Dreams from Bunker Hill (6 page)

When Frank Edgington learned that I was homeless he invited me to his house in the hills above Beechwood Drive. It was a two-bedroom place in a thicket of eucalyptus. He showed me to my bedroom, and I put my suitcase on the bare floor. There was no bed in the room—except for a double mattress pushed against the wall.

Living with Edgington was a strange experience. His style emerged out of his childhood, and the games we played in his office were as nothing compared to the games scattered about in his living room. We plunged into the glamorous, romantic, enthralling life in Hollywood, beginning with a game of ping pong in the garage. Then we moved to the kitchen and filled our tumblers with table wine. On to the living room, throwing ourselves on the parquet floor, and thrilling to a game of tiddlywinks. The more we drank the wilder we played. We battled one another at the dart board. Sometimes we fell asleep playing bingo. It was pure and it was clean and when it rained and water thundered on the roof we turned on the gaslight in the fireplace and it was like turning back to a boyhood time beside a campfire in the mountains.

I rarely saw my boss Harry Schindler. When I ran into him in the elevator or down the hall he grabbed my arm affectionately and steered me along.

“How’s it going?”

“Okay,” I’d answer, “just fine.”

“You’re doing a hell of a job. Keep it up.”

“I’m not writing, Harry. I want to write.”

“Hang in there. Take your time. Let me worry about your writing.”

Every day the reception room we shared was full of mysterious people waiting to see him. They must have been writers, directors, production people. When I asked my secretary who they were she wouldn’t tell me. As time went by I felt like an orphan, a pariah, non-productive, unknown and exiled. The money kept me there, the absence of poverty, the fear of its return. The thought of being a busboy again made me shiver. I took out my little savings account passbook and studied the figures. I was up to $1,800, and still sending money home. I had no cause for complaint.

One morning Thelma knocked on my door and opened it.

“Harry wants to see you.”

I found Schindler lighting a fresh cigar.

“I may have something for you pretty soon,” he said. I got excited.

“You mean an assignment?”

“Maybe. We’re negotiating.”

“What is it?”

“A novel,
The Genius
, by Theodore Dreiser.”

“Oh my God! When will you know?”

“A couple of weeks.”

I left his office in a dream. Thelma studied my face. I bent down and kissed her on the mouth.

“Get me a copy of
The Genius
by Theodore Dreiser.” The novel came up from the studio library within the hour, and I began to read. It was a very long novel and by the end of the week I had read it twice and collected a notebook of ideas on how to convert it into a picture.

Two months later I read
The Genius
for what must have been the tenth time and I had four notebooks filled with observations, stacked on my desk. I jumped whenever the phone rang, thinking it was Schindler. I kept my door open watching the reception room for his appearance. His office had another door leading to the hall. Whenever I heard it open I jumped up and rushed outside. A couple of times I
stood waiting as he appeared. It was as if he did not see me at all as he walked by. I slunk back to my office and sat brooding.

Why was he doing this? What was happening to me? Was there some conspiracy against me in the world? Had I offended him? Hadn’t he offered me this job? Was I accursed by Almighty God? Perhaps my mother was right. Lose your faith and you lose all. Was she better informed than I on the ways of the Lord? Was I too late to make amends? I walked down to the parking lot, got in my car, and drove up Sunset to the Catholic church. Kneeling in the front pew, I prayed:

“Please, God, do something about that assignment. I haven’t asked anything of you for years. Do this for me and I will come back into the arms of Mother Church for the rest of my days.”

After a while a priest appeared and moved into the confessional. A few old women knelt in the vicinity. I went to kneel with them. Then it was my turn and I entered the confessional. Through the wooden grillwork I saw the priest’s white face. I had nothing to say. The guilt for past sins had left me. I knelt there in embarrassment. The moments passed. The priest stirred. His eyes sought mine through the grill.

“Yes?” he asked.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, “I haven’t prepared myself.” I rose and walked out, down the aisle and through the heavy front doors to the street. I was more despondent than ever, for somewhere in my heart there had always been a conviction that the church was my ace in the hole. I had always believed this without articulating it. Now the conviction was gone and I was lost, and facing a hostile world. I walked down to my car and got in. Suddenly, desperately, I got out again and hurried back into the church and knelt down and tried to pray.

I murmured a Hail Mary and found it interrupted by Thelma Farber. Hail Mary full of grace and Thelma Farber naked in my arms. Holy Mary, Mother of God, kissing Thelma Farber’s breasts, groping at her body and running
my hands along her thighs. Pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death and my lips moved to Thelma’s loins and I kissed her ecstatically. I was lost, writhing. I felt my body kneeling there, the hardness in my loins, the fullness of an erection, the absurdity of it, the maddening dichotomy. I arose and dashed out of there, down to my car, and drove off, frightened, shaking, absurd.

