The Autograph Hound (12 page)

“Another duet?”

“The spotlight dance. I was the best, I was always in the spotlight. The kids liked watching me.”

“No, what was the dance?”

“A waltz.”

“Nobody waltzes. It's all jumping and twisting and shouting. Waltzes are only for big-deal celebrations.”

“You don't know these kids, Benny. Some of them grow up to have seats on the Stock Exchange.”

Sypher is standing on the curb by the Majestic.

“Get lost, Louis. She's ready. She's as good as any of us.”

“Speak for yourself.”

“I've taught her the tricks.”

“I'm not conning you. Listen to Louis the Lion-Hearted, sweetheart. The Garden's a gold mine. You gotta walk before you can run. Ethel Waters, Paul Anderson, the world's strongest man, and Billy Graham—Mr. Religion himself. Got them all. The place's packed. Everywhere you turn there's another famous face. They're all kneeling. I mean they're sitting ducks.”

“Benny showed me what to do. I have my pad.”

“Opening night crowds are a bitch, honey cake. The first people through those doors will be the critics. They're the ones dressed in gray and running. Forget them. Next, there'll be a lot of rich types from uptown. Speak clear—they think every stranger's out to strangle them. The stars go backstage. You got to be quick.”

“I'll be okay,” Gloria says.

“She will, too, Louis.”

The ushers swing the exit doors open and jam wooden pegs underneath to hold them in place. We can hear the applause and see the white light from the stage. Most people are standing and yelling “Bravo.” For a moment, there's nobody in the lobby, then suddenly people shove through the doors, blinking in the fresh air.

“Don't just stand there, Gloria.”

“I'm making a wish.”

“Go right up. Remember Sardi's.”

“Hey, some technique you're teaching, Walsh …”

“Star light,

Star bright
,

First star I see tonight,

I wish I may, I wish I might

Have the wish I wish tonight.”

“Jesus, Walsh!”

“What did you ask, Gloria?”

“I'm not telling. Wish me luck.”

“Good luck.”

“No, our way. ‘Cottage for Two.'”

We move into the crowd. Autographs are like tuna fishing on the TV. The minute you snare one, you haul it in, flip it away, and go after the next. At openings, speed's important. There's no time for singing.

“Benny!” Gloria waves. “Rosemary Clooney's here … Hurry!”

Gloria doesn't understand that shouting spooks the stars. They want to be recognized, but quietly. She's getting excited. An usher starts to follow her.

Sypher grabs Gloria around the waist. “The number one Louis Sypher rule—I taught it to Moonstone, I'm telling it to you—rumor.”

Sypher steps in front of the usher. “Apologize to Cary Grant!”

“Where?” The usher turns around.

By that time, Gloria's inside.

I wait under the marquee. After a while, Gloria appears, smiling. “I got twelve signatures, Benny. Once, I didn't even have to ask. The man just took my pen and signed. You know who? Fernando Lamas.”

“I got five.”

“I'm pooped.”

“You have to conserve your strength, Gloria.”

“Are you okay?”

“Sure.”

“Did you see me with Rosemary Clooney? I yelled.”

“I didn't want her.”

“Are you sure you're all right?”

“Sypher left. He mumbled something about ‘Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full.' I waited.”

“Look at these names.”

We lean against a car and stare at the marquee lights.

“You don't get your name up there easy.”

“Hard work,” says Gloria.

Gloria counts her autographs again. “They laughed at Lucille le Sueur. She made her own dress for a sorority dance, and they made fun of her. It gave her strength. She vowed to succeed.”

“Now that you're collecting more, you're going to have to learn about other people besides Joan Crawford.”

“Will that be tough?”

“The starlets are hard. After a while you'll see it.”

“I will?”

“Energy.”

“You mean get up and go?”

“Yeah.”

“I know that already. When you become an actress, you have places to go, people to see. You have appointments.”

