Super (4 page)

“Every once in a while a convict would be proved innocent seconds before the switch was to be thrown. That would be where the reporter characters would come in. Heroes all, of course—”

“Of course. We’d go into detail about last meals, last requests, last statements, last-minute confessions, last sex, last fantasies …”

“Shoot the whole thing right there in the prison at Joliet. Think of the great publicity that’d be for the great State of Illinois …”

“I’m not sure we could get Loretta Young or one of her TV types to go for it but who knows?”

When they finished, she was the first to speak.

“You really are The King … Mr. Gable,” she said. Gable did not say thank you or anything else, expressing whatever he had to say with a pleasant grunt as he, in several quick moves, pushed away from her, swung his legs down from the bed, stood up and pulled up his dark red silk pajama bottoms.

“I remember that chest from
It Happened One Night,”
she said. “But it didn’t have any hair on it in the movie, like it does now.”

“I let it grow out,” he said. The subject clearly annoyed him.

She just laughed. Then she said, “I just have to know. One of those awful movie magazines wrote that Claudette Colbert is a … you know, a lady queer. That can’t be true, can it?”

Gable shrugged. He was now standing with his back to her, seemingly looking for something.

“I’ll bet you don’t even remember
my
name, do you?” she asked.

Turning to face her, he said, “Betty?”

“No. It’s Sarah.”

“Same thing,” he said.

She started to laugh but caught herself. It was clear he was not joking. He meant what he said.

Clark Gable had found what he was looking for. He held her two light nylon stockings in one hand and her bright pink panties in the other.

She paid no attention to that and made no move to get out of bed. She said, “I am Sarah Strother and I live in Jefferson City, Missouri. I’m going to get off in Kansas City and take an early-morning Missouri Pacific on home. My husband is a lawyer and I work for the lieutenant governor of Missouri as his legislative assistant. He’s a Democrat. What are you?”

“A Republican,” said Gable.

“Why?”

“I was in the war with Ike.”

“Everyone who was in the war was in it with Ike.”

Now Gable extended and raised his arms, offering the woman her stockings and panties. “I think it’s time for both of us to get some sleep,” he said. “I’m going to need that entire bed, small as it is.”

She pulled the sheet and blanket away from her and scooted to the edge of the bed. Her eyes remained fixed on Gable.

“Your ears really aren’t that big, Mr. Gable,” she said. “I hate what they say about your ears.”

Gable’s friendly smile disappeared.

“Well, whatever, I still can’t believe this happened,” she
said. Still naked, she stood up. “I have never ever played around on my husband. Never ever. Maybe if I told him it was with Clark Gable he wouldn’t mind.”

Gable was shaking his head as he handed her the panties.

“Don’t tell him?” she said, taking the stockings and then reaching for her bra and then her slip and the rest of her clothes.

“I wouldn’t, if I were you,” Gable said, barely paying attention as she dressed. “Husbands don’t like to hear stuff like that from their wives, no matter who was involved. In fact, doing it with somebody like me might even make it worse.”

Dressed, she took a step to be in front of the tiny mirror over the small stainless steel washbasin in one corner of the drawing room.

“I don’t even want to comb my hair or change anything about the way I look … you know, after it was over. This was kind of an historic thing for me.”

Gable said nothing.

She turned toward him one last time but made no effort to kiss him good-bye or even to touch him. She clearly knew for sure what had happened was now over.

“Can I ask you one last favor before I go, Mr. Gable?”

Gable gave her a smile. It contained the answer—depends on what the favor is.

“Would you say
it
for me?”

He didn’t have to ask what
it
was.

Accompanied by a fulsome grin, he said, “‘Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.’”

She giggled and clutched her arms across her chest. “I didn’t even notice your false teeth the movie magazines write about so much,” she said.

Those were her last words as she left the presence of The King.

Rinehart and Mathews encountered Ralph standing in the narrow passageway. They were heading back from the dining car; he was knocking on a compartment door with one hand, holding a tray of food in the other.

“Sounds like a secret signal of some kind.” Mathews laughed. “One long, two shorts?”

Ralph, who hadn’t seen the two Hollywood Regulars coming, jumped away from the door as if he’d been shot at. “No, sir, just bringing a passenger a late-night snack …”

At that moment, the bedroom door opened. And there stood Ralph’s Private.

Rinehart and then Mathews glanced at the man as they squeezed by Ralph.

Neither looked back as Ralph took the tray on into the bedroom and closed the door behind him.

“There was something familiar about that guy,” Rinehart said.

“Not to me … well, now that you mention it, maybe so,” Mathews said. “A movie type—a bit actor?”

Rinehart shook his head. “I don’t think so. Maybe he’s from the news. Maybe his picture was in the paper.”

“What kind of news?”

“The government kind … Washington probably,” said Rinehart. “I’ll think of it eventually. I know faces. Remember Tracy Thurber?”

