Nights like the booze-soaked evening at Bublichki were rare, but not unique. There were times when the movie industry came together, and, not wanting to get on its bad side, invited the Breen Office’s staff, then largely ignored them. On nights like those, Marcus and Oliver publicly declared their love with three tugs of a shirt collar or three faked sneezes.
The night of the 1944 Academy Awards coincided with Marcus and Oliver’s first anniversary. Earlier that day, Oliver’s present had arrived in the mail: a pair of gold cufflinks, each one imbedded with three tiny emeralds. The note attached read, “Wear these tonight and meet me at the bar, 7:30.” Marcus was still hooking the links when he walked out of his bedroom; Doris was seated at his dining table in front of a Los Angeles Examiner.
“The Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals,” she read from the paper. “They sure sound like a riot, huh?”
Since the Alliance announced its formation a month before, the Examiner, in classic hysterical Hearst style, had ballyhooed the message pounded by the men behind its formation: Walt Disney, director Sam Wood, and MGM writer-producer James McGuiness, among others. They were convinced that Hollywood was infested with Communists and Fascists intent on perverting the movies “into an instrument for the dissemination of un-American ideas.”
Most of Hollywood—and certainly everybody at the Garden of Allah—dismissed their grousing as grumpy-old-men paranoia. But this morning, the paper reported that the Alliance had set their sights on the Hollywood Writers Mobilization. They viewed the HWM as dangerously influential because of the progressive sentiments its members were writing for the screen.
“Since when does progressive equal Communist?” Marcus moaned to Alla earlier that week. It was bad enough that Marcus was still toiling away uncredited on one MGM picture after another, but now he was a member of the organization the Alliance had in its sight. That made two strikes against him.
Doris stood up and straightened the lilac organza ball gown Gwendolyn had donated for the evening. She fingered the amethyst necklace Kathryn contributed. “Is this on straight?”
Kathryn let herself in, pulling Jim Taggert behind her. “Look who I found lingering outside.” Marcus had arranged for Taggert to be Doris’ date.
“I bought you a corsage,” Taggert confessed, “but I slipped on a champagne cork and now the cursed thing is floating in the pool.”
Doris bunched her hands together and confessed, “I do believe I’m starting to get quite nervous! Humphrey Bogart will be there tonight, won’t he?”
“He’s nominated for Casablanca, so you can bet he’ll be there,” Kathryn said. “I’ll introduce you to him if you like.”
Doris started to fan herself with her purse and made little noises that sounded like a giggle crossed with a gasp. Marcus fingered his new cufflinks. “Oh, baby, you ain’t seen nothing yet.”
* * *
On Academy Awards night, Grauman’s Chinese Theater was usually lit up brighter than the Fourth of July. But this was wartime, so the searchlights were in storage, the banquet was dispensed with, and the giddy excitement was noticeably subdued.
Marcus found a nook just outside the auditorium doors, where they watched Paulette Goddard, Mickey Rooney, Greer Garson, and Walter Pidgeon float past. He felt Doris’ grip tighten when Bogie and Mayo appeared.
The Battling Bogarts now dispensed with anything resembling an everything-is-peachy façade, and instead ignored each other as they picked their way through the crowd. Only Bogart was smiling as he graciously acknowledged a succession of well-wishers. He looked relieved when he spotted Kathryn. Marcus felt his sister tremble as Kathryn introduced her to Bogart. He could almost feel her memorizing every last detail for the benefit of her friends back home.
Marcus and Doris hadn’t talked about the folks yet. It was a conversation he’d wanted to avoid at first, but that was before he’d discovered that his pigtailed little sister had grown into an open and warm woman. Her small-town upbringing had left her naiveté untarnished, and yet she was far more astute than he’d anticipated. Now that her visit was drawing to an end, Marcus felt compelled to bring up the subject he’d most dreaded.
“I’m going to grab a quick drink at the bar,” he told her. “Why don’t you take a wander through the crowd? Gary Cooper’s bound to be around here someplace.” He was relieved when she nodded. “You have your ticket; I’ll meet you inside.”
