Melting the Snow on Hester Street

She was holding out changing into her evening dress, too, for fear of creasing the damn thing. In the meantime – though her short dark hair, shorn into an Eton crop, was perfectly coiffed, and her finely arched eyebrows, her full, wide mouth, her green eyes were perfectly painted – she was still wrapped in an old silk bathrobe.

She had already busied herself with a final, unnecessary tour of the house: just to be extra certain that everything was in place. And so it was. A fleet of waiting staff had already reported for duty and were in the hall, receiving final instructions from the Beecham housekeeper.

And so she stood: at a loose end on her Italianate terrace, gazing at those silken flags, fluttering like bunting in the electric light. They’d been Max’s idea – because of the movie. Had he seen them yet? She supposed not. Eleanor hadn’t realized, when the designers described them to her, quite how low they would hang, nor quite how they would resemble … Gosh, she hated them. But it was too late. It was just too bad. Max had said he wanted them. She wondered if he’d had any idea …

Eleanor had nothing much to do. The last few lobsters were being boiled in their shells in the kitchen: she could hear the squeak. The scream. She could hear the scream and it made her shiver. The cook had prepared the hollandaise – the oysters were set in aspic. It was done. Everything was done. She sighed. Nervous as hell: of course. Nervous as ever – but this time, somehow, she was nervous without being excited. When had this wonderful party – this highlight of the Hollywood social calendar, this manifestation of her and Max’s extraordinary success – when had it lost its magic and turned into a chore?

She wondered briefly, bitterly, was it a chore to Max too? Who the hell knew?

She’d left him upstairs, changing, but she needed to discuss with him various things. She needed to tell him about the problem with the ice sculptures in the front hallway. And she needed to say something about the far arc light, behind the mimosa on the eastern end of the terrace. It looked as if it might be dipping slightly … She wandered up to join him.

He was already bathed and dressed: bending awkwardly over the looking glass at her dressing table, slicking back his dark hair with one hand, smoking a cigarette with the other. He was wearing a white evening jacket and matching, loose-fitting pants. Handsome as ever. It always struck her, even now, in spite of everything, just how handsome he was: fit, slim, well built, dark, elegant – good enough to be a movie star himself, if he’d wanted it. She still loved the look of him. Sometimes. And it still took her by surprise.

‘Hello, handsome,’ she said, putting her two arms around his waist – sensing his body tense at the intrusion, and hating him for it – hating herself for not having remembered, once again, how painful it was, to try to breathe warmth on his coldness. ‘Nice jacket! I’ve not seen that get-up before – have I?’

He glanced at her reflection as she stood behind him; at the green eyes, not really smiling at him. He turned and pecked her on the end of her nose. ‘You’ve seen it often,’ he said smoothly, removing her hands. ‘By the way,’ he added, ‘did Teresa tell you? Chaplin called.’

‘He did?’ She sighed, exasperated. ‘When? This evening? Because if he’s not coming, he might have told us so before this evening.’

‘Sure he’s coming! He called to say he was bringing Marion.’

‘Oh! … You mean Marion Davies?’

‘Of course, Marion Davies. What other Marion?’

‘Well … that’s a bit awkward …’

‘I don’t see why. Marion’s all right.’

‘I didn’t say she wasn’t.’ Eleanor turned away from her husband, sat herself on the edge of the marital bed: a bed so wide they could have fitted a lover in there each, and hardly bumped elbows. She sighed again. Who in hell could she put beside Marion for dinner?

‘I thought it was kind of flattering,’ he said, smiling a little, elegantly shamefaced. ‘Maybe now she’s gatecrashing our party, she and Mr Hearst will finally invite us up to San Simeon.’

‘Hah …’ Eleanor offered up a soft, half-laugh. ‘Yes indeed … Wouldn’t that be something?’

