Last Dance with Valentino, page 13
Blood and screaming – I can’t remember anything, except so much blood and noise. The blood was gushing from him and spilling onto the wood of the terrace, and spilling across the terrace where Rudy and I had danced, and spilling out onto the steps. I ran up the same steps – there was blood on my shoes afterwards – and I tried to – stupidly, I suppose, it wasn’t my place – I tried to take hold of little Jack, to shelter him from what was happening. But then somebody had already done it. I’m not certain who, but by the time I reached the terrace, he was gone and Mr de Saulles was trying to say something. There was blood everywhere. His father was bent over his body … Somebody shouted at me to get back off the terrace …
She had, I think, put the gun back in her purse by the time her husband fell silent. After that, she didn’t seem to show much interest in what happened – not to him, or to her son, or even to herself. She went to sit on a bench somewhere on the edge of that big garden and she waited.
She was arrested, of course. The local sheriff carted her off to the Mineola jail soon after the ambulance carried away the body of her ex-husband.
Mrs de Saulles stayed in jail for five months before her case came to court. Her mother (who was, indeed, the sister of a former president of Chile – my father’s information had been quite right) did what all former presidents’ sisters would do, I suppose, when their daughters shoot dead their estranged husbands in front of seven or so witnesses: she engaged the most distinguished defence attorney in New York. Thanks to him – Mr Uterhart, he was called – there wasn’t a day of those five months when the newspapers didn’t present the world with some sympathetic story about his client – usually on the front page. Mrs de Saulles, in all her languid, wasted beauty, needed to do nothing but sit in her cell and receive visitors, though – from what I understood – not many came.
We read about how slim she had become, and pale, and lifeless (as if she wasn’t all those things already). We read about how she had ordered a Thanksgiving feast to be prepared and delivered to her fellow prisoners at Mineola jail (but even Mr Hademak admitted it couldn’t feasibly have been her idea). Most of all, we read about how she suffered maternal deprivation between the short visits from her small son. But never – not once – did we read a word about regret.
By the time the case came to court every man in America was in love with her. Not only that, so many foul stories had been circulated about the husband she had slain – his drinking and philandering – there was barely an adult in America who didn’t at least half believe he had deserved to die.
Mr Hademak and I – and Madeleine, too, since she’d been with Mrs de Saulles all that morning – were each required to stay nearby to give evidence at the trial and it was decided, by the powers who decided such things, that in the meantime we should continue to live at the cottage at Roslyn. Mr Hademak, still on a full salary, was often busy running errands for the de Saulles estate, but Madeleine and I, who had had our salaries cut by two-thirds, had nothing much to do but wait.
We used to go to the movies a couple of times a week, sometimes even more. I had some money left over from Mr de Saulles’s generosity, and we spent our way through that – but the time hung heavy, for both of us.
Perhaps it was the relief from tension, after so many months under the yoke of Mrs de Saulles’s foul mood swings. Perhaps it was the solitude of her situation, far from home and family, at the centre of a tragedy she could not control … but Madeleine seemed to find the change in our situation very hard to take. Above all, though, the source of her greatest unhappiness was the man she adored – a married man and a father of two – who did not return her adoration. She couldn’t and wouldn’t accept it.
The two of us sat together, night after night, at the kitchen table, churning over the same ground: her love – and mine.
She didn’t understand my passion for Rudy. And I suppose, if I am honest, I did not entirely approve of her passion for the married man. But we listened to each other all the same, and comforted, and reassured as best as we could. I should have attended to her more closely. How different things might have been if only I had.
We weren’t allowed to see little Jack. He was whisked away immediately after it happened, first by the parents of his slain father, and later – in what was quite a public coup for Mr Uterhart – by his Errazuriz grandmother, who had rented a large house a mile or so from Mineola.
I missed him terribly. Sometimes, on the days he was due to visit his mother (he came, as Mr Uterhart had so obligingly informed America’s press, at noon, on Tuesdays and Thursdays of every week), Mr Hademak and I used to stand outside the jailhouse simply to catch a glimpse of him – and to let him catch a glimpse of us, too. I wanted him to know that we were thinking of him, that we had not abandoned him – even if we were forbidden to meet.
There would be reporters lying in wait, and a crowd of onlookers, and then Grandmother Errazuriz and her other daughter, a coarser version of the sister behind bars, would roll up in a great limousine, and between them, dwarfed by all the activity around him, would walk little Jack, clutching the hand of his grandmother – as hard-looking a woman as any I set eyes on. The reporters would shout and the crowd would shout; and Mr Hademak and I would shout until our voices were hoarse.
He saw us once. I’m sure of it. His solemn little face lit up. He stopped – turned towards us – and then, just as we were about to reach him, his hatchet-faced grandmother tugged angrily on his sleeve and he had to walk on, sandwiched between the two women, with the cameras popping on either side of them, and the sheriff standing at the top of the steps, shaking their hands as if they were royalty arriving at a film première, not two spoilt women come to visit their murderous kin in a jail cell.