He made his way to the bar through a crowd of servicemen the Hollywood Victory Committee had bussed in for the night. He smiled when he saw Oliver had lined up three dry martinis, each with three olives. They clinked their glasses three times.
Oliver said, “You have very good taste in cufflinks.”
Marcus extended his arm so the emeralds twinkled in the light of the crystal chandelier. “They’re my favorite.” He glanced down at a specific point below Oliver’s waist. “Are you comfortable?”
Marcus’ gift to Oliver was a pair of silk boxer shorts he’d found at Desmond’s department store. Against a background of alternating black and gray stripes, the number 3 was arranged in a pyramid formation. “Very comfortable, thank you for asking. I appreciate your interest.”
Oliver tapped a cigarette on the bar three times and lit up. “Your sister’s visit is coming to an end soon, isn’t it? Tomorrow, if I recall.”
They’d agreed it was best if Oliver kept his distance while Doris was in town. Marcus ached to feel Oliver’s arms around him again.
Marcus nodded. “Yep, yep, yep. The eleven o’clock bus.”
“Shall we say your place? Three o’clock?”
The lights in the packed foyer dimmed for a moment. Marcus bowed. “Enjoy your evening.”
“I expect to enjoy my afternoon more.”
* * *
After the ceremony, when Doris suggested they walk back to the Garden of Allah, Marcus was glad to hear Kathryn declare her heels were too high for a twenty-block walk. They left Taggert and Kathryn in the line for taxis and headed west along Hollywood Boulevard.
Marcus took his sister’s hand. “Was tonight everything you hoped?”
“Oh, Marcus!” Doris exclaimed. “When I came to Los Angeles, all I really wanted was to get to know you a bit. Yes, okay, and maybe look into job prospects with Lockheed, too. But I never dreamed I’d get to go to the Academy Awards. I can’t begin to thank you for tonight. I’ll never forget it as long as I live. Back home, nobody’ll believe it!”
“That does bring up something I wanted to ask you,” Marcus said.
“You mean about Lockheed? I don’t know why I thought things would be any different out here. The guy was very nice, showed me all around the plant. When I bought up the possibility of coming to work there, he was all for it. But the next thing out of his mouth was, ‘Until the end of the war.’” She shrugged. “I gave it a shot.”
Marcus was surprised at how sorry he felt. He’d gotten used to his sister’s bubbly laughter and spirited approach to life. They stopped at the La Brea Avenue corner.
“We haven’t had the conversation I was hoping we’d have,” he said evenly.
“You mean the one about the folks? How they are, and all that jazz?”
The lights turned green and they stepped off the curb. He nodded.
“Everybody’s fine. Conrad and Jessica and Betsy, they’re all out of the house with families of their own.” Marcus caught his breath at the mention of his three siblings: he hadn’t spoken their names in the seventeen years he’d been gone. “Pop still runs the show, so he and Mom rush around town playing Mr. and Mrs. Mayor. Banquets, meetings, you name it. Especially since the war. Mom’s on seven different committees and heads up four of them.”
Marcus could feel his hands clamming up and wished he wasn’t holding Doris’. “So,” he said with all the nonchalance he could summon, “do they ever mention me?”
When Doris spoke, her voice dropped a notch. “You’re the big family secret nobody talks about. I never knew h
ow to bring you up to the folks until that night at the movies when the credits for William Tell came up. I heard Mom give a little yip when she saw your name.”
“And Dad?”
“Nothing. I waited until we got home and brought it up with them. But Dad left the room before I even finished the question.”
“And Mom?”
“Mom just shook her head, like she was saying ‘Don’t even bother.’ That’s when I decided to write to you. I figured, Hey, you’re my brother. I’m entitled to contact you if I want.”
“I’m so glad you did.”
Doris let out a nervous giggle.
“So when you told them you were coming to LA . . . ?” Marcus prompted.
“They didn’t say anything. Maybe because I made out that it was really about a job with Lockheed.” She pondered what she’d said for a moment. “I don’t know about Dad, but I doubt I fooled Mom.”
