Authors: Ace Atkins
The bastard didn’t even have a hat on his fat Irish head.
“HOW WAS I TO KNOW?” MABEL Normand asked. “I thought it was some kind of fever. All I knew is that Mack didn’t want that girl on the lot. He was afraid it would infect the whole crew.”
“You know what it was?”
“Mack would know,” Mabel said. “He’s had all those social diseases. Isn’t it funny that they call them that, ‘social diseases’? Makes it almost seem dignified, as if you got ’em from shaking hands or doing the waltz.”
Mabel Normand reminded Sam of a child’s doll, with her milk-colored skin and saucer black eyes. Her hair in ringlets. She looked even more like a toy as she perched on top of a cracker barrel, her feet drumming on the wood while she talked about the good ole days with Fatty and Minta and the craziness on the lot at Keystone.
“Minta’s a good egg,” Mabel said. “I don’t know if I’d stand by Roscoe in all this.”
“She says she loves him.”
“That’s another kind of sickness. I got the same sickness and it’s terminal, brother. Say, do you have a smoke?”
Sam fished out a cigarette and handed it to her.
She remained in her stage costume, that of a turn-of-the-century washerwoman, complete with a frumpy dress and slouch hat. When Minta introduced them on the back lot at Sennett Studios, Mabel showed off the pruning of her hands from all the wash she had to do for the part in
Molly O’
.
“I swore to myself I wouldn’t step foot back on this lot without killing Mack, but, here I am, crawling back to the son of a bitch. I shoulda stayed with Goldwyn. He’s an all right fella, if he’d just keep his hands off my ass.”
“I heard that Roscoe had a thing for Virginia.”
“A thing? He had a hard-on like a divining rod for that piece. Every man on the lot did. She showed up here from somewhere back east, with her polite smile and those gorgeous clothes, and every boy knew they had some pie fresh from the oven. Little did they know she gave it away for free.”
“Was she ever with Roscoe?”
“She wouldn’t,” Mabel said. “Said he was too fat. She said she didn’t like fat men. But he sent her flowers and candies and took his hat off when she walked by. Even when she was with Lehrman, he tried.”
“You know this?”
“I saw this. He acted like a fool.”
“You know, I saw you once in a nickelodeon in Baltimore,” Sam said.
“I never been to Baltimore.”
“I saw you in one of those things you crank and the photos flip.”
“Anyone ever tell you that you look like Wallace Reid?” Mabel asked.
She smiled at him and Sam decided she had a very nice smile.
“All the time.”
“Well, you do. If the detective thing doesn’t work out, you could make a fine living as his double.”
“I don’t think I could live here.”
“How come?”
“Too spread out. I like a city where you can walk and get to know the neighborhoods and back alleys. A real city you can know on your feet. I’d get lost here.”
“This is no city,” Mabel said, looking down the row of wooden barns and façades of a city set. “Sometimes I think I live in purgatory. I had the craziest dream the other night. I dreamed I was bleeding from my mouth and couldn’t breathe or see. Say, you wanna get a drink, Sam?”
“I’m catching the three o’clock back to Frisco.”
“Too bad,” Mabel said, finishing the cigarette and flicking it into the dusty streets of the lot. “Next time you’re here, give me a ring.”
“Does the name Hibbard mean anything to you?”
Mabel Normand, the old little girl in makeup and ringlets, looked to Sam like he was some kind of rube.
“Don’t you read the papers?”
“Mainly the comics,” Sam said. “I love
Mutt and Jeff
. ”
“That’s Roscoe’s buddy.”
“I don’t follow.”
“Fred Hibbard. The Romanian. He calls himself Fishback now. He thinks it’s pretty goddamn funny because he directs comedies.”
“I LOVE YOU.”
“I love you, too, W.R.”
“Are you ready to open your eyes?”
“Where are we?”
“Quit fiddling with that blindfold,” Hearst said. “Two more steps and we’re there.”
“I been b-blind since you picked me up,” Marion Davies said in that cute staccato Brooklyn accent. “You ride me all over the city up and down hills and around c-corners and I don’t know which way is up. Do you call that fair?”
“What’s that?”
“K-keeping a person blind for the whole goddamn drive? It’s c-c-cruelty.”
“It’s a present.”
“Because you love me.”
