Chance Elson

by Ballard, Todhunter, 1903-1980

  She looked at him doubtfully. "I don't want to go to a boarding school."

  Doc said, "You want to sing, don't you? You want to be an actress?"

  She turned her head.

  "And how do you think you're going to manage it, sitting behind a cactus plant taking care of a bunch of lousy hogs?" "Well, I-"

  "You've got to learn things. They have dramatic schools. They have voice coaches. You never had a singing lesson in your hfe. You don't even know how to breathe."

  Judy was pretty certain that Doc was conning her, that Doc merely wanted to get her out of town the way he had talked Chance into coming to Vegas, but her mind played with the idea, turning it over and over. "Could I go to Hollywood? They have schools and teachers there."

  Chance said, "Hollywood is out. Cellini's there, and Dan-zig.

  Doc apparently did not hear him. He said to Judy, "Why Hollywood? Why not New York?"

  "Well," she said, "it's not so far from home, and that's where the picture business is. I been reading the theater magazines about New York, and how there are only so many plays produced each year, and how people go from one office to another to get into a play."

  Doc said, "It's no cinch to get into pictures either, believe me.

  "I know it." Judy's small chin set. "But look, Doc, they make more pictures than they produce plays, and there are all kinds of bit parts and things. Don't you think the odds are better for pictures than they are for Broadway?"

  "You got it figured out," said Doc. "Okay, it's your deal and a man should always pick his own game."

  "Not Hollywood," said Chance. He had a low opinion of Hollywood. He'd seen a lot of movie people since he'd come to Vegas and he had not been impressed by those he'd seen. Besides, CelHni and Danzig seemed to have a lot of power in Hollywood. "Not while Cellini is around."

  Doc was annoyed. He had carried Judy to the point where she was willing to leave Vegas, even arguing to go, and Chance was being stubborn.

  He said, "L.A. is a real big town, and the picture business is a real big business. The odds against Cellini ever seeing her are small. If you're real worried, she can change her name."

  Chance looked at the girl. "You really want to?"

  She kissed him, her small hands holding both his ears, pulling his hps against hers, hard.

  "Stop it," he said, grinning as he pushed her away. "You're beginning to act like an actress already."

  Doc drove her over to Hollywood because he knew more about such things. Judy called herself Judy Liller. Cellini knew her as Judy Elson, and besides, it made the story that Doc was her uncle sound better.

  Doc had not the shghtest idea how to start. He thought it over very carefully and then he went down and talked to a reporter on the Daily News. The man had been in Vegas on a story the year before and Doc had entertained him at dinner.

  When they were seated in a Tenth Street bar, Doc said, "I'm not looking for any favors or expecting any. I don't know whether my niece has talent or not, and I only know one way for her to find out—to try."

  "How old is she?"

  "Nearly eighteen."

  "Good looking?"

  "Not bad, and she'll be a lot better in a few years. She has that type of face."

  "Introduce me to her."

  Doc grinned at him. Doc knew the type, a little young, a little cynical, playing at being wise, hking flattery. "There are enough wolves in this town vdthout me dragging one over by the ears."

  The reporter laughed, pleased. "Okay, what do you want me to do?"

  "Find a good dramatic school. I know a lot of them are rackets. Gimme the name of a good voice coach, one that will tell me the truth."

  "Hold the phone." The reporter rose and went into a

  booth at the far comer of the bar. He came back in a quarter of an hour. "You owe me twelve nickels, Doc."

  Doc counted out sixty cents.

  "All right. I called the movie writer on our sheet and one of the boys at the Times and a couple of producers. Here's the scoop. There's an actor, he used to be a star. He runs something he calls Screen Door, It's on Sunset." He hunted through his notes and gave Doc the number. "His name is Price, Albert Price, and they say he's good. Your voice coach is a guy named Martin. He's on Santa Monica. My man didn't know the street nimiber but the phone is Morgan 9-5432."

  Doc scribbled the nimibers down.

  "Now, she can go to the Studio Club—it's a girls' living club—or a couple of other places." He gave Doc the names. "Now you can do something for me."

