Big Money

  When Margo came back from getting her wraps she found Mr. Hardbein waiting for her in the vestibule. He bowed as he squeezed her hand. “Well, I don’t mind telling you, Miss Dowling, that you made a sensation. The girls are all asking what you use to dye your hair with.” A laugh rumbled down into his broad vest. “Would you come by my office? We might have a bite of lunch and talk things over a bit.” Margo gave a little shudder. “It’s sweet of you, Mr. Hardbein, but I never go to offices . . . I don’t understand business. . . . You call us up, won’t you?”

  When she got out to the colonial porch there was Rodney Cathcart sitting beside Margolies in the long white car. Margo grinned and got in between them as cool as if she’d expected to find Rodney Cathcart there all the while. The car drove off. Nobody said anything. She couldn’t tell where they were going, the avenues of palms and the strings of streetlamps all looked alike. They stopped at a big restaurant. “I thought we’d better have a little snack. . . . You didn’t eat anything all evening,” Margolies said, giving her hand a squeeze as he helped her out of the car. “That’s the berries,” said Rodney Cathcart who’d hopped out first. “This dawncing makes a guy beastly ’ungry.”

  The headwaiter bowed almost to the ground and led them through the restaurant full of eyes to a table that had been reserved for them on the edge of the dancefloor. Margolies ate shreddedwheat biscuits and milk, Rodney Cathcart ate a steak and Margo took on the end of her fork a few pieces of a lobsterpatty. “A blighter needs a drink after that,” grumbled Rodney Cathcart, pushing back his plate after polishing off the last fried potato. Margolies raised two fingers. “Here it is forbidden. . . . How silly we are in this country. . . . How silly they are.” He rolled his eyes towards Margo. She caught a wink in time to make it just a twitch of the eyelid and gave him that slow stopped smile he’d made such a fuss over at Palm Springs. Margolies got to his feet. “Come, Margo darling . . . I have something to show you.” As she and Rodney Cathcart followed him out across the red carpet she could feel ripples of excitement go through the people in the restaurant the way she’d felt it when she went places in Miami after Charley Anderson had been killed.

  Margolies drove them to a big creamcolored apartmenthouse. They went up in an elevator. He opened a door with a latchkey and ushered them in. “This” he said, “is my little bachelor flat.”

  It was a big dark room with a balcony at the end hung with embroideries. The walls were covered with all kinds of oilpaintings each lit by a little overhead light of its own. There were oriental rugs piled one on the other on the floor and couches round the walls covered with zebra and lion skins. “Oh, what a wonderful place,” said Margo. Margolies turned to her, smiling. “A bit baronial, eh? The sort of thing you’re accustomed to see in the castle of a Castilian grandee.” “Absolutely,” said Margo. Rodney Cathcart lay down full length on one of the couches. “Say, Sam old top,” he said, “have you got any of that good Canadian ale? ’Ow about a little Guinness in it?”

  Margolies went out into a pantry and the swinging door closed behind him. Margo roamed around looking at the brightcolored pictures and the shelves of wriggling Chinese figures. It made her feel spooky.

  “Oh, I say,” Rodney Cathcart called from the couch. “Come over here, Margo. . . . I like you. . . . You’ve got to call me Si. . . . My friends call me that. It’s more American.” “All right by me” said Margo, sauntering towards the couch. Rodney Cathcart put out his hand. “Put it there, pal,” he said. When she put her hand in his he grabbed it and tried to pull her towards him on the couch. “Wouldn’t you like to kiss me, Margo?” He had a terrific grip. She could feel how strong he was.

  Margolies came back with a tray with bottles and glasses and set it on an ebony stand near the couch. “This is where I do my work,” he said. “Genius is helpless without the proper environment. . . . Sit there.” He pointed to the couch where Cathcart was lying. “I shot that lion myself. . . . Excuse me a moment.” He went up the stairs to the balcony and a light went on up there. Then a door closed and the light was cut off. The only light in the room was over the pictures. Rodney Cathcart sat up on the edge of the couch. “For crissake, sister, drink something. . . .” Margo started to titter. “All right, Si, you can give me a spot of gin,” she said and sat down beside him on the couch.

