“We’re not going to Arthur Summers’ studio just yet,” Carol said. “I’m taking you to Brooks’.”
“What would that be?”
“Just how you thought you were going to get on in this household without at least a dinner jacket is beyond me. I’m going to get you outfitted.”
Cain was angry. “Now listen, sister, I agreed to accept voice lessons from your mother. That’s strictly business. But I am not being kept!”
“That’s what you think,” said Carol.
A chauffeur appeared in the doorway. “The car is ready, Miss.”
“Come on, you,” said Carol, and marched out the door,
Cain looked at Edgar Stoddard. The old man laughed soundlessly. “Keep your left well out in front of you,” he said, “or you’re liable to get clipped!”
Still angry, Cain sank down in the back seat of the Packard and was reminded of the soft embrace of a feather bed. Carol’s cigarette was only a glowing stub now. She tossed it out the window. “Brooks’, George,” she said to the chauffeur.
“Let’s get this straight,” said Cain. “I am not going to … ”
“Mr. Cain,” said Carol, “you have signed up to play on this ball team and I’m very much afraid you’ll have to wear the uniform whether you like it or not. This dinner coat is just so that Emily won’t faint when she sees you at the table tonight.” Again the appraising look. “Fortunately, with those shoulders, you won’t need any special tailoring.”
“You wouldn’t like to look over my teeth so you could guess at my age, would you?”
“The only thing that concerns me,” said Carol, “is how fast I can get you housebroken.”
Cain loved a fight and suddenly he saw this encounter with Carol in terms of conflict rather than as an affront to his self-respect. He laughed.
“What’s so comic?” Carol asked.
“I was just wondering if I should do it now,” Cain said.
“Do what?”
“Follow out a suggestion of your father’s.”
A half frown crossed her face. “I don’t know what Edgar’s been saying to you, Mr. Cain, but it might be a good idea if you and I understood each other from the start. My father is, to put it kindly, an eccentric. Not that I blame him entirely. Emily has enough energy to swamp tougher specimens than he is. But it is a little trying to have a father who has given over his life to polishing harness for imaginary horses.”
“It’s better than drink or chorus girls,” said Cain.
“That’s a matter of opinion,” Carol said. She took another cigarette from her case. “Anyway he’s no problem if you let him alone. Emily’s different. You’re not the first pet poodle she’s introduced into the household, Mr. Cain. We’ve had painters, Hindu swamis, male ballet dancers, and singers. Mostly singers, because Emily believes Arthur Summers is a genius. By the way, have you any voice at all?”
“It’s loud,” Cain said.
“At least you’re frank about it. Emily’s passion is to direct other people’s lives. That would be all right if she didn’t leave me the dirty work … like now. I want you to know that I’m not tagging around with you out of choice and you’ll be doing me a favor if you’re not too difficult about it.”
“If you’re tired of it all, why don’t you run away or get married or something?” Cain said.
“Don’t tell me you’re psychic, Mr. Cain!”
***
The next forty-five minutes left Cain breathless. In the course of it he realized that this wasn’t Carol’s first experience in the business of buying men’s clothes. Undoubtedly the swamis and ballet dancers had also been on the disreputable side.
A floor-walker hurried forward as they entered the store.
“Good afternoon, Miss Stoddard.”
“Hello, Mr. Werfel. Another guinea pig. Dinner jacket … the works. Socks, shoes, shirts, studs, collars, ties.”
“And a good scrubbing behind the ears,” said Cain.
Mr. Werfel was not amused.
“I think you won’t have much trouble fitting Mr. Cain out of stock,” Carol went on. “We must have these things by seven tonight. Tomorrow you can send over a half-dozen suits on approval.”
“Yes, Miss Stoddard. This way.” There was a subtle change of inflection in the last two words.
Cain’s coat was taken away from him by Mr. Werfel who put it down on a distant chair as if he were afraid of germs. Cain was whisked in and out of dinner jackets while Carol watched with a critical eye, smoking one cigarette after another. At last Mr. Werfel found a jacket that suited him. Next Cain was fitted to shoes. He was questioned about collar sizes.
“I want a red ribbon to wear across my shirt front,” Cain said.
