IV. SUE HARVEY

I DIDN'T phone the Fleishmeyer Agency; I missed my three o'clock appointment at Paramount and came to work the next afternoon twenty minutes late. The boss was very nice about it though—in the pig's neck. He suggested, in his broken English, that I fix my alarm clock, spend less time in the company of broken down picture actors and deduct a dollar from my weekly pay. But he didn't fire me. He knew what a hard time he would have trying to hire another girl to fit my uniform.

“What I do after hours is my own affair,” I told him. “And I'll go out with whomever I please. ”

Mr. Bloomberg shrugged his fat shoulders.

“So it's your funeral, not mine. I only try to look after my girls like a father. I don't want to see any of them in trouble. Actors out here you can get a dime a dozen, but good waitresses don't grow on trees. Now, hurry up. That sedan ain't taken care of yet.”

My work I did as usual—efficiently but mechanically. My body would be occupied carrying trays, taking orders and calculating checks while my mind would be elsewhere. I was a day-dreamer from the time I went to work until Selma came on to relieve me at midnight. There could be a terrific racket going on around me—dishes clattering, horns blowing and motors roaring—without it distracting me. I was deaf to most of these sounds. When customers addressed me it would register, but little more than just that. The fresh young fellows in huge, expensive cars with empty gas tanks could jolly me all they liked. I never complained because I took no notice of any remarks other than definite orders.

And my dreams? Oh, the usual Hollywood hopes: a contract, some money, stardom and that sort of thing. They were silly, of course; I knew that. Mathematically, I hadn't a chance in a million, Gaynor or no Gaynor. Still, in Hollywood, even the exact science of arithmetic cannot dull the hope, the secret belief even, that you will be the lucky one. Only not entirely lucky. You are talented also, and you are beautiful. The studios only have to awakened to the fact, that is all.

And then sometimes I'd pretend I was on my way back to New York to see my friends. Not as a failure, naturally. I'd step from the train at Grand Central, or from the plane at Newark Airport, dressed in a Paris frock and wearing a chinchilla coat. The press people would all be waiting, armed with flash cameras and note-books. And there would be flowers, offers for personal appearances, a handful of autograph-seekers (not too many to be annoying), and Alex. He would be wearing a new suit of clothes-made-to order, not one of his customary $19.95 specials—and a shirt that wasn't frayed at the collar. He would be shaved and his hair would be neatly cut and his shoes shined. He would know enough to tip the Red-Caps and he would refrain from slapping me on the back and calling me “Sue”. I wouldn't be Sue Harvey any more. My name would be Suzanne Harmony... And, oh, yes. There would be several legitimate stage producers at the station, too. They would wave contracts at me and beg me to sign for a role. My answer would have to be: “No, no. I'm sorry, Mr. Harris, Mr. Schubert, Mr. Pemberton. I'm signed on a long-term contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and I am not permitted to do a play.” And perhaps Bellman would be in the crowd and plead with me to come to his club for one night to help business along. My manager would object to this strenuously, but I would overrule him for the sake of old times. “Yes, I'll come, Bellman. Anything to help out a friend.” Then the opening night of Thais, in which I would portray the part of a notorious dancer (my past experience would come in handy there). It would be at the Music Hall in Radio City, and there would be kleigs and a long, red carpet and a broadcaster. I would step from a Duesenberg town-car, dressed in a metal-cloth creation which cost three hundred dollars—$299.85, to be exact, including the tax—and Alex would be my escort, in a full-dress suit, if I had to kill him to get him into one....

Stupid? Yes, I suppose so. And funny, when you come to think that I imagined ail this while working in a greasy hamburger-stand. Yet, I believe a goodly number of shop girls, waitresses, models, laundresses and housewives shared these dreams. There are many Garbo and Dietrich scrubbing floors, washing dishes, selling stockings; loads of Barrymores and Taylors and Colemans parking cars.

Occasionally actors or actresses drove in to the stand, sometimes even in costume and with panchromatic smeared on their faces. Although I would pretend indifference, I couldn't help feeling a thrill merely in waiting on them. They were creatures out of the world I was creating, a world more often real to me than reality. Most of them I knew were no more than extras or bit players, yet that sense of importance shrouded them—even if they went away, as so many of them did, without leaving a tip. Producers, directors, writers and technicians were pointed out to me, too. But they were different. Compared with the actors they looked very dull and ordinary.

