Queen of Hearts

by Rhys Bowen

  “If this is a city, then I’m Charley’s Aunt,” my mother said. “I’ve never seen a drearier place, have you? Thank God I don’t have to really stay here for six weeks. I’d go mad.”

  We found our lawyer—who looked almost like a caricature of a slick villain. He had a large paunch, a hair-thin mustache, smoked a big cigar, and talked out of the side of his mouth. “Don’t you worry your pretty little head one bit,” he said, putting a big hand on Mummy’s shoulder. “Cy Goldman told me to take care of you and take care of you I will. ‘Take care of my new star,’ Cy says and whatever Cy says, Cy gets. Know what I’m saying?”

  He whisked us off to the Riverside Hotel, told us that a stay had been arranged in a bungalow at a dude ranch where they asked no questions, and that Mummy’s stand-in would report for duty as soon as Mummy wanted to check out. I could tell from her face that she’d like to check out in the next five minutes. However we did what we were told. The papers were filed with great ceremony. We walked up and down Virginia Street in the evening, visited casinos, and made sure that plenty of people noticed Claire Daniels.

  “This is certainly not Monte Carlo,” Mummy said, coughing in the smoke-laden atmosphere as we walked between craps tables and penny slot machines. “I hope Max appreciates how I’m suffering for him. At this moment I could be at the villa on Lake Lugano, at my own dear little house in Nice or in London at Brown’s. I never believed I could feel so homesick and so far away.”

  I shared her feelings. I lay listening to the mournful toots of goods trains as they rattled past and wondered what Darcy was doing at this moment and when I’d see him again. Had he caught his gentleman cat burglar? I wondered.

  “Cor, miss, this is bloomin’ awful, ain’t it?” Queenie said. “If this is America, give me good old England any day.” Since she came from the backstreets of Walthamstow, near the gasworks, it really must have been bad.

  It was hard to sleep with the heat and the trains and I was glad when we moved away from the tracks, out of town, to a ranch in the middle of the dusty desert. At least it had a swimming pool and shading cottonwood trees. Mummy refused to swim and stayed out of the sun. “I’m sure Queen Mary Tudor did not have a tan,” she said. “The English aristocracy have always been noted for their porcelain white skin. Look at you, darling. If you go in the sun you just freckle. You turn into a revolting orange blob, darling.”

  “Thanks, awfully,” I said. “You really know how to boost my confidence.”

  She slipped an arm around my shoulder. “Sweetie pie, nature isn’t fair, is it? Some of us are born beautiful and some aren’t. Take your Darcy, for example. I’m sure he was a devastatingly handsome little boy, whereas you were such a homely child.” She walked away then turned from the door and added, “I wonder sometimes what he sees in you.”

  With a mother like her, I thought, who needs a Mrs. Simpson to deliver catty remarks?

  I was extremely glad when Mummy’s awful lawyer paid a visit, introduced us to Wanda, who was to play the part of my mother while she was in Hollywood, and said that Mummy was free to leave. Queenie and Claudette perked up at this news and packed our things in record time. Then we were off on a train again, first across the Sierra Nevada mountains to San Francisco and then down the coast to Los Angeles.

  “I’m having horrible second thoughts about this whole thing,” Mummy confided to me in a rare moment of intimacy. “I mean if that dreadful place can call itself the best little city or something, then what do you think California will be like? One hears about Hollywood glamour but will it really be more dust and shacks and men spitting on the streets, do you think?”

  “Golly, I hope not,” I said.

  The train ride across the mountains was spectacular. We changed trains, caught a glimpse of San Francisco Bay, and then we were off again on the Coast Starlight. The first part of the trip was nowhere near the coast and all we saw were golden hills and more golden hills. We fell asleep and when we awoke there was the sparkling Pacific Ocean right beside us. We breakfasted and soon after we pulled into the Los Angeles station.