Mr. Werfel explained that only a Knight of the Legion was entitled to wear a red ribbon.
“Don’t you think I deserve some kind of decoration after this?” Cain asked.
“Really!” said Mr. Werfel.
Carol crushed out what Cain estimated was her eleventh cigarette. “Come on, wise guy,” she said wearily.
Chapter Two
1
Arthur Summers’ studio in Carnegie Hall was a duplex affair laid out with a bedroom, bath, and small sitting room upstairs; and downstairs the reception room, busy as the Grand Central Station most of the day, a kitchenette, and the big studio room where Summers did his teaching.
The first impression Cain had, after tagging along the dim stone-flagged corridor after Carol, was of brightness. There were no outside windows in the reception room, but indirect lighting and pale furniture gave an illusion of air, and space. Summers had had the walls paneled, but the mellow wood was completely hidden by hundreds of photographs, many of them vaguely familiar to Cain. All the people Summers had worked with in opera, stage, and radio were there on the walls, extravagant expressions of affection and gratitude scrawled across the bottoms of their pictures.
Behind an old maple desk in one corner of the room sat a girl. She was striking looking in a dark, oriental sort of way. Perched on the desk by her was a handsome man, slightly gray at the temples. His double-breasted suit was well padded at the shoulders and his starched shirt and polka-dot tie things of perfection. He glanced at Cain and Carol, one eyebrow elevated.
“The lamb to the slaughter,” he said. “But this time what a robust lamb.”
“Hello, Robert. Hello, Margo,” Carol said. “Mr. Cain … Miss Reed and Mr. Royce.”
Margo Reed looked at Cain and smiled. Somehow he felt that in that brief instant she knew all about him and would make no mistakes. “Hello, Cain,” she said.
There were two other men in the room. One of them sat in a chair by the door to the main studio. He was a huge, hairy, barrel-chested fellow. His eyes were half closed and he was swaying from side to side as if in great pain.
“Mr. Cain, this is Mr. Dmitri Rosokov, the famous Russian basso,” Margo Reed said.
“Hallo,” said Rosokov, without opening his eyes. His voice had the quality of the base note on a pipe organ.
“And this is Beany,” Margo said. “Or, rather, Mr. Virgil Cook … Mr. Cain.”
Virgil Cook said nothing. He was occupied. A pair of horn-rimmed spectacles lay beside him on a table and he was now intent on following the slow revolutions of a pencil in front of his eyes. Presently he put down the pencil and closed his eyes tight.
“Exactly thirty seconds,” he said, when he opened them again. “I’ve gotten so I can time it perfectly. Did you say something, Margo?”
“This is Mr. Cain, Beany.”
“Oh,” said Beany. Then he saw Carol. “Oh! Mrs. Stoddard’s new protégé.”
“Thanks for the elegant title,” said Cain. “I’ve been called almost everything else today.”
“Well, I’ve delivered him,” said Carol. “Now I’ll leave him to you. Dinner’s at seven-thirty, Mr. Cain. You won’t forget to turn up?”
“I won’t forget,” said Cain. “But maybe you ought to send out a St. Ber
nard to guide me home safely.”
“Wait a minute, Carol,” Royce said. “I’m going out, myself. How’s Bill, by the way?”
“Bill is fine,” Carol said.
Royce picked up a hat and stick. He held out his hand to Cain. “If Emily’s picked a winner this time, old man, perhaps you and I will be seeing something of each other. I’m a concert manager, you know.”
“I didn’t know,” said Cain, “and it will be a long time if ever.”
“Oh, Mr. Summers has made many a silk purse out of a sow’s, ear,” said Virgil Cook. Then he clapped a hand over his mouth. “Really, Mr. Cain, I didn’t mean that to sound as crude as it must have.
“Well, be seeing you,” said Robert Royce hastily. He took Carol’s arm and they went out together.
Cain glanced at Margo Reed and found her smiling at him. “You’re wrong, Cain,” she said. “Robert isn’t my dish.”
Cain was startled to realize that she had read his mind.
“Robert finds all women quite irresistible,” Margo said.