The beauty of San Simeon was legend. The luxury of Randolph Hearst’s fairytale castle 200 miles north of Los Angeles, perched high on a fairytale hill overlooking San Simeon bay was legend, too. But the house parties he and Marion held there were the greatest part of the legend of all – not just in Hollywood but around the world. Invitations were delivered by chauffeur, in envelopes so fine, so deliciously soft and fragrant they might been pulled from Marion Davies’s own underclothing drawer. Nobody turned them down.

‘And in the meantime,’ Eleanor added, ‘I guess I’m going to have to rearrange the whole damn seating plan …’

Max looked down at his wife, watching as she absently gathered the silk robe around her, and crossed her smooth brown legs, one over the other. It shocked him every time, after all these years, but there were moments when her sensuality moved him still. ‘What is that thing, a bath gown?’ he asked her.

She looked down at the robe. Didn’t bother to reply. He’d seen it a hundred times before. And then – yet again – he surprised her, swooped suddenly and kissed her. She moved her face before he could reach her, and his lips caught the edge of her cheek. ‘You’ll have every guy in the place swooning, just as you are,’ he said. And it sounded tender. As if he meant it.

She gave him a tight smile, refused to return his gaze for fear he might notice his effect, the hopeless burst of happiness – and pushed him away. ‘Only, it’s rather difficult, isn’t it?’ she said, just as if he hadn’t spoken, ‘especially with so little notice. Because you never really know who’s going to turn out to be the most terrible bluenose. Not really. The oddest people go funny around Marion … especially after a few drinks. I don’t want her coming to our house to be insulted.’

‘Nobody’s going to insult her,’ he said, turning back to the dressing table.

‘Well. They had better not. Poor girl.’ Eleanor pulled herself up, glanced vaguely around her, sighed lightly ‘… I guess I’d better do something about the seating. Come down, Max. When you can. Come and see. They’ve finished on the terrace. It’s looking …’ She stopped, uncertain how to finish. ‘Have you seen it?’ she asked instead. ‘Have you seen the bunting? The flags?’

‘I have,’ he replied. A short silence. Hardly noticeable. ‘Very nautical,’ he added, with a little smile.

‘Yes. Nautical … Lovely,’ Eleanor added quickly. ‘Don’t you think?’

He didn’t disagree.

She told him about the problem with the ice sculptures, and the dipping arc light in the far eastern corner, but he wasn’t really listening.

‘By the way, El,’ he shouted after her. ‘For God’s sake don’t put Marion beside Von Stroheim. He’s pretty crazy at the moment. And he never could stand the sight of her …’

3

Three hours later, the Beechams’ famous 17 October Supper Party was in full and boisterous swing. Eleanor’s aquamarine satin sheath dress, which brought out the magical green in her eyes had, indeed, become a little creased. And Eleanor knew quite well that after the third glass of champagne – or was it the fourth? – her face was more than a fraction wilted. But, as she kept reminding herself, it didn’t matter. Not any more. In the softly falling terrace lights, and with the liquor freely flowing, no one was going to notice anyway. Everyone was canned. For the hundredth time that evening, she told herself to relax.

There had been an incident with one of the waitresses shortly before the guests arrived which hadn’t helped to ease her mood. But she really ought to have shaken it off by now. These sort of things happened to movie stars all the time. Thomas Mix found one in his bathtub. Gary Cooper (who lived in the house next door) was constantly encountering them roaming his private grounds. Mary Pickford found one splashing about in her swimming pool. It came with the territory … There were always stories of stray fans slipping through the stars’ careful barricades, and it wasn’t the first time it had happened to Eleanor, either. Perhaps, Eleanor considered, if the wretched girl had been anywhere else, holding anything else, on any night but this one, it would have felt less threatening: simply an amusing story to tell. But Eleanor found her right there in the bedroom – standing, guilty as a thief, at the same dressing table she’d left Max at only half an hour earlier. In the girl’s hand was a heavy gold photograph frame; and in her eyes – Eleanor shuddered – dark pools of emotion and fear: all the madness of a fan obsessed. Eleanor had never seen it so close, and it frightened her. She had shouted for help, and within moments, Joseph the houseman had been there, standing beside her, and then, just a little later, Max had come, too. The wretched girl, sobbing uncontrollably, clutching Eleanor’s precious gold photograph frame until it was taken from her hand, had been escorted safely from the property.