  As we stood on the platform a young man with slicked-back hair, horn-rimmed glasses, and a worried look on his face came hurrying toward us. “Miss Daniels, Lady Georgiana?” he said. “I’m Ronnie, Mr. Goldman’s assistant. He sent me to collect you. They are filming at the set and he couldn’t get away, but he wants me to say that all is ready for you and I’m to take you to the Beverly Hills Hotel.” With great efficiency he whisked us across the station, made porters appear as if by magic, and in seconds had us seated in an impossibly long black motorcar, then directed the maids and luggage to a taxicab that looked nothing like a London taxi. As we drove away from the station I gazed out of the window in excitement. There were pastel villas dotting wooded hills and when I spotted the Hollywood sign up on top of a hill my heart gave a little leap. We were really here! Who couldn’t feel excited about being in Hollywood?

  Soon we were driving along Sunset Boulevard, lined with fine-looking new buildings in bright pastel shades. A tramline ran down the middle of it and there were motorcars everywhere. The depression that had been so visible in New York clearly hadn’t struck here. Mummy had perked up considerably since arriving and when we turned into the driveway of the Beverly Hills Hotel she gave a little squeak of pleasure. It was a pink palace with palm trees and brilliant tropical plants turning it into a fantasyland.

  “I think you’ll be quite comfortable here,” Ronnie said with understatement.

  Young men in crisp white uniforms rushed out to greet us. Instead of being taken into the main building of the hotel, we were led through the grounds, past a big sparkling swimming pool, to our own bungalow set amid more riots of tropical foliage. Bougainvillea spilled around the front door. Spiky bird-of-paradise and hibiscus lined the path. The sunlight and colors were dazzling and the air was heady with perfume.

  “The first thing we shall need is sunglasses, darling,” Mummy said. “I can’t risk getting frown lines.”

  “I’ll have an optical store bring you a selection right away,” Ronnie said. “Do you think you can survive here for the time being?” He opened the door to a sumptuous interior, gold and white wicker furniture and white filmy curtains at the windows. There were two bedrooms and two bathrooms, and a small maid’s quarters behind.

  “I think we’ll manage,” Mummy said. Luckily I wasn’t asked, or I might have said something childish like “golly.” The contrast to one who has survived years of Fig’s frugality and Castle Rannoch’s damp cold was overwhelming.

  “Great, then I’ll have the sunglasses guy come over and anything else you need today? If not, get some rest and the car will come for you at six o’clock tomorrow.” Ronnie was already heading for the door.

  “Six o’clock? For dinner?” Mummy asked.

  Ronnie laughed. “No, six a.m. Cy wants you on the set. We’re already shooting. Your final script will be delivered later this afternoon with the scenes for tomorrow marked up.” He glanced at his watch. “I’d better be going. Cy gets mad if I’m away too long. And order what you like from the restaurants and bars. Just sign for it.”

  “Well,” Mummy said as the door closed behind him. “This isn’t bad, is it? Apart from having to learn lines by tomorrow. I don’t think I’m going to take to films. On the set at six a.m.? Really not me. Thank God the theater is more civilized.” She sank onto the brightly upholstered sofa and picked up a peach from an enormous bowl of fruit on a rattan table. “Frankly, darling, I don’t know why I agreed to this. I mean, I don’t need the money. I don’t really want to become a film star. It must be Stella’s fault.”

  “Stella?”

  She took a bite of peach then looked up at me. “I suppose it was just that I wanted to prove to Stella that I still had it. You know, last time we worked together she was just a little nobody. I was the big star of the pantomime and Stella and her sister were t
he novelty act—skinny little girls with big eyes like waifs. They were quite good little dancers and acrobats, I seem to remember, and they adored me.” She sighed, remembering being adored, I suspected.

  The luggage arrived with Queenie. She looked around with approval. “This ain’t half bad,” she said. “I think I’m going to like California. They were telling me on the train that everybody’s equal in America. None of this bowing and scraping and calling people ‘my lady.’” And she gave me a disapproving stare.

  “If you want to find you still have a job when we return to England, I suggest you don’t get carried away by what is done in America,” Mummy said. “Face it that you’re hopeless, Queenie. Nobody else but my good-natured daughter would employ you. Now hurry up and unpack your mistress’s cases. I’m sure she’d like to go for a swim while I study.”