“And he pinches,” said Virgil Cook, replacing his spectacles. “If you are going to do your shopping, Margo, I wish you’d hurry.” He looked at Cain. “I am writing a book about Mr. Summers’ life and methods of teaching but they never give me a chance to be at it. Mr. Summers is too busy to talk except at odd moments and I am always having to substitute for Margo or run errands. It’s quite distressing.”
“It’s a conspiracy, Beany,” Margo said, getting up from behind her desk. “We don’t want you to finish the book. We want you to stay here forever and ever.”
Rosokov opened his eyes. “What is this ‘Beany?’” he asked. He had a thick Russian accent. “In this country everybody is crazy. If your name is George, they are calling you Butch or Mac! My name is Dmitri so they are calling me Trotsky at the Opera House. Please somebody explaining!”
“It is very simple, Mr. Rosokov,” Beany said. “There are certain types of minds that have to concern themselves with a kind of vulgar humor. I don’t happen to be built like a professional football player, as Mr. Cain is. And I am not the handsome lounge lizard type, as Bill Brackett is. So, because my stomach is not as flat as a board, Brackett thought it was extremely funny to call me Bean-belly.”
“Who is Brackett?” Cain asked Margo, who was putting on a hat in front of a wall mirror.
“The light of Carol’s life,” she said. “Surely you’ve heard of Bill Brackett, Mr. Cain?”
“No dice,” said Cain.
“The voice that made people forget Bing Crosby,” she said. “The darling of café society. The maestro of the Tinsel Club band.”
“And a complete stinker,” said Beany with emphasis.
Margo was ready to go. “I’m sorry to leave you to Beany’s tender mercies, Cain, but we’ll be seeing a lot of you. Mr. Summers is expecting you as soon as he finishes this lesson.”
“Thanks,” said Cain, “and so long.”
Beany Cook walked over and sat down behind Margo’s desk. He was evidently not inclined toward conversation. He picked up a Vogue and began to thumb through it. Through the closed door of the main studio Cain could hear Summers talking earnestly to some pupil. Then the pupil started vocalizing. He had a pleasant tenor voice.
“Radio, radio, radio!” Rosokov exploded. “Everybody is singing in a whisper so they don’t breaking the machinery. The voices all sound like the piccolo. No wind … no bellows!” He beat his huge chest. “That’s why the opera is smelling!”
“The opera always smelled for my money,” said Cain.
“Phooey!” Rosokov’s indignation was rising. “There was good singers once and there are good singers now. But where are they? Like me. Understudies! Singing in the ensemble! Since Gatti the opera is run like a music school at a college. Edward Johnson! What does he know about opera?”
“He can’t know much,” said Beany Cook acidly, and without looking up from his patterns. “He’s only been in it thirty years.”
“John Erskine!” Rosokov was shouting now. “He should sticking to Adam and Eve and forgetting about music.”
A buzzer sounded over the desk and Beany got up and went in to Summers. He came back with a smug look on his face.
“Mr. Summers says to please be quiet, Rosokov. He can’t hear himself think.”
Rosokov’s chest swelled, but he spoke in a stage whisper. “You see, I am drowning out these bathroom tenors even when I am speaking in a natural voice. No power. Like piccolos!”
At this point an apparition materialized at the outer studio door. It was a woman. A losing fight against age was indicated on her wrinkled face by a brilliant lipstick, much rouge, and plucked eyebrows. She wore an India-print dress and was literally weighted down with bracelets, rings, necklaces, and small tinkling bangles.
“Rosokov!” she said. “I have worked out your chart. You simply mustn’t give that audition today. Things will not be sympathetic for you until Friday.”
Rosokov grunted.
Beany looked up with an air of distaste. “Hello, Naomi,” he said. “This is Mr. Cain, Emily Stoddard’s latest … Mrs. Naomi Wilder.”
Mrs. Wilder’s eyes narrowed. “When were you born?” she demanded of Cain.
“Nineteen-ten,” he said.
“Day and month … and hour, if possible!”
“August tenth,” said Cain. “I don’t know the hour.”
“Find out if you can,” said Mrs. Wilder in a business-like tone. “Then drop up to see me. My studio’s on the floor above, right next to Robert Royce’s office. I’ll tell you whether this venture holds any promise for you.”
“Good afternoon, Naomi,” said a pleasant deep voice.