It was nine-thirty before the dinner rush was over and I had half a minute to sit down, catch my breath and glance at the Examiner. I like to read the gossip columns to see who went where, did what and why. None of that, of course, is any concern of mine; however, it makes me feel that I am keeping in close touch with things. The front pages which deal chiefly with foreign wars, strikes and politics bore me to distraction. Like most Hollywood people, I believe the sun rises over Glendale and sets some place in the neighborhood of Culver City; I don't care particularly who sits down and strikes where, what party holds the reins of government, or whether Senator So-and-so proposes a bill in Congress or not. Who Selznick is planning to use in his Gone with the Wind cast is more in my line. Perhaps this is a very narrow attitude to take, but the picture industry is the most important thing in my life. My pet theory is that if only other people would think more about their occupations and less about what the Japanese are doing or the Germans, there would be little unrest in the country. Is that an idiotic notion? I don't know; maybe it is.

I glanced through a paper one of the customers had left behind and almost at once my eye fell on a small item which made my heart leap. FILM PLAYER HURT IN FALL. I can't understand it. The moment my eye lighted on that heading I had a feeling it was Raoul. And of course, it was. He was in the Cedars of Lebanon Hospital with lacerations and a dislocated arm.

My first reaction upon running across the article was surprise, naturally; then it became remorse for having treated the boy so shabbily when it had all been my own fault. However as I read along, I began to smile. It wasn't very nice, but I immediately began to think that here was something else for Raoul to add to his scrapbook. Here were five full paragraphs dealing with him alone. But the final paragraph, when I reached it, wiped the smile off my face:

 

“The accident, according to the actor, happened during the course of his morning constitutional, a climb to the top of the Hollywood mountain. Not far from the old sign at the peak, he slipped and fell. The brush growing on the steep sides of the mountain fortunately broke the fall and saved him from what easily might have been a fatal injury. Mr. Kildare, last seen as the young aviator in 'Wings of the Damned' is for the present at liberty, so his accident will cause no casting difficulties.”

 

I read the article through again for a more definite hint as to what time the accident occurred. Yes, it was a little before seven o'clock. That meant he must have gone up there soon after he had left me at my door. A cold hand began to close over my heart. I was responsible. The more I thought about it the more positive I grew that the mishap had not been a mishap. Try as I might to dismiss the thought, I became convinced that he had taken to heart what I'd said to him and it had made him despondent. For was it reasonable that Raoul should want to climb mountains in the rain? And at that ungodly hour? Even in Hollywood people don't do such silly things, unless they're drunk or surrounded by publicity men. Raoul had been sober as a judge, if that is an accepted simile.

I was worried. Not about Raoul particularly, for he wasn't seriously hurt, but about myself. I suddenly recognized myself to be a weapon, every bit as formidable as a knife or a gun, and liable to do untold damage unless kept in check. Now someone had actually attempted suicide because of a few words I had uttered. I didn't want anything like that to happen and, for the first time in my life, I began to realize just how deadly our tongues can be. I am afraid up until that time I had been in the habit of speaking without thinking, saying things I really didn't mean and not caring a great deal what effect my words took. Scenes came back to me out of the past: Sammie Keener, when I handed him his hat and told him I never wanted to see him again because he was a hopeless drunk; Bellman, when I laughed at his clumsy attempt to make love to me and when I told him to act his age, that he was old enough to be my father; Alex Roth, the time I bawled him out for doing no more than turn on a bed-lamp. Those things all had hurt. God knows how long the sting had lasted. I hadn't given them a thought because I didn't know any better and wasn't there to see the damage. However, now, with Raoul falling or jumping off mountains, I was afforded the privilege of witnessing the whole show. I didn't care for it, I can tell you.

I went inside the stand and telephoned the Cedars, Mr. Kildare was doing very well, thank you—as well as could be expected. Visiting hours were in the afternoon. Yes, I could come in the morning after ten if that was the only time I had free. No, Mr. Kildare could not receive a phone call at that hour. If there was any message I wanted to leave, it would be delivered to him first thing in the morning.

After I hung up I sat there in the booth biting my nails. Was I jumping to conclusions? After all, why should Raoul care one bit what I said about him? I was nothing in his life—just a girl he had been to bed with. But climbing up to the sign, and in the rain, and immediately after seeing me home.... Too much coincidence there. I stepped out of the booth and looked on the counter for the paper. I thought that maybe if I read it again... but someone had walked off with it.

