“Reckless Hearts” is a work of historical fiction, using well-known historical and public figures. All incidents and dialogue are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Where real-life historical or public figures appear, the situations, incidents, and dialogues concerning those persons are entirely fictional and are not intended to change the entirely fictional nature of the work. In all other respects, any resemblance to persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.
A Dell Ebook Original
Copyright © 2016 by Melanie Hauser
Excerpt from The Swans of Fifth Avenue by Melanie Benjamin copyright © 2016 by Melanie Hauser
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Dell, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.
DELL and the HOUSE colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.
This book contains an excerpt from the forthcoming book The Swans of Fifth Avenue by Melanie Benjamin. This excerpt has been set for this edition only and may not reflect the final content of the forthcoming edition.
eBook ISBN 9780425284537
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Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Reckless Hearts
By Melanie Benjamin
About the Author
Excerpt from The Swans of Fifth Avenue
SPAIN, 1959
It had started out being a marvelous evening, as most evenings with Papa tended to be. He was at his best then, especially if he’d done a good day’s work. Mornings with Papa were pure hell; late afternoons, he hadn’t had enough to drink yet to be charming. Late nights were bad, too, because the drink had soaked him until only his tongue remained sharp and lethal.
But tonight, he’d been in good form, and Slim knew it was because of Betty’s presence. “I have to meet him,” Betty had begged her, when Slim told her that Papa was in Málaga, too. Betty was there to film a movie; Papa was there to watch the bullfights. Slim was there because she had nowhere else to be.
“Christ, I’ve starred in movies of his, and I’ve never yet met Hemingway? Slim, we have to see him!”
So Slim, despite some misgivings, had arranged it. She didn’t know how Papa would behave, frankly. She hadn’t seen him in more than a year, and the last couple of times, well—they hadn’t lived up to the expectation she always carried when it came to him.
Slim Hawks Hayward first met Ernest Hemingway back in 1939, when she was just twenty-two, before she was married to Howard Hawks but when she was unofficially living with him. Papa was in the midst of divorcing his second wife for his third, but was quite alone when she and Howard arrived in Key West. Except for his two youngest sons.
Slim was—charmed. More than charmed. Overwhelmed. Back in Hollywood, she was used to men who were larger than life; men who seemed to be lit by an inner glow so that their teeth were whiter, their eyes more luminous than those of mere mortals. Men who were so vivid and boldly drawn that they looked at home only on a giant silver screen—men like Clark Gable, Gary Cooper, John Wayne. So Slim was no starstruck bobby-soxer.
But when she saw Ernest Hemingway striding out the front door of his home in Key West, she was struck dumb. He wasn’t simply lit from within; he’d harnessed the sun itself, hauled it down from the sky with those enormous hands, swallowed it so that it sat squarely in that barrel chest, molten rays radiating out of every pore.
He reared to a halt when he saw her, as well. His brown eyes narrowed, and a slow grin spread over his entire face. “Well, well, Howard,” he’d said softly, admiringly. “She lives up to the advertising.”
And from that moment on, theirs was a slow, simmering flirtation. Not of the flesh—at least, not on Slim’s part. As rugged and as virile as Papa was then—he was forty—there was about his flesh something not quite clean. He always had dirt beneath his bitten-off fingernails; he had a tendency to wear the same clothes for days on end. Being a fastidious person herself, Slim required the same in others.
Papa’s feelings for Slim, however—well. That was another story. An entire anthology of them.
“Call him, Slim,” Betty urged her. “Say we’re coming over for dinner.”
Slim knew that she could; she knew that Papa would always come running to her. It was a fact of her life, a gift, albeit one she didn’t take out and unwrap frequently. She knew that Papa was best in short doses; she understood that their flirtation survived only because they didn’t see each other very often.
She also understood that he would fall immediately for Betty Bacall, because she was exactly his type of woman, which is to say, she was very like Slim, only younger. Tall, slender, tawny, no-nonsense. A real broad who could drink like a man. And, of course, she was Hollywood royalty, and no matter how Papa might protest that he hated Hollywood, he was just as starstruck as anyone.
