“Somebody? You may as well know it, kid, Noel Airman is the end of the trail. I hope you marry him—of course you will, for better or worse, otherwise he’ll haunt you to your grave. They don’t come like Noel. Men, that is.”
“Now we come to the strange part. It’s a little hard to talk about.” She looked away from Marsha’s inquisitive eyes, out into the street. The table was near the window. Rain was showering down, breaking in little gray stars on the pavement. Since her infancy she had loved to watch those little leaping stars. “It’s a cloudburst, do you know? Happy day, Marjorie graduates—I think I might have refused to see him when he finally did phone again, Marsha, late in September, if not for all those dull dates. But it was such a blessed relief to hear his voice, an intelligent voice. He sounds intelligent, you know. So—I did it, I said all right, I’d meet him for a drink. We went on to dinner, naturally. And there were more dates, and—I don’t know, I hate getting clinical about these things—”
Marsha said, “Dear, I’m an old woman.”
Looking out at the dancing gray bubbles on the sidewalk, Marjorie said, “I didn’t enjoy kissing him any more. Or—or any of that, you know. It was like kissing Wally. That was five months ago, and it’s still more or less true. Now you know. That’s the gist of it. In every other way I still admire him and like him, in fact he fascinates me, I guess, but—the romancing, shall we say, just doesn’t work any more.”
“Not at all?” Marsha said, staring. “Never?”
“Well, to be honest—confession is good for the soul and so forth—a couple of times, when I’ve had a few drinks, there’s been a sort of glimmering. But so feeble, compared to what it used to be, that he just gets disgusted and quits. I don’t fight, you see, or anything. I just don’t care.”
“No response,” Marsha said.
“Exactly. No response.” Marjorie laughed self-consciously. “Could anything be queerer?”
“And how does he feel about you? Or say he feels?”
“Oh, him. Exactly as always or more so, he claims. Under the circumstances he’s been remarkably patient and kind. He talks about it a lot, of course.”
Marsha’s lips curved. “What’s his theory, dear?”
“Oh, very complicated. I’m a horrible emotional mess—Judaism, and sex guilt, and father-love, and mother-hate, and a desire to torture Seth, and all that, all tangled up in the background. What it all boils down to is that I still love him madly, but my uncle’s death was a horrible shock and brought out the guilt feelings and all the complications, and I’ve got a bad case of emotional paralysis or amnesia. There’s some name for it. He says the books are full of it, it’s the commonest thing in the world, and I’ll get over it. He’s just going to wait it out.”
“And then what? Marry you?”
Marjorie hesitated. “No, not necessarily.”
“What, then?”
“Oh, you can imagine, can’t you? When two people are in love the way we are, it’s too precious to be ignored or wasted—and so forth, and so on.”
Marsha lit a cigarette from a burning butt. “He hasn’t written any new songs lately, has he?”
“He’s done nothing since he left South Wind. Or virtually nothing. It’s absolutely incredible how lazy he can be, Marsha. It worries me. He’ll sleep eighteen hours at a stretch. He’ll go to one of these chess clubs and just play chess day after day. He’s a whiz. Then again he can do a staggering amount of work, staggering, in no time at all. During Christmas week, a producer named Alfred Kogel said he’d take an option on Noel’s musical comedy if he’d make certain changes. Well, in nine days Noel wrote a whole new show. So help me. Including a lot of new music, beautiful music. I mean, it’s the same basic idea—it’s a script called Princess Jones—but he improved it terrifically. I’m sure it’ll be produced some day, and it’ll make Noel. It’s brilliant. But it’s off the beaten track in every way, and—”
“What happened with Kogel? He’s a damn good producer.”
“It was heart-rending. Noel came to his office with the revised script, and found out Kogel had nearly died of a heart attack on New Year’s Eve, and has to stay in a sanatorium for a year. So, back he went to sleeping and chess. That’s what he’s still doing.”
Marsha shook her head. “Well, I can understand that. Nasty blow.” She sipped her cocktail, then stirred it for a long time, with her eyes on the moving stick. “But never fear, Golden Boy will recover. You can’t down a man like that. There are other producers, and he’ll write other shows. As for this emotional numbness of yours, why, it’s nothing, it’s bound to wear off. It’s the luckiest thing that could have happened, in a way. You’ve challenged the man to his soul. The one thing Noel does with both arms tied behind him is arouse women. He’ll wake you up again, or die trying. Male vanity. You’ve got him, baby. I foresee nothing but a happy ending for both of you. Orange blossoms, fame, fortune, and a huge house with a swimming pool in Beverly Hills.”