“Yes.”
“Can I t-take this off now?”
Hearst was silent. And then he thumbed open the bottle of champagne, making Miss Davies jump back, maybe thinking it was a gunshot, as she fingered open the silk blinds on her eyes and smiled. He could almost hear her smile, the moist parting of her lips, that small cracking noise of lip on teeth, as she spun around in the center of the theater, in the middle of all those slabs of wooden seats. She crooked her head up at the ceiling, still half done—the sloths—but enough done to see those Spanish patterns and curves and buttresses and delicate designs he’d had hand-copied from Madrid.
“Where are we?” Miss Davies asked.
“Miss Davies, we’re in your theater.”
“Mine? Don’t k-k-kid me, W.R.”
“Have you ever known me to joke about a gift?”
Davies raised her eyebrows and shrugged a bit, pursing her lips. “No.”
“It’s called the Granada. Isn’t that just a wonderful name? The perfect place to premiere
Enchantment
.”
“You b-bought a whole theater for one picture?”
“Why not?”
He walked tall and erect down the aisle toward the stage, not a soul in the place, just as it was supposed to be. The screen wasn’t up yet, or the big red curtains he’d handpicked from a hundred samples, but he just couldn’t wait another moment. She had to see it.
“The stage will be set on the seventeenth of November. When the clock strikes one, the guarding doors will swing wide for those lucky San Franciscans who will first taste the glories of the new Granada. ‘A surprise upon surprise awaits. A foyer smiling beautiful—a palace where quiet luxury warmly glows—and then thousands of comfortable, hospitable seats.’ ”
“You ham.”
“Now for the program,” Hearst said, mounting the steps and comfortably finding the stage. “
Enchantment
. Heralded and accepted by New York—of course New York, letting all these San Franciscans know about the true tastemakers—as an exquisite photo comedy—and chosen for the Granada’s opening program in competition with the best current, super features, ‘
Enchantment
will add a captivating climax to an event already big.’ ”
“You fool.”
“Do you love me?” Hearst asked from the stage.
“I love you.”
“Even as a ham?”
“Even as a f-fool.”
The theater was as large, or larger, than any movie house in New York.
The façade was just grand, the opening mouth to a palace, a castle, a cathedral onto Mission Street. He could see all those faces on opening night, their mouths agape, looking at the black-and-white images floating across the screen. Miss Davies’s angelic profile, her lithe form, the goddess in ringlets smiling at all of them. He felt his heart shift inside him.
“W.R.? You okay up there?”
“Fine.”
“You looked as if you’d pass out.”
“I did this all for you, Miss Davies.”
“C-come down this instant.”
“I like it up here.”
He mouthed the words “All for you.”
Marion found the staircase and the stage and walked to him, finding a spot under his big arm. He pulled her into his stiff black suit, the kind George said reminded him of an undertaker, her head not even reaching his shoulder.
“I miss the eye contact,” she said. “When you’re on stage, you c-can see people having a good time. B-b-but in a picture, you’re just one of them.”
“Isn’t that the point?”
She smiled up at him and pinched his cheek. Hearst felt his face turn red as he looked out onto the empty seats, feeling the jitters of opening night coming into play. Everything was set. All there was to do was sit back and watch the thing play out.
“How ’bout dinner?”
“More champagne?” she asked.
“Always.”
“In p-pajamas?”
“Of course.”
“You screwy boy.”
“SO HE’s A LIAR?” the Old Man asked.
“He’s not so much a liar as he just left some things out,” Sam said.
“With his fat ass on the line, you’d think he could stand to be a little more truthful,” said Phil Haultain.
“He probably left out that the Fishback fella brought the booze to keep him out of trouble,” Sam said.
“What about lying about knowing the girl?” the Old Man asked.
“To keep himself out of trouble,” Sam said.
“He should’ve figured he’d get found out on that one,” the Old Man said. “I wonder who Brady has lined up to tell about Arbuckle’s passion for Miss Rappe.”
“Plenty,” Sam said. “I heard Tom Reagan was down, too.”
“You run into him?”
“No,” Sam said. “But I hear he was talking to the same people.”
“You think they know about Maude Delmont running that con on that fairy actor?”
“I’d bet on it,” Sam said.