The remainder of the night was ruined for me. Usually the hours went by quickly and Selma's arrival at midnight to relieve me was always something of a surprise. Tonight it was different. Time dragged like nothing human, and I was in such an unpleasant frame of mind that I slapped the short-order cook for a childish prank which at any other time I would have ignored. “What's the matter?” I heard him grumble. “Is it made of gold?”

Selma came to work thirty minutes early. That was quite a shock to everyone. Although she was conscientious and a very good worker and never even so much as a minute late, her appearance at the stand always was on the dot of twelve. You could almost regulate your watch by her. Mr. Bloomberg, who was preparing to go home, nodded in satisfaction—although he took pains to conceal his approval from her by grumbling how terrible business was in answer to her “good evening”. Mr. Bloomberg's idea of an employer was somebody who is ill-treated, a scapegoat and a martyr. Had there been any hair on his head, he would have blamed the grey ones on his cooks and waitresses. After Selma had changed into her uniform, she came out to where I was stationed. “You're not off yet, Sue. It's only eleven-forty. I came early so I could talk to you.”

There was very little business at that hour so what there was of conversation went uninterrupted. “Did you see the paper?” she asked, coming right to the point.

“Yes. Too bad, wasn't it?”

“Yes. ”

“Lucky he wasn't killed. What a fool thing to be doing in the rain.”

She fixed a penetrating stare on my face and for what seemed like a long time she didn't say anything. I felt very uncomfortable standing there, with Selma trying to read my mind. I had nothing to conceal, but my eyes felt shifty for all of that. That annoyed me. I made up my mind if she became too inquisitive I'd put her in her place. What had happened between Raoul and me was my business, not hers. Yet, there was something about her which put me on the defensive, an air of authority. I respected it, strangely enough.

“Sue, what did you do to him?”

“Do?”

“Yes. I know something happened. It would take more than just no work to drive Raoul to do thing like that.”

“I don't know what you're talking about.”

Selma moved closer, so close that I could smell the Dentine on her breath. Her large breasts pressed against my shoulder.

“Oh, yes, you do. You were out with him last night, weren't you?”

“What if I was?”

“You were the last person with him.”

“Well? Is that any business of yours?

She hesitated a second. When at length she spoke it was in a calm, quiet voice. It was strange, but I would have felt better if she had shouted.

“Yes, I'm afraid it is. Raoul is... a friend of mine. I've known him for a long time and I wouldn't like to see him wind up wrong.”

I didn't relish the implication and I flared into a temper. I don't fly off the handle very often, but this was a deliberate slap in the face. “What's the matter, Selma? Are you jealous because he went out with me instead of taking you out?”

This time it was Selma who dropped her eyes and I knew I'd hit me sore spot. I felt repaid, and with it a generous mood came over me. I would give up Raoul, nobly, like the wife in a movie to “the other woman.” Selma could not fail to appreciate the sacrifice... Of course, since I really didn't care about the man it wouldn't hurt very much. But Selma needn't know this. Selma, however, spoiled it all.

“No, I'm not jealous. Nothing of the kind. I don't care how many little tramps Raoul runs around with—providing they're harmless. But I'm not so sure about you, Harvey. You have a mean streak.”

Can you imagine such a thing!

No one, not even my mother, had ever spoken that way to me before. A mean streak, indeed! While all my life I may have been thoughtless, I had never been deliberately mean, that I know of. My dander was up. I wanted to fly into her with my nails and rake that sullen look from her face. I don't know what kept me from doing it—unless it was because I realized that was exactly what Selma was hoping to do. Selma was built like a peasant.

“Yes,” she continued, “you're hard and mean. I've only known you a few months, but it sticks out all over you. You want to get ahead and you don't care who you step on if you can make the grade. Now Raoul Kildare is a nice boy—too good for your kind. I'm not going to sit by and watch you play him for a sucker. I saw him this afternoon at the hospital. From what I gathered, that fall wasn't an accident. I'm giving you fair warning that...”

I didn't love the man, didn't care whether I ever saw him again or not, but I couldn't let Selma give me “warnings”. I would see Raoul again. I would go out with him, if only to show her I refused to be bossed.

