The Ladies' Man (23 page)

“Shouldn't we get started?” says Cynthia.

Without preamble or introduction, Nash sits down at the piano and plays a medley: “I Love New York” segues into “Look for the Union Label,” then “G.E., We Bring Good Things to Life,” “I'm Chiquita Banana and I've Come to Say”; he ends with a jaunty, staccato “The Incredible Edible Egg.” When the last note is played, he swivels around to face his small audience. “Familiar?” he asks.

“Very,” says Mrs. Glover.

“Popular songs?”

“Commercials,” she says.

“Did you write these?” asks Mr. Glover.

Nash says, “If only.”

“How about a jingle sing-along?” Cynthia asks, activity Number Two according to plan. Nash surveys the audience: Kathleen curls her lip and avoids eye contact. Olive says, “Okay, but I can't carry a tune.” Mrs. Glover checks with her husband, who says, “We only watch public television.”

Nash says, “Let me start with something simple.” His fingers flex and jump over the keys, producing a jingle that stumps everyone but Mr. Glover, who says tonelessly, “Plop, plop, fizz, fizz, oh, what a relief it is.”

“That's an oldie,” says Nash. “Charles and I are dating ourselves.” He checks a slip of paper in his shirt pocket, plays a jingle from his crib sheet. “Anyone?” Olive and Cynthia supply an off-key rendition of “Sooner or later you'll own Generals.”

“Excellent, ladies,” says Nash. He hits the next notes playfully, fingers roiling. When no one else speaks up, Kathleen recites glumly, “We build excitement—Pontiac!”

“Bingo!” says Nash. “Ten for accuracy; zero for expression.” He sits with his hands poised above the keyboard.

“Play one of yours,” says Cynthia.

“Do,” says Mrs. Glover.

He turns back to the keyboard, thinks, plays a few bars. “Maybe if you sing it,” says Cynthia.

Nash, in an unexpectedly thin and flat voice, croaks, “When the game's been lost or won, when the races have been run, when all's been said and done, you'll want Red Cat.”

Kathleen is sitting at the end of the semicircle, feet pointed toward the door as if waiting to leave at the next annoyance. “Red Cat?” she repeats.

Nash explains, as he reprises the tune, “It's a microbrewed root beer made in Portland. I don't think the spot runs outside the Pacific Northwest.”
Or at all
. “What I tried to do here was fuse the sounds we like to get with cola commercials—bouncy, effervescent—with the sounds that work for beer—big, full, powerful. I like to mix styles, and so do advertisers. That's why I was excited about doing root beer. It can be both fun in the sun and a little machismo.”

“I assume you don't sing them yourself,” says Kathleen.

Nash laughs. “Believe me, I've tried.”

“Tell them why,” says Cynthia.

Nash turns around fully, takes a deep breath and says, “Okay: Jingology One-oh-one: It's the singers who make the serious money, not the composers.” Without looking back at the keyboard,
his right hand crosses under his armpit and plays three familiar notes: Na-bis-co. “That's what we call a musical logo,” says Nash, “and I'm here to tell you that the voice that sings those three famous syllables has probably made a million bucks in residuals, while the guy who wrote those same three notes was paid a onetime composing fee.”

He hesitates, then decides to confide in his new friends. He plays his most famous, and therefore his most poignant financial failure:
“Leg-a-cy … it sets you free.”

“You
wrote
that?” says Olive.

“I hear it every time I turn on the TV,” says Lorenz.

“Well done,” says Mr. Glover.

“The irony, of course,” Nash says, “is that it damn well could have set me free, but I had to sign away my rights to the song. And when I wised up, and insisted on retaining rights, the agency stopped using me.” He doesn't tell the rest of the story: how he made a pass at an assistant copywriter who went on to become the head copywriter. “Cruel business,” he says.

“I would think there would still be some gratification in it,” says Mrs. Glover. “To have sent a piece of music out into the world and to know it's endured, and it's still making the policyholders feel good about their company. It's not unlike the satisfactions of a volunteer job.”

“It hurts whenever he hears the song,” says Cynthia. “It's so unfair.”

“Life's unfair,” says Kathleen.

I
t isn't the first time Lois has moved into Mrs. Chabot's establishment on Beacon Hill, walking distance from Unemployment, but she's never stayed this long. Mrs. Chabot likes Lois, considers her a model tenant and classy lady/career gal who's never smelled of liquor at the breakfast table, who scrubs the tub with Dutch Cleanser after every use, although it's not required, and carries a briefcase to work. Mrs. Chabot does not mind fielding the occasional phone call on her private line because Miss Dobbin's callers are as considerate as her tenant. “I hate to disturb you …” they begin. Or, “Would it be possible to speak to Lois Dobbin?”

