“It will look ravishing on you, Mrs. Wyke.” Norman nodded as he handed her the gown and surveyed her tall, blond lean looks with admiration. She thanked him and took the gown into the dressing room behind the fabric curtains.
“Call me Constance, Norman,” she said.
“It will look as good on you as our model. Not many civilians could carry this off.” He marveled at her height and perfectly proportioned figure.
“Here, try this brassiere under the gown and use these shoes,” Jean Louis directed her as he handed her the undergarment and the peau de soie pumps through the curtains. After pulling the fabric panels closed, Constance breezily disrobed and put on the new strapless brassiere and gown and then slid into the slightly oversize shoes. The gown fit her like a glove and gave her a clean, streamlined look, like a blond racehorse. The stress and the weight loss had even yielded a more mannequin-like figure. She knew she looked like a movie star as she held the hem of the gown, walked toward the three-way mirror, and stepped up on the wooden box so that Jean could pin and use chalk to make the final adjustments.
“It looks divine on you.” They both thrilled at the sight of her.
“She could be the model.” Jean smiled brightly. “But she has beauty and brains.”
Suddenly, across the room she heard a commotion as another customer emerged from an identical dressing room in an emerald-green satin sheath. She was diminutive and dark, but extremely sexy and alluring, her raven hair cascading against her dove-white skin, her substantial bust spilling out over the satin strapless garment. Constance almost fainted when it registered that it was Josephine Herz. Jean walked over and fussed over her as well.
Constance saw Josephine stop briefly and also regain her composure when she saw her, yet she just marched forward in defiance and stepped up on the wooden platform as though she were leading a marching band.
“I assume you two ladies know each other?” Jean said cheerfully, unaware of their feud as the two women stood in stony silence, looking at anything and anyone but each other.
“That would be an understatement.” Constance gritted her teeth.
“Or overstatement.” Josephine rolled her eyes.
“Oh, I see.” Jean detected the chill and withdrew slightly.
“Darling, can you bring me my emeralds?” Josephine commanded her ladies’ maid, Valentina. “I want to see them with the dress. Not the Riviera, the parure…,” she said for effect.
Neither woman said a word, as the oxygen had seemingly been sucked out of the room. Jean and Norman knew from the froideur that they also needed to stay cool, calm, and out of the way in the midst of the dueling titans.
Suddenly Constance could not stand the silence anymore.
“Well, she looks good,” she said icily. “For a thief!” she hissed under her breath.
“She looks fabulous.” Josephine’s eyes had a volcano of fire under the lids. “For a sleazy spy!”
“You stole Lashmatic from me. And you know it.” Constance turned to her and threw the first direct grenade.
“You should know that I was working on my mascara project years before you infiltrated my company with your cohorts.”
“Don’t think I don’t know that CeeCee gave you my color scheme … mine. It’s Palm Beach, dahling, somewhere you have never been and your kind would never be accepted.” She smirked.
“The color scheme is all mine … it’s pink for the color of my lips, smiling as I see green, the color of money piling up in my bank account. Not yours.”
“You’re just a … new-money parvenu,” Constance said in an exasperated tone.
“Darling, I thought you had no idea who I was,” Josephine taunted her. “And by the way, I would wear a girdle if I were you. You may be thin”—she sniffed—“but I can see your cellulite, dear. Jean, the crepe is not very forgiving for women with that issue. I do have a cream for that problem should she want it.”
In her fury, Constance, walked off the wooden platform and up to her. Josephine recoiled, not knowing if she was going to get physical.
“You’re short and fat. And that fur is mine.” She ripped the mink shrug right off of Josephine’s shoulders. Without so much as a thought of a reprisal, Constance marched off to her dressing room with her prize, seemingly the victor.
“Well,” Josephine shot back, glaring, “you take it. It’s not mink, it’s rat, like you.” She stood her ground as Constance turned.
“You listen to me, you Polish bitch,” she hissed in front of Jean and Norman, who were now actively cowering in the corner. “I am going to do to you what you did to me if it takes me an entire lifetime. You wait. You will get yours.” She raised her voice, clear, clipped, and modulated in anger.
“You think I am vorried about you?” Josephine laughed out loud and stood firm, her hand on her hip. “Miss Palm Bitch, I have CeeCee and all your secrets. I vould be very careful, though.” She wagged her finger, her accent emerging in anger. “Don’t overstep your bounds, Mrs. Gardiner-Vyke. I vould advise you, like the little Dutch boy, to just keep your finger in the Dyke-Vyke.” She laughed out loud. Her assistant helped her off the box as the seamstress unhooked her green satin gown. She stepped into the dressing room and pulled the curtain in a flash of anger and energy.
