Jacqueline Susann's Shadow of the Dolls (33 page)

“This can’t be true,” Anne said.

“Anne, her story just doesn’t play out. Don’t tell me you haven’t sensed it.”

“It’s just the usual stuff,” Anne said. Everyone in Hollywood embroidered their biographies. “I never imagined there was anything …”

“Scandalous?” Keith said. “This is hot stuff. Spend the first hour warming her up with softballs, and then I want you to go for it.”

Anne read the report again. Someone had found a fragment of a pornographic videotape, and the woman in it was clearly Casey. There were no records of her ever having lived in California before she met Gregor: no voter registration, no driver’s licenses, no passports. And there was a rumor about an earlier marriage, though no one could find hard proof. “Look, this isn’t fair,” Anne said. “There may be explanations for everything. We don’t have enough backup. We’ll look ridiculous if we go out there with guns blazing. I’ll get creamed, and you know it.”

“I’m not asking you to accuse her of anything. Just lead the conversation in the right direction. She isn’t that smart, she won’t know what to say. She’s been coached up to her eyeballs, but I’d bet the farm her publicist doesn’t have a clue about this stuff. You don’t have to say anything, just hint at it, that will be enough. Just show her the rope, she’ll hang herself. You’ll come out smelling like a rose.”

“I won’t do it,” Anne said.

“You have to do it. Otherwise this is just a puff piece.”

“You asked me to get Casey and I did. You should have told me about this earlier. We had a deal.”

“I didn’t know about this earlier. I swear to you, Anne, the information just came in last night. This is a great story, it’s the kind of story that can make a career. Come on, how well do you really know Casey Alexander?”

Anne thought about it. “Not so well after all, that’s obvious.”

“Then what’s the problem? It’s not like she has you wrapped around her little finger. Remember, you’re in charge, it’s your interview, you’re in control.”

Through the French doors Anne could see Casey having her hair fluffed. Maybe Keith was right. Casey was just another movie star, using the press to get what she wanted. The Greta Garbo bit had probably been dreamed up by her publicist, and Anne had
fallen for it. Charlie had always called Anne a soft touch, a sucker for a good sob story. She had felt bad about using Casey, but maybe Casey had been using her all along.

“I’m in,” Anne said.

They spent the first half hour talking about what it was like to be married to a much older man.

“And this is his second marriage?” asked Anne.

“Yes,” she said. She talked about his first wife, who had died of cancer.

“And your first,” said Anne.

“Yes,” Casey said.

“There’s a rumor that you were married before,” Anne began. “I know it isn’t true, but maybe you want to say something to help clear up the misunderstanding.”

Casey blinked and signaled for a time-out. “Could you please turn off the camera,” she said.

She leaned over toward Anne. “What’s going on?” she whispered. “You know I wasn’t married before.”

“It’s no big deal,” said Anne. “We have to ask. Just tell the truth, everything will be fine.”

“You must think I’m stupid,” Casey said. “What else do you have.”

“What do you mean.”

“You promised me, no surprises. You promised.”

Anne took Casey’s hand. “Don’t be nervous. Trust me, everything will be fine.” She nodded to the crew, and the cameras were turned back on.

“Okay,” Anne said, “we’ll go back to the marriage stuff later, if we have time. Let’s talk about before you met Gregor.”

Casey told a few waitressing stories, most of which Anne had already heard.

“And before you were a waitress,” said Anne. She read from an index card. “In 1991 … No, I must have written it down wrong. In
1992 … let’s see … this doesn’t make sense. Forgive me, I’ll find it in a minute.…”

When she looked up, Casey’s face was pale, her mouth set in a nervous line. Casey began to play with her left ear, twisting her earlobe back and forth. Her hand looked so familiar … the long, tapering fingers, the delicate bones of her wrist. There had always been something familiar about Casey … everyone said she looked so much like Jennifer North. Jennifer had pretty hands, too. But there was something else about her … the way Casey was staring at her, like a sad little puppy … the way she played with her ear. Her ears were lovely … Jennifer had such big ears, that’s why she always wore her hair long and loose … Anne felt the realization rising up in her like a wave. But it couldn’t be … it wasn’t possible …

“Turn off the camera,” Anne said. “We’re through.”

