by Alan Handley
“But his show’s already in rehearsal.”
“There’s many a slip before opening night. Fine man, Mr. Frobisher. I remember when I was with him in Star Light…. I was just back from the coast…. I had a scene….” I quickly shut off this scrapbook browsing. I’d heard it all before. Kendall had a memory like a library, and with that memory…
“Kendall, did you ever hear of anyone named Bobby LeB.?”
“Bobby Le Bee? What a curious name…No, I’m sure I should remember it if I had.”
“LeB. is just the initials of his last name—L, E, capital B.”
“There was a Robert LeBor who’s a director in pictures now. Just an assistant director when I knew him. Is he the one you mean?”
“No, he’s in Hollywood. Any others?”
“Well, a Robin LeBaron died several years ago. I never knew him personally, though I think he was considered quite good. Of course I was on the coast at the time.” I could have saved myself a trip to Equity if I’d thought of Kendall first.
“No, I know about those two. Any others…” He seemed to be poking about in that rye-soaked brain for another one but he couldn’t quite make it.
“It seems to me there was another one somewhere along the line…. I’m not very good on names.” He was doing all right. “But I never forget a face. I can’t quite seem to place him. It’s a rather unusual name. Now let me see…”
“Well, don’t strain yourself. Beat it now, I want to make some calls. But if you remember, let me know. By the way, I suppose you heard that Nellie Brant is dead?” His reaction was a momentary expression of definite pleasure before he could pull that old saggy face into the proper grimace of sadness. Why is it old people are glad when other people die? Or is it just actors?
“Why, no…1 didn’t know. I haven’t been out of the house all day.” He evidently forgot the trip to the liquor store for whiskey with the two bucks I had given him this morning.
“Was she dead when you got there?” That startled me.
“When I got where?”
“Why, I thought you told me you had an appointment with her this morning.” I didn’t remember telling him anything of the kind, but I may have. This morning I wasn’t playing it so cozy. Still it did give me a start.
“Did I? Well, I was wrong. It was somebody else.”
“Sure. I probably just misunderstood you.”
“Yes, I guess you did.”
“We played together, you know. She was with me on Front Page Stuff.”
“No, I didn’t know.” It had never even occurred to me she’d been an actress. “What was she like?”
“A brilliant comedienne. I remember we had one scene together. I was playing Lord Washburn…pearl-gray cutaway. She mistook me for the butler—very amusing. That scene took all the notices. I think I still have them if you would care to look at them. Mr. Frobisher was stage manager then, you know.” I hadn’t known that, either. But, like agents, producers don’t spring full-fledged out of sea foam.
“What happened to Nellie? Why did she stop acting if she was so hot?”
“Another great tragedy of the theater.” Presumably he meant he was the first. “She was a singer, and, I believe, she strained her vocal cords or something, because after a while she couldn’t sing anymore.”
“Okay, scram, will you, Kendall? I told you I’ve got to phone.” I started looking up Frobisher’s number in the phone book. Kendall strode majestically to the door, which, in my cheese-box, takes some doing. He rested one hand on the door casing and gave me burning stare No. 6A with all the stops out.
“I go.” Pause. “I go to return anon.”
“Yeah, yeah, okay.” I began dialing Frobisher’s number. Kendall relaxed.
“You wouldn’t, perchance, have a couple more fish swimming around loose, would you?”
“No, I wouldn’t.” I made a mistake in the number and had to start over again. “Get the hell out, will you?” I threw the telephone book at him, but he closed the door too soon and it just hit the door and slapped to the floor.
A clipped British accent finally allowed me to speak to Mr. Frobisher.
“Mr. Frobisher, this is Tim Briscoe. You asked me to call you?”
“Oh, yes, Tim. I wondered if you would be available for a part in a show I have in rehearsal?” How available can you get?
“I believe so, Mr. Frobisher. Of course, I have a couple of things on the fire….”