It was nothing. A hazard of the job. Poor girl … Max had brushed it off; told Eleanor not to fuss. She should take comfort, he teased, considering some of the notices for her last picture, that there were still fans out there who cared enough to bother. And he was right of course. These things happened.

In the meantime here she sat, the Queen of her own fairy tale. She should try to enjoy it. The evening’s guests were seated at the long banquet table before her, deep in noisy conversation, and from what she could tell, they were happy to be there. The freshly boiled lobster had been eaten and carried away, and so, by now, had all remnants of the perfectly judged, entirely exquisite Beecham Supper Party feast … She could hear the sound of the jazz band filtering delightfully through the open windows. Soon, after coffee, and more drinking, she would slip quietly inside and ask them to snazz up the tempo, and there would be dancing. Everything was just as it was supposed to be. Everything was Lovely.

Eleanor had decided, finally, to put Marion in place of honour, beside clever, gently spoken Irving Thalberg, whom Marion knew well. She had placed herself on Irving’s other side. Not because she liked him (although it happened that she did), but because, as chief executive producer at MGM, the largest and most profitable studio in Hollywood, he was the most powerful man at the table, if not the industry. And since her seven-year contract with the almost as large, but not quite so magnificent, Lionsfiel Pictures was shortly up for renewal, it seemed like a good time to foster relationships with the alternatives.

On her right side she put Douglas Fairbanks, who was tiresome in all sorts of ways, but a big star – and he would have been offended if she hadn’t. Max, far away at the other end of the table, had Gloria Swanson on his right side, for the same reason.

But he must have switched round the name cards on his left, because where Irving’s wife, Norma, was meant to be sitting, there sat none other than Blanche Williams, chief feature writer for Photoplay magazine.

Eleanor knew, because Butch Menken had told her; and Butch knew because … Butch made it his business to know everything. Also because he knew a German actress who lived in the same block, and the German actress had spotted Max going in and out of Blanche Williams’s apartment on numerous occasions. So Eleanor knew. Or she almost knew. And she had known (or almost known) for a couple of years now.

Did Max know she knew? Did he even care? She could never be sure, not about anything, any more, let alone who knew what about anyone else … Christ.

She could leave him, of course. And maybe one day she would. But not today … Eleanor needed to think of something else.

She wondered if Irving Thalberg was aware that her deal with Lionsfiel was up for renewal. Probably not. Should she tell him? Or would it be just too awkward? And if he already knew, would he perhaps suggest she came across to MGM?

Of course he wouldn’t.

Why would he do that? Why would he do that? Perhaps she should boast to him about the fan she’d only just encountered in her own bedroom? He might be impressed. He might even think – Eleanor pinched herself. She was drunk. Any minute now, if she wasn’t careful, she was going to burst into tears.

A passing waiter refilled her glass. She swallowed it back without tasting it, fixed a blank smile to her beautiful, full lips, and allowed her gaze to travel down the table. Stars, stars – and more stars … Buster Keaton and Natalie Talmadge … Gary Cooper from just next door, John Gilbert, Greta Garbo, Charlie Chaplin, Cecil DeMille … and Mary Pickford, of course, sitting beside her husband, Douglas Fairbanks, because tiresome Douglas would never have it any other way … And sprinkled between the stars were the others: the studio executives, the producers, the writers; all the big cheeses who helped to make Hollywood the money factory it had now become. Yes, Eleanor reassured herself once again, it was a good crowd. She and Max could certainly pull them in …

Everything was just fine.

… Were the flags hanging too low, so close to the candlelight …?

Concentrate.

Max was – was he? – was he running a finger along Blanche Williams’s cheek? He should stop it! She should put a stop—

Concentrate.