by Lee René
With that, she rushed off.
Ida called me to the publicity department the next week. I moved through the massive chamber, past the drone of worker bees, to Ida’s office.
“Mitzi, my little pearl, have you heard the news? You and Chick Hagan are now the uncrowned prince and princess of Regal Pictures. David sat down at a Moviola with one of the negative cutters and whittled out a dandy flick. Adding a couple of songs and a bit of comedy did the trick. The public will flock to it. Look at these. Aren’t they fabulous?”
My publicity stills covered her desk, me in the infamous torn camisole, me posed on a chaise in a ripped slip. Me, draped in a fox stole and nothing else. Me, lounging on a polar bear rug in my scanties. Some would call them tawdry and salacious, but if a girl could look glamorous half-naked, I did.
Everything was aces—that is, until…
Ida placed a motherly arm around my shoulder. “Kid, I have to talk to you. There’s been a bit of unsavory gossip about Chick’s behavior in Carlisle.”
Aha! Someone must have spilled the beans about the “Turkish” cigarettes. Still, marijuana was legal, after all, so there shouldn’t be a problem.
Ida’s demeanor suddenly changed from jolly to grave. “Mitzi, I’ve got to give it to you straight. Chick may be dashing, but he’s not the fellow for you. We can’t have an innocent undone by a rogue.”
Not her too. Was everyone against me being with Chick? She took my hands in hers. “I’m afraid Ben is concerned, Mitzi dear.”
I wanted to run out of the room screaming, Stay out of it. It’s my life!
She continued the lecture. “Ben has taken a fatherly interest in you and doesn’t want to see you compromised in any way.”
“Some father. He didn’t seem concerned about me walking around his studio half naked.” Once again my future with Chick dissolved before my eyes. “Tell Mr. Roth not to worry. Chick would never give me a tumble.”
Ida fiddled with her cigarette holder. “Not according to the grapevine. The guy has expressed, shall we say, an earthy interest in you.”
“He has? Honest?”
Her expression told me that my response didn’t thrill her. “Watch your step, Mitzi. I know you think I’m an old fuddy-duddy and I don’t know a thing about love, but I do. I assure you, you’d rather hear it from me than from Ben.”
“Ida, Mr. Roth doesn’t own me.”
“Oh, yes, he does. You belong to him, body and soul. He’s a benign master, and you could do a lot worse, but remember, you are the property of Regal Pictures.”
Time to take a powder. “I have to go, Ida.”
I had made it halfway out the door when she called out to me. “Mitzi, while you were in Carlisle, a British fellow phoned here from the Hotel Hollywood. He said they found an envelope addressed to a ‘Miss Vanderbilt.’ The guy didn’t know where to locate you until he recognized you from the screen. He assured my secretary you’d be interested.”
****
My heart raced like crazy when I reached the Red Car tracks. A British fellow phoned from the Hotel Hollywood, and I’d discover what old Clyde had found. A trolley heading east toward Hollywood stopped, but before I climbed on board, I heard a horn honking.
“Mitzi, get in.”
David sat behind the wheel of his Cadillac. From the way he scowled at me when I slid next to him, you’d think I’d done something wrong. “Dollface, what are you doing on the streetcar?”
Golly, he could be obtuse. “I always take the streetcar. That’s how I get around.”
He looked at me as if I had three heads. “You have an auto, don’t you?”
Honestly, someone needed to set the guy straight. “Yes, I do. It’s called the Red Car, it’s on a track, and the chauffeur rings the bell, ‘ding, ding.’ I ride it like everybody else in Los Angeles.”
He shook his head. “Well, that won’t do, not for an up-and-comer like you. You need a snappy little roadster that will turn heads. You know how to drive, don’t you?”
David would bring up a sore spot. “Yes, of course I can drive. Well, sort of. I learned on one of those old tin lizzies, the kind you have to crank up. I almost broke my wrist starting the engine. But, if you must know, I haven’t mastered the art of shifting and talking at the same time.”
He snorted. I saw a hint of a smile and didn’t like it. “If you’re going to laugh at me, drop me off at the next corner, please.”
The smile disappeared. “No laughing, I promise. I’d be honored to take you wherever you want to go.”
