Melting the Snow on Hester Street

Butch glanced at his clean, clear desk: he actually did have five minutes to spare. Why hadn’t he called her? He checked the time on his immaculately unnoticeable $25,000 white-gold wristwatch.

Because he was afraid. And he knew it. Because, in matters of emotion – real emotion, as opposed to the magic created for screen – Butch was lost. Like a child. He simply didn’t know how to deal with it. Not with Eleanor. All the shaking that was going to go on. The passion and control. The swirling, silent hurt, the unspoken accusations. Dammit. Damn her. Damn Max. Damn everyone.

At the production meeting yesterday he’d fought for her. He’d taken on the senior producers, the executive producer, the whole lot of them, one by one. But by then, by the time they told him what was planned for her, Butch had already informed them he was leaving. Their decision regarding Eleanor’s future – or lack of it – was, of course, in large part retaliation for that, and he knew it.

‘Why don’t you take her with you, Butch, huh?’ Mr Carrascosa (Senior) had suggested – sneered, actually: it was closer to a sneer. ‘She’s lost the magic. Lost it so long I can hardly remember she even had it.’

‘But she did have it,’ Butch said defensively, more quickly than he would have liked. She and he – and Max – had together made the finest films. And though the men had gone on to make more hits, not one of the three had made a film of the same quality since the split. He knew it. Everyone knew it. ‘The magic is still there,’ he said. ‘We only need to fix her up with the right director.’

‘So you’ve been saying for some time,’ replied Mr Carrascosa.

Butch had looked across the boardroom table to the Carrascosa Son and Holy Spirit, sitting on either side of their founding Father – but they said not a word. He looked at Mr Stiles, Executive Producer of the studio, and Eleanor’s friend:

‘Tony?’ Butch asked him. ‘She’s still beautiful. She still has so much to offer … Why don’t you give her another chance?’

Tony Stiles shuffled his papers, shrugged, slowly shook his head.

‘Hell, Butch – why don’t you sign her!’ Mr Carrascosa called out again. Pleased with the joke. ‘You’re so goddamn fond of her! … She’s costing us an arm and a leg – and for what? She’s finished here, my friend. She’s all yours!’

Butch smiled at them – one of his rare smiles. They had done it to spite him, without doubt. But they would have found another way to spite him if getting rid of Eleanor didn’t also happen to make good business sense. And the numbers were against her: her age, for one; her ticket receipts, for two. And Butch knew – everyone in the business knew – she just wasn’t as good as she used to be. On set, she was professional. She knew what was her best angle and where the kindest light shone; she knew her lines: like an efficient machine, she did everything right. But the tension was gone. She put no heart into it – and somehow, the camera could always pick it up. It’s what Butch had told her, more than once. He’d said it again only a couple of weeks ago.

‘You have to care, Eleanor. You have to care as Max does. As much as I do. As much as you care about life itself …’

‘Of course I care,’ she’d said – beautiful, trained voice crackling with the sound of caring.

It was Butch, then, who’d shaken his head. ‘I can’t protect you from them, Eleanor. You know that. Not if …’ But he couldn’t bring himself to mention it. Two weeks later, he still hadn’t told her he was leaving the studio.

‘I don’t need you to protect me,’ she said. And then, unkindly – she regretted it at once: ‘I have Max to do that.’

But Max had not protected her. Max had gone to Silverman. The truth of it rang out in the silence. Butch, his own guilt hanging heavily, left her statement unchallenged.

‘In any case,’ she added, and kissed him. ‘You mustn’t worry. I’m tougher than I seem.’ And she smiled, and seemed, to Butch, in that instant, to be quite unbearably fragile. He could protect her. If she would only let him.

He kissed her: ‘Eleanor, things might be going to change for me soon. Everything’s going to change. It’s going to be different.’ He stopped. Still, he couldn’t say it. Instead, to fill the silence, he said: ‘I think you should come live with me …’

Eleanor gave him a throaty chuckle: ‘Watch out, Butch Menken,’ she laughed at him. ‘One of these days I may just take you up on the offer …’

They were in his bed, in his new apartment at the Chateau Marmont, an apartment Eleanor had helped him to arrange. It was a beautiful, sultry afternoon. The ceiling fan had kept them cool and, from behind the half-closed louvre shutters, softening the whir of traffic as it chugged down Sunset Boulevard far below, the smallest, sweetest, softest breezes had caressed their warm, naked skin. They were a little drunk, both of them. And she wasn’t listening. She never listened.

10

Butch looked at his watch. Four thirty in the afternoon already. Even taking into account the party last night, to which, of course, he had not been invited, she must have woken and checked her post by now. Why hadn’t she called?