“You mind your own business,” I said through closed teeth. “I'll go out with him whenever I like. And if it burns you up, all the better.”

“You'll be sorry.”

I laughed in her face .

But later that night as I lay in bed alongside of Ewy, I began to consider the things Selma had accused me of being. Was I mean and hard? No, of course I wasn't. What an idea! I was always feeling sorry for someone and doing things for people I didn't really have to do. I want to get ahead, but I was certainly not the ruthless type.

That got me wondering. I began to ask myself what things wouldn't I do to land a contract. A whole flock of things came into my head at first—because I am essentially a decent person, even if I am ambitious. Nevertheless, after I weighed them honestly and balanced them opposite a fat part, they weeded out and the list gradually kept shrinking.

I wouldn't sell my body, of course—or would I? That was a disgusting thought and one I would have preferred to dismiss; but, well, would I or not? The truthful answer: I would. It would be a loathsome ordeal and I would hate every minute of it, but it would be over in no time and there were always some sacrifices a girl must make for the sake of her art. But only if the man was thin and youngish. I can't stand fat men...such as Manny Fleishmeyer.

What else wouldn't I do? There wasn't much, frankly. I was dead earnest about my film career, and the obstacles I would have to encounter did not bother me half as much as the thought that I might never have the opportunity to meet one of them. As yet there was not even a glimmer of hope ahead. In the final analysis, about the only thing I most certainly would not do was kill someone.

But that did not necessarily imply I was stepping on anyone by going out with Raoul—except poor Alex, who, after all, knew nothing about it. Raoul in no way affected my intended career. He wasn't a big enough figure to be able to help me. Good night, the way Selma talked one would think he was a star or an important executive, instead of a mere bit-player! All that threw me off on to the subject of Mr. Kildare. I commenced to wonder what he was thinking of the whole thing. Had he mentioned me to Selma when she visited him? Was he very angry? Was he injured—his pride, I mean? Was he in love with Selma? She with him? Or he with me? It was rather amusing to consider how very little I knew about the man who had attempted to kill himself because of me. I knew his name. But that was about all.

This business about being in love with me: I hadn't taken it into consideration before. While loads of men at one time or another have fallen in love with me—chiefly because I wanted them to—Raoul had displayed no visible sign that he was smitten. I remembered his attitude and grew a little provoked. I decided he was too conceited to care anything about anyone except himself. He was the kind who told a girl “I love you” just to hear the sound of his voice; and when she believed him and he got his way he went home later on and patted himself on the back, thinking what a great lover he was and how Casanova could have learned plenty from him.

There are a great many men like that. However, sometimes they get caught in their own trap. They try to be so convincing in their lives that they finally succeeded in convincing even themselves; and when eventually they wake up they are either married or in trouble. As for myself, I am also of the type easily carried away by props, dialogue and special effects. If there is a romantic background, a handsome man with a good line, and nothing to distract me—like phones ringing or magazine salesmen coming to the door—I'm apt to think I'm in love. The feeling only lasts momentarily, but very often that moment or two is all the fellow needs. I wish I had been made differently.

However, with Raoul I never for an instant fancied myself in love. He had made no effort to woo me that way. It had been straightforward sex, brought about by a quantity of inferior rye which he had fed me as rapidly as I could down it. There had been no lies, however sweet to hear, nothing at all to which I could cling later as an excuse for what we did. The man hadn't even tried to persuade me with the wild, Hollywoodish philosophy, stolen from the Rubaiyat and translated into slang. He had gone about the task of seducing me as simply and as matter-of-factly as a surgeon taking out a patient's tonsils. The thing that puzzled me though was why the patient hadn't struggled.

But mat was beside the point. It had nothing to do with the grave issue at hand. Since I am a believer in that old adage about burying the past before it buries you, I wanted to wash my hands of the whole affair. But first there was a lot to be ironed out. I couldn't go on and let the poor devil kill himself because of anything to do with me. Fun is fun. It ends there.

So at the risk of having him refuse to see me, I made up my mind to go to the hospital in the morning. I'd go early, to avoid running into Selma. I wasn't afraid of her in any sense of the word—I just didn't like her—but running into her might cause a scene. I'd bring some flowers along with me too, as a peace offering. I'd scrape together a few dollars for carnations or chrysanthemums and to hell with mother this week. Mother could wear her fall suit a little while longer. Raoul was far more important at the moment. He was probably in pain. While it wasn't exactly my fault that he was suffering (he was a grown man and if he wanted to be crazy it was his business), I felt somewhat guilty Selma had guessed that much correctly.

