Last Dance with Valentino, page 9
‘How could I?’ The only times I ever saw her weep, it was about the married car mechanic in Westbury. She adored him.
Mr Hademak offered to drive me to the station so I could spend the unexpected holiday with my father. Moved more by duty than enthusiasm, I accepted the offer. I had nothing better to do.
As I travelled into the city I searched the newspaper for details of the divorce hearing and was horrified to read that Rudy had played his part in it, after all. He had given his testimony, stood as a witness to Mr de Saulles’s adultery, and the reporter had gone to some lengths to mock him for it – mocked his dark appearance, his foreign accent, his profession, his decision to appear at all … It was painful to read.
I was mulling on all that, worrying for him, missing him, resenting him, dragging my feet through the busy crowd, that magnificent space at Penn Station, and feeling, for once, quite unmoved by it, when suddenly – I heard his voice! Was it possible? Was I dreaming? There were hundreds of people between us, rushing this way and that. And yet there he was, beneath the soaring arches, the giant columns, between all those hundreds and thousands of people – there he was. And in a few graceful, invisible steps, he was beside me, with his two arms wrapped around me.
‘Jennifer! … It is! It is you! I must be the luckiest man in New York! Where in heaven’s name have you been?’ He lifted me in the air, and he kissed me, one on each cheek, and it was so un-American; so careless – all I could do was to laugh. 1917, it still was; a lifetime ago. We had our hemlines still flapping just above our ankles! We were still so terribly correct! But Rudy’s warmth overrode all that. I could feel the people’s stares as they elbowed by. It couldn’t have mattered less.
‘Jennifer, wonderful Jennifer, where in God’s name have you been?’ he said again.
‘I should dearly love to tell you differently … ’ I laughed ‘ … only, Rudy, I think you know quite well where I’ve been!’
‘But I have left you so many messages – and nothing! Not a word! I wondered if I had done something to offend you … and so I thought and I thought – and I thought and I thought … and I could think of nothing!’
‘Nothing!’ I repeated. Like a fool. ‘Of course you’ve done nothing to offend me whatsoever … but you left messages where? At Roslyn? At The Box? Mr Hademak said you might have left them with my father.’
I had missed him and longed for him. Until that moment, with his arms still wrapped around me, I’d not the slightest comprehension how very much. I felt a rush of – relief, I suppose, flooding through me, and the most crazy, wild happiness … and then a lump in my throat, and my eyeballs stinging …
I longed for nothing more than to sink my head onto his shoulder and never ever to lift it again. He put me down, and gave me a moment to collect myself.
‘I went to call on your father. Five times. But he would never let me in.’
‘You called on him?’
‘Of course! When I didn’t hear from you. What did you expect?’
‘He never said so!’
‘No? No. He doesn’t like me very much … ’
‘But he never said so! Are you sure?’
He laughed. ‘Quite sure, Jennifer. Yes. I left letters for you each time. The last time I took him an excellent bottle of Scotch and I made him promise me that, in exchange for it, he would pass the letters on to you … ’
I tried to laugh, but I know it sounded bitter. ‘Father and his promises,’ I said. ‘I suppose he took the Scotch?’
‘But – sweet Jennifer – who cares?’ he cried. ‘What does it matter? Because, after all, here you are! At last I have found you! If you had any idea quite how much I have thought about you— Tell me, Jenny, what are you doing right now?’
‘I am – I am … ’ Actually, I didn’t want to remember what I was doing right then: I was on my way to Papa’s, of course, where I would spend the day with him in his room while he gazed out at the street below … ‘I read about you in the paper this morning, Rudy,’ I said instead. Rather carefully. ‘It was very … courageous, I suppose. What you did.’
‘Not courageous. Stupid! Stupid of me. I should have stood firm … Joan Sawyer is refusing to dance with me ever again. She is furious with me – and I don’t blame her. I am furious with myself. Only in the end … I simply couldn’t see a way round it.’
I replied, still carefully, ‘Mrs de Saulles can be … a hard woman to resist … ’
He shook his head. ‘She is a wretched, awful, terrible, dreadful woman! Determined to have her way, no matter what.’