  "What's that?"

  "You know Ralph Cellini?"

  Doc's face was bland. "I've met him. He's been in Vegas a couple of times."

  "Tell me who beat hell out of him."

  Doc raised his eyebrows. "Beat him?"

  "Come off it. Mean to sit there and tell me you didn't know Cellini was damn near killed night before last?"

  Doc shook his head. "I drove over early yesterday and I have been busy showing my niece the town. I haven't even had time to look at a paper."

  The man was skeptical. "Next you'll tell me that you can't read."

  Doc laughed. "Seriously, what did happen to CeUini? Not that I care."

  "You don't like him?"

  "I never heard of anyone who did. What happened?"

  "They don't know. He won't talk. A couple of miners east of Barstow found his car in their mine road. He was in the back seat, beat to hell and gone. I saw him when they brought him into the San Berdoo hospital. His head looked like it had been nm through a grinder."

  "But he'U liver

  I guess so.

  "That's tlie trouble/' Doc said. "You can't kill a rat like that."

  ^Aafot&% ff

  There was no vacancy at the Studio Club and Doc found a place in Hume House which was very similar. Hrnne House was run by an old actress who had spent forty years in vaudeville and pictures.

  There were twenty-six girls in the house. It stood in the hills above Hollywood and had at one time been the casde of a Midwestern wheat king. The girls called it "the castle/' and it was so known all through the industry.

  There were no meals served at the house and no supervision except for two firm rules. No man was ever allowed abovestairs and the big, heavy double doors were locked at twelve midnight sharp.

  Judy's roommate was Jane Morris. Jane was half a head taller than Judy, with dark hair and a. dark, brooding, oval face. She was from Omaha, and wanted to be a dancer.

  Judy was homesick. She missed Joe and missed lying awake, listening for the men to come home from the club. Doc had stayed in town a full week. He had gone to talk to the people at the school and made the living arrangements and taken her to see the voice coach.

  Judy did not like Martin. He had moist, sweaty hands, and he was always reaching out to touch her arm or shoulder. But apparendy he knew his job, and he did not mince words with Doc. "She's got a good, sound voice. It will never be great, but who in hell has a great voice nowadays? I'd say maybe in time she'd do okay in pictiures or radio. Tell her to come here twice a week." He consulted a dog-eared datebook. "Make it nine-thirty Tuesdays and Thursdays."

  Judy's life feU into a pattern. She and Jane rose at seven-thirty. Three or four of the girls would walk down the hill to-

  gether for breakfast. Sometimes they ate on the Boulevard. Sometimes they walked to Sunset, caught a bus and rode to Schwab's Drug Store or one of the other places where picture people were supposed to congregate.

  The theory was to be seen. Every girl in town dreamed of being spotted by some producer while she was eating ice cream at a fountain. Wasn't that the way Lana Turner had gotten her first break? At least that was the way the fan magazines told it.

  None of them had much money. Some, like Judy, were getting help from home, but most supported themselves as models, receptionists, carhops at the drive-ins. There was a set rule. They paid for their breakfast and usually their lunch, but if possible they managed to get a man to take them to dinner.

>   Jane was a past master at this. Judy wasn't. Most of the boys she met attended the same dramatic school and had less money than she had. In fact, she twice took two of them to dinner, guessing that they were hungry.

  Jane was horrified. "The only dames who spend money on men in this burg are actresses that are so far gone they need a little young meat to revive their courage."

  Judy was writing a letter home. She looked up from the desk, saying, "I wonder if you are as hard-boiled as you think you are."

  "Baby," Jane struck a pose, "you ain't never saw anyone as hard-boiled as I am."

  Judy smiled to herself. She thought of Doc and Dutch and Chance, yes, and Cellini. She had not told Jane who she was or where she came from. She had said a little town in Nevada and let it go at that. ...

  She wrote:

  Dear Guys:

  Well, here I am, one month from the day Doc put me in this school and I have become the best book balancer in class. Honest, they have us parade around with a book perched on our head to teach us how to walk.