I was glad when I got back to my office. It was like a nest that comforted me. Thelma was not there. I closed the door, sat at my desk and lit a cigarette. Mysterious unsettling things were happening to me. I had stepped out of the world and now it was hard to find my way back. I thought of Frank Edgington down the hall. Perhaps I could tell him my problem. But that was no good. Edgington was too sardonic, too impatient. He would merely laugh and blame it on my peasant origin.

There was a knock on the door. It was Thelma. A few minutes ago I had knelt in the church and kissed her loins and there she was again. She sensed something.

“You okay?” she asked.

“Sure.”

“Harry wants to see you.”

“What about?”

“How should I know?”

I crossed the reception room to Schindler’s door and knocked.

“Come in.”

I opened the door and found him sitting there.

“You wanted to see me?”

“Bad news.”

I moved closer.

“We can’t buy the Dreiser book,” he said.

“Why not?”

“It’s not for sale.” Somehow it didn’t seem important.

“What now?” I asked.

“Continue what you’re doing.”

“I have pages and pages of notes on Dreiser’s book. Do you want to see them?”

“No,” he said, “forget it.”

“Give me something to write.”

“I don’t have anything.”

I felt rage. “Think of something, you bastard!”

He looked at me with a tight jaw, and got slowly to his feet.

“Get out of here.”

I turned and walked out, back to my office. I felt it then, my grief, the rim of the world, the loneliness of being far away and lost, and I was crying. I threw myself on the studio couch and let myself go, sobbing. Thelma came to the door. She spoke softly.

“Arturo, what is it?”

I sat up and told her what Schindler had said, and started crying again.

“You poor thing!” She moved to the couch and sat down. I felt the weight of her body sinking upon the couch. It felt good. Encouraged, I sobbed again. She put her long soft arm around my shoulder and dabbed my eyes with her handkerchief. It was scented with her fragrance. I turned toward her and put my head on her shoulder. She hugged me gently.

“Help me, Thelma,” I said. “I’m so unhappy.”

She dabbed my wet eyes and pulled me closer, her bosom pressed against mine.

“Oh, Thelma, help me!”

“There, there,” she soothed, stroking my hair.

“Oh, Thelma, kiss me!”

She rose, went to the door and closed it, then returned to sit beside me again.

“Oh, Thelma. If you only knew how I’ve hungered for you, how I’ve wanted to hold you in my arms, to kiss you.”

“I’ve guessed it,” she said. “The way you’ve looked at me, I’ve known all the time.”

I lay back on the couch and pulled her toward me, her mouth settled on mine, soft and cool and full. Suddenly I groped at my fly, and tugged at the zipper, while she stood up and lifted her skirt and pulled down her white panties. She sank to the floor and spread her limbs.

“Hurry,” she breathed.

I rolled off the couch and positioned myself between her long smooth stockinged legs, but the zipper gave me trouble still, and I fought it desperately. Her hands probed at my belt and in one violent jerk my pants were down. I bent over her, my shooter at the ready as I sought to spear her, but I missed, and missed again, and with a little cry of annoyance she grabbed the thing and tried to insert it, and at that moment I heard the click of the doorknob and the sound of the door opening, and I rolled my eyes toward the door and saw Harry Schindler looking down at us. The life went out of the shooter, and I could do no more than lie there stupified while Thelma lay shocked, holding the limp thing in one hand.

“All right, Thelma,” Schindler said quietly. “Put that mushroom down, and get the hell out of here.”

She arose, straightened her dress, and looked at him in contempt and defiance, striding past him and out of the room, her panties in one hand.

“I’ll see you later!” he threatened. She tossed her head defiantly.

I got to my feet and pulled up my trousers.

“Let’s talk,” Schindler said. He turned and walked out.

I found him waiting for me, his feet on the desk, a new cigar in his mouth. He looked at me with a smirk.

“I can’t believe it,” he said. “It’s not possible.”

“I’m sorry, Harry.”

“Sorry for what? It wasn’t your fault. It never is.”

“But it was. I seduced her.”

He dropped his feet to the floor and leaned forward.

“Listen, kid. She eats writers alive. I mean big writers, Pulitzer prize winners, academy award writers, $3,000-a-week writers. That’s what I don’t understand. You! You don’t even have a screen credit!”

I didn’t know whether he was complimenting me or not.