But Slim liked to tell herself she wasn’t the kind of woman who was jealous of other women; that was what men loved about her, in fact. She liked to believe that she was without envy or vanity. So she grinned and arranged for them all to meet at a restaurant for dinner.
And it had started out marvelously. Wine flowed, food was passed around, conversation sparkled. Papa took Betty’s hand in his at one point and told her, with that intense light in his eyes that never failed to pin you down like a butterfly specimen, how much he’d admired her behavior during Bogie’s final illness, how brave she was, how singularly noble. And Betty, who rarely spoke of it, nodded once and kept hold of Papa’s great mitt of a hand for several minutes, as if it were a prize or a trophy, better than any Academy Award.
But Slim noticed how, down at the far end of the table, where Papa usually banished her, Mary Hemingway’s little eyes grew even smaller, boring a hole into those two twined hands, one so elegant and white, the other brown and weathered, just like the pigskin of a football. Betty and Papa didn’t notice; they were too busy laughing, their heads bent together.
“You should come on safari with us,” Papa bellowed, his voice intended for everyone in the restaurant—hell, everyone in Málaga, everyone in Spain—but his eyes for only Betty. “Right, Miss Mary?” For the first time this evening, he addressed his wife. “Wouldn’t it be an adventure?”
“I’d love to,” Betty purred in her throaty, intimate voice that once told Humphrey Bogart how to whistle—You just put your lips together and blow. “I’d absolutely love to. I’ve wanted to go back ever since the African Queen shoot.”
“Huston’s a hack.” Papa grinned, showing those hungry white teeth. “I’ll show you the real Africa.”
And that was when Mary Hemingway rose, and Slim held her breath, both afraid and eager to see what was going to happen next. “Betty,” Slim whispered into her friend’s ear. “Watch out.”
“What?” Betty glanced up, her face luminous, her eyes sparkling, just as Mary marched over to her, her two hands extended in fists.
Papa’s wife glared down at one of the most famous actresses in the world. “Choose,” she hissed, and Slim noticed that Mary had taken the rare trouble to put lipstick on, but she’d done it badly; her mouth was smeared, there was a blob of red on her front teeth. Other than the lipstick, she looked unkempt as usual, with an untucked white blouse, limp and wrinkled, over gray slacks and huarache
s. A woman unapologetically in her early fifties, beyond caring what other people thought of her, including her husband.
“Choose?” Betty looked bewildered at the two fists thrust before her.
“Choose. Left or right.”
“Okay,” Betty said gaily, thinking it was a game. “I’ll choose left.”
Mary smiled and opened her left hand. In it was a bullet, polished and sparkling even in the dim candlelight.
“This is for anyone who tries to take my man,” she growled, dropping the bullet squarely onto Betty’s plate, right in the middle of the paella. “One bullet. That’s all it takes.” Then she stalked back to her own seat, her chin high, her skin flushed.
The evening wasn’t so marvelous after that.
“I can’t believe she did such a thing,” Betty said to Slim later that night, after they were back in their hotel suite, lounging on chairs, a bottle of red wine open. They weren’t even bothering with glasses; they passed the bottle between swigs.
“I can,” Slim said with a dry laugh.
“Why didn’t you warn me?”
“I wanted you to have the whole Hemingway experience. Him and Her. It’s quite the show, isn’t it?”
“I’ll say.” Betty bobbed her head up and down; her silky honey-brown hair tickled her razor-sharp cheekbones. “Is he always such a flirt?”
“Papa has to flirt. He has to have one woman in his bag and another in his sights. The big-game hunter—you know how he is.”
“It’s a bit much.”
“You know, Truman has an idea about him.” Slim took a good long tug on the wine bottle and passed it to Betty.
“Truman?”
“Capote. You know, the writer? He’s becoming quite the little gadabout back home. I love him dearly.”
“What’s his idea about Papa?”
