‘Ah,’ he said, ‘ah,’ and he moved too, and the dart sharpened.
Chloe gasped, tensed, bit her lip; moved again.
‘There,’ she said, ‘there. Now.’
Ludovic pushed suddenly; she felt herself ease, round, tauten all at once, within.
‘Good?’ he said gently.
‘Good,’ she said, her voice very faint.
And she was sitting there, on him, her eyes closed, waiting, willing the pleasure back, when he said, quite briskly, ‘That will do then,’ and very gently eased her off him, and kissed her rather as if he had indeed just dropped in for a cup of coffee.
Chloe opened her eyes and stared at him. ‘What?’
‘I said that will do. Enough for today. We will continue. How about another coffee, before I go?’ He was laughing, his eyes all over her, her naked body, her tousled hair, her face which she knew must be shocked and raw.
‘You bastard,’ she said, genuine anger sweeping her. ‘You bastard. How dare you come in here and – and patronize me? How dare you?’
‘I dare because I love you,’ said Ludovic, more cheerful still. ‘And I’m not patronizing you, I’m taking care of you. I’ll be back tonight.’
‘I shan’t let you in,’ said Chloe.
But she knew she would.
Rose Sharon was a very skilful interviewee. She was also extremely attractive. Joe, who had become suspicious of and bored by famously beautiful and sexy actresses – ‘I tell you, they’d be asking you what you thought of their latest movie right up to the moment of orgasm’ – found Rose genuinely charming, slightly diffident, and most engagingly interested in him, and what he had been doing since she had last seen him.
‘Not a lot,’ he said. ‘Well, not a lot that’s worth talking about. Wrote a lot of articles I wasn’t really pleased with. Interviewed a lot of people I wasn’t really interested in. Got even more overdrawn . . .’
‘And didn’t go shopping often enough,’ said Rose, laughing. ‘Last time I saw you, Joe Payton, you had a rip in your shirt, this time you don’t have any buttons on it. I’ve heard of casual chic, but this is ridiculous.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Joe, surprised and oddly charmed she should even remember what he had been wearing at all, let alone that his shirt had had a rip in it.
‘Don’t be. I rather like it. Do you just hate shopping or what?’
‘I just hate shopping,’ said Joe.
‘Doesn’t your wife do it for you?’
‘I don’t have a wife.’
‘Or anything?’
‘Or anything,’ he said and knew from his voice and the expression in her large blue eyes that she understood beyond the actual words.
‘I’ve been having a horrible time too,’ she said. ‘Did a film I hated. The one I’m supposed to be talking about this minute . . .’
‘Really?’ said Joe. ‘What do you hate about it?’
‘It’s a me-too. Son and Daughter of Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice. I should never have agreed to it. Then we took the last film, the thriller, you know, Buckle My Shoe, to Cannes, and it did really badly. Have you ever been to Cannes?’
‘Only once,’ said Joe.
‘Well enough to know, I expect. Talk about vultures. Rows of them, sitting in the sun. Waiting for you to fail. Oh, that awful thing of going to a party the day after your film didn’t win. People smiling, sweetly, saying how wrong the jury had been, talking to you just long enough and then rushing over to chat up the winners. Horrible. And looking at all those babies of seventeen, all over everywhere, and telling yourself how ridiculous they are and then catching sight of yourself in the lobby mirror. Oh, it was awful.’ She sighed, then smiled at him. ‘Well, at least this is nice. Now then, what can I tell you about? My miserable childhood, that’s always a good one –’
‘It’s amazing,’ said Joe, interrupting her, ‘how many people have had miserable childhoods. Mine was really happy, I loved almost every day of my first eighteen years.’
‘Well, you’re very lucky. How about the next eighteen?’
‘They were mostly OK too. The last one’s definitely been the worst so far.’
‘Well, let’s hope a pattern isn’t setting in. Now look, Joe, we don’t have to do all that early stuff do we? You know it, all the getting discovered in the Garden of Allah, and everything. You can get that out of the cuttings.’
‘Sure. Can I mention Byron Patrick? All that stuff?’ he said.