“It just happened,” I said. “I hardly expected it. But don’t hold it against her. I mean don’t fire her.”

“I’m firing you,” Schindler said. “As of now, you’re
through.”

“What about Thelma? Is she fired too?”

“I can’t fire her. I’ll never fire her. I want her around so I can keep an eye on her, but I’ll tell you this—if it happens again I’ll divorce her.”

I said, “Oh God, Schindler,” and walked out in a daze.

You had to have an agent. Without one you were an outcast, an unknown. Having an agent gave you status, even if he never delivered. When one writer said to another, “Who’s your agent?” and you answered, “I don’t have any,” he immediately surmised that you lacked talent. Edgington’s agent was Cyril Korn.

“You won’t like him,” Edgington warned, “but he’s good.”

I sent three magazine stories to Korn’s office in Beverly Hills, and waited for his telephone call.

It never came. Finally, Edgington phoned him and made an appointment for me. His office was in a new building on Beverly Drive. His secretary announced me and I sat down to wait. After two hours I was admitted to the great man’s office.

He stood in the middle of his carpeted room, tapping golf balls into a glass. He didn’t even say hello. Finally, stroking his putter with great concentration, he spoke without looking at me.

“I read your short stories,” he said.

“Did you like them?”

“Hated them. You got no chance trying to peddle that kind of trash in pictures.”

“I’m not trying to peddle them in pictures. I just wanted to prove that I can write.”

He put away the putter, and looked at me for the first time. “I don’t think you can.”

“You mean you don’t want to handle me?”

“Have you written any screenplays?”

“No, but I’ve written a treatment for Harry Schindler. I did Dreiser’s
The Genius
.”

“And he fired you. Have you ever collaborated with anybody?”

“No.”

“I have a client who needs a collaborator—somebody who’s young and unsophisticated and unspoiled. My client’s name is Velda van der Zee. Ever heard of her?”

“Never have.”

“Where you been all these years? Velda van der Zee has written more screenplays than you’ll ever write in three life times.”

“You think we’d work well together?”

“It’s a big opportunity for you. Maybe you’ll get a screen credit.”

“I’d like to try.”

“I’ll let you know.” The phone rang. Korn picked it up and gestured to me with a wave of his hand. It meant: get out. I left in disgust. He had put me down and insulted me and filled me with misery, and I wanted no part of him. All the way home I ground my teeth when I thought of him standing there in a red velvet vest putting golf balls. I would rather get out of the business than have him for my agent. I would rather sling hash in Abe Marx’s deli than have him represent me. When I told Edgington about our meeting he smiled quietly.

“He’s peculiar, but he’s a good agent. Wait and see what happens.”

“I won’t even talk to the sonofabitch.”

Next morning the Cyril Korn office telephoned. It was the secretary: “Mr. Korn would like to see you at two o’clock this afternoon.” She hung up.

At two o’clock I sat in Korn’s office waiting. At four, after one pack of cigarettes, I was admitted.

There was Cyril Korn behind his desk, red vest and all, talking to a woman seated across from him. She was a large, florid woman, with melonlike breasts, wearing a big hat
and bouncing earrings. Her makeup was heavy, her lips too red. She smiled at me.

“Velda,” Korn said, “I want you to meet Arturo Bandini. He says he’s a writer.”

Velda held out her jewelled hand and I shook it. “It’s nice to know you,” I said.

“A pleasure,” she answered.

Korn rose. “I’ll leave you two for a while,” he said. “I want you to read something. He lifted a couple of manuscripts from his desk and handed one to each of us. “Read this and tell me what you think. I’ll be back in an hour.” He left the office and closed the door.

“You
are
young, aren’t you?” Velda said.

“I may be young but I’m a hell of a writer.”

She laughed. Her teeth were false. “You know something?” she said. “You look like Spencer Tracy. I saw Spence this morning at Musso-Frank’s. We had breakfast together. He was telling me about working with Loretta Young—how he loved it. She’s really gorgeous, don’t you think? I know Loretta and Sally and their mother. Such a lovely family. She was under contract at Metro when I was out there. We used to have lunch together, Loretta and I and Carole Lombard and Joan Crawford. You’d love Joan. Such a fine figure of a woman. And Robert Taylor! I swear he’s the handsomest man in Hollywood, excluding Clark Gable, of course. Clark and I are old friends. I knew him when he first started in the business. I’ve seen him scale the heights, and look at him now! They say he’s in love with Claudette Colbert, but I don’t believe it. I saw him at the tennis club the other day and asked him if it was true. He laughed that merry masculine laugh of his, and kissed me on the cheek and said, ‘You want the truth, Velda? I’m in love with you’. Wasn’t that priceless? John Barrymore always said the same thing to me. Such a tease! Not at all like Lionel or Ethel, but a free spirit, a romantic poem of a man. Some people say that Errol Flynn is more handsome, but I can’t believe it. Ronald Coleman, though, he’s something else—so dashing, with sparkling eyes, and princely manners. He gave a party
a couple of weeks ago in Santa Barbara. It had to be the most wonderful soirée in Hollywood history. Norma Shearer was there, and Tallulah Bankhead and Alice Faye and Jean Harlow and Wallace Beery and Richard Barthelmess and Harold Lloyd and Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. Oh, it was fabulous—a night I’ll never forget!”