Since he already knew about Uncle Baron, I gave him the lowdown on our way to Hollywood Boulevard. “Well, I’m heading to the Hotel Hollywood. Uncle Baron once lived there. When Leah and I first came to Los Angeles, I went there looking for information.”
“I’m impressed, Miss Schector. In addition to being a great singer, musician, and actress, you’re also a regular Nancy Drew.”
He may have been able to talk and drive at the same time, a real talent as far as I was concerned, but I found his Nancy Drew analogy exasperating. “Thank you for comparing me to a girl sleuth in a children’s book, Mr. Stein. It might interest you to know I’ve read all of Conan Doyle, and I know a thing or two about deductive reasoning.”
Not even a flicker of a smile from him, so I continued talking.
“I went to the hotel and met an old fellow who’d worked there since Moses wore short pants. He knew Uncle Baron and had even met Pops. The old guy said the previous owner had hidden some papers before she passed away, and he knew where they were. Then he phoned to say I’d be interested in something he dug up, only—”
He turned onto Hollywood Boulevard, and the Chinese Theater loomed in the distance. “Only what? What, Mitzi?”
Just thinking about Clyde made me want to start bawling. “He was a sick old bird and kicked the bucket before he could give me whatever he’d found. I thought I’d lost everything forever, but now it seems I haven’t.”
We were fast approaching the hotel, and I remembered my disguise. “There’s something else, and it’s very important. If the desk clerk calls me Miss Vanderbilt, don’t blink an eye. I was incognito.”
The fink started laughing. I chose to ignore him.
****
David and I entered the lobby just as the string quartet ripped into “The Blue Danube Waltz.” Two little girls, graceful in organdy summer dresses, danced together. The English desk clerk stood at the front desk, and his face lit up the moment I walked up to him.
“Miss Charles, how wonderful to see you again!”
How fascinating that a modicum of fame had changed his tune. He nearly swooned when we got to the desk. He was still oily, but now he behaved like a fawning toady.
“Miss Charles, or should I say, Miss Vanderbilt? From the moment you walked in that day, I knew you were a young lady of breeding.”
He looked up at David and simpered, “And this young gentleman is?”
David smiled, extended his hand, and spoke like a real New York aristocrat. “I’m Miss Vanderbilt’s fiancée. The name’s Rockefeller.”
The desk clerk pumped David’s hand so enthusiastically I feared he’d break it.
“Mr. Rockefeller, I am so honored, sir!”
He handed me a large envelope with “Miss Vanderbilt” scrawled on it, and then slid an embossed leather book toward us. “I wonder if you both would be good enough to sign my autograph album.”
David and I had great fun playing two goy swells to the hilt. Smiles frozen on our faces, we posed for photographs with the staff. Once we got back to David’s motorcar, however, my hands shook so violently that I couldn’t open the envelope. I handed it to him.
“I can’t. Please, David, tell me what’s in it.”
He tore it open, pulled out an official-looking document, and I watched as he read it. Minutes went by before he slumped against the running board. “Wow. You have to take a gander at this.” David shoved the certificate into my hands.
I�
�m sure my jaw dropped to the garage floor, but somehow I managed to speak. “It says Clarice Dumont, age nineteen, married Baron Meyer Schector, age nineteen, on the tenth of April 1923. Ben and Samuel Roth were witnesses. Clarice Dumont was my aunt?”
“Yes.”
He opened the Caddie’s door, and I slipped in next to him. He didn’t fire up the engine right away.
“I could use your help, David.”
The crumb feigned surprise. “You want my help? Will wonders never cease?”
“Sarcasm is unnecessary and quite unbecoming, Mr. Stein. You can be difficult, but you’re a man of the world and you know about these things. Ida took us to the cemetery where they buried Clarice. Her mother brings flowers to her grave on the twenty-fifth of every month, maybe because Clarice died on April twenty-fifth. I want to talk to her. Would you come with me when I do? Carlotta Dumont might have been a witch and Nussbaum’s pal, but I’ve got to find out what happened to my uncle’s body.”
He shook his head. “Mitzi, I don’t know, a woman like that probably wouldn’t talk.”