“It’s a small part in the last act. I’ve had someone rehearsing it for two weeks, but I’m afraid he isn’t working out. Frankly, you just stand around and look attractive until it’s time to wind up the plot, but you’ll have a few good lines and they take doing. The part pays a hundred and a quarter. Would you be interested?”
“What do I wear?” If I was going to have to buy a new suit, maybe I could get more money.
“Just a dinner jacket. You can supply that, can’t you?”
“Yes, sir.” I certainly had a dinner jacket.
“I know this is rushing things a bit, but we open in less than a fortnight. How about it?”
“I’d be glad to, Mr. Frobisher.” There didn’t seem to be much point arguing about money. He could get hundreds of actors who would jump at the chance to be in a Frobisher show for minimum.
“Fine. It’s settled, then. Eleven tomorrow morning at the Lyceum Theater and I’ve made an appointment for you at Hans Trindler’s studio for publicity photographs at nine, if that’s convenient.” Convenient? Trindler was only the best photographer in the business.
“That’s perfectly convenient, sir.”
“Good. I’ll see you at the Lyceum tomorrow at eleven.” He started to hang up.
“Oh, Mr. Frobisher. There’s just one thing, if you don’t mind my asking. How did you happen to pick me?”
“Today at Sardi’s. You see, it does pay to drink a little.” So I hadn’t been fooling him.
“And I thought you didn’t even know my name.”
He chuckled. “As a matter of fact I didn’t, I asked Renee.” God bless Renee the hat-check girl. I’d have to give her a bigger tip from now on. “I’ll see that you get your contract in the next few days. Goodbye.”
That’s the way it goes. You beat your brains out banging on agents’ and producers’ doors and what do you get? Nothing. But you happen to have a drink in a bar at a certain time and you end up with a job at a hundred and a quarter per—or that’s what I told myself. As I furiously dialed Maggie’s number to tell her the good news, I really believed I had been offered that part because Mr. Frobisher thought I would look attractive standing around until it was time to wind up the plot. Well, part of that was true.
Maggie finally answered.
“This is Tim. Guess what.”
“You, too?”
“Frobisher, you mean?”
“Lyceum Theater, eleven tomorrow. You, too?”
“Yes, isn’t it marvelous?” I said.
“I just can’t believe it.”
“And Trindler is taking my picture tomorrow morning for the show.”
“He’s already got some of me on file, but promise me you’ll give me one of you.”
“I promise.”
“Frobisher said I was only a small part in the last act.”
“Me, too. I wear a dinner jacket and look attractive.”
“A cinch. I’m having a fitting at Chez Ernest tomorrow at ten for my dress. Jenny Pittenger is doing the sets and supervising the clothes. I hope I get something good.”
“Chez Ernest?” I said. “But that was in the book and Nellie…”
“Now, Tim, let’s not start that again.”
“But don’t you think it’s funny?”
“Not particularly. Ernest does Frobisher shows. It’s a break getting my dress there. I like his stuff.”
“Maggie, can I go with you tomorrow?”
“Darling, I didn’t know you went in for that sort of thing.”
“I’d just like to find o
ut something.”
“If it were to keep me company, I’d adore it, but not if you’re going crawling around people with a magnifying glass.”
“I promise not to goose a single goose.”
“Well, all right,” she said reluctantly. “Meet me there at ten.”
“What about tonight? Let’s celebrate.”
“Haven’t you a date with Libby?”
“I’ll break it.”
“Oh, I don’t think so, darling. I’d better get a good night’s sleep. I must look ravishing tomorrow. Don’t forget you promised me a picture, so smile pretty at Trindler’s birdie. Good night.” She hung up, and I got undressed even though I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep.
I wished now I hadn’t bothered to call up Libby, but I was too excited at having a job to stay in all evening by myself, so what the hell.
There was a knock on the door just as I got all my clothes off and flopped on the bed. It was Kendall again with a fistful of clippings.
“Here are the notices of Front Page Stuff I promised you. All the interesting parts are underlined.” I knew without looking that the interesting parts were all concerned with the brilliant portrayal of one Kendall Thayer replete with pearl-gray cutaway.