“That he’s a queer. Papa, that is—of course Truman is. And shouldn’t he know, then? He says the macho stuff, the hunting, the bloodlust—Truman insists it’s all compensation. I don’t know, though.”
“I don’t see it. Hemingway is all man! He certainly acted that way tonight, anyway. And you said he’s always had a thing for you!”
“I know. And Mary hates it—you think she was crazy to you? She threatened to kill me. Many times. And the last time I was in Cuba…” Slim shook her head, lost in thought.
“Tell me,” Betty purred, curling her feet beneath her, resting her head on her hands. “I’m in the mood for a bedtime story.” She yawned.
“I’m not the storyteller,” Slim protested. “I’m no Hemingway. Or Capote!”
“Your life is a fascinating, fabulous novel, Miss Slimsky,” Betty murmured, calling Slim by the pet name that Papa had given her that first meeting, so long ago. Twenty years ago. Slim sighed, looking down at her puffy ankles; she patted her extra chin. Then she laughed bitterly. No longer did she live up to her advertising.
But then again, neither did Papa.
“Read from it,” Betty continued. “Tell me a story from the book of Slim.”
Slim put the bottle down on a table. She lit up a cigarette and reached over to switch off a lamp so that only the irregular streetlights of this tiny part of Spain below their window illuminated the two women, each lonely in her own way. A year after Bogie’s death, Betty Bacall was still a grieving widow trying to fill the emptiness with work. Slim Hayward suspected she was about to be a grieving divorcée, for her husband kept finding excuses not to join her on this trip. And rumors from home, concerning a certain Pamela Churchill, were reaching her ears, courtesy of her dear friend Truman Capote.
So why not tell Betty a story? Why not recall that she, Slim, was still a desirable woman, even if her husband didn’t seem to share that opinion? That she was, in fact, so desirable that Ernest Hemingway’s wife genuinely wanted her dead? Why not pull out that gift tonight, unwrap it and peek inside and take comfort in the memory of inspiring a great man to juvenile, puerile behavior?
“All right,” Slim said. And then she told Betty—
The Story of Miss Slimsky and the Sea
It was back when Leland, my dear, devoted husband who can’t seem to remember to return my calls, was producing the film of The Old Man and the Sea. Did you know I was one of the first people to read it? If not the first? Papa wasn’t sure if it should be published. He thought it was going to be part of something bigger, another novel—his Big Novel, he still calls it, even if I haven’t seen any evidence. But then he wrote this lengthy short story, really, about this old fisherman, and he couldn’t make it work with the novel in his head. But he couldn’t let it go, either. So he sent it to me, wanting my opinion.
Leland was very impressed by that, I remember. That Papa would trust me. That was back when Leland was still capable of being astonished by me.
Well, of course, I thought the story was brilliant. I told Papa he should publish it, and look what happened. He won the Pulitzer! And Leland snapped up the movie rights.
(“It wasn’t a very good movie,” Betty interrupted sleepily. “Spencer Tracy in a boat for an hour and a half! What were they thinking?”)
(“Money. Writers are always thinking about money—don’t let them tell you otherwise,” Slim answered.)
Anyway, right from the start there were problems. Peter Viertel was going to write the screenplay and he went down to Cuba, to the Finca, Papa’s house, to work on it with him. Papa’s not great with screenplays, to tell the truth. But he likes to be involved. And then there were all sorts of production issues—Papa utterly detested the idea of using fake fish, and of course you can’t make a movie about the sea without having to use props! There aren’t many fish trainers out there. You can’t take close-ups in an ocean. You have to use a tank sometimes.
So Leland, up to his ears in producing that movie about Lindbergh, and knowing that it wasn’t going so well down in Cuba, sent me there to shape things up. He knows how Papa feels about me, and thought that would be to our advantage. He thought Papa would straighten up and cooperate, and that Peter would finish the script. So I went.
Have you ever been to Cuba?
(Betty shook her head.)