K
eith waited with the crew for another two hours before finally packing up.

“Don’t bother threatening me,” Anne said. “It’s over.” Casey had locked herself in an upstairs bathroom.

“You bet it’s over,” Keith said. “You can kiss IBC goodbye.”

After they left, Anne poured two glasses of Scotch and went upstairs.

“You can come out now,” she said. “It’s just us.”

Casey’s eyes were puffy and her makeup was streaked. “Did you tell them?” she said, sniffling.

“Of course I didn’t tell them. What kind of person do you think I am?”

“I was starting to wonder,” Casey said. “God, I never should have agreed to this interview. I knew it was a big mistake.” She pressed the skin under her eyes. “I must look terrible.”

“Not so bad,” Anne said. “I’ve seen worse.” She handed Casey the drink.

“Don’t you have anything stronger?” Casey said. They split a BuSpar. “You want to hear something funny? I’m kind of relieved. It’s so hard, day after day, to be living with all these secrets, to have to lie all the time. You have no idea how many times I almost told you. But I promised Gregor I wouldn’t, and a promise is a promise, right?”

“A promise is a promise,” said Anne.

“God, Anne, you really scared me there for a few minutes.”

“I was just doing my job. Or should I say, my former job.”

“Come on! They wouldn’t.”

Anne shrugged. “It’s just a job. But you … I don’t understand.”

“I’ll tell you everything,” she said. “But you have to swear to me …”

“I swear. But first, you better give me a big hug.” They wrapped their arms around each other. “It’s okay, it’s okay,” Anne whispered as the other woman began to cry. “Let it all out.”

“I’m so sorry,” she sobbed. “I didn’t want … I had to … I missed you so much.”

“Oh Gretchen,” said Anne. “I missed you, too.”

G
retchen began her story at the airport in Los Angeles. “I had my return ticket, so I figured I’d fly back to New York and wait for everything to settle down.” She glossed over the argument with Jenn, telling Anne it was just one of those ridiculous adolescent tantrums, that she couldn’t even remember how it started.

“But I couldn’t get a flight till the next day. I was going to have to spend a whole day and a whole night at the airport.”

She went to a bar in the late afternoon and ordered herself a margarita. Men kept coming over, asking if they could join her. She
nursed her first drink for a long time, then ordered another. An older woman approached her.

“Excuse me,” she said. “My husband and I, we’re sitting in the corner and we can’t help noticing. A girl like you alone in a bar like this, it must be difficult. Would you like to come join us?”

The woman looked exactly like someone from Southampton. Gretchen could tell—from her hair, from her clothing, from her upper-class accent with just a tinge of Europe in it—that she was from a nice family. Her husband had been in the oil business. They had just returned from three weeks at a spa in Mexico.

“They’re painting the house. We weren’t supposed to come home until tomorrow,” the woman said. “So we thought we would just kill a few hours at the airport, pretend we are still on vacation.” Sonia and Harry Chase both had deep tans and looked to be in their late fifties. They sat with Gretchen for two hours, telling her one fascinating story after the other: about Hollywood in the sixties, about their trips all over the world. They were glamorous, and funny, and clearly still madly in love after thirty years of marriage. Gretchen told them her life story.

“Such bad luck,” Sonia said. “Life can be so unfair.”

“We have been exceptionally lucky,” Harry said.

“Exceptionally,” said Sonia. Their personal assistant had just quit to work for a studio. They offered Gretchen the job. “Just answering phones, keeping track of appointments, that sort of thing. And Harry has to organize his papers, we need someone to help him organize his papers.”

“Thanks, but I really have to go back to New York,” Gretchen said.

“But why such a rush?” asked Sonia. “You haven’t even seen California. You can stay for a couple of months, no strings attached.” They would pay her three hundred dollars a week in cash, with room and board thrown in. “The house is so big, you’ll have plenty of privacy,” Harry said.

Gretchen had applied for jobs like this in the Hamptons but had always been turned down. She figured it was the way she looked, or maybe her accent. But the Chases didn’t seem snobby like the women Gretchen knew in Southampton.