“Thanks. Just throw them on the dresser and close the door softly on this exit. Make believe you’re Madame X.” Kendall looked a little hurt, but closed the door softly. I stretched out feeling just like Little Jack Horner with a plum on every finger.
Being an actor can be the most wonderful thing in the world…when you have a job. But when you haven’t, brother, it’s hell.
CHAPTER NINE
IT WAS SEVEN FORTY-FIVE when I woke up. In twenty minutes I had showered, shaved and was on my way to the subway. I hit an express on Fourteenth Street and again Life was good to me. It wasn’t till around Twenty-eighth Street that I remembered that I hadn’t locked my door because Kendall hadn’t given me back my keys. Not that I had anything of value in my room except the telephone, but the inhabitants of the Casbah can never resist making long-distance calls on a hot, free phone. This time I’d just have to take a chance till I got to Bergen’s and could phone Kendall or the Mad Swede to lock it.
Bergen’s Bar is a hole in the wall on Forty-fifth Street just off Eighth Avenue. Like a railroad car with a long bar running down the left, stopping only for the men’s room, which is nothing more than an irrigated broom closet. There are some tables in a line down the right side checkered with tablecloths, a few haphazardly framed photographs of some of the customers past and present, and, of course, a jukebox.
I was fifteen minutes late. Libby was already there sitting at the first table, right next to the jukebox, with another girl. Even though Nick had given me three tickets, it annoyed me to see that she had someone else with her. When you ask a girl to go to the theater, you don’t expect her to drag along a friend. I’ve pulled that same trick too many times myself to enjoy being played for a sucker. She didn’t know the seats were free, although with me I suppose she’d be a fool to think otherwise. And I wasn’t too anxious to have an audience while I tried to pump Libby.
She says she comes from a good family in Columbus, where her father makes paper boxes and sent her to Bennington, and she’s never gotten over either of them. She wears her mousy hair dank and long on the sides with bangs in front, and doesn’t use any makeup except eye shadow which, for some obscure reason, she wears under her eyes. I happen to know her clothes are expensive, but she goes in for lumpy suits that look as though they were woven out of old spinach.
Her friend wasn’t any more appetizing than Libby, though I must say she was better dressed in what Maggie always calls “the basic sack.” She also reeked of an earlier vintage Bennington—circa when Katharine Hepburn was the dream girl—and was still sporting that scarlet, square mouth without any dip in the upper lip that Miss H. started, but had sense enough to change.
The moment I got a load of the two of them, I started trying to figure out how to cut the evening short. Libby greeted me like a spaniel and obviously expected to be kissed, so I did. She introduced me to her friend who turned out to be named Margo Shaw. I’d have laid ten to one she’d turn out to be a Margo after the first glimpse. They were drinking brandy. I settled for a rye and water and told them to hold everything, I had to phone.
I dialed the Casbah’s instead of my own number and luckily Kendall answered.
“Kendall, this is Tim. Why the hell didn’t you give me my keys back?”
“I’m profoundly sorry, Tim, but the simple truth of the matter is that I forgot. I’ll go lock your door right this minute.”
“Yeah, do that. And keep out of my drawers, too. I’ll pick up the keys from you when I get back. You’ll be in about midnight?”
“Most assuredly.”
“Okay, then take off.” I hung up and went back to the girls. We had about fifteen minutes till curtain and I couldn’t waste any time. Old square-mouth didn’t show any signs of blowing so I gave Libby a big smile and patted her knee under the table. “Now then. Tell me all about it.” She didn’t even bother to ask why I wanted to know or what I meant. Obviously it must be about Nellie as that was the only important thing that had happened to her since she had discovered eyeshadow. A swig of brandy and she was off.
“Well, it was the most amazing thing. I’ve just been telling Margo all about it.” She turned to Margo. “Darling, you don’t mind hearing it all again, do you?” As if square-mouth had any choice other than to walk out.