Phil Haultain walked to the windows and looked down on Ellis Street. You could hear the sound of the cable cars zipping up and down Powell and the yelps of the little newsboys hawking the afternoon editions. The big lug was wearing his big brown Stetson and a double-breasted suit and nodded while the Old Man and Sam talked, as if making sure they knew he was all right with what they were saying.
“I wouldn’t screw that Delmont broad,” Haultain said. “She’s old as my mother and twice as ugly.”
“You’re a romantic, Phil,” Sam said.
“I likes what I likes.”
“Phil, stick with those two women.”
“I got to know Miss Blake and Miss Prevon on an intimate basis,” Haultain said.
“Where are they?” the Old Man asked.
“Living on the hospitality of Ma Murphy.”
“And who’s Ma Murphy?” the Old Man asked.
“Mother of George Murphy, young assistant district attorney in the employ of Brady,” Haultain said. “She runs a rooming house and they got guards round-the-clock.”
“Sam, go home, see your wife, take a shower, have a hot meal.”
“Will do.”
“And then I want you to shadow Maude Delmont. I want to know what the coppers know. You understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“There’s something at that party we’ve missed,” the Old Man said.
“That’s why I followed Jack Lawrence,” Sam said. “But the more I know about that party, the less I know.”
“You don’t trust Arbuckle?” the Old Man asked.
“Not as far as I can throw him.”
Sam looked to young Phil Haultain and he smiled back.
“You got this guy running shadows now?” Sam asked.
The Old Man cracked a smile. A rare smile for the Old Man, who didn’t seem to know what a smile was all about.
“Stir the pot,” the Old Man said. “See what floats to the top.”
“Even if we don’t like it?” Sam said.
The Old Man placed his feet on his desk. He lit a cigar. The sounds of people and machines and cable cars came from outside. He smiled but said nothing.
“It’s good to know,” Sam said.
“You bet,” said the Old Man, the cigar a burning orange plug in the side of his mouth. “Even if we want it buried.”
18
W
eeks later, the morning of November 11, Sam awoke to military bands warming up by the Civic Center and City Hall—the first few chords of “How ’Ya Gonna Keep ’Em Down on the Farm?”—and the metallic sounds of the testing of amplified voices from where President Harding would address the crowds later in the day. The apartment windows were open onto Eddy; a soft, cold breeze parted the torn curtains and brought in the early sounds of Armistice Day. But Sam soon closed the windows to shut out the racket and returned to watching his daughter sleep. Her name was Mary Jane, perfect and tiny and pink, with the sad soft eyes of her mother and the long delicate fingers of his mother’s family, the Dashiells.
After the baby had been born, Jose didn’t miss a beat, changing and washing diapers, soothing the late-night cries, and walking that creaking floor with the child just about the time Sam would come in from a shadow job. He’d sit with the child, after a long day on his feet, and rock her, careful not to breathe close, head turned and sometimes holding his breath, at the doctor’s request. Sam made camp on the Murphy bed, an alarm clock and bottle of balsamea kept nearby for company, while Jose and the baby slept in the bedroom.
Sam left the crib and Jose and the bedroom and set a match to the burner on the iron stove, making coffee. He was off today, as was most of San Francisco, but was already showered and dressed, his military papers tucked securely in the vest pocket of his tweeds. The
Examiner
had run a story the day before about veterans being given food and coal, and even toys for their children, and this was the first day since making his way west that he’d been proud he’d signed up for the goddamn circus. He’d been ignored by pencil pushers, told the sickness he’d caught back in camp wasn’t worth a damn, and was now forbidden by docs to be close to his daughter. He’d be damned if he wouldn’t get every scrap offered by his government.
The coffee boiled and he strained it over a mug. On a hook by the door sat his old Army-issue coat and cap. He heard Jose stir and she came tiptoeing into the room and leaned down to kiss Sam on the cheek.
“You think we’ll have room in the icebox?” Sam asked.
“We’ll make room.”
“The paper said to come to the Civic Center.”
“Do you hear all that?”
“It’s what woke me.”
“You think you’ll see the president?”
“I’ll give him your best.”
“I’d like to get the baby out.”
“It’s shoulder to shoulder,” he said. “Drunks and fat politicians. I won’t take long.”
Sam stood, finished the coffee, and walked with Jose to the door, sliding into his Army coat and cap.