The Butterfly Plague

by Timothy Findley

  Waving her red-and-white smile and doing forbidden things with her angora, Evelyn made it all the way across the room, untouched by human hand. A triumph.

  Her retinue followed. More triumph. Plus applause.

  Intoxicated by this reaction, Evelyn turned to blow a few red kisses at the crowd. But instead of offering more applause and accolades, as might have been expected, the diners and drinkers burst into instant laughter.

  Laughter? Evelyn was furious.

  But even the swiftest perusal of her person would have given her the answer.

  Her fly was undone.

  1:45 p.m.

  Only Ruth ate. George just went on drinking and arranging things on the table top.

  Finally, when her coffee came, Ruth said, “You were about to tell me about Letitia and her comeback, Father.”

  “Oh, yes,” said George, as though there had been no interruption at all.

  “Well?”

  His red eyes slid toward her.

  “You a rich woman?” he asked.

  It was gentle.

  “Moderately,” said Ruth, who had her answer all prepared. She feigned ignorance of his true intent.

  “Well,” said George. “If I could have a little money—if I could have a little money—you know,” he said, the tears welling up again for the last time, “you know—I have always…”

  “If you had a little money—what?” said Ruth. She got out Hermann Goering’s compact.

  “If I had a little money, I could buy in. Take an interest. And with my interest they would have to let me—they would simply have to let me be the one…”

  Ruth powdered her nose industriously.

  “Be the one to what?”

  She licked her lips.

  “Be the one to direct Titty’s great comeback film.”

  The simplicity of it was appalling.

  “How much is a little?” Ruth asked, by now at the lipstick touch-up stage.

  “A million dollars,” said George.

  There.

  Ruth snapped the lid shut, carefully dusted her suit front and put the compact away, and the lipstick, and lit a cigarette and inhaled and exhaled and said, “Father, I have lied to you.”

  George’s eyes lit up. Visions of millions danced brightly in the red-banked fires of his little eyes. His daughter had lied to him. It was charming. She was not just moderately rich after all. She was a multi-millionaire. Millionairess.

  “Yes? Yes? What lie?” he said, the saliva mounting.

  Ruth stared straight into his face.

  “I cannot let you have any money, Father,” she said.

  “Can’t? Can’t? What do you mean can’t?”

  “Just that. I can’t.”

  “Why?”

  Ruth paused and then said, “I can’t because I’m going to have a baby.”

  The Chronicle of

  Myra Jacobs

  Monday, October 10th, 1938:

  Beverly Hills

  11:00 a.m.

  Adolphus picked up the telephone and carried it across the white expanse of his living room, so that while he was talking he could look out of his window at the shaded tennis courts and the sunny swimming pool beyond. It was not his pool and not his tennis court, but he liked to look anyway—at the beach hats, the bathing suits, the tennis rackets, the tennis balls, and the net. He also liked to look at the water.

  He sat down, placing the white telephone on a large glass table beside him. He was wearing slacks, sandals, and a sport shirt and he dialed CRestwood 5329. The table offered support to, besides the telephone, a bottle of rye whiskey, an ice bucket, a tumbler, an ashtray, a cigarette lighter, a cigarette box, and a copy, in plaster, of a Grecian frieze depicting a one-legged white man on a horse. Everything excluding the rye bottle was white.

  Far away in Brentwood the telephone bell was jingling in response to its dialed message. It stopped ringing and a Negro voice said, “Elbow?”

  “Hullo, Ida. It’s ‘Dolphus Damarosch speaking. Is Miss Myra there?”

  He lit a cigarette.

  “Toozabed. Shizabad.” (Too bad, she’s in bed.)

  “Is she asleep?”

  “Zzzz. Fotodin.” (Yes. Folded in.)

  “Listen, for heaven’s sake, surely she’ll talk to me, Ida. I’m not Studio.”

  “Zizint mother. Shintin nomaddtax.” (That doesn’t matter. She ain’t in no mood to talk.)

  “Well at least for gawd’s sake ask her. Tell her I’m on the line.”

  “Ho kaymizindamenpsst. Isst casaway.” (O.K., Mr. Damarosch. Just ‘cause it’s you.)