  He was attractive. She found herself letting him kiss her but right away his hand was working up her leg and she had to get up and walk over to the other side of the room to look at the pictures again. “Oh, don’t be silly,” he sighed, letting himself drop back on the couch.

  There was no sound from upstairs. Margo began to get the jeebies wondering what Margolies was doing up there. She went back to the couch to get herself another spot of gin and Rodney Cathcart jumped up all of a sudden and put his arms around her from behind and bit her ear. “Quit that caveman stuff” she said, standing still. She didn’t want to wrestle with him for fear he’d muss her dress. “That’s me,” he whispered in her ear. “I find you most exciting.”

  Margolies was standing in front of them with some papers in his hand. Margo wondered how long he’d been there. Rodney Cathcart let himself drop back on the couch and closed his eyes. “Now sit down, Margo darling,” Margolies was saying in an even voice. “I want to tell you a story. See if it awakens anything in you.” Margo felt herself flushing. Behind her Rodney Cathcart was giving long deep breaths as if he were asleep.

  “You are tired of the giddy whirl of the European capitals,” Margolies was saying. “You are the daughter of an old armyofficer. Your mother is dead. You go everywhere, dances, dinners, affairs. Proposals are made for your hand. Your father is a French or perhaps a Spanish general. His country calls him. He is to be sent to Africa to repel the barbarous Moors. He wants to leave you in a convent but you insist on going with him. You are following this?”

  “Oh, yes,” said Margo eagerly. “She’d stow away on the ship to go with him to the war.”

  “On the same boat there’s a young American collegeboy who has run away to join the foreign legion. We’ll get the reason later. That’ll be your friend Si. You meet. . . . Everything is lovely between you. Your father is very ill. By this time you are in a mud fort besieged by natives, howling bloodthirsty savages. Si breaks through the blockade to get the medicine necessary to save your father’s life. . . . On his return he’s arrested as a deserter. You rush to Tangier to get the American consul to intervene. Your father’s life is saved. You ride back just in time to beat the firingsquad. Si is an American citizen and is decorated. The general kisses him on both cheeks and hands his lovely daughter over into his strong arms. . . . I don’t want you to talk about this now. . . . Let it settle deep into your mind. Of course it’s only a rudimentary sketch. The story is nonsense but it affords the director certain opportunities. I can see you risking all, reputation, life itself to save the man you love. Now I’ll take you home. . . . Look, Si’s asleep. He’s just an animal, a brute blond beast.”

  When Margolies put her wrap around her he let his hands rest for a moment on her shoulders. “There’s another thing I want you to let sink into your heart . . . not your intelligence . . . your heart. . . . Don’t answer me now. Talk it over with your charming companion. A little later, when we have this picture done I want you to marry me. I am free. Years ago in another world I had a wife as men have wives but we agreed to misunderstand and went our ways. Now I shall be too busy. You have no conception of the intense detailed work involved. When I am directing a picture I can think of nothing else, but when the creative labor is over, in three months’ time perhaps, I want you to marry me. . . . Don’t reply now.”

  They didn’t say anything as he sat beside her on the way home to Santa Monica driving slowly through the thick white clammy morning mist. When the car drove up to her door she leaned over and tapped him on the cheek. “Sam,” she said, “you’ve given me the loveliest evening.”

  Agnes was all of a twitter about where she’d been so late. She was walki
ng around in her dressinggown and had the lights on all over the house. “I had a vague brooding feeling after you’d left, Margie. So I called up Madame Esther to ask her what she thought. She had a message for me from Frank. You know she said last time he was trying to break through unfortunate influences.” “Oh, Agnes, what did it say?” “It said success is in your grasp, be firm. Oh, Margie, you’ve just got to marry him. . . . That’s what Frank’s been trying to tell us.” “Jiminy crickets,” said Margo, falling on her bed when she got upstairs, “I’m all in. Be a darling and hang up my clothes for me, Agnes.”

  Margo was too excited to sleep. The room was too light. She kept seeing the light red through her eyelids. She must get her sleep. She’d look a sight if she didn’t get her sleep. She called to Agnes to bring her an aspirin.