“There are other things. Guts. Patience. It takes time. Look at The Homestead. Garcia shouldn't rush everything—the food, the service, the busboys. That's not how artists work …”

Gloria reaches into her purse. “You made me realize something Joan said. I've never understood it till now.”

“I did?”

Gloria opens a piece of paper folded into a small square in her wallet.

“‘Then I found that incredible thing, a public.… From this moment on, I had a sense of audiences as warm, loving people who would care for me in direct proportion to the energy and talent I would give to a public to whom I owed a loyalty and from whom I've always received loyalty.…'”

“I am loyal.”

“What can I do for you, Benny?”

“Nothing.”

“I know somebody who might have a job …”

“On Broadway?”

“Near it.”

“Sypher said Madison Square Garden's packed. That's more important.” Gloria takes my arm. “I never thought of myself as a public.”

The Garden's so crowded that the only place we can see Mr. Graham is in his special Prayer Room. The usher shows us to the door. Inside, Mr. Graham's being broadcast on a six-foot screen behind the altar. When he asks the people to pray, they bow their heads. When he says come forward, they leave their wooden seats and kneel at the altar. “Let's do it, Benny. Praying helps.”

“The reception's terrible. You can't pray to somebody you can't see.”

“It's Billy Graham, Benny. He prays with Presidents.”

“I always get in trouble in Church. Bad thoughts.”

“My mother reached out and touched Oral Roberts during Temporary Interference. It still worked.”

“We'd get up early and go to Rumson for Confession. I'd tell everything. But when I knelt down in Mass, even with Mom next to me, I'd feel the hard wood against my stomach. The perfume from the girl in front of me—always the same redhead—tickled my nose. I couldn't think holy. Bad thoughts would begin. There was nothing I could do. I'd follow her high heels up to the altar. I'd try to concentrate on the priest. But then I'd peek. Her mouth would be wide open, her eyes shut, her tongue would curl out. She really sucked the wafer, pulling it in from the tip of her tongue, scraping it between her teeth! It was embarrassing. I'd pray hard for forgiveness when I received Communion. But each time I walked back to my seat, hands folded the way Mom taught me, I'd see her. Praying in the raw. I'd get so nervous I'd chew my wafer.”

“Mr. Graham has helped a lot of people. Don't be shy. He might have some job ideas.”

“Let's go, Gloria.”

“You're looking a gift horse in the mouth.”

I walk out. She follows me past the food stands.

“Maybe I got my own idea. Gloria, and I don't know it yet. Maybe it will come to me just like that.”

“That's a vision. It's very hard to have one of those.”

“How do you know?”

“My mother had one, once. She kissed the bronze statue of Pope Pius XII and suddenly he spoke to her.”

“What did he say?”

“He said to leave Dad and move to Fort Lauderdale.”

“Did she?”

“She had to. He also said to leave me in the custody of my father. And that I'd grow up to be a very talented and successful girl.”

“What does it take to have a vision?”

“Faith.”

“I have faith.”

“My mother said she heard music—violins, harps.”

“Does buzzing mean anything?”

“No, but music's a good sign.”

Outside, Gloria says, “Can I ask you a very personal question? How much money do you have in your bank account?”

“I don't have a bank account.”

“What if you get sick? What if you want to make plans?”

“You can't make too many plans. You've got to be at the right place at the right time.”

“Think of yourself, Benny.”

“You sound like my mother.”

“There are other things to life besides signatures.”

“Like what?”

“Eating well. Having a good job. Nice surroundings. Pleasant company.”

“I've got all that.”

“You had it.”

“Don't rub it in, Gloria.”

“Let's go to the Gaiety Girls. My friend's—”

“I'm not going anywhere. I'm going home. You've spoiled tonight.”

“I'm trying to help.”

“Why do you want to dig at me? Make a guy worry when he's having a good time.”

“You've got to get another job.”

“Go find Sypher. I'm not blind, you know. Letting him feel your arm, and say those things. Daredeviling under his nose. Yelling at me just to make me look like a fool.”

“What's wrong with you?”

