Marjorie Morningstar (68 page)

“Marsha, you—”

“I’m very far from pitying myself, sugar bun. But I did keep my beady little eyes
open. I gradually learned that big shots mostly work twice as hard, and are twice
as thorough about dull detail, as the small fry. That’s the big open secret, baby.
I don’t know where the hell the idea got around that big shots just sit on their can
and make decisions a couple of hours a day, and for the rest play golf and drink champagne
and commit adultery. I tell you, for every step up the ladder, there’s more work and
more attention to detail, and more chances to make a big fat jackass of yourself real
fast. I had my chance. I flubbed it with a loud crash. Never mind the details. I think
in Technicolor, you might say, always the rosy final picture, never the dull in-between
details. Oh, being the boss’s son helps, we all know that. But other things being
equal, I swear to God most of being a big shot is first of all being a work horse,
and second of all applying arithmetic to everything in the whole bloody world, and
never making a mistake in addition or subtraction. Me, I’ve always stunk at arithmetic,
just like my dear wonderful useless father. End of Marsha Zelenko, smart career woman,
envy of two continents, as she dashes back and forth between New York and Paris, the
dreaded arbiter of the haute couture. The name is Mrs. Lou Michaelson, and I love
it. Let’s have another drink.”

The two girls sat smoking, looking out at the pouring rain. When the cocktails came
Marsha said, “I certainly hope Noel’s show is going to be a hit.”

“So do I, of course,” Marjorie said.

Marsha said, “I’m not just being polite. Lou has money in it.”

“He has?”

“Not much. A couple of thousand. Mrs. Lemberg is a client of Lou’s. The show looks
pretty good at this point, I must say. I love the songs, especially the—Why are you
looking so blank?”

“Who’s Mrs. Lemberg?”

“Don’t you know?”

“Marsha, I haven’t been seeing Noel since—oh, I don’t know, last March, April.”

Marsha smiled. “I mentioned your name a couple of times at the rehearsals. He didn’t
pick me up on it. Just went breezily on to something else. But his face changed a
bit, kid, if you’re interested.”

“I’m not, and I’m sure you’re mistaken.”

“He hangs around with a tall dumb-looking redhead from the chorus.”

Marjorie hoped her face didn’t show how the words stabbed. “Good for him and for the
redhead. He’s a connoisseur of chorus girls. That’s just what he needs. More power
to him.”

“You’re crazy, she bores him,” Marsha said. “I know what he needs. But it’s none of
my business. Pardon the long poking nose.”

“Perfectly all right. Who’s Mrs. Lemberg?”

“She’s backing the show. Don’t you really know any of this? Oh, goody, here’s the
food. If you call this nasty heap of dry grass food. I’d like to set fire to it. And
you, you pig—curried chicken and rice! Wait till I’m safely married, baby. Jolly Marsha,
star of the freak show, four hundred pounds of quivering female pulchritude… But about
Mrs. Lemberg… Lord, I’d give an eye for just one spoonful of mayonnaise on this green
filth. But I can’t, I just can’t. With my lousy glandular system, I’d swell like a
blimp before your very eyes.”

Marjorie said, “Well, about Mrs. Lemberg—”

With a mischievous grin, Marsha finally told her. Mrs. Lemberg was an old friend of
Lou Michaelson’s mother, another rich widow. Most of her money was in Brooklyn apartment
houses, formerly managed by Mrs. Michaelson, and now by Lou. Mrs. Lemberg had met
the producer of
Princess Jones
, Peter Ferris, at Palm Springs. He was a handsome young actor and stage manager,
who had become friendly with Noel in Hollywood; and he had talked Mrs. Lemberg into
putting up the money for the production. She always consulted Lou in business decisions,
so she had telephoned him in Florida about the show. “Naturally, when I heard it was
by Noel Airman I jumped,” Marsha said. “I raved on to Lou about how brilliant Noel
was, so he telephoned back that same night, and told la Lemberg to go ahead, if she
felt like gambling on Broadway. And I got him to buy a little piece of the show, just
for luck. Now he’s so steamed up about it and so pleased with himself he can’t sit
still. He keeps saying he’s just begun to live. At rehearsals, he’s like a child of
six at a circus—Well, that’s the fact of it, baby. It’s a small world, hey? If I’d
ever dreamed the day would come when I’d help Noel Airman get his first musical show
produced—The craziest things happen if you live long enough, don’t they?”

Marjorie shook her head, smiling, and said nothing.

“I’m going to the rehearsal from here. Come along,” Marsha said.