  Clank. Ida laid the phone down distantly. Adolphus could hear her walk away across the tiled floor of Myra’s house. He heard her perform moving-all-over-the-house-looking-for-Myra noises, plus a questionable imitation of Myra’s dainty sibilance, and as he listened he made a picture for himself of the scene.

  Ida had large, white-shoe-encased feet. She also had large hands, tall legs, a long, flat body, and a small head. She looked as a giant must look to a baby lying on the floor—the top parts of her receding into diminishing perspective. She clothed herself entirely in white, and since there was no mixture of blood in her veins, she was that uncommon North American phenomenon, a truly black Negro. To look at her you might imagine she had been born on the outskirts of Nairobi, instead of on the outskirts of Philadelphia.

  Drawn to Hollywood on a general principle of racial ambition (engendered by the successful rise of Ethel Waters and Bojangles), Ida had failed as a singer and dancer, but she had succeeded mightily as a servant to the rich and famous. Before working for Myra Jacobs she had been employed briefly by Alice Gottschalk and then by the Bronson Baileys, and when Myra first used her, it had been when the Bronson Baileys were away on their much-publicized European vacation, without servants. When Mr. Bailey died (a famous tragedy) Ida became Myra’s permanent property. Then Myra left Huge Company and went over to the Manning Brothers Studios. That was in 1934. Then she went over to Tremendous, ‘34 - ‘35. Then she went over to Marvel, August ‘35. Then she went over to Civic. Then she went over to Gaylord, ‘36. Then she went back over to Huge Company, ‘37. And now she was at Niles, ‘38, which is where she was about to go phhhht!

  Ida had been with Myra ever since her rise to the top, ‘34, and she always talked about “us killing Mr. Danton” (a perfectly ordinary scandal) in 1936 (hushed up) and “us being counteracted to the new studios” (whichever, whenever) and now “our trembles” (presumably troubles) in October 1938.

  Ida bumped around in the tiled hallway, giving her performance.

  “Miss Myra! Miss Myra!”

  (Change of voice.)

  “Yes, Miss Ida. Yes, Miss Ida.”

  (Nobody, least of all Myra Jacobs, knew the origin of the “Miss” in front of the “Ida.”)

  “Mr. Dolly’s on the telephone. Mr. Dolly’s on the telephone.”

  “Yes, Miss Ida. Yes, Miss Ida.”

  Clump, clump, clump. Ida did a little large-footed imitation of Eleanor Powell.

  “He wants to talk to you Miss Myra. Mr. Dolly wants to talk.”

  (Adolphus listened to all of this impatiently. He had heard variations of it every day for over a week. He poured himself another drink and watched the bathing suits and the tennis balls, thinking that he had the answer to Ida’s failure in show business.)

  “Tell Mr. Dolly no. Tell Mr. Dolly no.”

  (Dolly whispered involuntarily, “Tell Mr. Dolly no.”)

  “Yes, Miss Myra. Yes, Miss Myra.” Dance.

  (Bill Robinson.)

  Clump. Clump, clump, clump. Clank. Adolphus winced aurally. “Yes, Ida. What’d she say?”

  There was a short moment of hard breathing on the other end of the telephone. “She’s out,” said Ida. And hung up, still tapping her white-boxed toes.

  October 11th, 1938:

  Brentwood

  Myra Jacobs owned a sparrow and the sparrow lived in a large cage which sat in the window beyond the curta
ins of Myra’s mezzanine sitting room.

  Every day began with Myra drinking coffee on the mezzanine and listening to the sparrow sing. Every single day: workdays, Sundays and days you got fired by the Studio.

  The sparrow loved to sing, especially in the mornings and evenings. So, daily, when it was bright and sunspangled and again when it was shadowy and cool, the sparrow sang its song.

  Two years ago Myra had fallen in love with the sparrow at a time when they were both singing in a picture together. “Two little chippies,” everyone had said, except that it was not a chipping sparrow but a song one, as Myra herself told the jokers who threw that kind of dirt around, and, “Don’t think I don’t know what a chippie is,” she said, “either. Which I am not, nor is my sparrow.”