This settled, I poked Ewy in the ribs. I hated to awaken her, but I never hear alarms when I want to hear them. She sat up in bed.

“Now what?”

“Oh, are you awake, Ewy?”

“I wasn't, until you jabbed your fist into me!”

“Did I? Oh, I'm sorry. Go back to sleep, honey. I'll be careful next time I rollover .”

“See that you do. My god, have a little consideration!”

“Well, no sense getting angry about it. I said I was sorry, didn't I?”

“All right. Only shut up.”

“Good night.”

“Umm.”

“And Ewy...”

“Well, what is it now?”

“Will you get me up when you leave for work tomorrow?”

“I'll do my best. Good night.”

“Be sure I get up, will you? It's important.”

“All right.”

“Well, good night, Ewy. Sleep tight.”

She didn't answer me.

Even after having made that decision I tossed around in bed for hours. I made three not-very-necessary trips to the bathroom, reading a fifteen minute Liberty story and a short note from Ewy to the effect that Mr. Fleishmeyer called and wanted to know if I had died, and that due to a horse named Black Brigand, Ewy would be two dollars short on the grocery fund this week. I felt uneasy in my mind and I kept seeing Raoul's face before me. At one moment he would be kissing me and, at the next, balancing himself on top of one of the letters in the sign H-O-L-L-Y-W-O-O-D. I caught myself spelling the word over and over again. H-O-L-L-Y-W-O-O-D. It didn't put me to sleep, like counting sheep jumping over a fence; it kept me awake. At length I sat up and felt on the night-table for my package of cigarettes. Lighting one, I held the match close to the battered face of the clock on the floor beside the bed. It was four-thirteen. I propped the pillow up behind my back, drew the covers under my knees and sat there smoking until dawn. I just couldn't sleep.

It is going to be extremely difficult to describe my visit to the hospital the next day. This is because the whole thing remains vague to me. I found out two things which absolutely astonished me, so for the greater part of the half hour I was in a fog. When I finally came out of the place I crossed Fountain Avenue and looked for the nearest bar. I needed a drink and needed one badly. For not only did I find out what was going on in Raoul's mind, I found out what was hidden in mine.

It will always remain a mystery to me: how we can go along blissfully from day to day, never realizing things which have happened to us. Why we can't detect feelings that are new without having the roof fall in suddenly is the craziest unanswerable question of nature. Have you ever been surprised at yourself? It is a funny feeling. We are so sure we know our inner selves, yet very often we are quite different. Sometimes I think that other people—even comparative strangers—know us better than we know ourselves. But all this must sound silly. I'll try to relate what happened.

When a nurse ushered me into his room he was sitting up in bed, reading a book. He looked a mess, all right. His head was swathed in bandages and his left arm was in splints. All a person could see of his face was the small area from his mouth to his eyebrows, the rest was gauze and adhesive. The nurse left us alone, for which I was grateful. I didn't know how he would receive me; if he threw the book at me it was just as well we had no audience.

“Hello, Raoul. I... I heard you had an accident and.... well, I've come to see how you are getting along. I... I was passing in the neighborhood so I thought... er...”

I was frightfully uncomfortable. There didn't seem anything to say. His head was still facing front and he had not dropped the book, but even so his eyes were on me. He didn't have to speak. I saw quite clearly that he was greatly surprised to see me, then annoyed, and then ashamed. The visible portion of his face grew as red as his lips.

I came over to the bedside, holding out my hand. Slowly, he lifted his good arm and shook it. I don't know which one of us had the wet palm but I suspect it was me. Yes, he was suffering—but so was I, and every bit as much. All he was facing was a woman who had insulted his manhood; I was facing an over-sensitive boy I had almost killed. I was frightened and embarrassed and at a total loss where to begin to rectify things. The point had been reached where I could no longer pooh-pooh the notion that what he had attempted was due to quite another matter. Everything indicated I was to blame.

“How are you feeling?”

“Oh, I'm all right.”

“You're not in pain?”

“No not much.”

“Is your arm broken?”

“Just dislocated.”