  Agnes propped her up in bed with one hand and gave her the glass of water to wash the aspirin down with the other; it was like when she’d been a little girl and Agnes used to give her medicine when she was sick. Then suddenly she was dreaming that she was just finishing the Everybody’s Doing It number and the pink cave of faces was roaring with applause and she ran off into the wings where Frank Mandeville was waiting for her in his black cloak with his arms stretched wide open, and she ran into his arms and the cloak closed about her and she was down with the cloak choking her and he was on top of her clawing at her dress and past his shoulder she could see Tony laughing, Tony all in white with a white beret and a diamond golfclub on his stock jumping up and down and clapping. It must have been her yelling that brought Agnes. No, Agnes was telling her something. She sat up in bed shuddering. Agnes was all in a fluster. “Oh, it’s dreadful. Tony’s down there. He insists on seeing you, Margie. He’s been reading in the papers. You know it’s all over the papers about how you are starring with Rodney Cathcart in Mr. Margolies’ next picture. Tony’s wild. He says he’s your husband and he ought to attend to your business for you. He says he’s got a legal right.” “The little rat,” said Margo. “Bring him up here. . . . What time is it?” She jumped out of bed and ran to the dressingtable to fix her face. When she heard them coming up the stairs she pulled on her pink lace bedjacket and jumped back into bed. She was very sleepy when Tony came in the room. “What’s the trouble, Tony?” she said.

  “I’m starving and here you are making three thousand a week. . . . Yesterday Max and I had no money for dinner. We are going to be put out of our apartment. By rights everything you make is mine. . . . I’ve been too soft . . . I’ve let myself be cheated.”

  Margo yawned. “We’re not in Cuba, dearie.” She sat up in bed. “Look here, Tony, let’s part friends. The contract isn’t signed yet. Suppose when it is we fix you up a little so that you and your friend can go and start your polo school in Havana. The trouble with you is you’re homesick.”

  “Wouldn’t that be wonderful,” chimed in Agnes. “Cuba would be just the place . . . with all the tourists going down there and everything.”

  Tony drew himself up stiffly. “Margo, we are Christians. We believe. We know that the church forbids divorce. . . . Agnes she doesn’t understand.”

  “I’m a lot better Christian than you are . . . you know that you . . .” began Agnes shrilly.

  “Now, Agnes, we can’t argue about religion before breakfast.” Margo sat up and drew her knees up to her chin underneath the covers. “Agnes and I believe that Mary Baker Eddy taught the truth, see, Tony. Sit down here, Tony. . . . You’re getting too fat, Tony, the boys won’t like you if you lose your girlish figure. . . . Look here, you and me we’ve seen each other through some tough times.” He sat on the bed and lit a cigarette. She stroked the spiky black hair off his forehead. “You’re not going to try to gum the game when I’ve got the biggest break I ever had in my life.”

  “I been a louse. I’m no good,” Tony said. “How about a thousand a month? That’s only a third of what you make. You’ll just waste it. Women don’t need money.”

  “Like hell they don’t. You know it costs money to make money in this business.”

  “All right . . . make it five hundred. I don’t understand the figures, you know that. You know I’m only a child.”

  “Well, I don’t either. You and Agnes go downstairs and talk it over while I get a bath and get dressed. I’ve got a dressmaker coming and I’ve got to have my hair done. I’ve got about a hundred appointments this afternoon. . . . Goodboy, Tony.” She patted him on the cheek and he went away with Agnes meek as a lamb.

  When Agnes came upstairs again after Margo had had her bath, she said crossly, “Margie, we ought to have divorced Tony long ago. This German who’s got hold of him is a bad egg. You know how Mr. Hays feels about scandals.”

  “I know I’ve been a damn fool.”

  “I’ve got to ask Frank about this. I’ve got an appointment with Madame Esther this afternoon. Frank might tell us the name of a reliable lawyer.”

  “We can’t go to Vardaman. He’s Mr. Hardbein’s lawyer and Sam’s lawyer too. A girl sure is a fool ever to put anything in writing.”

  The phone rang. It was Mr. Hardbein calling up about the contract. Margo sent Agnes down to the office to talk to him. All afternoon, standing there in front of the long pierglass while the dressmaker fussed around her with her mouth full of pins she was worrying about what to do. When Sam came around at five to see the new dresses her hair was still in the dryer. “How attractive you look with your head in that thing,” Sam said, “and the lacy negligee and the little triangle of Brussels lace between your knees. . . . I shall remember it. I have total recall, I never forget anything I’ve seen. That is the secret of visual imagination.”

