more attention on the Web, you know. But one found Jesus, and the others went into different lines of work, so they don’t want to make a big deal over their pictures.” She shrugged. “I’ve still got feelers out.”

  “Let me know if you find anybody who’d be interested in talking to me.”