“Sorry. I have a million things to do this afternoon.” It was all a little too much,
Marjorie was thinking. Marsha Zelenko—of all people in the world, Marsha Zelenko—was
a personage around the
Princess Jones
production, and could come and go at rehearsals. Why was she yearning to become an
actress? What was so good about being sponsored by Mrs. Lemberg, and praised by Marsha
Zelenko to her little gray-headed fiancé, Lou Michaelson? The glamor seemed to be
going out of the theatre. She fumbled at her purse.

In a sudden dry tone Marsha said, “I’m paying, remember? Don’t fool around.”

Marjorie looked at her and put down the purse. “With pleasure, moneybags. With pleasure.”

“Are you really through with Noel, Margie? For good?”

“Obviously.”

“Is there another guy?”

“Oh, there have been others, and there’ll be others, Marsha. But no more Noels, thanks.
Pixies bore me.”

“How about fauns? I’d say Noel Airman is more on the faun side. Looking better than
ever, by the way.”

“Fauns, pixies, brownies, satyrs, you can have them all. I don’t like mythical creatures.
They’re too airy. I don’t like a man you can see through, like a double exposure.
Do you know, by some chance, a nice solid man?”

“Sure, Lou Michaelson,” Marsha said. She snapped open her purse, took out a twenty-dollar
bill, and dropped it on the check. Lighting a cigarette in a holder with a long narrow
red mouthpiece, she squinted at Marjorie through smoke. “Okay. I won’t go to the rehearsal.
Will you help me shop for my trousseau? I’m up to nightgowns on the check list. Help
me pick out some real yummy things to please Lou.”

“Well—sure, I guess so. I can do that. I’d like to.”

“And you’ll come to my wedding, won’t you? It’s a week from Sunday.”

“Of course. I’d love to.”

“Wonderful. Got a guy to come with you?”

“I’ll provide a guy, if I want one.”

“Shall I invite Noel?”

“No, don’t.”

Marsha’s eyes glinted. “Okay, I won’t.”

“Where and what time?”

“Six-thirtyish.” Marsha tilted her head archly. “Guess where. Just guess.”

“I haven’t an idea in the world. Some hotel?”

“Remember the El Dorado? Lou lives there. It’ll be in his apartment.”

Marjorie said, “Well, well. You’re practically producing Noel’s show, and you’re going
to live in the El Dorado. What next?”

Marsha shrugged, grinning. “The wheel of fortune, hey, sugar bun? It’s all too ironic
for words, but—What are you puckering your forehead about?”

“Michaelson… Did this Mrs. Michaelson limp?” Marjorie said. “A small dumpy old woman,
always wore black, limped?”

“She did have a clubfoot, Lou says—”

“Why, I knew her,” Marjorie said. “She and my mother were on some charity committee
of the El Dorado—Red Cross, or something. She was in our apartment a dozen times.
I’ll be damned. You’re marrying old Mrs. Michaelson’s son. My mother will die.”

They looked each other in the face, and at the same instant burst out laughing. They
laughed very hard. Marsha touched a tiny handkerchief to her eyes. “Ah, God, it’s
a marvelous life, Margie, I’m telling you, if you don’t get easily discouraged and
cut your throat. It’s a temptation now and then, I grant you. Come on, let’s shop.”

It was very cold in the wet sunny street after the rain. Marjorie said, “Well, this
ought to be gay, shopping for a trousseau. Good practice for me, let us hope.”

Marsha said abruptly, “I thought you had a million things to do this afternoon.” And
when Marjorie stared at her in confusion, she said, “When will you get wise to yourself?
If you were through with Noel Airman you’d have gone to the rehearsal like a shot.
And you wouldn’t have given a hoot whether he came to the wedding or not. However,
not another word from me will you hear. I’m the original genius at conducting one’s
love life. Taxi!”

Setting out for the El Dorado, Marjorie was unaccountably nervous. Her palms were
wet, and she was swallowing often and hard, as though she were about to go up in an
airplane, or take a stiff college final. When she emerged on West End Avenue, low
black clouds covered the sky except in the west, beyond the Hudson, where the sun
was going down in a dismal yellow glare. The queer light, the raw air, made her shiver.
She had intended to walk to the El Dorado; instead, she caught a cab.

She had not been at the El Dorado for more than two years, but the red-faced doorman,
in a purple uniform newly frogged with gold, touched his hat and said, “Evening, Miss
Marjorie.” It was like a dream to find herself walking through this luxurious lobby,
a stranger and a visitor—a visitor, moreover, to Marsha Zelenko. She was glad that
the elevator man was new. It would have been too unsettling to be taken up to Marsha’s
wedding by her old white-headed friend Frank. She looked at herself in the coppery
mirror and saw a troubled young woman, somewhat thinner, perhaps prettier, certainly
much more sober than the girl who had last looked out at her from this mirror.

