“Yes,” Marty said importantly. “My wife and I are with the company playing the Opera House this week!” He signed “Mr. and Mrs. Marty Nolan” with a flourish.
The little clerk eyed the register dubiously and informed him, “That will be ten dollars for the week. Theatricals pay in advance.”
“In advance?” Marty said with annoyance.
“Don’t blame me! It’s a rule of the boss!”
“Where is the boss?” Marty demanded indignantly.
“In Minnesota,” the little man said. “We just run the place for him.”
With some discomfiture Marty produced his wallet, extracted a ten dollar bill, and asked for a recipt. Anita was less impressed than she might have been, since she recognized the worn ten dollar bill as one of those which she had given Marty.
The little man showed them up to their room which looked out onto a trash-filled, cat-infested alleyway. Anita stared around her at the worn dresser and the chipped white paint on the iron framed bed and wondered for perhaps the twentieth time if she had been wise in running away from home.
Marty abandoned the bags and plumped down on the bed. It gave ominously under his weight. He smiled at her. “We’ll be cosy as toads in this!”
“And just as cold,” she told him. “No tricks until we have it all legal and right!”
“Jezebel!” he cried in an impatient tone. “Unpack while I got out in search of a JP and suitable witnesses.”
By the time he returned she had unpacked their scanty belongings and was stretched out on the bed resting. As soon as he burst in she could tell that he’d been drinking. And the moment he came close to her she smelled cheap liquor on his breath. She got to her feet to face him.
“You’re drunk!” she accused him.
“Man going to get married deserves a drink,” he said with a wave of his arm.
Her face was expressionless. “I’m not sure there’s to be any marriage if you’re counting on me!”
“I found him! The JP!” Marty announced. “He’s also the local barber and bootlegger. So I paid him to get us a license, perform the ceremony, cut my hair and give me a couple of drinks.”
“If the haircut is a sample, you got no bargain,” Anita told him.
“Don’t be so sour!” he pleaded, reaching out to take her in his arms. “Back in Lynn you were my little darling!”
“Little simp would be nearer to it,” she said, taking a step back. “When are we going to be married?”
“Tomorrow. Right after one o’clock. And Belle Ames and Romero are going to be our witnesses.”
“I’ll believe it when it happens,” she said.
“It’ll happen, you’ll see,” Marty promised her. “Now let’s have a bite downstairs. I have to go to the theatre early for a run-through.”
About an hour later they arrived at the Opera House. Anita thought it unimpressive even by Binghampton standards. The village had more indoor plumbing than Marty had admitted and there was at least one Irishman in town, if not a Catholic, as she’d seen the windows of O’Malley’s feed and grain store. They made their way inside and through the shabby lobby to the equally dismal little auditorium. It had nothing of the grandeur of the theatre in Lynn.
In these surroundings the vaudeville show had little glamor either. The music was supplied by the house pianist, an elderly, neurotic man with little interest in helping the performers do their best. He wore a green eye shade, a loud vest and a striped shirt. When Marty came on for his turn the pianist was especially unpleasant.
He waited until Marty handed down his music from the stage and then scowled at it, saying, “Okay! I can handle it!”
Marty remained center stage and told the man in the orchestra pit, “I’d like to go through a little of it.”
The pianist stood up angrily. “You think I got time to waste? You’re a two-bit dancer and I can handle your music any time!”
Marty folded his arms and remained where he was. “How do I know you’re not a two-bit pianist? I want my act right. You’ll give me some music or I’ll call the manager!”
The pianist stared at him a moment, then sat down and spread the music out before him and began to play. He played well enough, and Marty went into his dance steps and measured the stage in respect to his act. The pianist didn’t play long and ended with a burst of sour notes.
Marty leaned over the footlights and grinned, “That’s a sample of your disposition, not my act!”
Anita, who had been seated in the dark at the back of the little theatre, heard a voice at her side say, “You must be doing Marty some good! I’ve never seen him stand up to anyone like that before!”
She turned to see it was Belle Ames who had come to sit beside her. The girl from the seal act was wearing a red coat with a pitiful-looking fur collar. Anita asked her, “Do you all have to battle with everyone for your rights?”
“Twenty-four hours around the clock!” Belle said with a smile.
“I didn’t think show business was like this,” Anita said with despair.
“We can’t all be Theda Baras or Mabel Normands,” Belle said. “But if you hold on there’s always that one chance you may make it some day.”
Anita said, “Marty says you’re going to be a witness at my wedding tomorrow.”
Belle nodded. “Yeah! I feel like they say in court, an accessory to the crime! You’re sure you want to marry Marty?”
“Yes,” she said with a rueful smile. “I love him and I feel sorry for him. I know he drinks too much and he hasn’t any great prospects, but O’Hara girls have contended with things like that for ages!”
“Well, you can’t say you weren’t warned!” the other girl told her.
Anita attended the show that night on a special pass given reluctantly by the manager. In the end he offered it as a kind of wedding present. This time she sat in the small balcony at the manager’s request, since he didn’t want any of the good seats below to be occupied free. She was encouraged when the house filled almost to capacity.