It really is lovely. It’s what Key West used to be, before the tourists took over. Wilder, though—more bugs, bigger trees and vegetation. The Finca, is just like you’d imagine. About fifteen miles out of the city, Havana. Animal trophies on every wall, bearskin rugs, leopard-fur blankets, mixed with chairs of English chintz. Ceiling fans everywhere, to stir the air, but even so, by mid-afternoon the air is so dripping with humidity that all you can do is lie in a chair and drink his famous daiquiris, until it’s time to dress and hike up to the Hotel Floridita for more drinks. And there, in his favorite bar, you are treated to the sight of Papa really turning it on for the tourists. He does what I call the Full Hemingway—arm wrestling, drinking everyone under the table, telling his stories, snarling at all the men, flirting with all the women. Mary’s an appendage, stuck in the background; he pays no attention to her at all whenever anyone else is around. Sometimes I do understand her rage. She’s just so wrong for Papa. Now, Martha Gellhorn—she was a peach! Literally, peachy skin, hair, luminous eyes, and so smart, so sophisticated. But she couldn’t put up with Papa’s act, his need for a geisha to take care of him, run his life, worship him, wait on him hand and foot. Near the end of the war, Martha told him she was getting the hell out, and by then, apparently, he’d already bedded Mary. She was a war correspondent, too—the only thing she had in common with Martha. Papa and Mary met in England, right before the invasion.
Anyway, Mary. She hates Papa and she loves Papa, just like all his women. But unlike the others—Pauline Pfeiffer, Martha Gellhorn, who both came from wealth—Mary really has no place to go, no resources other than what he parcels out. So she’s stuck with him, which explains a lot.
I called them up at the Finca and said I’m coming down, and Papa’s voice was just like honey on the phone, dripping with desire. And all the while I knew Mary was rig
ht in the room, listening to him go on and on about his Miss Slimsky, how he’ll take good care of me, how he’s missed me, dreamed of me, et cetera. Other times, I admit, I’ve fallen for it, hook, line, and sinker. I’ve needed it, that treatment, especially from him—only from him. But this time, I don’t know—it wasn’t Papa I was looking for, this time. But still, I was flattered. I couldn’t wait to see the look in his eyes, the way he is when he first sees me, after time apart. It’s like I’m the Mona Lisa and he’s viewing it for the first time. He does have that way.
(“I know,” Betty murmured. “I felt it tonight.”)
But when I got there, it was Peter I realized I wanted. Peter Viertel—you know, he’s such a playboy. And he’s young and muscled and gorgeous—and Papa is anything but. So I arrived at the Finca, took one look at Peter—and he took one look at me—and we said good-bye to Papa and Mary, and went off to a hotel in Havana for the weekend.
Well.
I should have known, of course. I should have anticipated how this would affect Papa. And maybe I did—maybe I wanted to make him jealous, I don’t know. Christ, all I know is that I needed a good roll in the hay, after taking care of Leland and his kids for so long, just a glorified housekeeper and nanny. I needed to stop thinking, stop worrying, stop planning—I was thirty-eight and felt like I’d been a hausfrau forever. I needed to just be. It was a glorious weekend; we never left our room, but when it was over, it was over.
Peter and I returned to the Finca, where he took one look at Papa and beat it back to Havana, while I was given the guesthouse. And a great many searching, furious glares.
Of course, there was still the matter of the script despite all this drama, and so I had to placate both men. Peter would come to the Finca during the day and work with Papa, while I did the usual things I do when I’m down there—soak up the sun, try to talk to Mary, who is the world’s dullest woman, but still. That’s all part of the game, of course—cultivate the wife. In the late afternoon, I’d join the men and we’d discuss the script, what they’d written that day, and then we’d all head over to the Floridita for dinner. Mary has no interest in food at all; she doesn’t even know what to do with a cook, how to order food, all that. So they take most of their meals at the Floridita.
Reckless Hearts (Short Story): A Story of Slim Hawks and Ernest Hemingway (Kindle Single) Page 1