  Kidding aside, I'm learning a lot, mostly how very ht-167

  tie I know about acting. Some of the kids are real good, natinrals. One boy who has only been here two months got a test for a part and they say he's terrific. Me, both my feet seem to be left ones. They won't track.

  Could you send me twenty-five bucks extra? There's a dress in a shop down the Boulevard I've just got to have.

  love Judy

  P.S, My singing is coming along better than my acting, but if the old goat doesn't keep his hands to himself I'll slug him and then I'll need a new singing teacher.

  J-

  Chance read the letter aloud to the crowd. When he got to the part about the singing teacher, he looked at Doc. "What the hell is this?*'

  "Relax," said Doc. "Martin is a fat buzzard with creeping hands. The kid can take care of herself. She's eighteen. She's in Hollywood and she's going to be an actress. You can't run around changing her diapers every half hour. Forget it."

  Chance did not forget it, nor would he have been happy had he been present when Judy and Jane came in from their first double date.

  Jane had gotten the dates. "They're coUege boys," Jane said, "and one of them has dough. At least he drives a good car. Just relax and enjoy your dinner. They think it's big stuff, taking out actresses. String them along."

  Back at the castle, Jane was furious. "What in hell's the matter with you?" She sat on the side of her bed, stripping her stockings from her long, dancer's legs. "You didn't have to sock the guy."

  Judy said, "Just because he spent five bucks on my dinner doesn't mean I want to screw him."

  "Of course it doesn't, but you could string him along. Christ." Jane stopped examining the stocking to make sure it had no runs. "Where were you raised? Haven't you ever been out with a man before? You must have hved in a convent."

  Judy was annoyed. It might have been different had Jane been a close friend.

  "Look," she said. "Just because you think it's smart to whore around, I don't. When the right guy comes along, I'll probably sleep with him, but I'm not going to lay every punk who's silly enough to buy me a meal. And stop trying to be tough. What if I told you I'd been in reform school?"

  The other girl was quiet for a moment. "No kidding?"

  "To heU with it," Judy told her. "Just keep your tongue off me or I'll take it out of your head." She slipped off her clothes, got her robe and towel and went down the hall to the bath. At least, she thought with satisfaction, she had silenced Jane for the moment.

  She had a run-in with Martin during her third month in Hollywood. The fat man had become more and more familiar as the weeks passed and he cornered her one Tuesday morning, grabbing her shoulders, wheezing a Httle as he bent toward her.

  "Baby, I got a chance for you."

  She made no move to escape. His breath was bad, but she did not even turn her head. "What do you mean, chance?"

  "They're organizing a new band. They want to audition singers. They want me to send someone over."

  "Sor

  "So if you'd just be sensible, be a little nice to old Joey, the spot is yours."

  She reached up. She grasped the center linger of each of his pudgy hands. She did it gently so that he did not suspect. Suddenly she bent both fingers backward as hard as she could.

  The fat man cried out in pain, writhing to free himself. "You Httle bitch." He wrenched free, staring at her, his mouth slobbering. "You bitch."

  She picked up her purse from the table. It was a heavy leather bag on a shoulder strap, well filled.

  "Listen, you slob, call me that again and I'll bounce this off your head." She tmned and walked out then, knowing that she had to find another voice coach.

  This time she chose a woman, an ex-opera star who 169

  weighed nearly three hundred poimds. She listened as Judy-ran through the scale and she tried three numbers.

  "Commercial." She was nodding to herself. She had a mustache almost as heavy as a man's, and a habit of discussing her thoughts aloud. "Commercial. You work with me six months, and I get you a chance. The rest is up to you."

  "Fair enough." Judy moved out of the castle. She could not take Jane Morris any longer. She and two girls from school rented a small apartment near Third and Fairfax. They did their own washing and a lot of their cooking. It was far cheaper that way.

  One of the girls had done work in radio. She knew some directors and two announcers. She and Judy fell into the habit of eating breakfast in a small restaurant near the NBC studios. They ate at ten, which was the break period for a lot of people from the broadcasting building.