‘If you want to. I mean I’d rather you didn’t go into it all too deeply, because it’s not actually too relevant, and anyway it’s rather well-worked soil. But of course, yes, if you think it matters.’
‘Well, I’d like to mention it,’ said Joe. ‘If only because I covered his story in my book. Which I’m sure you never heard of . . .’
‘You sound like a movie star, Joe. Of course I heard of it. Of course I read it. I thought it was excellent, really well researched. I think that was truly one of the saddest episodes in my entire life. Darling Yolande helped you with it, didn’t she? Oh, I miss her. I still miss her.’
‘Me too. She became a real friend.’ Joe looked at Rose carefully, while ostensibly pulling his notebook, pen, notes out of his shabby briefcase. He wondered if Rose had really been fond of Yolande, or if it was an expedient fondness, designed to make him like her more. He decided that, unlikely as it might be, it had probably been genuine. She was gazing out of the window of the Savoy, down the river, an expression of rather distant sadness on her face. Then he shook himself mentally. She was an actress, for God’s sake. She had a fine line in sadness, distant or otherwise. Watch it, Payton, you’re getting soft.
‘Look, I tell you what,’ he said, ‘I’ll read you that bit over. Take out whatever you’re not happy with. You’re right, it isn’t very relevant. It’s just rather sweet, boy and girl stuff. Is that OK?’
‘Of course.’
‘I’m much more interested,’ he said, ‘in why you’ve never married again. After David Ezzard. Only one husband. All this time.’
‘Don’t say all this time,’ said Rose, laughing. ‘It takes me straight back to Cannes. Oh, Joe, if I knew the answer to that question I’d probably be married again now. If you see what I mean. I think I’m just afraid. So many Hollywood marriages mean no more than lunch. If you see what I mean. Well-publicized lunches. David was different, and I loved him to pieces and it really broke me up when we split. But I’ve never met anyone since who was worth risking it again.’
‘But you’ve had – relationships?’
‘Oh, dozens,’ said Rose, laughing. ‘I hope you’re not implying there’s anything suspect in my single state, Joe. I’m as red-blooded as the next girl. Yes, of course. But I don’t name names on that one. Sorry.’
‘You must regret not having children?’
‘Well – I do. Of course. Everyone wants children don’t they? It’s a stake in immortality. But I don’t want children without a fully present husband. I don’t believe in it. I’m an old-fashioned girl, I think there has to be a mummy and a daddy, all the time, every day, for ever and ever, Amen. You see, I believe having children is about love and tenderness and security, not just sex . . .’
Joe realized she had settled into interview mode, was trotting out her usual line, carefully dressed in just slightly different colours for him, because she liked him, and he let her talk. Life Style would want lots of stuff on sex and relationships, she knew that and he knew that, and she was delivering the goods, in return for being on the cover to coincide with her new picture. It was a very fair deal, really. He just got a bit tired of tying it up sometimes.
After they had finished, and Rose had given him a very good two hours’ worth, a very nicely accomplished blend of philosophy, anecdote and self-publicity, she got up and stretched and said, ‘These things a
lways make me feel atrophied. Do you have anything much to do for the next hour or so? Because I’d really like a walk, and I could use some company. This can be a lonely city. Or would you feel propositioned?’
‘I’d like to feel propositioned,’ said Joe, laughing. ‘And yes, sure I’d like a walk. Only won’t you be mobbed?’
‘Of course not. People actually don’t see you if you don’t want them to. Laurence Olivier once told me that. If you go out, looking to be noticed, you will be, but if you walk quietly along, where nobody’s expecting you, just doing ordinary things, you usually get away with it.’
‘But surely everyone knows you’re here.’
‘Yes, they do. But if you went out the front door and brought a cab round to the River Entrance and I was there, especially if you’d let me wear that revolting raincoat of yours, and we took the cab to somewhere like Hyde Park, I bet we wouldn’t be noticed. In fact I bet you a hundred dollars we wouldn’t be noticed.’
‘I can’t afford to bet a hundred dollars,’ said Joe.