They walked on in silence as the stores on Hollywood Boulevard gave way to houses and apartment blocks. Eventually, Marcus said, “And when you get home? Will you tell anyone you saw me?”
“Are you nuts?” She hit him playfully with her purse. It was snakeskin, dyed black to match her shoes, neither of which really went well with her dress, but it was the best she could do. “I have a brother who writes movies at MGM. He hobnobs with stars and took me to the Academy Awards. Look at what you’ve achieved, where you live, your wonderful friends. You think I’ll go home and not talk about that?”
“I meant are you going to mention all this to Mom and Dad?”
Doris stopped walking and looked into her brother’s eyes. “Why did you leave?” she asked, unblinking. “No warning, no goodbye?”
“What did Dad tell you?”
She parked her rear end on a low brick fence in front of a weather-beaten bungalow. “He said you’d decided it was time you went out into the world, like it was Pilgrim’s Progress.” She watched the traffic snaking along the boulevard.
It had been a while since Marcus thought of that night, but he could still picture the horrified look on his father’s face as he scrambled to pull up his pants. Seventeen years, and he could still hear the screaming and the cussing echo off the brick walls. He could still feel the outrage and disappointment radiating from his father as they sat in his car to the McKeesport railway station where Roland Adler silently bought his son a one-way ticket on the night train to Chicago.
“I always knew that McKeesport wasn’t for me,” he said. “I was made for big-city life.”
She somberly studied his face for a moment or two. “It sure has its charms.” She hooked her arm around his as she stood up, and pulled him farther westward. The night air was cooling noticeably and she pressed herself against him for warmth. “Who was that guy you were talking to at the bar before the show started?” He could smell the Miramar perfume Gwendolyn had lent her. “The one with the Ronald Colman moustache.”
He’d assumed she was too distracted by the crème de la crème to notice. “Remember that organization I told you about, the Hollywood Writers Mobilization? He belongs to that, too. Why do you ask?”
“Some guy came up and asked me about the two of you.”
“What guy?”
She shrugged. “Said he worked for the mayor.”
“Mayor of Los Angeles?” Fletcher Bowron rarely made an appearance at the Oscars. If he had, Marcus would have noticed. “What did this guy look like?”
“Kinda rough around the edges. Like he knows how to throw a punch. Talked like a New Yorker, but not some Park Avenue sophisticate.”
The man Doris described sounded like Eddie Mannix, assistant to Mayer. The skin across Marcus’ back felt taut and prickly. “Are you sure he didn’t say he worked for Mayer, as in Louis B. Mayer?”
“Maybe. At any rate, he caught me watching you from across the foyer. He came right up to me, complimented me on my dress. I told him I was your sister, and he asked if I knew who you were talking to.”
“What did you say?”
“I recognized him from the photos you’ve got stashed in the drawer where you keep your playing cards and poker chips.”
Marcus felt twitchy. “You saw those, huh?”
“I was looking for a pen to write some picture postcards. So I told this guy, he’s a pal of my brother’s.” She noticed Marcus had slowed his pace to a sluggish stroll. “Did I say something wrong?”
Marcus fingered the three emeralds on his new cufflinks and wondered if their cover story about the Mobilization was sturdy enough to withstand scrutiny—especially now that the Motion Picture Alliance had decided it was a den of dangerous progressives.
“Nah.”
He went to cross Fairfax Avenue and head down to Sunset when she pulled him back from the curb.
“What’s his name?” she asked.
Marcus swallowed hard. “Oliver.”
“He’s more than just some pal, huh?”
Her face had taken on that same intense, unblinking gaze Marcus had last seen on their father. He nodded silently, then found himself overcome with a sense of relief he hadn’t seen coming.
“So he’s your . . . I don’t even know what the right word is,” she confessed with a nervous laugh. “Beau seems too way-down-South-in-Dixie. Boyfriend, maybe?”
“I guess you could call him that.” It struck Marcus that the word boyfriend seemed too casual for what he and Oliver had.
“So, this Oliver guy, he makes you happy?”
Any idea that Marcus had about his sister being just a small-town girl evaporated at that moment. “Yes,” he said, “very happy.”