Marjorie couldn’t help smiling at Marsha’s unchanging glibness. “And what’s been happening with you, Marsha? Good Lord, you just let me talk on and on about myself.”
“Honey, you’re the interesting one. What can happen to me? I’d love to meet a guy. I’ve done everything I can, you see—starved myself to death for a year, and so forth—”
“You look stunning now.”
With a wry smile Marsha said, “It was really my mother’s fault, you know, the old exotic effect. Russian intelligentsia’s idea of high fashion. Gawd. By the way, she has a fur coat now. A beautiful Persian lamb. She really looks grand in it. When she flounces into Town Hall in that coat, you’d swear she was Wanda Landowska. I bought my father some decent clothes, too—” Marjorie’s eyes wandered to the damp squirrel coat on a rack by the table, which Marsha had worn years ago to The Mikado rehearsals. Marsha followed her look and quickly said, “Hell, what’s a coat? Something to wear in the cold and the wet. It’s just that my mom had built up this fur-coat idea in her mind. Wanted one for ten years, ever since her old one fell to rags. But what with my dad’s brilliant operations in the Street—Don’t you worry, kid, I’ll have a mink one of these days, and so will Mama, but first things first. Had to get some decent furniture for the apartment—I’ve bought everything on time, and heaven knows I’m in hock up to my eyebrows, but I’m a fanatic on prompt payments, baby. You wouldn’t know me. I think it was the money that split you and me, as much as anything. I never forgot it.”
“Oh, Marsha, I swear I never thought about it—”
“You thought plenty.” Marsha drank. “My folks talk about you all the time, you know. And I—well, I’ve never stopped thinking about you. You’re one of the household gods. You just flashed through, like a rocket on the way up—you see, you’re so pretty, and fortunate, and so damned respectable. My folks have wanted to be respectable since they got off the boat, and they’ve never made it. Until now. But they’re respectable, kid, you wouldn’t know them. Petty bourgeois, pure and simple, sitting in the sun in the park—they’ll be spending their winters in Florida in another year or two, I’ll see to that. They’ve never had much. But at least they’ve got me, by God, now that I’m a big girl.”
Marjorie said in a subdued tone, “You’re worth ten of me, Marsha. I’m still a burden to my parents.”
“Oh, Prince Charming will relieve them pretty soon. Or if not, you’ll be raking in the dough on Broadway. That little red carpet is going to go right on unrolling in front of you, sweetie.” She laughed. “I’ll give you one teeny bit of advice, though. If you promise not to sock me.”
“Go ahead.”
“Well, it’s nothing much. Just this—if Noel ever does corner you in that Bank Street love nest of his one evening, with a mad gleam in his eye, don’t bite and scratch too hard or too long, will you? He’s not used to such struggling—Oh, come, don’t look so cross-eyed at me. What do you think it is, a fate worse than death? Take a poll among your graduating class ten years from now, sugar bun,
about their marriages, and find out how many of them clinched the deal by giving out a few free samples—if you can get them to tell the truth—Okay, here I go again, the corrupter of youth. Welladay. Pay no attention to me.”
“I don’t,” Marjorie said. “I never did, really, and I never will.” She shook her head, smiling.
“Stick to your ideas, sweetheart,” Marsha said, putting on her coat. “Lord knows mine have got me exactly nowhere, though I don’t think they’re the reason. We’ll compare notes when we’re old and gray and see who came nearer the mark.” As they walked to the front of the restaurant she added, “But let’s not wait till then to see each other again. This has been fun.” The change from stagnant steam-heated air to cold wet wind made Marjorie sneeze. They hesitated outside the door, shrinking from the rain, buttoning their coats. Marsha said, “Me for the bus. You?”
“Oh, it’s graduation day. I’ll take a cab.”
Marsha looked into her eyes. “Do you have fun, Margie? Do you have many friends?”
“Not to speak of. Noel, mostly. You know how that is.”
“Sure.” Marsha held out her hand. “We had some wonderful times, didn’t we? This was like the old days. Happy graduation, Marjorie Morningstar.”