Rudy’s letter arrived with me at Roslyn almost seven weeks after the story of the slaying first hit news-stands across America. Mr Hademak arrived from The Box, where he had spent most of his days since the police cleared out. The de Saulles family had employed him to help with closing up the house. He handed the letter to me with a flourish and a blush. He said, ‘This one is for you, Jennifer! Perhaps a little happiness for you in this black days … ’
I took it. Simply – stared at it. Too shocked, too full of hope to be able to speak. After all, who else would be writing to me? I knew no one – no one but him.
‘It sseems from the envelope that Mr Guglielmi posted it some time ago – Six weeks ago – do you see? To The Box, I’m not sure why. Perhaps he imagined … In any case – look! He has moved himself to California! You won’t mind me taking note?’
I laughed aloud. Mind him taking note? I minded nothing! Nothing … I examined the envelope – a little confused. Having never received a letter from him, I did not know Rudy’s handwriting then. And there was nothing on the outside to tell Mr Hademak from whom the letter had come. I wondered …
‘But—’
Mr Hademak seemed to realise his mistake before I did. If he hadn’t blushed before, he blushed then. ‘I only guess,’ he said quickly. But it was too late. In any case the poor man was so ashamed I think he longed to confess. I learned then that Rudy had written to me before this – at the cottage. It was immediately after my father died, even though he had told me he would not. And, sure enough, the letter had been intercepted. Not by Mr Hademak, he explained hastily, but by Mrs de Saulles herself. Mr Hademak had found her bent over it, standing in the hall in her night clothes. Rather than attempt to disguise her actions she had passed the letter to him and ordered him to read the rest of it to her aloud.
‘I am sso ssorry … ’ he said.
‘What did it say?’ I asked.
‘Oh, gosh. I don’t remember … The usually things … I don’t remember. It was very – affectionate. It was very affectionate … ’ he said again. ‘I am sso ssorry … I tried to prevent it but Madame was … she was not herself, and I see now I should have stopped her. She took it and she ripped it into pieces. I should have stopped her.’
‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘It matters, yess. And I am truly sorry … ’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ I said again. With this new letter in my hand, nothing mattered … In any case, I knew what it was to go against Mrs de Saulles – I had witnessed, with my own eyes, what happened to those foolhardy enough to try … And Mr Hademak was in love with her, the poor dub. We all knew it. How could I not feel for him? ‘But tell me Mr Hademak – was it the only letter? Has he written to me since?’
‘Not since then. He has not. He dared not. After he wrote the last time, Mrs de Saulles … ’ For a moment, Mr Hademak looked as if he might burst into tears. ‘Mrs de Saulles … ’ he tried again. ‘After he wrote the last time, I’m sorry to say Mrs de Saulles – she told him if he wrote again, she would turn you outside of the house.’
‘She said that?’
‘She said it before that – if you ever wondered. Before that – she threatened him with you, and it’s why he agreed to make the appearance in the courtroom for her divorce.’ He paused, then seemed to decide something, and continued, ‘Mr de Saulles – I don’t like to speak unkindly of the dead man, but as a result of it he set a type of trap for Mr Guglielmi. He organised some documents … making it appear that Mr Guglielmi was mixed up in all sorts of criminalities, with unsavoury peoples, and bribery and so on, and they had him arrested … Mr Guglielmi was treated very roughly – by Mr and Mrs de Saulles. I must admit to it.’
I stared at him. ‘You knew all that? And you didn’t tell me?’
He didn’t look at me. ‘Finally I don’t know what happened. But he was let go again, because even with the documents it couldn’t appear that he had done so much wrong – and I don’t think the case of his criminality went to the court … ’
‘But Mr de Saulles was so kind to me and he came to Papa’s funeral. And then— But how could he? ’
Mr Hademak shrugged. He didn’t understand any better than I did, the depths to which the educated and privileged will stoop to protect their position. ‘It’s about the time you know it all,’ was all he could say. ‘And I am truly sorry for the role I have played in it. I knew it was wrong. They were wrong and I was wrong and it was all wrong.’
‘It was very wrong.’
A long silence – and then, suddenly, I couldn’t wait to be rid of him. What did any of it matter now, in any case? Rudy had written to me, and he was alive.
With hands that shook, I opened the envelope. It was a long letter, and on the paper was the faintest hint of his scent. I breathed it in, felt for a brief moment as if he were there with me in the room, his arms around me … From between the sheets dropped a handful of dollar bills. He had sent me money.
Dearest, Darling Jennifer
(I have the letter still, thumbed and torn, and with a hole worn in the paper at the corner where the page is folded. I know it by heart, every line of it. Its image is as familiar to me as my own face.)
I have just now read the shocking news – how could I miss it? It is everywhere. And I admit my first thought was not of sorrow for Mr de Saulles – I will come back to that. It was this – that with Blanca de Saulles locked up in a jail cell, where I have long since wished her, my letters will finally be allowed to reach you. I hope I am right.