I was feeding him lines, like in a play, anyone of which might be the cue for his replying, “What do you care, you selfish bitch?” I half expected to hear that each time he opened his mouth.

Just then the nurse entered with a vase and arranged my flowers in water. “Aren't they beautiful, Mr. Kildare?” she asked, taking them over to a little table by the side of the bed. Raoul looked at them absently for a moment; I don't believe he even saw them.

“Yes. Very. Thanks.”

“Oh, it's nothing. When do you imagine they'll let you go home?”

“Home?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Oh, I don't know. In a few days. Maybe a week.”

We both fell silent and there was a tension you could all but hear. I began to fidget with my gloves, my bag and a thread that was loose on his bedspread. Although we were facing each other our eyes did not meet. What, I asked myself, could a person say in a situation like this? I was wishing I hadn't come. If only he would get on his high horse, curse at me and demand an apology it would be a relief. Or if only he took revenge by commenting upon my qualifications in the dark! But no. He sat there saying nothing, looking whipped and very ill at ease.

“You're looking well,” I said, when I couldn't stand it any longer. I didn't realize how ridiculous that remark was until later. There he was in a hospital, literally covered with bandages!

“Thanks. You're looking well yourself.”

“Thanks. ”

“Not at all.”

Another long silence. The noises of the hospital crashed in my ears and I decided then and there that no sound is louder and more disturbing than that of persons taking pains to be quiet. Then, suddenly driven to make conversation, we both started to say something at once. Then we both stopped and politely waited. God, it was terrible. In desperation and before a series of you-first-my-dear-Alphonse could commence, I held out my hand. “I've really got to run along now, Raoul. I'm on my way to an appointment. Just thought I'd stop by and tell you I am sorry for what I said the other night. I didn't mean it, of course. I must have been high.”

He didn't flush this time. He merely dropped his eyes.

“Oh, that's all right. It doesn't matter now.”

There was a hopelessness in his voice that worried me no end. Was he going to try it over again when he got discharged from the hospital? He answered that question himself a second later in reply to my, “Well, I hope I'll see you again very soon.”

“I don't think it's likely. I expect to leave for New York immediately. I have a chance for a nice part in the new Harris production that's going into rehearsal this month.”

I can't begin to tell you how relieved I was to hear that. At once all nervousness left me and I came back to his bedside from the door. “But that's marvelous, Raoul! It's a break to work for Harris. He's the biggest man on Broadway.”

“Oh, I haven't got it yet. I'm only going on spec.”

“You'll get it, all right,” I said encouragingly. “I've seen your work. You've got loads of talent.”

He thanked me quietly, but as though I had only told him something he already knew. However, the attitude was empty. Every trace of conceit and his former armor of braggadocio had vanished in him; a person could scarcely recognize Raoul Kildare in the meek, easily embarrassed figure on the bed. If my words had stripped him of his manhood, they had also taken his self-confidence and his poise. I realized instinctively that my brief apology would never restore all this. The only thing to do was to get to the bottom of it.

“Raoul,” I said, despite the fact that I have always been one never to arouse the sleeping dogs, “will you tell me why...”

“Yes?” His voice came as a dare.

“Why you did it?”

He frowned in displeasure for a minute. Then, as his face cleared, I saw the answer. You can see those things, you know—if you'll only look. But what was immediately so plain almost floored me, and inside my head everything became hopelessly jumbled. I dropped my bag on the floor, stooped, picked it up, and then I dropped it again. I was that flustered.

“You don't...” Then it broke, like Niagara. “All right. Now you know. You weren't satisfied before. You had to come sneaking around here to find out more. Why can't you let me alone? Haven't you done enough harm? Now get the hell out of here. Get out, God damn you!”

I leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. He stopped shouting but I could feel his face trembling under my lips. From beneath the bandages covering his forehead a thin trickle of blood commenced to trace a path to his brow. I was completely shaken. “It's all right, Raoul,” I heard myself say. It's all right, I love you, too.”

 

Did I or didn't I? That was one whale of a question and I tried to answer it honestly over four Scotch-and-sodas. If I didn't, what was that feeling I had, that warm, enervating glow that made me want to cry? I knew—and there was no sense trying to deny it—that if it had been possible he could have had me right men and there in the hospital. I shouldn't have been able to stop him—not that I would have wanted him to stop. Something about his love struck a responding chord in me. Yes, he did love me. I knew it—certainly much better than I knew my own feelings. How could I be so positive? How did I know he wasn't just acting? That I can't tell you. I just knew.