‘Well,’ I said, trying to hide the swell of delight his words brought me; trying to pretend to be balanced and fair, ‘I suppose she needed your help. For all her – for all the way she is, she’s quite alone here. Like the rest of us. I suppose someone had to speak up for her.’
‘Nonsense! She has the world eating out of her hand.’ He shivered. He didn’t tell me then. All these years he kept it to himself – only Mr Hademak told me, afterwards. But the reason he did it – went to court for her – it was for me: because she told him she would throw me out, and I would be homeless and jobless, with a father to take care of … He did it for me.
‘She is very beautiful,’ I said, God knows why.
‘Not when you look more closely,’ he said. ‘Look closer and you’ll see she’s quite possibly the most hideous woman in the entire universe.’
I giggled, but he didn’t. ‘She’s an awful woman, Jennifer. I swear to it. Unlike any other. Her egotism – it’s like a mad woman. I swear she would do anything … But let’s not think about it.’ He shivered again, as if trying to shake off even the thought of her. ‘What’s to be gained? Nothing at all! And, Jennifer – of all the people in the world to bump into this morning, when I was feeling quite so low – I cannot believe my good fortune. Jennifer – cara mia – tell me, what are you doing right now? What are you doing today?’
‘Well, I am on my way—’
‘Oh, don’t answer it! Tell me instead how you’re on the way to spend your day with me! Why don’t you? I have nothing planned, nothing at all – I have nothing to do except to mope about my stupid mistakes. And feel sore about all the rude things they said about me in the newspaper this morning. And I have … ’ with a flourish he emptied the pocket of his overcoat, pulled out a chaotic bundle of dollar bills ‘ … I have all these dollars to spend! Won’t you let me spend them on you? Please? We could have lunch! We could … ’
It was snowing.
‘We could catch the steam ferry to Coney Island and spend the day on the beach! And ride the roller-coaster at Luna Park. We could … ’
I thought of my father, wincing at my arrival, and of the wasted day I would spend in his cold room. I thought, too, of how he had failed to pass on the messages from Rudy, even when I had directly asked if there had been any. I thought of all the days I had spent in the city, unable to explore, and I thought of riding that famous roller-coaster at Luna Park. I thought of spending the day with Rudy.
I thought of myself.
So I left my father to his private wretchedness, to gaze out of that cold window undisturbed, and Rudy and I took the steam ferry to Coney Island.
I had glimpsed the minarets and towers and flashing lights of the island amusement parks as our ship had sailed into New York harbour and, in spite of what I had heard – that it was the most horribly crowded place on the universe, overflowing with every manner of unsavoury human specimen – I had been itching to visit the place ever since. It was, I imagined, the essence of everything my father despised about this country and, in a small way, the essence of everything I found inspiring.
We drank beer, on board the steam ship – at nine in the morning – and Rudy, who said he adored Coney Island better than any place in the world, told me about the dance halls and the sideshows, and the light shows and freak shows, all the wild amusements that were awaiting us: the levitating ladies and the fat ladies and the two-headed ladies and the midget ladies … and the fortune-tellers, the escape artists, tightropers and elephant trainers, the stilt walkers and knife throwers … I wanted to see and do it all.
‘And for luncheon,’ he said, ‘we can go to somewhere ritzy on Manhattan Beach, and drink champagne and eat clams. Jennifer, a person hasn’t lived until they’ve tasted Coney’s clams … And then, if you like, after that, we can enter a dance competition, which, of course, we shall win.’
‘Except, don’t forget, you’ll be dancing with me!’ I said. ‘I mean – that is – I certainly hope you will … ’
‘We dance perfectly together – don’t you remember?’ He stopped. ‘You haven’t forgotten, have you?’
‘No!’ I laughed. ‘I certainly haven’t forgotten.’
‘And with our winnings we can go – where? Where shall we go together, Jennifer? Paris? London? Perhaps when the war is over. Shall we go to Paris together?’