The next day, in a fury, Constance manned the phones and hired a new Jewish law firm and a new advertising agency. This gave her some solace, but the patent situation was already locked down, and she knew that even if she could develop something new, it would take months, even a year, to redevelop a competitive product. The worst thing was she knew she would have to have a mascara product for her woman, her middle-American customer, so there was no going back. Gardiner would have to develop something new and patent-worthy, and she knew when she did that Herz and Lashmatic would already be famous for the single greatest breakthrough in the cosmetics industry and synonymous with the industry herself. Worse than that, she would have to rub shoulders with Josephine Herz in competing Jean Louis evening gowns at the Ziegfeld opening on Broadway. In a city of millions, New York was just too small for the two of them.
37
WITH THE WIND
New York City, 1939
Josephine sat alone in the darkened movie theater and did something she hadn’t done in many years … she cried.
Never one for light entertainment or emotional entanglements, she allocated little time for everyday diversions or frivolities. Trips to the theater, movies, card parties, tennis games, and affairs of the heart held little or no allure for her. Small people were occupied with such things, she thought, not her. “Work, work, work” was her motto. It was all-consuming, and the seasons flew by with few markers and any sort of emotion was never investigated, only flung to the side into a pile of yesterday’s dirty laundry. Even the limited time she spent with her son was about making sure someone had fed him and gotten him off to school on time. Perhaps a dinner occurred once a week, and when it did she peppered him with questions and demands for academic excellence. His emotional state held absolutely no interest for her; if that was something his father wanted to explore with his twice-monthly dinners, so be it. Josephine was often quoted as saying she was not interested in “wasting time with nonsense.”
That said, despite the monumental success of Lashmatic, she had recently read about a new cosmetics company called Heron Cosmetics that had surfaced in Los Angeles and was starting to get real attention and traction in the marketplace. Its dashing founder, the playboy Mickey Heron, was often photographed in the press squiring around young, nubile Hollywood starlets at the Cocoanut Grove and Café Trocadero. His savvy association with stars and his ever-present product placement within films had created a new niche in the marketplace.
From the black-and-white newsprint photos in the Daily News and other assorted papers, she gathered he was a handsome and sexy bachelor; she couldn’t deny that. He had dark movie-star looks, that was for sure, but what was his motivation? She couldn’t begin to understand, beca
use he was a man and she had given up trying to understand them. Earlier that morning, she looked in the mirror and found and then plucked at an errant grey hair. The singular hair was coarse and unruly and made a bold statement. There! it said. Age is upon you, and it’s not pretty. She was turning forty and laughed bitterly that the last movie she had seen must have been a silent reel starring Theda Bara. Was it that long ago? She thought back. Nonetheless, Heron’s success and promotion with Hollywood Hurrah, the Technicolor musical, and the resulting Hurrah collection of lip glosses prompted her to take what was happening on the West Coast and the silver screen a bit more seriously. She knew she needed to see what was currently playing in the theaters and who the latest stars were, as she was completely uninformed. She had spent years educating herself on French antiques and modern painting and was so knowledgeable about jewelry she could have been a lapidary. She didn’t often punish herself, but it pained her that she had been wrong to put her head in the sand and ignore the film industry. How could she have been so stupid? Even that dragon Gardiner had her eye pencil product in a new film. As Josephine had done before, she treated herself harshly for a day or so and then moved on. She would now embark on a Hollywood tutorial to take Herz Beauty to the next level. She had her assistant order all the movie magazines. Her star employee, CeeCee, had contacts in the film and theater worlds and she had tapped her to keep current. CeeCee had casually mentioned she knew Mickey Heron, and Josephine decided in the next coming months she would send her to Los Angeles so she could meet the locals and see if there were opportunities for Herz Beauty, not to mention a location for a Beverly Hills Herz flagship shop and salon. She was thrilled that CeeCee seemed eager to uproot herself and venture to the West Coast, since Hollywood and the trip out west held little or no appeal to her.
The film adaptation and enormity of press surrounding the premiere of Gone with the Wind had piqued her interest, and she decided that on a Friday afternoon between work and dinner with Miles, she would see what all the fuss was about. Her driver brought the gleaming limousine to a halt in front of the box office, where she bought a ticket and entered the vast, ornate Capitol Theatre. After buying a bag of popcorn, she spied an empty end seat toward the front and then quietly draped her mink coat over the chair and settled into her seat without much fuss. It seemed odd to her that she was seeing a movie while it was light outside, but it was now deemed work, and therefore it was acceptable. Her secretary had advised her to time her arrival to avoid the stage show, for which she had little patience, the movie being long enough.