Later she heard this was usually the case. If the show was awful the opening night crowd booed it and everyone else stayed away for the week. If the show was good the word went out and generally a satisfactory week’s business followed. There was one drawback in this case; the manager of the Binghampton Opera House was known in the trade as one who didn’t give an honest house count to the company. So, good or bad, it wasn’t likely they’d leave the little town with much earned.
The main movie of the evening was a western starring William S. Hart and Anita gathered from the general conversation around her that this was the chief reason most of the audience were there. But before the western there was a two reel comedy, and of all people, it featured Billy Bowers! She was at once lost in the magic of the silver screen performance of the talented comic and found herself laughing riotously at his bashful antics. It was exciting to know that he and Marty were friends. She wished that she could tell everyone around her and impress them. Let them understand that her husband was of some importance. She enjoyed the manly Bill Hart with his two guns in the exciting western which followed. Then the canvas curtain with its advertisements of local stores dropped down, and the footlights came on. She knew that behind the canvas drop the screen was being removed and the stage being set for the vaudeville acts which followed.
The pianist had vanished for a little and now he returned and began playing “Avalon.” The curtain rose on a crudely painted garden backdrop. Little Sherman Kress came from the wings in white tie and tails, trying to look warm and friendly. He didn’t succeed too well, giving the appearance of an unhappy, sour, small man, which he surely was.
He sang several choruses of “Avalon” and then waited for an embarrassing few seconds for applause. Receiving none, he went into a series of stale jokes which drew a few boos from the audience. Undaunted, he finished with another song and introduced Romero the Great.
Anita was feeling friendly towards the mustached young magician si
nce he was going to be one of her witnesses the next day, and his act was fairly good. He moved quickly about the stage drawing endless ribbons in gay colors from his pockets and sleeves, and from the air around him. Then he produced flowers from an empty newspaper receptacle, and he wound up by some sword swallowing. The sword bit drew applause from the audience who were clearly in a mood for adventurous happenings.
Sherman Kress bounded on again with an agonized grimace of forced geniality and introduced Madame Irma. The big woman swept onstage with an air of courage and command, looking much better than in the second class railway car. In a sequinned dress with an ostrich plume in her hair and a fan of the same feathers in her hand, she came downstage smiling. She bowed as if expecting applause and to Anita’s amazement the audience gave her quite a hand.
“Thank you, dear friends,” Madame Irma said in her deep contralto voice, and then began her act. It was evident that her claim to having been a headliner was justified. Whether it was due to a failing voice or some other quirk of fate, she obviously belonged in a better troupe than the present one. Her rendering of “On The Road To Mandalay” was a great success with the audience and when she sang a series of sentimental ballads, they applauded more wildly. But it was her medley of patriotic songs of the recently ended war which won her tremendous appreciation at the very end of her act. Her rousing rendition of “Over There” saw her off to tumultuous applause.
It was evident that Sherman Kress knew a good thing when he saw it. He saw that his prima donna took several curtain calls. Madame Irma came out grandly each time, bowed, waved to the little man with her ostrich fan, and then vanished.
Next to closing came the act of Pontiface and Percy, and once again the audience were happy. The gloomy Mr. Pontiface knew how to put the seal through his paces. Percy was the favorite, but Belle Ames, in a revealing skimpy dress, added decoration to the act. Anita was sure the males in the audience paid more attention to the pretty Belle than they did to Percy balancing his rubber balls and playing his horns. But it added up to lots of applause and a satisfied audience.
Sherman Kress came back to introduce the closing act, Marty Nolan. Anita found herself holding her breath in fear that the young man with whom she was going to spend her future wouldn’t be well received. After a moment of breathless anticipation the pianist began to play and Marty came dancing on from the wings. In his straw hat, dapper check suit and black and white buttoned boots he looked the perfect picture of a young man at the seaside.
When he finished his opening dance he began a patter about how badly his holiday was going, especially in the romance department. This was his cue to begin singing some semi-humorous love songs. Anita thought he did them very well but it was his dancing which was best. When he began to dance again the audience were with him. He finished to applause at least the equal of that awarded Pontiface and Percy and Company. The curtain fell after Marty took his single curtain call, and the show was over.
Anita waited until the locals had filed out and then she hurried around to the backstage door. After a difficult moment of explanation to the ancient doorman, she was allowed in. Even this modest backstage held magic for her and made her realize how much her heart was in this crazy show business. She found Marty talking to Romero and Pontiface. As soon as he saw her he left the other two men and came to her.
She said, “You were wonderful!”
He laughed happily and took her in his arms and kissed her many times. “You’re a love,” he said. “I knew you’d get over your sour spell!”
“Are you ready to go back to the hotel?” she asked.
“Not yet,” he said warily. “As you know it is the custom on a man’s wedding night to have a few drinks with his male friends.”
“A stag party?”
“Yes,” Marty said. “And I know you’ll not deny Romero and Pontiface the pleasure of sharing a few rounds of their bootleg booze with me.”
She sighed. “You won’t drink too much?”
“I never drink too much,” Marty said with righteous indignity. “Now you go back to the hotel and tuck yourself in bed and know that I’ll be drinking to our future with my two chums!” He kissed her again and sent her on her way.