  But this morning the sparrow did not sing.

  “What is it, sparrow? Are you sick?” asked Myra.

  The sparrow just sat there looking through the bars, out the window, and did not reply.

  “But I can’t,” said Myra, thinking that she knew what was in the sparrow’s heart. “If I did let you out the sparrow hawks would get you. And we don’t even like the thought of that.”

  She looked out the window herself.

  There it was, her property: the long driveway and the lawn, the gate and the police car. The policeman was asleep. Day and night the police car was parked there for Myra’s protection. When she had gone to the studio in her own chauffeur-driven Rolls, the police car had followed all the way until she was safely inside the studio walls. Then it had followed her home again at night and parked down by the gate.

  Myra thought about Hell’s Babies and Adolphus Damarosch. So far it had been fun in itself, and all the grips and electricians and studio personnel and everyone all said it was sensational and lovely. Except some of the executives. Those people from New York. They wore blue suits and had dirty minds.

  “She’s fat,” said one.

  “She’s old,” said another.

  Fat and old. Fat and old.

  “Nonsense.”

  The next day she had been late.

  “Now she’s late and fat and old. See? What’d we tell you.”

  And the next day she had quarreled with the hairdresser.

  “Bitchy, late, fat, and old. See? We told you. We told you what would happen.”

  The next day she developed a rash.

  “Bitchy, old, and fat, Myra got a rash and now that’s that!” The New York executives had chanted it. But the front-office Hollywood executives, especially Mr. Niles, were worried. Myra was precious to them. They had their picture to finish.

  “Give her time to get well,” they said.

  “We’ll give her two days.”

  “Give her time,” said Hollywood.

  “She’s had three weeks,” said New York.

  “Just a few days more,” said Hollywood.

  “No. No damn whore is gonna hold up our schedule,” said the man from New York. “Cancel that contract. Get Mitzi Tomahawk.”

  “Mitzi Tomahawk can go to hell,” thought Myra when she read about it.

  So, old-fat-bitchy Myra wandered for a few days around her house. The rash was gone. The itch remained. The fat had come. She watched Ida baking a cake and listened to the sparrow singing. And she was lonely. There was no one in the house to look at her.

  She wasn’t really so fat. Not really. Men liked her like that. That she knew. Didn’t they like her in Kiss Me Hullo when she was like that, and didn’t they like that lovely transparent net-and-rhinestone dress she wore? Sure they did. And she wasn’t even old, either. Thirty-two isn’t old. Is it, sparrow? No. Thirty-two is just not old. And that’s all there is to it. Besides, the Studio always said she was twenty-six and everyone believed it. Everyone.

  She wandered around the house for a couple of days more. Maybe she’d renegotiate her contract. Maybe she’d go back over to Huge Company or over to Mega, where she had never been. Wouldn’t that Mr. Mugging just love it if she came over there and knocked on his door. Wouldn’t that make everyone jump? You bet your boots it would.

  Dolly phoned every day. She was sorry for Dolly. It was his picture, too, after all, and they’d been such good friends. They’d almost had an affair. But she didn’t want to talk to him. She didn’t want his pleas or his sympathy. She was sick of driving his car, anyway. She wanted the phone to ring and it would be Mr. Niles and Mr. Niles would say, “Come back, Little Myra. Please come back.” Maybe he would say, “We’re sorry.”

  But Mr. Niles didn’t phone and neither did Arnold Niles, his brother, and now there was something wrong with the sparrow and Ida was uppity and Adolphus was beginning to dislike her, too, and he probably thought she was a bitch after all. Which she wasn’t. How could she be?

  She just wanted them to let her look like herself, that was all—and be like herself and give up running around the studios all the time. If only they’d make Heirs Babies the way she was, then they’d see that the public did like her that way, with her body plump like that. And they’d see that if they’d only leave her alone she could still make it at the box office, too. After all, she’d had a nervous disease and was entitled to a little consideration. (The nervous disease was eczema.)

  But they wouldn’t have her. Not like that. Not fat. No. It was final.

  “What is it, sparrow? What is the matter with you?” said Old Fat, standing there by the cage. Old Itchy Fat.

