Full Service (31 page)

When Carol offered to pay Frank for doing all this for her he simply smiled and said, “You’re a friend of Scotty Bowers, aren’t you? That makes you a friend of mine. You don’t owe me a dime, my dear.”

Although Carol’s custody battle ended happily, other aspects of her life remained problematic. In 1956, to the surprise of many—myself included—Carol and Charley Lowe got married. As I said, Charley was openly gay. I immediately saw the writing on the wall. I felt guilty about it; after all, I was the one who had introduced them. Although they remained married for over forty years it was a marriage in name only. Throughout it Charley continued to play the field in the gay world. In 1998, shortly before Charley died, Carol filed for divorce. I heard that after divorcing Charles she said indignantly that they’d been married for forty-two years and in all that time he’d only had sex with her once.

O
N THE HOME FRONT
, Betty continued to man the fort in our little house on North St. Andrews Place and my daughter Donna had become a lovely young teenager. She was studious, popular among her friends, and was attending Hollywood High School. I saw her whenever I could but, to be truthful, that wasn’t nearly as much as I should have. I probably missed out on some of the best years of her life. Nevertheless, whenever we spent time together she was always overjoyed to see me. As, indeed, was Betty. Bless them both.

O
f the many women that have come into my life, two alone stand out above the rest. They brought me not only pleasure, carnal delight, and intense satisfaction, but taught me what real love was. When Betty and I first met after the war I thought I was in love with her but, as I pointed out earlier, the passion didn’t last. We continued to care for one another. She was the mother of my daughter. We had a home together—even though I didn’t spend much time there. So although we cared for one another, love had long ago gone out of the relationship.

I screwed many women. In fact, I probably screwed more women than men. But love, per se, was never part of any of those short encounters. And then something extraordinary happened.

The year was 1965. My friend Jerry Herman, the guy who wrote the music for the hit Broadway musicals
Hello, Dolly!, Mame,
and
La Cage aux Folles,
and who was nominated for five Tony Awards, winning twice, called me up from New York. He told me he was coming out to the coast with his secretary to negotiate the screen rights for one of his shows with a local studio. I had met Jerry back in 1961 and we had remained friends ever since.

The day after Jerry arrived I went over to the Beverly Hills Hotel where he was staying with his secretary. I went in, waited in the lobby, and Jerry came down to meet me. Then he introduced me to his secretary, whom he had asked to come down and join us for dinner. Her name was Sheila Mack. She was twenty-seven years old and a little on the heavy side, but she had a lovely, open, friendly face. She had light brown hair, gorgeous brown eyes, was about five feet eight, and wore very little makeup. Her complexion was like the proverbial peaches and cream. She seemed extremely calm, content, and peaceful. She radiated an indefinable warmth. As she softly shook my hand, my heart melted. I have no idea why, but I instantly fell head over heels in love with her.

After dinner that night Sheila and I went to her room. It was a wonderful night. It wasn’t just sexy, it was
romantic
. As we coupled it wasn’t merely a matter of having sex, but of making love. Oh, if only more people could realize the difference. If only more of us could discern the subtle dividing line between lust and love. That night, more than ever before, I learned what love was. Our passion was intense. But our feelings for one another, on some kind of mysterious, esoteric, indefinable level far exceeded the raw beauty of the physical experience. The next morning when I awoke next to her, sensing the softness and feminine magic of her body next to mine, I knew that I had never really, fully, deeply known a woman before. It was a revelation. We were totally, inexorably in love.

Sheila was originally from California. She came from a very wealthy and closely knit family that owned a department store outside San Francisco. The business was run by her brother, apparently a very smart and pleasant guy. As for Sheila, when she left home she went to a finishing school in New York. She remained there and got married quite young. Alas, the marriage lasted less than six months. She divorced and got a job as Jerry Herman’s secretary, which consumed just about all of her time.

Jerry was a very busy man, much in demand, and he relied totally on Sheila to keep his professional and business affairs on track. They weren’t here in town very long before they had to fly back east but I spent every single moment that I could with Sheila. Those nights with her in the Beverly Hills Hotel were bliss. Unforgettable. But, as so often happens, all good things eventually come to an end. It was very wrenching for both of us to say good-bye. By now Jerry had picked up on our intense relationship and when he bid me farewell he said that if ever I got out to New York I was welcome to stay at his place. With that, he and Sheila glided out of the Beverly Hills Hotel driveway in a limo en route to the airport.

As the car joined the traffic I caught sight of Sheila’s hand sticking out of the side window frantically waving to me. As the vehicle disappeared I felt a terrible sense of loss. I was devastated to see her go. But I was overjoyed when, two weeks later, a telegram arrived from Sheila inviting me to spend a weekend with her in New York. I responded with an immediate “Yes!” Within a few days a first-class air ticket turned up in my mailbox. To Betty’s credit—bless her soul—when these items were delivered to the house she never even queried me about them. I have to admit that I probably never really gave her the recognition and respect she deserved.

When I got to New York, Sheila met me at the airport and we took a cab to Jerry Herman’s place at 50 West Tenth Street in Greenwich Village. Sheila was staying there because Jerry was traveling out of town. His home was remarkable. It had once been a fire station but had been converted into a very fancy place by its previous owner, an old queen and a good friend of mine by the name of Maurice Evans. Maurice was a Shakespearean actor on the Broadway and London stages but I guess his real claim to fame was the role he played as the character Samantha’s father in the hit comedy TV series,
Bewitched
. When Maurice bought the building from the New York Fire Department he wanted to maintain the integrity and style of the place. He didn’t even remove the original brass pole that extended down from the upper two floors to the ground level where the fire trucks used to be parked. It was down that pole that the firemen used to slide from their sleeping quarters to the engines whenever there was an alarm call. The building had great charm with immense spaces everywhere. The ground floor area could easily accommodate six or eight cars.