This visit has been quieter than usual. Miss Dobbin looks a little washed out, or maybe it's the new hair color, or maybe the change of life. She's never in a jovial mood during her stays. She arrives looking sad or miffed, and seems to regain some good humor over the course of her two or three days, which is just the point at which she packs up and goes back home. Mrs. Chabot has never asked about the big rock on her left hand, and can only assume after all these years as “Miss,” with no mention of a fiancé, and no visible bruises, that there's no fellow on the other end of it. She's known women who have worn engagement rings they inherited when their mothers died, and Mrs. Chabot gets the idea that Lois comes from money, which is why she doesn't mind her airs. Someday she'll ask, and the answer will be gracious. No one else notices
that the orange juice she serves at breakfast is not from concentrate, or when the scones vary from plain to raisin. Mrs. Chabot lets Lois pay by personal check and has never had a problem.

It seems to Lois as if she's watching some sort of Jewish night on 'GBH—a documentary about Philip Roth, which is leading into
Goodbye, Columbus
. They have snagged the actor who played Ali MacGraw's brother, now a middle-aged doctor in New Jersey and still a big goofy jock, talking on tape about the importance of supporting public television. The volunteers answering the phones are introduced as members of Hillel at Harvard and Wellesley. Lois is evaluating Adele's appearance and, as much as she can tell on an eighteen-inch screen, her sister's frame of mind. Adele's dress is new—color uncertain in black and white; possibly navy or a chocolate brown; what their mother would have called “a frock,” in a silk crepe, maybe a good rayon, with covered buttons. Adele looks happy, Lois thinks, but dismisses it as on-air poise and experience. Lois has volunteered in Studio A, has seen Adele smile on cue and ignite a fake inner glow as soon as the director's finger points her way. Sentence after sentence Adele beseeches, extols, and paints a bleak picture—no one dramatizes it better—of Life Without Public Television.

And now Adele is introducing 'GBH's new station manager, recently promoted from staff attorney, Martin Glazer, who, she says, is going to describe how much it costs to acquire shows produced at other affiliates and why financial support is so desperately needed. Lois watches Adele's face as she listens to him, and notices that her sister is not shuffling her index cards. She is listening as if Martin Glazer is fascinating, and he, in return, is addressing Adele with an eagerness that Lois recognizes, with a start, as puppy love. Lois looks for a wedding ring on Glazer's hand and sees none. Now he is saying that he grew up in Boston, on Dorchester's Blue Hill Avenue, and his family couldn't afford symphony tickets, but because of WGBH he got to hear some of the world's most famous orchestras and conductors.

“And the Boston Pops?” Adele reminds him.

“My grandmother's favorite,” he says. “She used to send a birthday card to Arthur Fiedler every year.”

“And your mother thinks she discovered Julia Child? Tell us about that.”

And you know that how? Lois wonders.

“Well, you have to remember that Julia was a new commodity, and hardly formidable, this tall lady with a funny voice. My mother used to take notes—of course she's never followed a recipe in her life, but she kept a pad of paper and a pencil on a tray table in the living room expressly for this purpose.”

Adele looks up and says, “How much time do we have? Can Marty tell us about his mother's letter to Julia?”

Marty?

Adele answers her own question. “Okay. No time. Next pledge break. It's a very sweet story about skimming soup. One eight hundred four nine two one one one one is our number here. We'll be taking your calls throughout the movie. These charming and dare-I-say brilliant Harvard and Wellesley students can't wait to talk to you.” She looks directly into the camera and says, “And now, the classic, almost folkloric
Goodbye, Columbus
.”

Lois has been studying Martin Glazer the entire time he's filled her small screen. Around Adele's age, she thinks. No hair to speak of, just a salt-and-pepper ring around his male-pattern baldness. Dark suit, white shirt, tight in the neck, striped tie. His face is round and fleshy. His eyes look light—green or blue—and kind.

Lois snaps off the TV and does her abdominal crunches on Mrs. Chabot's hooked rug. In a sateen boudoir chair she skims the movie listings in the
Globe
, reads “Confidential Chat.” At eight-thirty she runs a bath down the hall. As soon as her plastic bubble of champagne bath oil dissolves and sinks, she hears her name: It is Mrs. Chabot, saying, “Phone call! Your brother.”

“I'm in the bath,” Lois yells back. “Where is he?”

Mrs. Chabot answers, “He says he's at a phone booth. Can you get out for a minute?”

Lois puts on her big rose terry-cloth robe, goes to the extension in the hallway, picks it up, and says, “I've got it.”

“Lo?” says Richard.

“How did you know where I was?”

He laughs. “You always end up there.”

“I had to get away.”

“Believe me, I know,” says Richard.

“I was going to call you later.”

“Whatever. Have you eaten dinner?”

“Hours ago.”

“How long does it take you to dry off and get dressed and meet me at the Hampshire House?”

“I hate it there,” says Lois.

“The Parker House?”

“Good. Oh, and Richard—I'm now a blonde,” she says.

Marty Glazer's mother is still alive, and keeps one of her sets tuned to Marty's station all day. He doesn't live with her, but he calls every morning when he gets to work. Tomorrow she is going to inquire about the redheaded woman who asks for money in such a nice way—whether she's married, single, or by any chance Jewish. Tonight, alerted by her son she is all ears as he talks about his childhood (she doesn't like the part about their not being able to afford symphony tickets), but forgets and forgives when the Dobkin woman says, “Do we have time to hear about his mother's letter to Julia? It's a very sweet story about skimming soup …”