When we were together last you promised you would never despair of me. Do you remember? I have clung to it. Have you kept your promise, in spite of these months of silence? I can only pray that you have. If not, I pray that at least you will be generous enough to read this letter to the end …
And now I’m not even certain where to begin. With an explanation for my long silence? Or a declaration of my continued love for you, which has never once dimmed, not once in the four long months since you climbed out of the auto, that unforgettable night, and I watched you return along that lane, so bold and brave and dreadfully alone … You have been with me, in my thoughts and my heart, every moment of every day since …
He explained about the arrest. The charges had indeed been dropped but within hours of being released he had received a letter, anonymous, but on Tammany Hall writing paper even so, threatening further charges, and the inevitable deportation back home to Italy. Mr de Saulles had personal and business connections through to the very top of the Democratic Party – all the way to President Wilson himself. That was well known. Rudy had hightailed it out of town that same day – the day of Papa’s funeral. He took a job with a travelling theatre and wound up in California where for the last few months, it was clear he had been struggling to scrape a living, working as an extra for the studios. But he had not forgotten me. He had been saving money to return to New York and fetch me.
As it is [he wrote], I have enough money now for one person’s passage from New York to Los Angeles. In a few months I would have enough for both of us but it occurs to me, now that you are free to receive my letters, why would I wait? Instead I am sending you all the money I have so far saved …
In that way, Jennifer, there is no need for either of us to wait a moment longer than necessary, and the choice to come, or not to come, is yours completely. If you have missed me a quarter as much as I have missed you, I know you will not hesitate. You will take the money and buy a train ticket to California, and you will come and live with me here, and I will build my cars and act, and you will write your scenarios and make me laugh, as only you can, and be beautiful as only you are – and you will become my wife …
Will you come to Hollywood? It is wonderful here: the orange groves, the warm sun, the hot, dry landscape – they remind me of my home … And yet, with all its hope and peculiar vigour, and with so much changing, so much that is new here every day, this little town – which grows bigger by the hour – possesses everything that is most exhilarating about America! You would agree with me, I’m sure of it. Jennifer, I swear you would love it here. Will you come?
I have enclosed an address for you to reach me in Hollywood. I will not pretend it is a palace – not quite yet. It is a small grey room, in a small grey boarding-house, where women are not even permitted … But if you come, we will find a new place together, and in no time we shall be building our own palace together. We can do that, can’t we, Jennifer?
I shall wait, and pray … Jenny, darling, please come! I cannot think of a person on this great planet of ours I should be happier to see. I have missed you – your beautiful face, your courage, your humour, your spirit. I have missed you, darling, more than I can ever express. Sometimes it is so intense that I look out from my window onto the sun-baked street and imagine I can see you appearing as a mirage through the dust. It was always an impossible dream before and yet when I looked out I could still believe it. Now that you know where to find me – perhaps, one day, when I look out, it will really be you …
In any case – if you have read this far – please know it for ever, cara mia, that I love you, and wherever I go, whatever I do, there will always be a place in my heart which waits for you …
Hopefully and for ever yours, darling Jennifer
your
Rodolfo
Chapter 7
Hotel Continental
New York
Monday, 16 August 1926
He is at the Polyclinic Hospital on West 50th. In the ‘lucky suite’, it says in the paper, because a few years back Mary Pickford was in the same room and made some kind of miraculous recovery. I’m praying it might be so lucky for him.
They told me on the telephone he was in the operating theatre. That was yesterday. I went directly to the hospital as soon as I finished on the telephone and of course they ordered me right away again. I told them my name – I suppose I hoped it might have registered. There might even have been a message for me. But, of course, how could there have been when by all accounts poor Rudy has been unconscious since he arrived?
Today everything is much worse. There are reports on all the front pages that he is gravely ill, having been operated on for a ‘perforated ulcer’. But what does that mean? How does a man, perfectly healthy one day, suddenly have a perforated ulcer the next? Is a ‘perforated ulcer’ something people die from? Apparently, it says in the paper, if it’s bad enough, yes, they can. Or if something goes wrong, yes, they can. Yes. Except it’s impossible. I cannot imagine a universe without Rudy.
I have already been to the hospital again this morning, but now there is such a crowd out there they have barricaded the entrance and they aren’t letting anyone in. This morning I couldn’t reach the desk to discover what news there was – let alone to give them my name again. He might have asked for me.
And now I have returned to my hotel because that way at least I can telephone the hospital from the lobby. But I have tried fifty times already and the line is always busy. I have telephoned the Ambassador Hotel too. Not surprisingly, they sounded thoroughly fed up when I told them my reason for calling, and spent almost our entire conversation listing reasons why they were too busy to help – time they could easily have spent checking he hadn’t left me a message, or at least allowing me to leave a message for him.
But the hotel is flooded with calls, since nobody can get through to the hospital, and now they are simply refusing to help anyone at all. God forbid Mr Charlie Chaplin should call for news of his friend. Or President Coolidge. Or me. Because we shall none of us receive it in any case. The hospital won’t answer the telephone. The Ambassador won’t even receive messages.
‘All enquiries regarding Mr Valentino should be directed to the Polyclinic Hospital on West 50th,’ the operator said, the instant I uttered his name. I got a little choked up trying to explain, which didn’t help. I could hear my voice rising, however hard I tried to stop it – because I could tell that any minute she was going to cut me off, and then it would be another half an hour or an hour before I could get through to talk to them again.