Marsha ran off into the rain toward the bus stop. It was the old clumsy run; hips swaying, heels kicking outward.
Chapter 22. GUY FLAMM
Marjorie kept waiting for Noel to telephone all evening. She tried to seem gay and grateful during the elaborate dinner her mother had prepared to celebrate her graduation, but her mind was so far away that Seth finally said, “Your ear is going to fall off, Margie.”
“Eh?”
“The one that’s stretching toward the telephone.”
The parents guffawed, and she turned a little red. Seth sat imperturbably enjoying the success of his joke. He was fifteen, six feet tall, with huge dangling bony hands, and an absurdly smooth childish face topping his lanky frame. He was president of his class, his marks were good, and he held a number of school honors and posts. He was enormously favored by fourteen- and fifteen-year-old girls, painted children wobbling on high heels in too-mature dresses. It was hard for Marjorie to realize that they were the same age she had been at the start of the great dim George era.
Marjorie was not much annoyed by Seth’s gibe. Noel was an old story by now in the family; the time of surreptitious dates in the Forty-second Street library was long past. It had ended abruptly one night in October when she had said, for the third time in a week, “Well, I have to go down to the library again,” and her mother had answered, “Look, call up that book and tell him to come here for a change. I like him.” Mrs. Morgenstern was unfailingly cordial to Noel, though the father was inclined to short formal growls with him. Noel avoided coming to the Morgenstern apartment as much as he could. He said it was nobody’s fault, but he felt trapped there.
Mr. Morgenstern said, rubbing his eyes, “It seems to me we ought to do something tonight. Go to a show—”
“Thanks, Papa, but I think maybe I’ll turn in,” Marjorie said. “Get up bright and early to face the cruel world.”
“Are you really going to look for an acting job?” the mother said.
“I’m going to get one.”
Mrs. Morgenstern said, “Well, to me it’s like fishing for nickels in subway gratings. A crazy way to make a living, but you’ll be out in the open air a lot. Listen, it’s your life. Good luck to you.”
Mr. Morgenstern said through an immense yawn, “She was fine in that school play. Maybe she’ll surprise us all.”
Marjorie was lounging in a housecoat on her bed, reading a lending-library novel, when there was a tap at her door. “Are you dressed?”
“Come in.”
Seth wore a loud gray tweed overcoat with the collar turned up, and a new red-and-yellow tie. His blond hair gleamed wetly. “Well, I just wanted to say congratulations and all that, from me to you personally.”
“Thanks, Seth.”
“Sorry I missed the commencement. I’d have liked to see you in a cap and gown. Bet you looked silly.”
“Idiotic.”
“How does it feel, Marge? To be out of school, all finished and done with it?”
Marjorie paused. “Well, it’s a great relief. But also a little empty.”
“I think I’d be scared. I don’t want to finish school.”
“You’ll change your mind about that. Of course right now you love it. You’re king of the school. And all your little dates seem so precious and fascinating—”
“Oh well, so far as that goes—” Looking at his moving shoe, he said, “Not that you’re any great shakes, but I’ve never come across a girl anywhere near you. Shows you how sad the female half of the human race is.”
Marjorie went to him and kissed his cheek. It still felt queer to look up to her towering baby brother. “Thanks, despite the reservations.”
Briefly, and with astonishing rough force, he hugged her, and let her go. “Margie, all the luck in the world. I think—well, hell—I’m sorry I kidded you about Noel—he’s all right, I guess.” Seth went out in a stumbling tangle of arms, legs, and tweed.
Guy Flamm’s office was in a narrow old building in the West Forties, between two theatres. It was a thrill just to read his name on the grimy directory board. Once again she felt in her purse for the letter; then she rang for the elevator, hands perspiring and stomach fluttery.
She opened the glass door marked in gold leaf Guy Flamm Enterprises with a feeling of stepping into the future.
A fat girl with greasy hair and thick greenish glasses sat inside, boxed between an old switchboard, an older filing cabinet, and a card table piled high with scripts bound in many colors. “Yes?” she said in an offended tone, sipping coffee from a paper cup, and biting a semicircle out of a bun.
“I’d like to see Mr. Flamm.”
“What about?”
“An acting job.”
“No.”
“I beg your pardon?”
The girl chewed the bun for a few seconds. “He’s not casting.”