  Queenie stomped off.

  “That girl is getting too big for her britches,” Mummy said. “You may have to replace her whether you like it or not.”

  “I know,” I said, “but it’s rather like taking in a stray animal that you know can’t survive on its own. You’re stuck with it.”

  “Not me, darling. You must learn to be more ruthless. It’s the only way.” She went to the window and looked out. “We’ll have to go shopping before anything else. Our clothes are simply too formal for California. Look at those women in shorts. And none of them has a good bottom.”

  The sunglasses arrived. Mummy found some shorts and halter tops in the hotel shop then settled down to study her script while I was banished to the pool. It was surrounded by lounge chairs, nearly all occupied by impossibly tanned bodies. I had just found a free lounge chair when a rather splendid lady came to sit beside me. Unlike everyone in shorts she was wearing a long silk gown and trailing flimsy scarves, one of which was tied around 1920s-style bobbed hair. It was hard to say how old she was, as she was wearing a lot of makeup and big sunglasses.

  “Well, hello there,” she said. “I never see skin as white as yours in California. Look at you—absolute porcelain whiteness. You must have come straight from England where I’m told the sun never shines.”

  “Not very often,” I agreed.

  “Ah, so I’m right. You are English.”

  “Half Scottish, actually.” I found I was stumbling over my words in the way I always did in Queen Mary’s presence. She was quite an overpowering lady. “Actually a quarter Scottish and a quarter German.”

  “Interesting,” she said. Then she wagged a finger, bedecked with rings and red-painted nails. “I bet I know who you are. There was a whisper going around that a royal personage was coming to stay here. You must be she. Am I right?”

  “No, I’m not exactly royal,” I said. “Queen Victoria was my great-grandmother, so the king is my second cousin, or is it first cousin once removed?”

  “See, I knew it!” The woman gave a cackling laugh. “That’s royal enough for us out here, honey. Say, do I have to call you ‘Your Highness?’”

  “Oh, no,” I said. I was about to say that “my lady” was the correct term of address but I remembered what Queenie had said about everyone being equal in America. I didn’t want to start off on the wrong foot here. “My name is Georgiana, but everyone calls me Georgie.”

  The woman stuck out her hand. “Welcome to America, Georgie, honey. I’m Barbara. Barbara Kindell. I live here at the hotel and if you need anything you just ask me.”

  “Thank you very much,” I stammered. We in England were not used to such friendliness. “Are you also part of the film business?”

  “In a way, Georgie, honey. In a way,” she said. “I’d better let you go for your swim while I make a telephone call.”

  As I lowered myself into the pool I was conscious of a small, wiry dark-haired man sitting with his legs dangling into the water and watching me with interest. Of course then I was horribly self-conscious of my lack of swimming ability. I did a dignified breaststroke up and down the pool, then when I stopped the small man slid into the water beside me. He had an interesting face with dark, alert eyes. Not exactly handsome but there was something about him—a confidence, maybe, in spite of his small stature. He swam over to me with easy strokes.

  “You want to watch what you say to Barbara,” he said, “if you don’t want it splashed across the front pages of every newspaper in Hollywood.” He grinned at my surprise. “She’s our leading gossip columnist, sweetie. She prowls these places like a shark.”

  “Crikey,” I said.

  The man burst into laughter. “Now that’s a word I haven’t heard in many years.”

  I noticed then that he had a trace of English accent in his American-sounding speech.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I know I should sound more sophisticated but words like that just slip out, especially when I’m nervous.”

  “You shouldn’t be nervous around me. I’m a real friendly sort of guy,” he said. “And do you know you have lovely long legs. I adore women with long legs.” And to my amazement he ran a finger gently up my left thigh.

  “I think I should go and see how my mother is getting along,” I said, making for the steps.

  “I’ll see you around then, you sweet creature. Someone completely unspoiled—now that’s a rarity for Hollywood. What a challenge.”

  As I got out of the pool, my face rather red, I suspect, I met Barbara Kindell coming back from her telephone call. She beckoned me over to her. “Watch out for that one, honey,” she said. “He eats little girls like you for breakfast.”