He should call her. He should tell her he was leaving Silverman – if she didn’t know it already. He should talk to her. There was really no way out of it. He knew that. And so, finally, he geared himself to do it. He would call before Max got home and had a chance to break the news to her himself. He would check up on her, make her feel better, soothe her with promises to help …

Grimly, he leaned to pick up the telephone. As he did so his secretary buzzed through on the intercom. Max Beecham was on the line.

HA! It was, Butch realized, the very call he had been waiting not to take all the long afternoon. All day, actually. Ever since his cocktail with Blanche Williams the previous afternoon.

‘Thank you, Mrs Rowse,’ said Butch, soft and succinct as ever. ‘You can tell the son of a bitch I’m out of town.’

‘Out of town. Right you are,’ Mrs Rowse said primly. ‘Shall I say when you’ll be returning?’

‘Tell him I’m back after the weekend. I’m on vacation.’

‘Mr Menken, you’ll be on a reconnaissance out at Palm Springs this coming Monday. Shall I tell him you’ll be back Tuesday?’

‘You tell him that. And tell him you’ve no idea where to find me.’

‘I’ll do that.’

Butch stood up, feeling satisfied. Trying to feel satisfied. The job was done. The son of a bitch could take care of his beautiful wife himself, for once in his lousy, cheating life. Butch had a date with a cute little actress named … Melanie … No, Bethany. From Savannah. Maybe Charleston.

In any case, he was heading home to shower.

11

On those very rare occasions when Max allowed himself to think about it, the truth seemed to shine out like a beacon: the most immutable fact in the universe. Butch Menken had always been in love with his wife. During all the years the three had been working together, Max used to see Butch, watching her, from behind his clever, blue, predatory eyes. And then Max had moved to Silverman. And because she reminded him of so many things he needed to forget, he had turned away from her long before and he had left the two of them together. He never quite knew how long she held out – not quite as long as he might have hoped, perhaps. They were as lonely as each other. But he knew one thing, always. She never stood a chance.

It was all such a long time ago now. But the months and years rolled by – and he knew the affair rumbled on. Or he didn’t know. But he knew. Because Eleanor almost never mentioned Butch’s name, though they worked together; and because Eleanor lied so well, about everything, always, and because she seemed always to be wrapped in an invisible, impenetrable shell. Just as he was.

After his failed attempt to get through to Butch, Max had thrown down his telephone in disgust and immediately, blindly, stormed along the corridor to fight it out with his boss.

Silverman glanced up from his work as Max burst in. ‘Ha!’ he barked cheerfully. ‘Well, I was wondering when you’d finally show your handsome face in here. And before you even start, Max – listen to me. You’re gonna get used to him. Trust me. He’s good news for the studio. Which means he’s good news for you and he’s good news for me.’ And that was it.

When Max tried to present the case against Butch: that he was untrustworthy and extravagant; that his artistic taste was vacuous and shallow; that the sort of big budget films he produced were anathema to all that Silverman Pictures stood for, his employer and friend held up a hand to shush him. And when that didn’t work, and Max continued shouting, he stood up from behind his desk (something he didn’t do often) and simply pushed him from the room.

‘It’ll be good for us,’ was all Joel Silverman would say. ‘Don’t whine, Max. Men should never whine. Butch Menken’s the best producer in the business. He’s just the tonic we need. And if you cared about this studio as much you ought to, you’d be celebrating. Just as I am. Now go home, Max. Lighten up. Enjoy a pleasant weekend with your beautiful wife … And while you’re at it, would you thank her please for a beautiful party last night. Tell her Margaret wants to know where she found those lobster …’

Max returned to the Castillo not long afterwards. Feeling bruised and foolish, and in a filthy mood, he went directly to his study, where he stayed, hidden away, drinking heavily to dull the myriad of pains – among them the ache, ever present, in the palms of his two hands. It was always more acute when he was tired. He sat at his desk and pulled out the old screenplay, the one he turned to whenever his hands burned, or his heart ached, and which one day he swore he would make into a film. After several hours of failing to make any progress with it, he staggered to bed.

All the time he had imagined his wife’s brooding presence somewhere in the house, and was torn between resenting her failure to engage with him, and delighting in not being required to engage with her. But then the bedroom was empty. And then there it was, the miserable little note:

M,

I shall be gone for a few days. I think it’s about time we talked, don’t you?

E

He stared at it stupidly, mind throbbing, trying to work out what in hell it meant. Time to talk? About what? He was tempted to laugh.

Where did she imagine they could possibly begin?

The Nickelodeon on Hester Street

12

New York City, December 1909