Doris jutted her chin out and gave her head a decisive nod. “That’s all I need to know.”
She squeezed his arm and pulled herself in closer for warmth. “Come on. It’s time we both went home.”
CHAPTER 31
When Bing Crosby walked to his microphone and said, “This one is for all our fellas on Utah and Omaha beaches,” the atmosphere in Studio D became electric. Every joke, song, and piece of business and patter was met with tidal waves of hope and joy.
Well before the end of the show, the audience was on its feet, hollering so rowdily that Bing had to wait a few moments before he could point to Ginger Rogers. Their duet of “There’ll Be A Hot Time In The Town Of Berlin” just about brought down the ceiling.
Kathryn had been on the radio for almost a year now, but she hadn’t been approached by strangers until she participated in the USO bond drive last winter. It first happened in Eugene, Oregon, and Kathryn was so flustered she broke the fan’s pen. Bogie and Judy Garland had laughed themselves silly. Fan mail started to arrive soon after; ironic, considering her first Hollywood job was answering Tallulah Bankhead’s fan mail. But nothing had prepared her for the surge of adrenaline fueled by tonight’s audience. She felt like she wouldn’t sleep for a week.
She was taking a minute to wind down in her dressing room when Sonny the NBC usher appeared. “Miss Massey, there’s someone in the foyer asking to see you.”
Kathryn looked at her watch. She was already late for Cole Porter’s birthday party. “Business or fan?”
“Definitely not business,” Sonny said, “but no sign of an autograph book.”
Kathryn checked the mirror. Her heart was still pumping, her cheeks were flushed.
“Oh, and Mr. Wilkerson said he’ll be waiting in his car around the corner on Argyle.”
Kathryn thanked Sonny and gave her hair a quick comb. She stepped back to check her dress: a calf-length hip-hugger in terracotta crêpe Georgette. Not quite formal enough for a party at Cole’s, but it would have to do.
The main foyer of NBC’s radio studios was a cavernous three-story atrium dominated by an enormous mural depicting a four-armed genie holding a portable radio that spit sparks in several directions.
The woman who stood by herself against one of the walls was instantly recognizable. Kathryn had met her only once, at her desk, two and a half years before. Her face was thinner
now, more drawn—like so many faces these days.
“Hello,” Kathryn said solemnly.
Roy’s wife interlaced her gloved fingers. “I have news to share with you.”
Kathryn took in the woman’s outfit. From pillbox hat to low-heeled Mary Janes, she was dressed all in black. Kathryn felt her breath grow shallow. She focused on the onyx brooch pinned to the woman’s jacket.
“Roy was at D-Day,” Mrs. Quinn said calmly. “He was part of the Western Task Force that landed on Omaha Beach.” Kathryn felt a cold sweat break out beneath her hair. “He wasn’t supposed to land, but things got crazy and he went ashore.”
“You’re wearing black.” Kathryn barely recognized her own voice. It sounded distant, unemotional.
“His body was identified two days later.”
A broken “Oh!” shuddered out of Kathryn.
“I’ll say this for them: they don’t waste any time sending that telegram.”
Kathryn dredged up the courage to meet Roy’s wife in the eye. She saw there only a steely determination. If she can get through this without crying, so can I. “Thank you. I—I want you to know how very much I appreciate you going out of your way.”
Mrs. Quinn made a vague shrug. “I like to think that this war has made us all a bit more compassionate. I realized if I didn’t tell you, perhaps nobody would.”
Kathryn heard footsteps echo on the terrazzo. “Miss Massey?” It was Sonny. “Mr. Wilkerson sent me to tell you he’s waiting.”
Mrs. Quinn turned to go.
Kathryn offered up her hand. “Thank you.”
The woman eyed it for a moment, weighing up whether or not to shake it, and decided against it. “Goodbye, Miss Massey,” she said, “and good luck.”
* * *
Kathryn slipped into the rear seat of her boss’ limo and prayed Wilkerson wasn’t in a chatty mood.
Searchlights and Shadows (Hollywood's Garden of Allah novels Book 4) Page 22