  “Who is he?” I asked.

  She threw back her head and laughed. “You don’t recognize him, sweetie? He’s Charlie Chaplin.”

  I looked back and saw that the little man was now sitting on the side of the pool again, looking at me with amusement in his eyes. He looked nothing like the comic figure I had seen on the screen.

  I was about to make for our bungalow when I saw a sight that stopped me dead in my tracks. A large person in yards and yards of a red and white frilly bathing suit was coming toward me. On her head was a red flowery bathing cap. She looked like a buoy floating off the coast and it took me a second to recognize her.

  “Queenie!” I stammered. “What on earth do you think you’re doing?”

  “Going for a swim, miss. That pool don’t half look good.”

  “Queenie. You are a lady’s maid. You simply can’t swim in the pool with your betters,” I said.

  “Why not?” She glared at me defiantly. “This is America. We’re all equal. I do my job when you need me and when you don’t need me I can do what I like in my own free time. That’s what they told me on the train.”

  I think I gasped. “Queenie, do you think the queen would let her maid go roller-skating up and down the halls of Buckingham Palace?”

  “We ain’t at Buckingham Palace, are we? We’re in a different country with different rules and I don’t see why I can’t take a dip in a pool during my free time.”

  I couldn’t think of a good answer to that. It was quite possible that American maids did swim in pools with Charlie Chaplin. “I’m sorry, Queenie, but this is something we need to talk about,” I said. “At the moment it is not appropriate. Please go back to the bungalow.”

  “A right old spoilsport you’ve turned out to be,” she said and stomped ahead of me toward the bungalow.

  Chapter 13

  AT THE BEVERLY HILLS HOTEL

  MONDAY, JULY 30, 1934

  Talk about the lap of luxury! I’m feeling a bit like a film star myself. I wonder what Belinda would say if she knew that Charlie Chaplin had been flirting with me. I wonder what Darcy would say. . . .

  I was completely shocked. I remembered having the same feeling when I adopted an adorable kitten from the stables as a child and one day it scratched me. Not that Queenie was adorable. I followed her back into the bungalow to hear an imperious voice sayi
ng, “My sister? She is not my sister. She is the spawn of a whore, a nobody.”

  Mummy looked up in annoyance as we came in. “You’re not back already? I was just getting the feel of the character. Quite a challenge to make her appealing when she really is such a bitch. In fact I . . .” She looked up and those large eyes opened even wider. “My God. What is that?”

  “What is what?” I asked.

  She pointed at Queenie. “That. Your maid.”

  “It’s my swimming costume, madam,” Queenie said. “I was going to go swimming but your daughter won’t let me.”

  “Queenie, in the first place I suspect that maids don’t swim in the pool at the Beverly Hills Hotel and in the second I’ve never seen anything more hideous in my life. Where on earth did you find it?”

  “I bought it a while ago. Just in case I ever got the chance to go swimming,” Queenie said defiantly.

  “It is utterly hideous. You look like a beached whale wrapped in a barber’s pole. Go and take it off, for God’s sake.” And she started to laugh. “Absolutely hideous. Never seen anything worse in my life. Oh my God. It will probably give me nightmares!”

  Queenie went to say something, then glared and pushed past me into her room. I followed. “You do understand, don’t you, Queenie? There’s a gossip columnist at the pool. The press would love to print pictures of you, and then the queen would see them and be mortified.”

  She looked like a deflated balloon and as usual I felt sorry for her. “Maybe we’ll find a way to go to the beach soon. I’m sure nobody would mind if you swam in the ocean there.”

  “Well, I don’t want to wear my uniform,” she said. “It’s too ruddy hot for this weather and I sweat something terrible.”

  “I understand,” I said. “I had no idea we’d be away long in a climate like this. I’ll arrange for a lighter uniform. I’m sure Ronnie can make one appear by magic for you.”

  “And I don’t have to stay in my room in the bungalow all the time, do I? There’s not enough space to swing a cat in here.”