He was glad he hadn’t because she was right. She came out of the River Entrance dressed in a pair of jeans, a sweater, and his raincoat, and not even a pair of dark glasses, just make-up-less, with her long hair scraped back, and nobody glanced at her. They told the cab to go to St James’s Park – ‘Much nicer,’ said Joe, ‘less moth-eaten’ – and walked around it, chatting easily, and then out into the Mall and down towards the palace. It was a perfect gold and blue autumn day; Queen Victoria glittered gold in the sun, Buckingham Palace looked carved stolidly white out of the blue sky.
‘This is a very regal area,’ said Rose. She took Joe’s arm. ‘I love London. Some of my happiest times have been here.’
Joe smiled at her slightly foolishly. He was beginning to feel a little light-headed.
‘I must get back,’ said Rose with a sigh. ‘Awful publicist coming to see me in half an hour. This has been such fun, Joe. It’s been so kind of you to spare me the time.’
Joe looked at her. He found it very hard to believe he was the only person she could genuinely wish to be spending time with this morning; on the other hand he couldn’t think of a single reason she should be bothering with him if she didn’t want to.
They were nearly back at the Savoy when she provided it.
‘Joe, could I ask your advice about something?’
‘Of course.’
‘I’ve been approached by someone called Magnus Phillips, to be interviewed for some book he’s writing about Hollywood. What do you think I should say?’
‘I think you should say no,’ said Joe, trying to sound light-hearted, to ignore a cold dread striking at his heart. ‘He’s a fairly terrible man. A real gutter journalist. Works for the tabloids. You wouldn’t like him at all.’
‘Well, that settles it,’ said Rose. ‘I just didn’t know what to think, and I was sure you’d have a view. The thing is I don’t know many of the press here, and it’s so hard to know where to go for advice. He’s very successful though, isn’t he?’
‘Yes, very,’ said Joe. ‘The last two books have been bestsellers. But honestly, Rose, he’d sell his own grandmother if it was going to make a good story. As we say over here. Did he give you any idea the sort of area he wanted to interview you about?’
‘No,’ said Rose. ‘No, it was all rather vague. Of course if I was going to do it, I’d have gone into it all very carefully. But I shan’t even bother with it. Thank you so much for the advice, Joe. I’m really grateful.’
‘That’s OK,’ said Joe. He felt rather hurt and foolish suddenly.
Rose looked at him; her blue eyes were very gently watchful. ‘You think I only wanted to spend the morning with you so I could get your advice, don’t you?’ she said.
‘No. No, of course not.’
‘Yes, you do and you’re very silly,’ she said, smiling at him. ‘I could have asked you that hours ago. I wanted to spend the morning with you so I could spend the morning with you. I’m having the tiniest party tonight.’
‘Yes?’
‘If you come a little bit early I’ll mend your shirt for you.’
‘I’ll buy a new one,’ said Joe and walked off into the autumn afternoon feeling as if he had plunged down Alice’s rabbit hole.
Much, much later that night as he lay in her arms in her suite at the Savoy, wiping the tears away that she had shed, sweetly sad after he had made love to her, she said, ‘You’ve no idea how lonely it is to be me, Joe. No idea at all.’
Interview with Perry Browne, for Lost Years chapter of The Tinsel Underneath. Happy to be quoted.
Well, I certainly had no idea Piers Windsor was here then. If only I had! I could have helped him so much. How very sad that no one introduced him to me. Such a wonderful man, and such a very great actor. We could have flown to the moon together, Mr Phillips, made the most marvellous team. It makes me quite wretched, just thinking about him, and what I could have done for him. I had such contacts in those days. Well, I still do of course, but it’s not quite the same.
He can’t have been here for very long, or I would have met him. There was no one, but no one, that I didn’t know. I was at all the parties, of course, every single one. It was so much more glamorous in those days. So much more fun.