“But maybe she’d listen if I told her how much my family has suffered all these years. My bubbe died grieving over Uncle Baron’s death. Pops went to his grave wondering where his brother’s final resting place was. If I begged her on bended knee, don’t you think she might tell me where he’s buried?”
I couldn’t keep the tears away and bawled like a baby. David pulled out a fancy monogrammed handkerchief and wiped my eyes. At that moment, I knew the Icebox had died.
“Doll, if you ask her like that, she can’t turn you away. It would be my honor to come with you. Do we have a date for next month, Mitzi?”
Maybe he could be a cold fish, but I knew he was a man of his word.
“Yes, only don’t tell Leah. She’ll worry if she knows. Promise you won’t.”
“I promise, baby, cross my heart and hope to die.”
Just hearing him say the words made me feel a million times better.
“Thank you for all you did today, David. Well, I guess we should go home now.” For once, he’d been a brick, and I had to make it up to him. “Say, if you don’t have plans for this evening, maybe you’d like to break bread with us. Leah is always happy to see you and so is Omar. If we’re lucky, he might play his saxophone. He used to play in a jazz band.”
He looked me square in the face. “What about you? Would you be happy to see me too?”
“I invited you, didn’t I?”
For the first time I noticed the golden flecks in his eyes. David Stein was one handsome fellow.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
The Plot Thickens Even More!
Leah hadn’t stopped scrutinizing the marriage certificate from the moment David handed it to her. She examined every inch of the document, threw it down in frustration, then picked it up again. In fact, she became so engrossed she paid no attention to anything else. For the first time since we’d met him, Omar appeared annoyed with her.
“Leah, we have a guest.”
She looked up, embarrassed. “David, please excuse my rudeness, but this is so unexpected. Uncle Baron married Clarice Dumont? I’ll have to ask Mr. Roth about this.”
David reddened. “Leah, I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”
When Leah gave him the Look, I knew she meant business. “But I have to ask him about it or we’ll never know the truth.”
He shrugged. “Nobody talks to Ben about Clarice. He’ll think you’re spying on him and blow his stack. If he does, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Leah spoke, but not to anyone in particular. “Maybe we don’t have to mention how we found out. If Mr. Roth asks, we can say we discovered it with some of Pops’ old papers.” She thought about it for a second. “But that would be a lie, wouldn’t it?”
Tears of frustration rolled down her cheeks. “You don’t understand how important this is, David. It’s about our family. I won’t let Mr. Roth push us around.”
I looked to Omar to intercede, but he walked into the kitchen without a word. Leah had made up her mind, and that ended it. Three hours later, we dined on the world’s best chicken paprika, but the conversation centered on Baron’s marriage. David was still mulling over the situation when I walked him to his automobile.
“You think we should keep quiet, don’t you, David?”
He paused for a moment then nodded. “Yes, I do. You’ve never seen Ben in a real rage. He’s impossible.”
Maybe he was right, but as Leah said, it involved our family. “I wish Pops was around. He’d know what to do. I’m so confused.”
Perhaps my nerves got the better of me, but for some reason I began playing with David’s lapels. It couldn’t be called flirting, but a fellow like David Stein didn’t take anything lightly. I realized what I was doing and pulled my hands away, but he grabbed them back, and held on for the longest time. We looked at each other without speaking. After what seemed an eternity, he released me, jumped into his automobile, and sped away. I felt the familiar warmth between my legs and walked back to our apartment, confused.
****
Leah and I had been nervous Nellies for most of the week, waiting for Mr. Roth to fit us into his schedule. Finally, we got the call. Since he expected his employees to always look their best, we wore our snazziest outfits. We sat outside his office, listening to him howl at his brother in New York. With his voice, I bet the whole Eastern seaboard got an earful.
“Sam, the next time I’m in New York I’m gonna knock that putz’s block off. Huh? Mae West? She’s talking to Paramount? About what? Huh? They want her for movies? That broad’s forty if she’s a day. Besides, Will Hays and his hayseed cronies will blow a gasket over her shenanigans. Oh, is that so? Then you find me another fat-assed blonde who talks dirty.”