The moment the opening title sequence appeared on the screen, Josephine sat back and watched the epic movie in awe. The screen proclaimed “A Selznick International Picture.” A fellow Jew, she thought, and felt a moment of pride that the producer David O. Selznick was associated with one of the great American stories. Leave it to a yiddishe boychik to bring the book to the big screen. The period piece about the Civil War based on the book by Margaret Mitchell was riveting and she related to the feisty main character, Scarlett O’Hara. Engrossed, she ate her popcorn, slowly savoring each piece. It was the longest movie she had ever seen, and it seemed to fly by. The Technicolor screen cast an illuminated glow on her face, like an immense makeup mirror. Suddenly, she felt a lump in her throat as Scarlett visited Melanie on her deathbed. She couldn’t understand why, but within minutes a torrent of tears fell from Josephine’s face. Perhaps mortality stared back at her from the celluloid. The year 1939 had turned out to be a tumultuous one for her, with the Nazis invading her native Poland. She feared for her remaining relatives and her youngest sister, Chana, who had been a small child when she had left for Australia. What would become of her? She had a top lawyer working on trying to locate her and bring her to New York, to no avail. And then there was her former husband, Jon, remarrying to her shock and surprise. The events had shaken her to the core, and she felt more vulnerable than usual. Not to mention she was also turning forty. Forty. How could she be forty? And so alone.
“Look after him for me.…” Melanie’s kindly face and words to Scarlett about her husband, Ashley, knifed her to the bone, and tears fell from Josephine’s eyes as her body convulsed in emotion. It was as if a garden hose had suddenly sprung a leak and then another and another as the water seeped out. Miles was growing like a weed and he was always off at school events with his friends. How much longer would he be home, even for their sporadic weekly dinners? Her sister Sybil was running the London operation and they rarely spoke unless it was a business issue. Jon, who had run off with the former showgirl and radio announcer Sylvia Shore, was now an omnipresent part of New York café society. As the film concluded and Scarlett uttered the famous words “I’ll go home and I’ll think of some way to get him back. After all, tomorrow is another day,” Josephine related to a strong woman in pain and the emptiness she was feeling.
She may not have wanted Jon Blake back, but she knew she was more alone than ever. She had started to resent going to evening events without a date and when she ran into Jon and Sylvia at two social gatherings, she decided enough was enough. She knew that despite her fame, success, and fortune she needed another man, another husband. It was as simple as a woman knowing she needed another black cocktail dress in her closet, as the old one was worn-out or last season’s design. As with her new mission in Hollywood, she also knew she would have to make the time to meet a man now that she was turning forty. With the success of her iconic Parfum Empress Josephine and Lashmatic mascara, which had swept the nation, Josephine had become the richest woman in the world. How come, she thought, she felt poorer than before? It was all catching up with her. She wanted a man, needed a man, and would find one, even pay for one. She was a realist. After all, she thought, as she raised herself and wrapped herself in her creamy mink at the conclusion of the film, she was Scarlett and not Melanie, and tomorrow was another day.
38
THE VISIT
Los Angeles, 1940
“Why the hell are you staying here?” Mickey looked around the lobby of the Dunbar Hotel with slight disdain after coming up for air. It had been one of the longest kisses in history. The zinc deco elevator doors had opened and CeeCee caught sight of him across the lobby, standing like a little boy in the corner, as if he had been waiting for his mother at school pickup, tapping his foot, with crimson roses dangling and hanging down at his side, the soggy paper staining his pants leg. When he caught sight of her he smiled brilliantly, crushed the cigarette in the sand atop the standing bronze ashtray, and surveyed her like a carnival prize. She walked shyly and then, as if to betray her outward stance, quickly across the room. They stood facing each other at first, only a slight separation between them, only a sliver of air. Was it a dream? she thought as they forced the air away and touched lips. She melted into him and swooned at his distinctive scent of aftershave masking manly sweat. It was the hint of animal that always did it to her, and she felt the usual heat between her legs.
“Should we go upstairs now?” Mickey nibbled on her ear.
“What kind of girl do you think I am?” She gave him a subtle, playful whack.
“You’re exactly like me and you know it.” He softly kissed her neck, which was pure velvet. “The way you smell is … well, you know.”
She wanted to admit right then and there that she was exactly like him, that his smell was an aphrodisiac as well, and that she would take him up to her room at that very moment and open herself up to him over and over. But she withdrew and took a deep breath of fresh air. She was in L.A. for business, not for pleasure. Pleasure would come later.
“Dinner and dancing and then we’ll come back. I promise.” She kissed her fingertips to his lips.
“One more kiss before dinner.” He lunged at her and they seemed to cling to each other for dear life. Within moments they were wrapped around each other, the intensity of a Venus flytrap and its prey.
“And for your information, this is the best hotel in town, where I can stay,” she said wi
thout bitterness at the whites-only hotel policies she was used to.
“You know I can get you into a regular hotel, CeeCee—with my help and with your last name. No one would think twice, especially in this town.” Mickey cocked his head.
“I don’t like lying, Mickey, you know that.” She caressed his brow and moved a tendril to his forehead. “You know that,” she repeated her words, and smiled faintly.
“You’re too by-the-book. Why the hell aren’t you staying with me? I have a house and a pool now. For chrissakes, I even have a guesthouse.” He crooked his finger at her.
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