“Of course not, Libby. I think it’s the most exciting thing I’ve ever heard. You were so brave. I mean, if something like that had happened to me I don’t know what I’d have…”
“Okay, okay,” I said. “What happened?”
“I’m trying to tell you, Tim.” More brandy, then, “I just stopped by Nellie’s office to say hello—and remind her of our dinner date. And when I got to the office—”
“What time was this?” I interrupted.
“Oh, it must have been a little after eleven.” At least Nellie hadn’t been cooling off too long. “And the door was closed and I knocked, but, of course, there wasn’t any answer. The light was on and I tried the door because I thought I might leave her a note on her desk. It was open so I went in….” She gave a five-beat pause for effect, another swig of brandy, and to pull some hair out of her mouth that had swung in. “And what do you suppose I saw?” I allowed as how I couldn’t imagine. “It was Nellie!” she said in a great rush of triumph. “Lying across her desk in a welter of blood…a welter.” Okay, so if it made her feel any better to call a dribble a welter, let her. “There she was lying in a welter of blood.”
“You said that. Then what happened?”
“Then everything went white.” It couldn’t be black like with anybody else—with her it was white. “And the next thing I knew I was screaming in Sardi’s. Whatever do you suppose made me do that?”
Margo answered her, “Shock, I suppose. You said everything went white.”
“Yes, that must have been it,” agreed Libby. “Shock.” She lowered her eyes and her white eyelids looked very strange against the smudge of black under them—almost blind.
“Okay, take it from there.”
“Well, everyone rushed back up with me. And after a while, the police and press came and they made everyone clear out. All except me,” she added proudly.
“What had happened to Nellie?”
“Oh, after they took some pictures, they flopped her back in her chair and cleaned up the place a little. And then the doctor came and they took her away in a basket.”
“What did the doctor say when he examined her?” I hated having to get all the dope secondhand.
“He said it looked like she’d fainted or passed out, there was an empty gin bottle right in the desk—you know Nellie—and she’d fallen across her desk on that filing thing. You know, the one she always had on her desk.” I said I knew. “Just happened to hit a vital spot and struck her h
eart and killed her, he guessed, without an autopsy.”
“They didn’t think there was anything fishy about it?”
“No. Why should they?”
“I mean did they go around spraying powder on things. You know, fingerprints?”
“I don’t think so, but they might have while I was being photographed. I kind of hoped there’d be more goings on, too.”
“But, darling, didn’t they even look for clues?” asked Margo. Libby thought a moment.
“I don’t think so, but then, I was so busy with the photographers…”
Well, I’d had it. I was just as wrong as before and really worse than Libby. She’d only made an audition of Nellie’s death and I’d tried to build it up to a whole three-act melodrama.
It was time for the curtain to go up so I went over to the bar and gave Patsy the money for the drinks, making the annoying discovery that Libby and Margo had had four brandies. What she had told me wasn’t worth it. I came back and helped them on with their coats.
“Would you like to go to the theater with us, Margo?” What the hell, I might just as well ask her. It wouldn’t make much difference one way or the other.
“Oh, no. I couldn’t,” she said not too emphatically.
“You might just as well. I have three tickets, anyway. I’d just have to turn one back.”
“Well, if you’ll let me pay for it, I’d love to.”
“Oh, no, I couldn’t.” Me trying to be the shy type.
“Please let me. After all, you bought the drinks, and I really barged in on Libby. It wouldn’t be fair if I didn’t.”
“Well,” I said. I hoped hesitantly. Four bucks would be almost clear profit—except for the drinks. She reached into her bag and pulled out a five-dollar bill and handed it to me.
“There, we’re even. You can buy me another drink when your show opens.”
“Show?” I said. “What show?”
“But aren’t you in the new Frobisher show?” She turned to Libby. “Darling, I thought you told me he was in the new Frobisher show.”
“Of course he is,” said Libby. “It’s all over town about you and Maggie Lanson. What’s the matter? You think it’s bad luck to talk about it?”