‘Paris … why not? Or maybe – perhaps if our prize money isn’t quite so much as all that – if we win today, I should love to see something on Broadway, perhaps. The Miracle Man. I read it was a sensation, Rudy. Have you seen it?’
‘I have not seen it, no, Jennifer, and I should love to see it with you. I will take you there, and introduce you to everybody, and we shall have a wonderful night … And then in the morning … ’ I smiled. We both smiled. ‘In the morning we will board the next ship to whatever place takes our fancy – to Peking! Have you been to Peking?’
‘I have not.’ I laughed.
‘Jenny, neither have I … I can’t tell you how wonderful it is to see you!’
Since I first glimpsed those flashing lights from the deck of the Mauretania all those months before I had longed to ride that roller-coaster at Luna Park. I said it to Rudy and so, the moment we docked, we began by heading there. Rudy insisted on buying me a ‘hot dog’ as we walked along the Concourse – which is broader and grander and, even under a blanket of snow, more full of life than the Mall on Coronation Day.
I would have liked to pause at every trinket stall, stop and stare at every show, but Rudy, who had frittered numerous days at Coney Island and considered himself quite an old hand when it came to getting the most out of it, insisted on chivvying us forward. ‘Or you won’t see anything, and we’ll never make it as far as Luna Park and, Jenny, I will have failed.’
‘Failed in what?’
‘Failed, ’ he said, as if I were stupid, ‘in getting to Luna Park!’
In Luna Park (he didn’t fail) we sat together in our little metal roller-coaster carriage. As it began its slow, steady climb towards the sky, I felt suddenly very sick. ‘I think,’ I said to Rudy, ‘that this may have been a mistake … ’
He took my hand and squeezed it tight. ‘It’s going to be fine,’ he said. ‘You mustn’t worry. You’re supposed to feel like this. Horribly sick. It’s an essential part of the experience … You have no idea how I loathe it.’
‘The whole experience?’
He smiled at me. ‘From beginning to end.’
Which made me laugh, and at that instant our little carriage tipped over the peak, and we plunged through the air towards the ground and I was never more certain that my life was about to end. I couldn’t breathe or move, and we clung to each other; and I remember thinking, with Rudy’s wonderful laughter ringing in my ears, and my own too, and the electric lights flashing and the view of the snow-covered world at our feet, and the ocean stretched out before us, and the wind on my face, and Rudy with his arm around me, holding me, laughing with me, I remember thinking, It wouldn’t be such a bad way to end …
Afterwards, with those dollar bills burning a hole in his pocket, he insisted on taking us up to the Manhattan Beach Hotel, the swankiest establishment on the island; and we ate clams and drank champagne – out of champagne glasses back then, not hidden in tea mugs as we must drink it today … And then, when we were quite drunk, we wandered out through the snow onto the long pier.
We stood side by side, looking out to sea. He lent me his coat and we leaned together against the wind. ‘Imagine us,’ he said, ‘in ten years’ time … ’
‘Impossible!’ I said.
‘Once the war is over … ’
‘Impossible!’ I said again. ‘Truthfully. I’m not sure I can remember what life was like before it began. I mean to say – I can’t remember England without the war … And now here it is, caught up with us again.’
We talked about that – and the possibility of his being called to fight. He would offer his services, he said. Perhaps this time round, with so many men already killed, they might be prevailed upon to accept him. If not in Italy – whose army had already rejected him (he wouldn’t tell me why; it was because of his eyes, I read in a magazine) – then here in America. He said he hoped the Americans would be more welcoming. I hoped not. But I didn’t say so. In any case, we were on Coney Island. It was our day together, and even if the war hung like a black cloud over all of us, over everyone, we didn’t want to dwell on it for long.
So we talked about the future – our hopes and dreams – as if the war was already over. ‘What would you like to do, Jenny?’ he asked me. ‘If you could do anything. Anything at all?’
Just then he was standing rather close to me, and I caught a hint of his scent, and of the warmth of his body – the warmth and strength that seemed to radiate from him – and the answer that first sprang to my mind made me look away. He laughed softly – I could feel his eyes upon me; I knew he was thinking the same. And yet he didn’t move any closer: he stayed just where he was, with his warm eyes gazing on me, and his hands in his pockets. It was very distracting.