  The sparrow stared out of the window. It got down on the floor of its cage and ruffled its feathers and sat there, staring and molting and not eating its seeds. It would not drink its water, either, even when Old Fat herself put it in as a drop on the end of her finger. The sparrow just hunched there like a little, thin, unopened package on the floor of its cage, and finally Old Fat Myra fitted her finger through the bars and touched it good-bye on the head and touched it again on each wing. Good-bye.

  Then Old Fat sat down in a chair and drew the curtain and they both stared out the window, Old Fat and the sparrow, and later that evening the sparrow died without having sung another song. Not even a note. And Old Fat cried.

  October 15th, 1938:

  Brentwood

  Adolphus finally decided that he would simply show up at “Myra-treat” without telephoning, a tactic arrived at through his acute awareness of Ida’s past mastership of the telephone as an instrument of war.

  So he took a taxi over on a Saturday afternoon. It was still quite hot and dry. Myra’s garden smelled of lemons and flowers and cut grass.

  There was no policeman at the gate. The Studio had removed his negligible, sleepy protection, and consequently, the front of the estate seemed naked. The policeman and his car had been like a set decoration. The loss was comparable to the loss of a shady and protective tree.

  Having got out of the taxi two houses up the road, where he would not be seen arriving, Adolphus strolled up to the iron gates of “Myra-treat” and, pushing them open with his cane, walked up to the house on the brick walk.

  He saw Ida, dressed in her whites, sitting on a large padded wicker chair on the colonial porch. She had a palmetto fan in one hand and a gin in the other and she was fast asleep. He could hear her snoring almost as soon as he came through the gate. This was a blessing. He could walk straight through to Myra.

  3:00 p.m.

  The lower hallway was filled with roses—all in baskets—all from the desperate Mr. Cohn, who was in love with Myra.

  Adolphus tiptoed up to the mezzanine and stopped. He looked at the cage emptied of its movement and its song. Now it, too, was filled with roses. Dead and rotten. From Mr. Cohn.

  He went on.

  At the top of the stairs he turned left toward a partly open door. Beyond it he could hear someone rustling little bits of paper in a box.

  For a moment he closed his eyes and tried to forgive himself for ever having thought Myra was obstructive or had bad taste or was stupid or ought never to drive a car or any of the bad things he had thought about her.

&
nbsp; He took a step nearer to the door.

  He wavered. He must go in and bring her back alive. Onto the screen. For her own sake. And for the sake of seeing New York, squirming with hats in hands, watching the money roll in past them down those long executive corridors in Manhattan.

  He pushed open the door. “Myra?”

  “Oh!”

  Old Fat sat in her bed.

  She was wearing a high-collared, open-necked Chinese robe, and she was eating candies. She had one box open on her lap and another, empty, lying beside her on the covers. The rest of the bed was strewn with little brown papers that had once been wrapped around the candies already eaten. A Victrola played softly in the background.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” Myra asked.

  Her mouth was full of caramel, marshmallow, and nuts.

  “Just passing…” said Adolphus, working so hard to control his stare that he could not finish the sentence.

  “Oh.”

  Old Fat swept off a portion of the coverlet and spread the brown-paper stars helter-skelter over the floor.

  “Sit down,” she said. “I’ll be with you in a minute.”

  She shut off the Victrola.

  He sat facing her at the foot of the bed.

  She closed the chocolate box, tossed aside the empty one, drew the Chinese robe tight around her expanded body, and hunched down under the covers. Her hair was stringy and uncared for. Without makeup she looked yellow and the shadows under her puffed-out eyes were deep green. There were one or two raw spots where she’d scratched the itch.

  “How’ve you been?” she asked him. Her eyes wavered. “Pardon my appearance.” She waved a chubby hand, saw that her nails were dirty with chocolate and marzipan and folded both hands into the double disability of fists. She sat there, heavily, with her wrists curving over the immense roundness of her raised and swollen knees.

  Adolphus gave a real smile. “Do you mind if a friend wants to say hello once in a while?”

  The accusing bravery left her eyes. She smiled back. “Not a real friend, Dolly. No.”