Cain turned and saw a man of medium height with slightly stooped shoulders standing in the door of the main studio. He wore a dark gray business suit and there was nothing at all arty about him. The deep lines in his face suggested good humor and patience. His cropped mustache and hair were black, except for a white plume running straight back from the center of his forehead.
“And if you don’t mind, Naomi,” he continued, still pleasantly, “I will be the one to decide whether Mr. Cain’s talents are worth working with.”
“Really, Arthur, it’s too bad of you!” said Mrs. Wilder. “When you see how the stars and the numbers invariably foretell coming events … ”
“And if you’re going to sing for Grew this afternoon, Dmitri, you’d better get over there,” Summers said.
“But he simply mustn’t give an audition today!” Mrs. Wilder protested.
“He must if he wants the job,” said Summers smoothly. “Won’t you come in, Mr. Cain?”
2
Sunlight filled the studio. One corner of it was occupied by a grand piano, stacked high with music. There were no photographs here; only a portrait in oils of Summers himself and a monstrous still life which Cain figured must have been painted by someone in the last stages of acute alcoholism.
The furniture was eighteenth century mahogany; excellent-examples, especially a highboy and a Hepplewhite secretary. The desk was open, every available pigeonhole stuffed with letters and papers. Summers followed Cain’s glance.
“I never throw anything away,” he said. “Once a year Margo cleans it out for me and we find that I have been treasuring nothing whatever of importance.”
“My mother never threw away string or boxes,” said Cain, “… just in case.”
Summers sat down on the piano bench. “Before we talk at all, Mr. Cain, suppose I hear you sing.”
“I haven’t any music,” Cain said, “and I ought to warn you I’m just a bar-room baritone. This wasn’t my idea, you know.”
“You probably know some of the old chestnuts,” said Summers. “Mandalay? Danny Deaver? Duna?”
“I could take a crack at Mandalay,” Cain said, “if you have the music there to play from.”
Summers smiled. It was a sort of one-sided smile. “My dear fellow, I must have played it not less t
han ten thousand times during my teaching career.” He struck a chord.
A sudden nervousness overtook Cain. He stood awkwardly by the side of the piano, clearing his throat.
“Take it easy,” Summers said. “Walk up and down. If you’d do any better with a glass in your hand …”
Cain relaxed. “Let’s go,” he said, “and remember the women and children get first shot at the life-boats.”
He sang the first verse and chorus. Summers didn’t look up from the piano keys as he played. Cain skipped to the third verse, giving it a highly melodramatic treatment.
“Ship me somewheres east of Suez,
Where the best is like the worst … ”
Then he really gave out on the final chorus.
“ … and the dawn comes up like thunder
Out of CHI-NA ’cross the bay.”
Summers sat for a minute, hands resting on the edge of the piano. Finally he swung about, “Play baseball, Mr. Cain?”
“I used to,” Cain said.
“Then you’ll know what I mean when I say you’re like a pitcher with all the stuff in the world and no control. You have the physical equipment to be a singer. Your voice has color and it’s true. But right now it’s God awful!”
“I was afraid of that,” said Cain. “Well, thanks for listenin’.”
“There are a couple of things that you and I should get straight, Mr. Cain. I’m not a chiseler. Emily Stoddard sent you here and she’s a very rich woman. If you had no talent at all, I could give you lessons for a year at considerable profit to myself. I don’t happen to be made that way. If I thought you were hopeless, I’d say ‘Sorry. Goodbye.’ ”
“That’s fair enough,” said Cain.
“I’m not saying that to you, Mr. Cain. You have the raw materials out of which a voice can be made. You haven’t too many bad habits to unlearn. But can you take it?”
“Take what?”
“Mr. Cain, over the years hundreds upon hundreds of people come in here with pleasant voices and a certain amount of ambition. The reasons they don’t make good are lack of intelligence and the inability to stand the gaff. Singing is hard work; hard physical work. After your first few lessons you’ll think somebody has been doing a tap dance on your stomach muscles. You’ll have to keep in the same kind of trim as a fighter. You’ll have to devote hours to practice; you’ll have to learn to read music and languages; you’ll have to gain poise and assurance. It won’t happen over night, Mr. Cain.”
I'll Sing at Your Funeral Page 2