‘What do you want, Jennifer?’ he asked again.
‘I want … ’ I said – I remember feeling quite bashful. It struck me, at the time, as such a terribly peculiar question. Looking back, I suppose it is extraordinary how much has changed – not just about me, my circumstances, but the world. Today, I suppose, for better or worse, I am a Californian, and a woman. I was an English girl back then – and it was 1917. What did I want? A husband and children. Of course … But I wanted so much more than that. What did I want? I didn’t quite know how to put it into words. I didn’t know where to begin. ‘Well, I should like to get out of Roslyn and come to New York … I should certainly love to do that … ’
‘And then? And then what?’
‘Well – I should love more than anything to set up on my own. As a secretary, I suppose. There aren’t many things a girl can do.’
‘But you can do anything! Anything you want. Jennifer, you are young and beautiful and intelligent – and this is America!’
Behind Rudy, waddling up the pier, I saw a young couple – married, and fat as butter, both. The man reminded of the great Fatty Arbuckle, who started life as an unloved little porter boy, orphaned, rejected, and who was now the most highly paid actor in America. Reminded me of Charlie Chaplin, who spent half his childhood in a pauper’s work-house. Reminded me that anything was possible in America; and most especially in the thrilling, new-fangled world of film making. I said, ‘Well, of course, what I should really like is to write photoplays … That is what I would truly love to do.’
He leaped on it. ‘I knew it!’ he cried triumphantly. ‘Jennifer, I knew it! From the way you talk about the films. You see? Ha ha! I know you well! Better than you think!’
I laughed. ‘But what do you want, Rudy? What do you want?’
‘There are books that show you how to break in, Jenny, I’m certain of it. Have you seen them? I shall get you some. And there are magazines, too – trade magazines – and they can direct you about where to send your scenarios, once you have written them, and they can tell you what sort of subject matters the studios are looking for, so you don’t need to waste your time writing stories nobody is interested in … I’m sorry … I imagine you know all this already, do you? Of course you do … ’
‘Of course I do … ’ I lied. I knew nothing. I hadn’t the faintest idea.
‘Of course … ’
An awkward silence. I didn’t look at him.
Suddenly he burst out laughing. ‘Never mind! I shall find them for you … and I shall send them to you – or I shall give them to you next time you are in New York!’
Rudy knew what he wanted. And he wanted nothing less than the world. He wanted to design and build automobiles and to breed and train horses … He wanted to own his own private zoo … ‘And to pay for it all – for you know I want only the best and most beautiful things in life … ’ He was smiling, and so was I. It all seemed so absurdly ambitious, just like our plan to go to Peking, but I realise now he was serious. ‘ … I have thought that perhaps I shall go into the movies too … As an actor, Jennifer. I am certainly no writer. In any case – we can’t have two writers in the same family … ’
I smiled. Pretended not to. Blushed, I’m quite certain. And told him at some length about the modern type of apartments for single working ladies, which I had read about in magazines. They had their own little kitchens with sinks, and their own private washrooms with their very own bathtubs … I had spent many hours, in my bedroom in Roslyn, imagining how I might arrange my own: a looking-glass here, a pot of flowers there … I was burbling about that, burbling about the writing I would do at the table by the window, which would look out over … and then I felt him turn towards me, or maybe turn me towards him, so that I could feel the warmth of his breath on my cheek—
In any case, he kissed me. Under the orange electric light bulbs … And for ten years I held on to that kiss; and sometimes, just once in a while, when I was in the arms of other men and it was all quite ordinary, I used to wonder if my memory was playing tricks – if a kiss could ever be as that kiss had been.
And it can.
We won the foxtrot contest and with it a thirty-five-dollar prize, which was quite a fortune to me back then; almost double what I earned in a week.
We took the train back to the city, because it was faster than the steam ship – and it was still early, barely six o’clock. I might have gone to see Papa then. He was only a few blocks away. But I didn’t.