The house was in Beverly Hills, behind tall iron gates. Her room looked over a garden and a small pond. In the mornings she worked for Harry Chase; he was only semiretired, and there was still plenty to do. Her afternoons were free.

“But I almost never went out,” Gretchen said. “I didn’t want to see anyone. I kept thinking, No one knows where I am. It was like I was safe for the first time, you know?” Her husband would never be able to find her.

“And they treated me like family,” Gretchen told Anne. “Harry picked out all these books for me to read. And Sonia, she was always shopping, and she would buy me clothing, all this amazing stuff. They didn’t have any children.” After two months Gretchen asked whether she could stay.

“But of course,” Sonia stay. “We love having you here. It was all so disorganized before you came. You can stay as long as you like.” Every Thursday night, when she went to bed, there was an envelope with fifteen twenty-dollar bills tucked under her pillow.

The Chases were charming but eccentric. They rarely went out at night, preferring to have their friends visit them for the long, elaborate dinner parties they threw every Tuesday evening. Gretchen was not invited to these. It was a big, old-fashioned house, with a long formal dining room and a small ballroom and a billiards room in the back. Gretchen would watch the staff set the table, and then, just before the guests arrived, she would retreat to her bedroom at the far end of the house.

“I kept waiting for them to include me, but they never did,” Gretchen said. “It was so silly. I knew I was basically just a glorified servant, but they were so nice, after a while I sort of resented not being included. One time, I guess I had had a little too much wine
with dinner, I asked if I could come to one of their parties. You should have seen the look on Harry’s face. I thought he would die.”

Two weeks later an envelope arrived in the mail. Inside was the longed-for invitation.

“And we have to get you a dress,” Sonia said. “You can’t go like that.” Gretchen was hoping Sonia would take her shopping, to one of the stores on Rodeo Drive that she had always heard about. Instead a shiny black box was delivered. Inside was a white silk dress.

“I spent that whole dinner terrified that I would spill something on the dress,” Gretchen told Anne. The other guests were two married couples the same age as the Chases and a few actors Gretchen hadn’t heard of. “I felt like it was the greatest night of my life. They talked about music, and paintings, and opera, and a lot about books, and when they talked about a book I had read, when I joined in the conversation, they didn’t make me feel stupid at all. Just the opposite. I was so happy. I felt like I’d been waiting my whole life for a night like that.”

After dinner, the men shot billiards and the women moved into the living room. One of the actresses tapped Gretchen on the knee. “You must love it here,” she said. “The Chases are such wonderful people.”

“They are,” Gretchen said.

“And so generous,” the woman said.

Sonia stood up. “Gretchen, you look tired. You don’t have to stay up with us if you don’t want.”

“Oh, but I’m not tired. I’m having a great time.”

“You are too polite,” Sonia said. “I can see how tired you are.” Gretchen felt she was being dismissed. Reluctantly, she went back to her room.

That Thursday, there was an extra twenty in her envelope. She thought perhaps it was a mistake, and she brought it up at breakfast the next day.

“No, it wasn’t a mistake,” Harry said. “You are doing a marvelous job.”

The next week, Sonia asked her about her teeth. “You should have them fixed. It’s so easy now, with the caps.”

“I know, I know. But it’s so expensive.”

“We will send you to someone.” After the dentist there was the hairdresser, who gave her a new cut and toned down her brassy highlights. After the hairdresser came the dermatologist and a series of painful peels and injections that smoothed out all the scars.

Then came another dinner invitation, and another white dress. The men went to play billiards, and the women once again retreated to the living room.

Sonia pulled Gretchen aside. “You look tired, darling, you should go to bed.”

“But I’m not tired at all. I want to stay.”

“You should go to bed, really.”

Gretchen left for her room, but she didn’t go to sleep. She read for an hour and then snuck back downstairs.

The living room was empty. So was the billiards room. The dining room had been cleared. She heard music coming from the ballroom. She tiptoed to the door. Someone was laughing, but she couldn’t tell who. She pushed the door open a few inches.

It was unbelievable. The ballroom had been decorated like a harem. There were pillows everywhere, and thick black candles in tall wrought-iron holders. And the couples … Sonia and Harry … but Harry was with another woman … Sonia was lounging in the corner, laughing and watching … It was an orgy!