Lou Michaelson lived in Apartment 15 F. The Morgensterns had lived in 17 F. Marjorie
knew how the apartment would be shaped, where the hallways would turn, where the windows
would look out to the park.

A Negro butler in a white coat opened the door, and the first person she saw in the
apartment was Noel Airman, leaning in the archway of the living room with his arms
folded, surveying the buzzing guests with a faint smile. She was not very surprised,
though the sight of him made her breath come hard. His tan was gone; he looked pale
and tired. His jacket was an old tweed he had often worn at South Wind.

He didn’t see her as she went past him. She gave her beaver coat to the servant, and
darted down the hallway to the bedrooms. Marsha’s mother, in a long blue gown decked
with a huge spray of green orchids, was chattering in the bend of the hall with a
group of guests. She held out both hands to Marjorie. “Darling! So sweet of you to
come. This is Luba Wolono, dear, you know, the great concert artist, my old, old friend.
Luba’s going to play for the ceremony. Luba, this is Marjorie Morningstar, the actress,
Marsha’s oldest and dearest friend. And this is Mr. Packovitch, and this is Mr. Maggiore—”
Marjorie wasn’t sure whether she had ever heard of Luba Wolono, but it sounded like
the name of a concert artist, and the woman certainly looked like one: almost six
feet tall, white-faced, and dressed in floor-length black, with long black hair parted
as with a hatchet in the middle and pulled straight back. Luba Wolono gave Marjorie
a small mournful smile. The guests stopped staring at the concert artist and turned
to stare at the actress.

“Where’s Marsha?” Marjorie said.

“Bedroom, first door on the right, dear. She’ll adore seeing you. You look lovely—”

When Marjorie turned the knob of the closed bedroom door there were shrieks, giggles,
and screams of “No, no!”

She slipped inside. “I’m not a man, relax.”

Marsha stood in the center of the room with one side of her skirt pulled up, showing
her thick leg, an ornate blue garter, a bare tan thigh, and most of a black girdle.
Three girls were pulling and hauling at her, all talking at once. The bedroom was
full of heavy carved black furniture, and a big black-framed photograph of Mrs. Michaelson
brooded over it on the far wall. Marsha shouted, “Marjorie, what can you do about
a goddamn lousy stuck zipper? Lend us a hand, will you? Otherwise the rabbi’s going
to get one hell of a thrill when I come out of here.”

The girls squealed. “These are my cousins from St. Louis,” Marsha said. “They’re so
excited they’re helpless. Elaine Packovitch, Sue Packovitch, Patricia Packovitch,
Margie Morgenstern.” The girls stopped plucking at Marsha long enough to inspect Marjorie
and chirp greetings. They varied in age from about eighteen to twenty-six, and they
all looked very much like Marsha at her least attractive stage. They were dressed
in terrible flounces—pink, green, yellow.

Marjorie came to Marsha’s side and peered at the skirt hem jammed in the zipper. “Let’s
see—”

Marsha said, “Isn’t it fantastic? Two years selling girdles, and I jam my own goddamn
zipper on my wedding day. There’s an omen for you. My hands are shaking so, I can’t
do anything.” Marjorie wrenched and pushed deftly for a second or two, and the skirt
dropped free. “Well, bless your little heart. What would I do without la Morningstar?”
Marsha straightened her skirt at the mirror. “What time is it, somebody?”

One of the cousins said, “Five to six.”

“Thirty-five minutes to go. God, where’s my hat? It was right here—oh, there it is—”
Marsha put on a small white hat with a white nose veil. “Somebody close the blinds,
the wind’s giving me the willies.” It had grown quite dark, and rain was rattling
on the window glass. A cousin snapped the Venetian blind shut. Marsha’s brown eyes
were brilliant with excitement; her face was flushed, and her upper lip quivered.
She wore a suit of navy blue silk, unornamented and severely cut, with a white orchid
on her shoulder. She said, “Okay, now. Something old, something new, something borrowed,
something blue—Wait, did I borrow anything?”

After a major squalling conference, with the Packovitch girls pressing earrings, bracelets,
watches, and jewelry on her, she took a handkerchief from Marjorie, tucked it in a
pocket, and dropped heavily on the bed. “Okay. The ox is ready for the knife.”