She paused for breath. “But here I am talking about myself as usual. Tell me, do you like Hollywood?”

“Sometimes yes,” I said, “and sometimes no.”

“Isn’t that funny!” she exclaimed. “Pat O’Brien said the same thing to me last week at Warner Brothers. We were having lunch in the Green Room at Warner Brothers—Pat and I and Bette Davis and Glenda Farrell. I don’t know why we got on the subject of Hollywood, but Pat looked very reflective and said exactly what you’ve just said.”

The door opened and Cyril Korn returned. “How are you two getting along?” he asked.

“Just fine,” Velda van der Zee said. “We’re going to make a great team.”

He turned to me. “You like the story?” he asked.

“Of course he does,” Velda said. “He’s in love with it, aren’t you, Arturo?”

“I guess so.”

Korn clapped his hands. “Then it’s settled. I’ll call Jack Arthur and tell him it’s a deal.”

“Who’s Jack Arthur?” I asked. Before he could answer Velda said:

“Jack Arthur happens to be one of the most delightful producers in Hollywood. He’s been my close friend for ten years. I was a bridesmaid at his wedding, and the godmother of his two children. Need I say more?”

“No,” I said. “That’s fine, fine.”

One thing about Cyril Korn: When he wanted you to leave he almost threw you out. He returned to his desk and sat down. “That’s it, kids. I’ll be in touch.”

I walked out with Velda. We descended the elevator to the street floor and walked out on the parking lot.

“Do you know anything about Indian wrestling?” she
asked.

“Not much,” I said.

“Last night at Jeannette McDonald’s house, Lewis Stone and Frank Morgan tried their hands at Indian wrestling. It was a scream. They tugged and pushed until the sweat broke out on their faces. And do you know who won?”

“Who?”

“Lewis Stone!” she exclaimed. “That fine elderly gentleman defeated Frank Morgan at Indian wrestling. Everybody screamed with laughter and applauded.”

I glanced at her. Her round face was flushed with excitement. Words tumbled from her lips, unstoppable. No doubt about it, she was a dingbat. She lived in a world of names, not bodies, not human beings, but famous names. Nothing she said could possibly be true. She simply invented as she prattled on. She was a liar, a lovable liar, her mind bubbling with preposterous tales.

She led me to her car—a bronze-colored Bentley.

“Wow!” I said. She beamed at her sleek car.

“It looks expensive,” I said. That pleased her.

“I bought it from Wallace Beery,” she said. “Wally decided on a Rolls Royce, and I got it for a bargain.”

She threw open the rear door and I peered inside. The seat was green velour. There was a stain in the middle, a brown stain. She smiled.

“You’re looking at that brown spot, aren’t you? Claire Dodd did it. I took her home from a party at Jeannettte McDonald’s and she spilled a glass of wine on it. Poor Claire! So humiliated! She wanted to pay for getting it cleaned, but I wouldn’t have it. After all, what are friends for?”

“Do you want me to call you?” I asked. She gave me her telephone number, and we shook hands.

“Can I give you a ride?”

“I have a car,” I said, nodding toward my Plymouth.

“Isn’t that a Ford?” she asked.

“Almost,” I said. “It’s a Plymouth.”

“I used to own one. They’re very uncomfortable.”

We said goodbye and I walked to my uncomfortable car.

The script Cyril Korn had given us was by Harry Browne. It was the story of a range war—the struggle between cattle men and sheep men. The cattle men were the bad guys and the sheep men the good guys. Also featured was a tribe of hostile Indians who captured Julia, the heroine, and imprisoned her in the Indian village. When the sheep men and the cattle men learn of her capture they join forces and ride off to rescue Julia. After the battle in which Julia is saved, the cattle men and sheep men shake hands and the range war is brought to a peaceful solution.