  When Agnes came back for her in the Rolls she had trouble getting away from Sam. He wanted to take them wherever they were going in his own car. “You must have no secrets from me, Margo darling,” he said gently. “You will see I understand everything . . . everything. . . . I know you better than you know yourself. That’s why I know I can direct you. I have studied every plane of your face and of your beautiful little girlish soul so full of desire. . . . Nothing you do can surprise or shock me.”

  “That’s good,” said Margo.

  He went away sore.

  “Oh, Margie, you oughtn’t to treat Mr. Margolies like that,” whined Agnes.

  “I can do without him better than he can do without me,” said Margo. “He’s got to have a new star. They say he’s pretty near on the skids anyway.” “Mr. Hardbein says that’s just because he’s fired his publicityman,” said Agnes.

  It was late when they got started. Madame Esther’s house was way downtown in a dilapidated part of Los Angeles. They had the chauffeur let them out two blocks from the house and walked to it down an alley between dusty bungalow courts like the places they’d lived in when they first came out to the coast years ago. Margo nudged Agnes. “Remind you of anything?” Agnes turned to her, frowning. “We must only remember the pleasant beautiful things, Margie.”

  Madame Esther’s house was a big old frame house with wide porches and cracked shingle roofs. The blinds were drawn on all the grimy windows. Agnes knocked at a little groundglass door in back. A thin spinsterish woman with grey bobbed hair opened it immediately. “You are late,” she whispered. “Madame’s in a state. They don’t like to be kept waiting. It’ll be difficult to break the chain.” “Has she had anything from Frank?” whispered Agnes. “He’s very angry. I’m afraid he won’t answer again. . . . Give me your hand.”

  The woman took Agnes’s hand and Agnes took Margo’s hand and they went in single file down a dark passageway that had only a small red bulb burning in it, and through a door into a completely dark room that was full of people breathing and shuffling.

  “I thought it was going to be private,” whispered Margo. “Shush,” hissed Agnes in her ear. When her eyes got accustomed to the darkness she could see Madame Esther’s big puffy face swaying across a huge round table and faint blurs of other faces around it. They made way for Agnes and Margo and Margo found her
self sitting down with somebody’s wet damp hand clasped in hers. On the table in front of Madame Esther were a lot of little pads of white paper. Everything was quiet except for Agnes’s heavy breathing next to her.

  It seemed hours before anything happened. Then Margo saw that Madame Esther’s eyes were open but all she could see was the whites. A deep baritone voice was coming out of her lips talking a language she didn’t understand. Somebody in the ring answered in the same language, evidently putting questions. “That’s Sidi Hassan the Hindu,” whispered Agnes. “He’s given some splendid tips on the stockmarket.”

  “Silence,” yelled Madame Esther in a shrill woman’s voice that almost scared Margo out of her wits. “Frank is waiting. No, he has been called away. He left a message that all would be well. He left a message that tomorrow he would impart the information the parties desired and that his little girl must on no account take any step without consulting her darling Agnes.”

  Agnes burst into hysterical sobs and a hand tapped Margo on the shoulder. The same greyhaired woman led them to the back door again. She had some smellingsalts that she made Agnes sniff. Before she opened the groundglass door she said, “That’ll be fifty dollars, please. Twentyfive dollars each. . . . And Madame says that the beautiful girl must not come any more, it might be dangerous for her, we are surrounded by hostile influences. But Mrs. Mandeville must come and get the messages. Nothing can harm her, Madame says, because she has the heart of a child.”

  As they stepped out into the dark alley to find that it was already night and the lights were on everywhere Margo pulled her fur up round her face so that nobody could recognize her.

  “You see, Margie” Agnes said as they settled back into the deep seat of the old Rolls, “everything is going to be all right, with dear Frank watching over us. He means that you must go ahead and marry Mr. Margolies right away.” “Well, I suppose it’s no worse than signing a threeyear contract,” said Margo. She told the chauffeur to drive as fast as he could because Sam was taking her to an opening at Grauman’s that night.