With Leah’s nerves already on edge, Mr. Roth’s screaming didn’t help. She turned to a secretary with bright red, finger-waved hair. “Excuse me, but why is Mr. Roth in such a foul mood?”
The girl looked at her, confused. “Foul mood? What do you mean? Foul mood is when he throws the telephone out the window. Everything’s swell today.”
We heard a telephone receiver slammed down, and then Mr. Roth yelled from his office. “Come on in, why don’t you? I don’t have all day.”
Not exactly a warm invitation, but we entered his office anyway. Mr. Roth sat at his desk, smiling, impeccably groomed as usual in a double-breasted suit, his white carnation boutonnière in place. Perhaps his secretary was right. He gestured to two chairs in front of his desk.
“Ladies, take a seat, take a seat.”
Leah and I had decided I’d do the talking. We figured since Mr. Roth considered me a kid, he might not yell at me, or at least not as loud.
“Well, Mr. Roth it’s like this—”
He interrupted before I could say another word. “Girls, you couldn’t have come at a better time. I’ve got something to talk to you about. I know I said musical pictures stink, and they do, but we’ve hired some of the sound wizards from Western Electric. Guess what? They tell me that musicals will be the next new thing. If Metro and RKO are planning to make musicals, Regal isn’t going to be left out.”
Leah gave my hand a squeeze, a signal for me to speak up. “That’s wonderful news, Mr. Roth, but you see—”
He glared at me. “Of course I’ll have to deduct the cost of your dancing lessons from your salary, but that’s fair, isn’t it?”
Dancing lessons? “Excuse me, Mr. Roth. I don’t dance.”
He turned his head from side to side, baffled as if I’d spoken to him in Chinese.
“What do you mean you don’t dance? You’re a kid, aren’t you? Kids are crazy about dancing. I hired this guy, a Broadway hoofer who claims he could teach a bull moose to tap. A little soft shoe, a time step, whatever it takes to get your caboose in gear. Slap a big smile on your kisser while you’re at it. I’ll give you a couple of months to polish up your dancing. I really believe in you, kid. You’re aces. Now s
cram.”
Leah and I glanced at each other. Then she took over. “Mr. Roth, Ben, it’s a wonderful offer, but Mitzi is a singer, not a dancer.” She threw her shoulders back and went into elegant lady mode. “To be honest, tap dancing is kind of vulgar, especially for such a cultured girl.”
Mr. Roth jumped up from his chair. “What do you mean, vulgar? It’s the rage. The public pays good money to see it. What is it with you, lady? You think your sister is too hoity-toity to dance for her supper? Ingrate! ‘He who eats my bread sings my song.’ Now, get out.”
I never thought I’d hear Pops’ words used against us. I took Leah by the hand and we left.
What a horrible day it turned out to be. Mr. Roth had gone into a rage, we were still in the dark about Uncle Baron’s marriage to Clarice Dumont, Nussbaum was on the loose, and now I had to learn to tap dance.
Mr. Roth had so upset Leah she took to her bed with a dreadful headache, and Omar wouldn’t be home for hours. Life stunk. Then a light bulb went off in my brain. I had a marvelous idea: potato latkes. I hate to toot my own horn, but even latke connoisseurs considered mine the best: light, crispy, and golden brown. The applesauce and sour cream were cooling in the refrigerator, and I’d put a brisket on to braise that morning. I set to work grating potatoes and chopping onions.
I’d just pulled out the skillet when someone knocked at our door. David stood at the threshold, stroking the brim of his hat. I felt the color rising to my face. He cut a very fine figure in his classy double-breasted suit, terribly suave, a striking fellow indeed. What the heck? Was I mooning over David Stein again? Perish the thought.
“Hello, David. Won’t you come in?” I took his fedora and placed it on a chair. “You were right about Mr. Roth. He has a horrible temper. We didn’t even get a chance to ask Mr. Roth about Uncle Baron. I might even be out of a job because I don’t know how to tap dance.”
I hadn’t cracked a joke, yet David burst out into laughter.
“Everything’s in the crapper and you think it’s funny? Who am I, Fred Allen? I’m so glad my life in ruins amuses you, David Stein. Maybe I should chug-a-lug a little cyanide while I’m at it. I’m sure my convulsions would be a real kick in the head.”