Tracy Thurber was a beautiful twenty-four-year-old junior high school English teacher who was discovered by Rinehart while she was riding on a trolley in downtown Los Angeles. Rinehart saw her face in the trolley window, ran after her to the next car stop and, on the spot, offered her a part in his upcoming movie
Dark Days
.

She spent fifteen days with Rinehart, Mathews and the crew shooting on location in Utah.

“Excuse me, Mr. Rinehart,” said Charlie Sanders as he slipped into a seat across from Darwin Rinehart in the darkened observation car lounge.

It was almost midnight, an hour into Iowa after crossing the Mississippi River at Fort Madison. The Texas Chief had stayed far enough ahead so the Super Chief was on time, in keeping with what Santa Fe advertising called The Chief Way.

Charlie introduced himself and said, “I am a huge fan of the movies, sir. I would say that I am more than just a fan, actually, I am a student of the movies.”

Rinehart looked only at the glass of scotch in front of him.

“I love movies, sir. I really do.”

Rinehart kept his look downward.

“I have an idea for a movie, sir. That’s why I am talking …”

“Everybody has an idea for a movie, kid. No offense—but go away, please. I like to be alone in here.” Rinehart spoke quietly but firmly and still without paying any real attention to Charlie Sanders.

Sanders knew all about Rinehart and his traveling habits. He had read in a movie magazine—one of several he bought reguarly—that Rinehart preferred to sip scotch by himself in the rear lounge late into the night after having dinner in the dining car with his longtime associate Gene Mathews.

There was now, in fact, no other person in the car—not even a bartender or steward, unless one was sleeping back there in the dark somewhere. They often did while off duty. The only light came from a small art deco lamp between Sanders and Rinehart.

“My movie idea, the whole movie from beginning to end, takes place here—on the Super Chief, sir.”

There, he had done it. Charlie Sanders, on behalf of the Santa Fe, had had such an idea for a while—all part of his natural thinking of movies as a way to promote travel The Chief Way. On assignment now and thus required to stay awake and on the job, he let his mind rest and linger on the fact that this was indeed the Train of the Stars. And this very night there was not only Clark Gable on board but also, Sanders knew, Darwin Rinehart, who had much experience with train movies.

“Sorry, kid, I know you mean well for your railroad but we have rules in the business about talking to people about their ideas. You talk, I listen, I make a picture, you claim I stole your idea, you sue me. Besides, they already did that picture four years ago.”

“Yes, sir. Gloria Swanson starred in it.
Three For Bedroom C
it was called.”

“Yeah. She loved the Super so much she had her studio make it solely on her clout from
Sunset Boulevard
. Big mistake for her and everybody involved. Lousy idea, lousy movie. It stank all the way from LA to Chicago and back ten times. End of discussion.”

“What if it starred Claudette Colbert?” Sanders said.

“Too French—too foreigny.”

Sanders, the big movies student, wanted to blast back in fierce defense of Claudette Colbert, who he believed was one of Hollywood’s best actresses. But that would have sidetracked his mission of the moment. “What about
Silver Streak?”
he asked.

Rinehart set his drink down hard on the table and smiled. “You know about
Silver Streak
, kid?”

“Yes, sir. It came out in 1934 …”

Rinehart held up his right hand. Shut up, kid, was the message. “That was the first picture I ever worked on. I was just a kid myself. I had a tall hill of hair on my head then. Came down to Hollywood from Sacramento. An uncle knew the producer, a helluva guy named Allvine—Glendon Allvine. He hired me
to be a gofer. I got coffee and ran errands and got my feet wet in the picture business. We made some of it around here somewhere …”

“Galesburg, Illinois. Yes, sir. The Super Chief passed through there earlier tonight—as I’m sure you, a prominent Super Regular, know. Most of the action shots for
Silver Streak
with the Burlington Zephyr were taken there, weren’t they?”

“Yeah, that’s right. How come you know so much about this?”

Charlie Sanders only grinned. Knowing this kind of stuff had been his passion since he was a
real
kid going to movies in the Chicago suburb of Garrison, Indiana. Now, for the Santa Fe, it was his business to know it.

Rinehart spoke softly, almost to the darkness rather than Charlie, as he had earlier to the Chicago suburbs.

“Allvine talked the Burlington into loaning us their new silver streamliner train. It was the first diesel like that. What a time we had. There were no stars. Sally Blane and Charles Starrett played the leads. Nobody’s heard of them before or since. Sally Blane was Loretta Young’s sister in real life. That silver train was the real star of the picture—”

“Yes, sir, and this one could be one again.”

“—No budget. Allvine made that for less than a hundred thousand dollars real money. Amazing, truly amazing. The story wasn’t much either. Something about an iron lung.”

“Yes, sir. They used the new streamliner to race an iron lung from Chicago to a sick man at Boulder Dam outside Las
Vegas in Nevada. The sick man was the son of the owner of the railroad and the brother of the girl who was in love with the scientist designer who invented the diesel streamliner train—”