Sheila and I spent most of that wonderful weekend oblivious to the world, happily, intoxicatingly, crazily in love and entwined in Jerry’s large double bed. I adored her. Unreservedly.

Not long after I returned to L.A. from New York I got a note from Sheila telling me that she was pregnant. Neither of us were certain how to deal with the situation. Then I got another note. She told me that she would be moving out to California within a couple of months. Apparently she had talked Jerry into relocating to Hollywood, where new opportunities in film and television were opening up for his musical talents. I could hardly contain my excitement.

As soon as she arrived back in town she took an apartment at 1125 North Kings Road, between Fountain and Santa Monica Boulevard. The day after she moved in she told me that she had undergone an abortion before leaving New York. In a way we were relieved, but then again, to be truthful, I know that she deeply regretted terminating the pregnancy. Long after we had separated, for years and years afterward, she used to call me up on the approximate date that the baby would have been born and remind me that it would have been time to celebrate the birthday. This went on for fifteen or twenty years. She would call up and say, “Our kid would have been ten years old today, Scotty.” Or twelve or fifteen or eighteen or whatever. The abortion broke her heart. She never got over it. And I never really knew how to deal with it, either. The pain was intense. In fact, it probably played a role in our eventual separation.

Sheila and I shacked up together for almost four years. I hardly ever slept at home anymore. If I wasn’t out all night bartending or tricking somebody I would sleep over at Sheila’s place. She was quite a gal. Apart from being great in bed, she had a heart of gold. She was utterly giving and forgiving. She was not in the least bit possessive, jealous, or controlling. She was so generous, open-minded, and considerate that on Christmas Eve or on my birthday I would come home to her and she would tiptoe me toward the bedroom, slowly open the door, and then show me a gorgeous young girl that she had in bed for me as a gift for the night. She believed in variety. She was convinced that surprises and the odd adventurous foray with other people kept a relationship alive, sizzling, and at its peak. She was determined to keep boredom at bay, no matter what.

There was only one impediment to our relationship. And the name of that problem was Judith Moore.

H
ERE’S HOW IT HAPPENED
. At the time that I was living with Sheila I had a good friend by the name of Al Grossman. Al was a sweet man who was immeasurably wealthy. He came from a highly successful family of industrialists and had inherited a fortune. He never had to work. He socialized a lot and moved in the most elite circles. For years he had been fixing me up with beautiful, moneyed women, many of whom had tipped me generously for sexual services. But he also found me a lot of really good personal dates.

One day in 1968 he left me a message at home and insisted that I call him urgently. In fact, it was Betty who took the call. When I popped in to see her and Donna she gave me the message. I called Al Grossman immediately.

“Get over here tonight, Scotty,” he said.

“Where?” I asked.

“My place. Seven o’clock.”

“Okay,” I answered, thinking he was having a party that evening and wanted a bartender. “How many are you expecting?”

“Just you,” he replied.

This made no sense to me.

“What are you talking about, Al?” I asked.

“I met this broad at a dinner last night,” he answered. “I want you to meet her.”

What could I say?

At seven that evening I knocked on the door of Al’s West Hollywood home. He showed me into the library and standing in the middle of the room like an object on display in a museum of fine art was one of the most magnificent creatures I had ever laid eyes on.

“Judith, Scotty. Scotty, Judith,” said Al.

I studied her, dumbstruck by her beauty.

“I see you two are gonna get along just fine,” Al chuckled.

I hardly remember anything else about that evening. Judith was exactly the same age as Sheila. She was also the same height. But she was a beauty beyond description. She had long, soft, dark hair, brown eyes, magnificent facial features. Her prominent cheekbones made her look like a portrait created by some classical Italian master. Her skin texture was so perfect that she wore only the tiniest hint of makeup. She was thin and trim, yet had just enough bulges in the right places to give her the figure of a fashion model. As she sat down and crossed her legs I was struck by her dainty, sensitive body language. This woman was all sex, a goddess from a far-off, mythical place. I could not take my eyes off her. She was the most captivating and magnificent woman I had ever seen, and that included Sheila plus all the hundreds of others who had preceded her. For once in my life I was speechless. She was perfect in every way.

The next night I took her out to dinner. Judith Moore was her name. She was a divorcée and had been single for a couple of years. She had two young kids. They were both at boarding school. Judith came from a wealthy Wisconsin family. It wasn’t dysfunctional in the contemporary sense of the word but its members were fragmented, detached, out of touch with one another. Her mother had divorced her father and moved to Switzerland. Her father lived in Chicago. She didn’t see much of either of them. She had a brother who lived in Portland, Oregon, and another brother who lived in Hawaii. There were years when they didn’t even send so much as a Christmas card to one another.

Judith had money. Lots of it. Her grandfather had invented, patented, manufactured, and sold machines that produced paper from pulpwood. The family had become one of the wealthiest in all of the Midwest. She told me she had an apartment here in town, but she also owned homes in Wisconsin, Rome, and London. She made it very clear from the get-go that there were indeed many men in her life and that marriage was remote from her mind. She enjoyed her freedom and she loved to play hard. But, despite her aversion to settling down, she said she also had the capacity to love hard. And it was not long before I began to experience precisely what she meant by that.

I quickly discovered that Judith was the most original person I had ever known. She exuded passion. Her heart was fathomless. She could love with an intensity that eclipsed even that of my dear Sheila. She was kind. She was sweet. She was gentle. She was funny. She was intelligent. She was worldly. She was unique in every way.

But she was never truly mine.