“I have an appointment.”
“Well, say so then. Name?”
“Marjorie Morningstar.”
“Wait.” The girl announced the name into the switchboard, and after a pause repeated, “Wait.” She resumed reading a script in her lap, peering and frowning through the greenish glasses.
Marjorie stood awkwardly in the middle of the little anteroom, uncomfortably warm in her beaver coat, but unwilling to take it off. Half of the effect of the new red dress lay in unveiling it; she wanted Guy Flamm to see that effect. There was a chair behind her heaped with scripts. “Miss, do you mind if I use this chair?”
“Yes.”
“Eh?”
“Don’t use it. I’ve got those scripts in a certain order.”
So Marjorie stood there in silence. It was eerie to be in a space the size of two telephone booths with another human being and not to exchange a word. She kept shifting from foot to foot. Ten minutes drifted by. Marjorie was working up her nerve to protest, when the switchboard buzzed. “Go on in,” the girl said, jerking her thumb over her shoulder.
The first noticeable feature of Guy Flamm was a pair of popping eyes, one of which was red and streaming. He held a handkerchief to it. He stood up behind his desk, a red-faced little man with thick well-groomed white hair, a trim white mustache, a tan tweed jacket, a shirt with faint green lines in it, and a green bow tie. “Come in, come in, my dear.” He gestured at a chair. Marjorie couldn’t help wondering what he had been doing while she had waited. The office was absolutely empty except for a desk, two chairs, and Guy Flamm. No telephone calls had gone through the switchboard. There was nothing on the desk but an ashtray containing two dead cigars and some ashes. On a shelf over Flamm’s head was a row of play volumes which looked as though they had been undisturbed for some years. “Well, well, so you’re Dora Kimble’s favorite pupil. And you’re going to set Broa
dway on fire. Sit down, sit down.”
Marjorie took the letter out of her purse and handed it to him. “Miss Kimble’s been awfully sweet to me.”
“Wonderful girl, Dora. Never cut out for show business, but—” Mr. Flamm glanced at the letter, mopping his bad eye. “You’ve done Eliza in Pygmalion, eh? Quite a challenge. Staged it yourself! Interesting.” He looked at her kindly. “That’s a very pretty coat. Not many young actresses can afford a coat like that. Aren’t you hot in it, though?”
Marjorie nodded and took off the coat. Since Mr. Flamm’s eyes popped anyway, she could not be sure of the impact of the red dress. She thought the eyes popped a bit more. “Marjorie Morningstar, eh? Very euphonious. Is that your real name, dear?”
“No. It’s Morgenstern.”
“Ah. Jewish?”
“Why—yes.”
Flamm nodded and mopped his eyes. “My first wife was Jewish. Lovely person. Where do you live?”
Marjorie told him.
“Ah. With your parents?”
“Yes.”
“What does your father do?”
“He’s an importer.” Puzzlement crept into her tone.
Flamm smiled. “There’s method in my madness, dear. I’m watching everything you do and say. You’d be surprised how you’ve characterized yourself already.” He fell silent, staring at her. “Interesting.” He reached to the shelf, took down a book, blew the dust off it, and held it out to Marjorie. “Are you a trouper? Right now, let’s hear Julie Cavendish’s big speech in The Royal Family.”
Startled, Marjorie said, “Give me a couple of minutes.”
“All the time you want.” Flamm smoked and mopped his eye.
She read over the scene; stood, book in hand, collected herself, and burst forth into the speech. Flamm’s eyes seemed to bulge further, and he stopped mopping. He began to nod, slowly at first, then more emphatically.
When she sat, trembling, he nodded for a long time, his eyes on her. “My dear, this is a little too good to be true. Girls just don’t walk out of college and read lines like that.” He stood and turned his back to her, looking out of the window at a brick wall. He whirled, smiling. “Look, I’m sorry, I should be more self-controlled, at my age. It’s a one-in-a-billion shot. I’ve been looking for a Clarice for eight months, and you’ve walked into my office, straight from Hunter and poor little old Dora Kimble. It’s incredible, but—” He yanked open his top drawer and flung a script bound in red on his desk. “If you can read Clarice the way you read Julie… Mind, it’s not the lead. It’s one smash scene in the second act. I’ve had every girl in town read Clarice—What’s the matter, dear?”