“That Waldorf wise guy. Go ahead after that bulging billfold. Fall for the dazzle on those shined shoes. Girls are suckers for amateur night.”

“Stop it.”

“Can't take what I'm saying about your Waldorf weasel?”

“I want to help you, Benny.”

“Sure. Make me a miracle.”

“If you get a job tonight, will you believe in miracles?”

“All I hear's a hum in my head.”

“You've helped me.”

“Don't remind me of certain things.”

“My friend's the headliner at the Gaiety. The girls there are bigger than Mae West.”

“Really?”

“That's how they're billed.”

“On the marquee?”

“Let's go, Benny.”

“Not many performers are bigger than Mae West.”

A woman's voice from the wings—“And now … The Gaiety Girls Revue Bar … is proud to present … the Yeast from the East, the prize who makes the men rise, that sweet confection who'll be your
reserection
, that sinner who's a winner, that quite contrary Merri with the magnificent mammaries—Miss Merri Magdalen.”

It's about time. “Show's just beginning,” the man outside said. That was five minutes ago. Then Gloria left to visit backstage and they sat me here in the dark. I like to be in the light, ready to move.

Miss Magdalen walks in large circles around the stage. She stops suddenly and comes right down to the edge. A man in the first row hops up and sits at her feet. She pats his head. Her voice is very confidential, but everybody can hear.

“What you want—take!

What you need—make!

What you know—fake!

What you got—shake!”

She runs her hands over her body. She nudges the man with her knee. He bites at her. She rubs up hard against him, then pushes him off the stage and into his seat. The audience likes it, even the man likes it. He raises his hands above him like he'd beaten Sugar Ray.

Miss Magdalen takes off her gold bolero and throws it in the wings. She has skin as white as lemon sherbet.

“Take me
.

Make me
.

Shake me.

Rake me
.

I don't care

If you forsake me …”

When she says “shake,” her body begins to tremble.

Her skirt falls to the floor.

Her hands never touched her clothes.

“Bring the lights down, Frank,” she says. The stage gets darker. I think she has no clothes on. She walks, in her high heels, to the front of the stage.

She has no clothes on.

She's beautiful and pink except for that one place, and there she's golden. From the wings, she takes two majorette batons. She lights them at both ends. She starts to twirl them. She swings them around her head, under her legs. She takes one of them and shoves it down her throat. She's breathing flame! A dragon.

A drum roll quiets the audience. Miss Magdalen adds more flame to one of the sticks. It's as big and hot as the one that put out Victor Mature's eyes in
Samson and Delilah
. She fastens it into her ass. No matter how fast she moves (and she's really picking up speed now) it doesn't go out. In fact, it gets larger. I know how dangerous this is from working in a kitchen. I'm scared for Miss Magdalen. The flame inches closer to her skin. The audience doesn't seem worried.

Miss Magdalen is at the front of the stage, swinging the stick into the audience. The men in the first row draw back in their seats. The fire swishes like a horse's tail. The man who nibbled at Miss Magdalen is now trying to light a cigarette in the flame. He can't get near it. The drums get louder. Miss Magdalen yanks the stick faster, closer to her bare flesh.

Miss Magdalen spreads her legs wide apart. (I can't watch this.) Miss Magdalen starts to draw the torch through her legs. (I've got to watch.) The torch moves closer to her skin. She's grinning, looking over her shoulder at the audience, wetting her lips. The torch's flame is as high as her shoulder. Her left hand stretches above her head, her fingers are spread wide. Her other hand holds the torch hard. Slowly, she pulls it between her legs. The heat's roasting her most private part. The flames have been sucked inside her. I can't see them. They must be gutting her stomach, charcoaling her intestines. She's quivering. There's nothing to throw my jacket on, nothing to aim at, nothing to smother. Just smoke. She's heaving back and forth. I'm ready to move.

I can't move.

The lights change. Miss Magdalen closes her legs and turns towards the audience in a hopscotch jump. She's all right. She's standing, bowing. It's a miracle!