  "It doesn't hurt to be seen." The girl was small, with blond hair and the longest natural eyelashes Judy had ever seen. She had won a contest put on by a Chicago paper, the prize a trip to Hollywood and a screen test.

  The test had come to nothing, but Mary Compton had not gone back to Illinois. She stayed, doing some modeling, picking up occasional work on radio and studying. She was as determined to succeed as Judy, and Judy liked her from the first.

  Although Judy was happy, she thought often of Vegas and Chance. At home he had dominated her hfe, her actions, her thinking, but here he seemed httle more than a shadow, a person of whom she was very fond, but who did not have any immediacy in her daily life. Then she saw CeUini.

  Cellini was driving down Sunset. She was waiting at the bus stop. His car halted by the hght, he sat not a dozen feet from her. But CeUini did not turn his head.

  She could not mistake him, although his face was marked, rumpled, as it were, with a Crosshatch of red scars. The light changed. The big car eased away and she let out her breath, surprised that her hands were shaking. She had not thought of Cellini in months, but Cellini had been thinking about her.

  Ralph CeUini had lain in the hospital for weeks. At times

  the doctors had despaired of his sight, and his hatred of Chance swelled within him, but it was tempered by his anger at Danzig. Benji had come to see him during the second week, and Danzig had pried the full story out of him.

  "You damn fool." Danzig's face had been a mask when Cellini finished. "I warned you not to stir up Elson. I've been checking the guy and he has more coimections in the state capital than we do."

  CeUini was whining a little. "But hell, Benji. As long as he stood out against us, the other club-owners might rally around him at any time."

  "Look," said Danzig, "let me do the thinking. I was in Vegas yesterday and their tongues are hanging out. They're begging for us to give them back the service. Let Elson alone."

  Cellini rose on one elbow, outraged. "You mean you'd let Elson damn near kill me and not do anything to him?"

  "He wouldn't have touched you if you hadn't threatened his kid. Goddamnit. This is a small town, and it's West. You stir them up by scaring their women and they'll hang you. I've got a mind to ship you back to New York." He tm-ned and stalked from the hospital and Cellini did not see him again for weeks. During the
period Cellini sweated, the hate and fear festering inside of him.

  He was still thinking about it as he drove along Sunset. He had not been in Vegas for six months, but he and Danzig were driving over that afternoon.

  Danzig was still sore at him. Danzig might yet make good the threat to send him back East. He glanced at his watch. He had to pick Danzig up in half an hour.

  All during the six-hour trip, CelUni sat staring blankly at the rolling desert. Danzig was driving, and he had not said more than a dozen words since getting into the car.

  Cellini glanced at him. If Danzig sent him back to New York it would be bad. He had never had it so good as he had it here. He liked the country, and the people, and the money, and the power he had as Danzig's second in command.

  "Benji, I—"

  He felt the car slacken suddenly. They were still a good

  five miles out of Vegas, but Danzig was stopping, staring at a new motel which was rising out of the desert waste.

  "What's the matter?"

  Danzig did not answer. Danzig did not even hear him, for Benji Danzig was having a dream, a dream that would alter the development of southern Nevada. Danzig opened the car door and stepped out. He had no way of knowing that Chance Elson had had almost the same dream two years before. He walked away from the car toward the jumbled mass of building material, of concrete footings and rising walls.

  The workmen paused at his approach, staring at him ciui-ously. Cellini saw him stop, saw him talk to a slender man in stained khaki. The minutes dragged. It was getting hot in the car. Cellini could not understand what Danzig was doing, what had captured his interest. Then the gangster got back in the car, his dark, lean face thoughtful, the eyes intent. He pressed the starter and drove on to the motor lodge where they would stay. "You register. I'm going back to that new place."

  It was two hours before he returned. CeUini was lying on the bed. Danzig helped himself to a drink from a bottle on the dresser. CeUini spoke to the ceiling. "It's too late to see those men." His voice was complaining.