On the other hand, if I was in love with him, how could I explain Alex? That was the rub as Hamlet would say. Without Alex there would have been not the slightest doubt in my mind; I would have surrendered myself to the fact that I loved Raoul and been done with it. But I loved Alex, too. Is it possible for a person to be in love with more than one man at a time? It never happens in the movies or in The Saturday Evening Post.

With my fourth drink in front of me I commenced to balance the two men, one against the other. In many ways they were much alike. Both of them possessed that “little boy” quality, that air of not being able to care for himself, sort of an innocence, which both took great pains to hide. Alex concealed his beneath an easily cracked shell of cynicism; Raoul, beneath a ridiculous and actually nonexistent conceit. Men do not like to think themselves soft. They believe it is unmanly. They don't realize that a woman can usually see through whatever pose they strike. Physically, of course, Raoul and Alex were in different classes. Raoul was handsome while Alex looked like something the cat dragged in. Yet, when a person knew Alex and liked him, his face did not seem to matter. Not that he was very ugly; he wasn't. He was just plain. It was only when you compared him with somebody like Raoul that he seemed a mess. Then you would begin to consider things that had never struck you before: his ill-fitting suits and the careless way he let his socks hang, the months he'd go without a haircut and the days without shaving. Raoul would never have dreamed of going about like that. But then, I remembered, Raoul was an actor. It is far more important for an actor to look well than for a musician. As a matter of fact, musicians are always sloppy by tradition.

But when it came to talent, I had to hand it to Alex. I had seen Raoul in several pictures and what little he had to do he did well; however, in no way could he approach the genius of Alex when he had a fiddle under his chin. I don't care much for highbrow music—maybe because I don't understand it sufficiently to appreciate it—but I'll never forget how he could stir me at times just by laying on his back and going to town on his violin.

After the club, when I invariably was tired and my head ached (to say nothing of my feet), I'd stretch out beside him on the bed with my eyes closed and he would play me to sleep. I never knew what the numbers were. I think most of the time he improvised. They were soft and of a pattern, yet, somehow, they didn't seem to have a tune. Surely, without even knowing the man, anyone could tell he was neither hard nor cynical. Very often after he had played for a little while, my headaches left me and either I fell asleep at once or gradually got the urge to take him in my arms. He was never rough in such things—which was more than I could say for Raoul.

Sleeping with Raoul was an adventure, impossible to experience without a great deal of wear and tear on the emotions; with Alex it was accomplished so gently and tenderly that after it was over you scarcely could believe it had happened.

Which one of them did I love?

Even after all this went through my mind I was still as much in the dark as before. I tried to imagine them standing one beside the other against a wall. They were going to be shot at dawn or something. I had the choice of saving one of them... After minutes of reaching out first to one and then the other, the only decision I arrived at was that I needed another drink. I downed my fifth Scotch in a dither.

Raoul needed me most, naturally. He had problems, he was over-sensitive and his career was not going the way he had planned. When a film actor has to travel all the way to New York on spec, work must be scarce and hope pretty low. In that sense, Raoul and I were very much alike and I could understand him. Alex was different. He had no worries, no grave problems. All he had to do was apply to any bandleader and sign the salary list. He didn't need help from anybody.

After the seventh drink it was time to leave for the drive-in. I took a cab, recklessly throwing away a hard-earned seventy cents. How I arrived there and how I managed to get through the night I'll never know. I was just beginning to sober up when Selma came on at midnight to relieve me. She didn't say anything to me when she took up her post, but after I had changed and came out of the dressing-room she told me the boss wanted to see me.

“I can't have drunks working for me,” Mr. Bloomberg said when I asked him what he wanted. “This is your last week. I'm sorry.”

I don't think I would have suspected anyone's fine Italian hand if I hadn't noticed Selma grinning like a fool, on my way out. I knew then that she had tattled to Bloomberg. At any other time I might have been furious, but that night, with Raoul and Alex on my mind, it didn't seem to make much difference.

Yes, Raoul needed me more. If I wasn't sure then, I was sure when I arrived home. For when I opened the door to the bungalow, Ewy was sitting in the living-room waiting up for me. She was crying as she told me Alex was dead.