A couple of days later Velda van der Zee and I drove the Bentley out Ventura to Liberty Studios to meet the producer, Jack Arthur. I sat beside her as she handled the quiet magnificent machine. She liked the story, she said. It was a classic, a sure nominee for the academy awards. She visualized Gary Cooper and Claire Trevor in the leading roles, with Jack La Rue playing the part of Magua, the Indian chief.

“Gary Cooper’s a friend of mine,” she said. “I’ll give him the screenplay. He has a high regard for my opinion.”

“Sounds good,” I said.

We pulled into the parking lot at Liberty Studios and walked down the hall to Jack Arthur’s office. Jack Arthur was a pipe smoker. He kissed Velda on the cheek and shook my hand.

“Well,” he said, “what do you think of the story?”

“Priceless,” Velda said. “We love it.”

“It has possibilities,” Arthur said. “Are you ready to go to work?”

“Of course,” Velda said. “How are the children?”

“They’re fine, fine.”

“You must meet Jack’s children, Arturo. They’re the most delightful creatures in the world.”

Jack Arthur beamed. “You’ll need an office,” he said, reaching for the telephone.

Quickly Velda said, “That won’t be necessary. We’ll
work at my house.” She turned to me and smiled. “Is that all right with you, Arturo?”

“Fine, fine,” I said.

“Okay, then,” Arthur said. “I’ll get in touch with Cyril Korn and we’ll draw up the contracts. You people need anything, just holler.” He shook my hand. “Good luck, Bandini. Write me a smash hit.”

“I’ll try.” Velda and I said goodbye and left.

On the way back to town I said, “I didn’t know we were going to work at your place.”

“I always work there.”

“Where do you live?”

“In Benedict Canyon. William Powell’s old house. You’ll love it.” She began to speak of Irene Dunne and Myrna Loy, but I was used to it by now and scarcely heard her as she moved on to Lew Ayres, Frederic March, Jean Harlow and Mary Astor. When she pulled up in front of Frank Edgington’s house she was well into a reminiscence of Franchot Tone, and I had to sit there patiently until the tale was told. Then I stepped out and she drove away.

The next day I drove out Benedict Canyon to Velda van der Zee’s French chateau. It was nestled in a grove of birch trees, white and serene and aristocratic. Twin towers with slate roofs guarded the front entrance, and a great oak door stood between Doric columns. A housekeeper answered the summons of the lion’s-head knocker. She was a middle-aged black woman in a maid’s costume.

“I’m Arturo Bandini.”

“I know,” she smiled. “Please come in.”

I followed her through an entry hall and into the living room. The place was awesome, intimidating, crowded with Louis Quinze furniture and huge beaded lamps. Over the mantel hung the large oil portrait of an elderly man with a white beard and mustache.

“Who’s that?” I asked.

“Mr. van der Zee,” the maid said.

“I guess I’ve never met him.”

“You can’t,” the maid said. “He’s dead.”

“He must have been very rich,” I said.

She laughed. “You’d be rich too if you owned half of Signal Hill.”

“Oh.”

Down the grand staircase came Velda van der Zee, afloat in a diaphanous hostess gown. Silken panels floated behind her like attendant cherubs, and a cloud of exotic perfume enveloped me as she offered her hand.

“Good morning, Arturo. Shall we go to work, or would you like to see the rest of the house?”

“Let’s work,” I said.

She took my arm. “That’s what I like about you, young man, your dedication.” She guided me into an eerie room.

“This is my den,” she said.

I looked around. It was indeed a den. Every inch of wallspace was crowded with autographed photos of film stars. The beautiful people. So handsome, so full of buoyant smiles and glittering teeth and graceful hands and beautiful skins. But it was a sad room too, a kind of mausoleum, a display of the living and the dead. Velda looked at them reverently.

“My beloved friends,” she sighed.

I wanted to ask about her husband, but it seemed inappropriate. She crossed to an elaborate French provincial desk, a typewriter upon it.

“My favorite desk,” she said. “A Christmas present from Maurice Chevalier.”

“It’s a beauty,” I said.

Velda pulled a red bellcord beside the doorway. A bell rang and the maid appeared. Velda ordered coffee. I went to the desk and sat before the typewriter.

“Have you read the script?” I asked.

“Not yet. I plan to do it this morning.”

She crossed to a divan and sat down.

“Shall I tell you something very interesting about this room?”

“Please do.”

“This is where I signed my first contract with Louis B.
Mayer. He sat exactly where you are and signed the papers. That was ten years ago. He’s a wonderful man. One of these days we’ll have a party and you can meet him. If he likes you your future is assured.”