She was halfway down the alley to the street when she heard a voice from behind her, call out, “Wait, kid!” She turned and saw that it was Madame Irma.
She waited until the buxom woman caught up to her. Madame Irma said, “We can walk together. Company for each other.”
“I’d like that,” Anita said. “You were the best thing in the show.”
The big woman gave her a friendly look. “Well, at least you have good taste, dearie.”
Anita said, “I can tell you were a big-timer like you said. The people really enjoyed you!”
“Even these hicks recognize talent,” Madame Irma said grandly. “Oh, well, maybe some day I’ll be back on Broadway.”
“I hope so,” Anita replied.
“Where you staying?” the big woman asked.
“The Depot House.”
“High class!” Madame Irma said. “But at least we’re going in the same direction. I have a little room in a boarding house just up the street from it.”
“Marty is using my money to pay for the room because it is going to be where we spend our honeymoon.”
“Generous of him!” Madame Irma sniffed.
“I know he’s not perfect,” Anita was quick to say.
“Not perfect? Don’t start me on him,” Madame Irma sad with wrath. “Where is he now?”
Anita smiled as they walked along the dark street side by side. “He’s having some drinks with the other men to celebrate our wedding tomorrow.”
“It’s nothing to celebrate,” Madame Irma warned her. “You can still get out of it if you want.”
“I don’t want to,” she said. “I love Marty in spite of his faults.”
“You’re in trouble, kid,” the older woman sighed. “I know the feeling. It cost me three husbands and a lot of misery.”
They had reached the door of the hotel. Anita halted and said, “Thank you for being so kind to me. I hope we’ll be friends.”
Madame Irma nodded. “I could have had a daughter your age. She died in a makeshift cradle backstage one night. I never had another baby.”
“I’m sorry,” Anita replied with sympathy.
“Sure, but that’s life. It’s never easy,” the big woman said. “You need to have something to love as well as somebody. I’m lucky I’ve got my career.”
“And you’re so good!”
“I’m a damned failure,” Madame Irma said angrily. “But you’re right, I am good!” And she walked off into the night.
Anita was a little taken back by her new friend’s quick change in mood, but she knew that theatre people were famed for being temperamental and that this had been a show of that quality in Madame. She could well understand that the aging woman might be lonely and discouraged, and no doubt she had reminded her of what her life might have been like if her daughter had lived and grown up.
Anita went up to the tiny room, undressed and got into bed. Then she lay awake waiting for her husband-to-be to return — the beginning of a long vigil that lasted most of the night. It was after three in the morning and she’d had only a brief nap when she heard stumbling footsteps in the hallway outside. There was much fumbling of a key in the lock until, exasperated, she got up and went in her nightie to open the door.
Marty stood swaying outside, pale and ill looking. He exuded the sour smell of vomit and had been sick all over the front of his suit. Anita groaned and helped him in, leading him to the bed. He sat down heavily in a dazed fashion and tried to say something but his words came out slurred and twisted. She struggled to remove his jacket and then he collapsed onto the bed. When Anita lifted up his feet onto the bed, he was already snoring, stretched out straight on his back.
She went to the basin in the room and used cold water, soap and one of the thin towels to try a
nd clean his jacket. It was a sickening task but she kept at it since she knew it was his best suit and the one he’d want to be married in. At last she had it fairly decent and hung it on a chair back to dry. Then she washed herself thoroughly and, dragging a blanket from the bed, she settled down in the easy chair and promptly went to sleep.
Marty greeted the morning sun, retching and cursing. Anita went down to the coffee shop below and brought up a pot of black coffee. Only after copious amounts of the strong stuff did he begin to come around.
“I really tied one on,” he said, seated on the side of the bed, a coffee mug in his trembling hands.
“You were disgraceful!” Anita snapped.
“What do you expect? A man has a right to celebrate the night before he gets married!”
“After seeing you last night, I’m not sure I want to marry you,” she told him sternly.
“Ah, now,” he said affecting a broad Irish accent, “that doesn’t sound like the delight of me life!”
“I worked more than an hour cleaning your jacket,” she said, waving at it where it hung on the chair back.
He got up and came to her unsteadily. “You’re a darlin’, that’s what you are!”
She kept him at arm’s length. “If we marry today, I want you to promise there’ll be not more wild drinking.”
“I need a little tot now and then,” he protested.
“You’d be better off not to drink at all,” she said. “You know that half the bootleg stuff is poison! You read about it every day in the paper! People are even blinded!”
“I’d say if you have to use a cane and black glasses, that’s the ideal way to get them,” he said, draining the mug of coffee.
“It’s not a joking matter,” Anita said earnestly. “I’m only a silly girl. But I can see you’re wrecking your health and your prospects. You surely don’t want to go on playing in places like Binghampton all your life?”
This seemed to reach him. He raised a hand. “Marry me and I’ll do better!”
“You’ll have to or you won’t have a wife long,” was her warning.
“Give me a kiss and let’s make up,” he said with some of his old charm. And he opened his arms for her.
Vintage Love Page 214