Kirstie Fairfax, no, rings no bells at all. There were so many of them, you see, so many girls, and boys for that matter, all desperately trying to make names for themselves. Missing out all for the want of a little expertise. They’re so arrogant, the young: they need help and they won’t ask for it. She died you say: how sad. I’m sorry to have to say this, Mr Phillips, but it happens terribly frequently. Drugs, alcoholism, body abuse generally. She was pregnant: well of course that was hardly unusual. The doctors made a lot of money. Of course if she had no money – well, they usually found some way or another.
Now you want to know about Gerard Zwirn. I do remember him. A charming, charming boy, terribly handsome, with the most wonderful very dark hair and eyes, and a beautiful dancer. And such lovely manners; I met him at a private function, he and two girls did a delightful little cabaret. I sought him out afterwards, gave him my card, told him I would be happy to represent him if he wished. He said he had no money, and I was so impressed by him that I said I’d work on a no-fee basis, on the understanding he would repay me when and if he became successful. Even then he refused, said he couldn’t take charity from anyone; I thought it was rather sweet of him, if misguided. I said well, anyway, he must let me advise him on a purely friendly basis, on things like contacts, and how he should approach people. I asked him to have dinner with me one night, and he accepted; it was all arranged, then at the last minute he had to cry off. He wasn’t well: or did he have an audition? I can’t remember. He lived with his sister, out at Santa Monica. She was a rather coarse girl, not in the least like Gerard. I tried to get along with her, made a great effort, but she was always rather abrupt.
I was able to do him a good turn at one point: one of my clients, Patrice Dubarry, I’m sure you’ll know of her, was giving a big party and wanted a cabaret. I told her about Gerard and she hired him. He did a marvellous turn, a Fred Astaire impersonation. Everyone thought he was quite wonderful, and then I was able to introduce him to all sorts of people afterwards, quite influential people in the business. He was so grateful to me.
He got very little work, I’m afraid. As I say, I know I could have helped, but he was very proud. He taught dance at a little school in Santa Monica, and that kept the wolf from his rather shabby door. I sent him the occasional pupil, and when they had a performance, which they did each term, I always went and took a few friends with me. I don’t know if it’s still there. It was called Tip Top Tap which I always told him was misleading, ‘people will think you only teach tap, Gerard,’ I said, and I suggested several names which I thought would be better. I remember particularly Stage Do
or. Don’t you think that’s rather clever? Anyway, he was very stubborn, wouldn’t hear of changing it.
He left town rather suddenly; I hadn’t seen him for a while and I called a few times; he was always busy, said he’d call me back. And then never did. Well, I didn’t mind too much, in fact I was rather pleased for him, obviously he was making some headway. Then he just disappeared. I called and called, spoke to Michelle, that was the sister, and she said he was away, and then finally they both just moved away, leaving no address. That was hurtful; I’d done my best for him, after all, and I felt he could have at least thanked me. Now you wanted to know if he had any connection with Byron Patrick? I really couldn’t tell you that. I’m afraid I lost touch with Byron. He was very unfriendly towards me, once he’d made his name. I find that sort of thing very hard to forgive. He owed me a lot, you know. I wouldn’t say I was glad when he fell from grace, that would be very unpleasant of me, but I did find it hard to be especially sorry.
There is one possible connection between them, and I really don’t know if this is helpful, but I do know Gerard knew Kevin Clint. You’ve heard of Kevin of course? One of the most important talent scouts in the fifties. He discovered Byron, in New York, and to be frank with you, I did wonder if he’d made a mistake. I mean Byron was wonderful-looking, but quite honestly he couldn’t act his way out of a paper bag. Well, of course, dear Miss MacNeice handled Byron so brilliantly, he owed everything to her. She – with some small input from me, I have to say – made him the star he was. I think he thought it was because he was talented, but that was very far from the case. Anyway, Kevin did know Gerard; he’d had him on his books briefly. But I don’t think, you know, that he quite understood Gerard’s personality; he wasn’t just another dancer, he had very real acting talent as well. It needed bringing out, developing; I mean, when I think what Miss MacNeice could have done with him! I did try to persuade her to see Gerard, but she wouldn’t. She said she didn’t need any dancers. It saddens me to think of all that care and attention being lavished on someone like Byron, it really does.
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