All the Stars in the Heavens (20 page)

The first person Loretta thought to share this bounty with was Clark Gable.

She knelt next to the box in her robe and began to cry. She tried to understand her tears, to put her feelings in some rational context, but she couldn't. Maybe it was being so far from home on her birthday, or perhaps it was where she was, frozen on a mountaintop in the bitter cold, adjusting to the short days and long nights, that made her miserable.

Or was this wave of sadness about the abrupt end of her friendship with Spencer? She missed their conversations, his view of the world,
his take on things. He could talk for hours about anything—acting, baseball, or spiritual matters. He had common sense. He taught her about polo, which on the surface of things bored her, but when he was describing the sport, she was riveted.

Loretta missed those talks, and she missed
him
. She wondered who she was alone, without someone to love, and the mirror reflection of someone loving her. She pondered her worth. Good actresses were like the oranges in the groves in California, plentiful, shiny, and sweet, an endless bounty that seemed to multiply in the heat of the California sun.

Now that movies were available in every small town across the country, the dream of acting in them was available to every girl who had the beauty, youth, and moxie to give Hollywood a try. Loretta had seen every variation of the story, but believed if she worked harder than the rest, she would continue her ascent, to earn roles in scripts worthy of talents like Jean Arthur and Bette Davis. But here, far away from her studio routine and all she knew, she questioned the talent she had worked so hard to nurture. Was she really strong? Had she been afraid on the raft that afternoon? Had she been brave, or was she simply acting? Was she good enough? Did she have the stamina to endure a career that would take her away from family and friends? What kind of life was this for a young woman who hoped to marry and have children of her own someday?

There was a knock at the door. She dried her tears and went to answer it.

Alda looked at Loretta and knew something was terribly wrong. “I heard all about what happened on the river. How can I help?”

“I'm all right,” Loretta assured her.

“Have you been crying?”

“A little.”

“Why?”

“I'm tired,” Loretta said. “I'll tell you what. I want you to help me make dinner tonight. I can't bear that bad food any longer. Mama sent a box of great stuff.”

“I know. I didn't want to open it.” Alda looked through the box. “Spaghetti!”

“When the crew has eaten and Elvira is done with work for the night, ask her if I can borrow the kitchen. Invite Luca. I'm going to invite Mr. Gable. We'll have a good time, just the four of us.”

“Should I extend the invitation to Mr. Gable?”

“I'll take care of it.”

Alda left to make the arrangements in the kitchen.

Loretta sat down at her desk. She drafted a short letter. She corrected her grammar and spelling, then wrote it out slowly and perfectly for delivery.

   
Dear Mr. Gable,

An astonishing stroke of luck has occurred that does not involve wild river rapids. I have received reinforcements from Hollywood (the food kind, not the chorus girl variety) and would like to invite you to dinner this evening at eight o'clock in the dining hall kitchen. Dress casual.

Your friend,

Gretchen Young

Loretta threw her fur coat over the robe and snuck down the hallway to deliver the invitation. As she approached Gable's room, the last room at the end of the hallway, she followed the scent of sweet tobacco and heard him talking on the phone. “Minna, I'm telling you, it was unbelievable! Bill said he never saw anything like it.”

Loretta slipped the invitation under the door and heard Gable's heavy footsteps coming toward her. She ran down the hallway and into her room, closing the door behind her.

Minna Wallis was Gable's agent. Loretta would never think to call her agent from a location, but that was the difference between them. He was busy acting in one picture while he was planning the next. Only a star connects one role to the next like glistening pop beads. Box office popularity could only be sustained by a star's constant presence in the local movie house, and that meant cultivating the next role while acting in the current one.

Loretta ran a bath. She placed the kettle on the hearth to make a cup of tea. She bathed quickly; the last thing she wanted to do after the raft scene was soak in water. She pulled on the robe and slippers and curled up on the bed with the fan magazines, the box of See's Candy, and a cup of fragrant Earl Grey. She opened
Photoplay.
In it was a full-page article about Gable and his wife, Ria. She sat up and read it carefully.

Under a photo of Gable wearing black tie and tails and his wife in a slim white gown, was the subhead R
AISE FOR
G
ABLE
. Loretta read that Gable was earning $3,000 a week. She whistled softly at the sum. He was quoted: “I do all right in pictures. My wife, no matter my salary, feast or famine or suspension by choice, always finds ways to spend what I earn on draperies and furniture.”

Loretta shook her head. That quote didn't sound like a man who was separated; it sounded like one who was very married. But the article went on.

Clark Gable is at the precipice of greatness. Box office gold, they call him. And while Mrs. Gable is busy decorating their mansion, Gable has an open lease on a bungalow at the Beverly Wilshire, where he lives most days and nights, fueling rumors of divorce.
His complaints about his wife's spending habits cannot help the situation. Time will tell.

Loretta stretched out on the bed, recalling the scene at the train station. Mrs. Gable had kissed her husband good-bye as if she were his aunt, not his wife. Loretta could not reconcile the Gable she was beginning to know with the wife he had chosen. There must be something more to it, but she couldn't imagine what that could be.

Loretta heard the soft brush of paper under her door. She lay still, lest the squeak of a bedspring or the creak of a wood slat reveal her. Only when she heard footsteps walk away from her door and down the hallway did she dare to slide off the bed and creep over to read the note. It read:

I'd be delighted. See you at 8.

—Jack Oakie

Loretta didn't find it one bit funny, but she laughed anyway.

“My mother used to say, if you have a lemon, a clove of garlic, some salt, olive oil, and spaghetti, that's all you need to live.” Luca stirred the sauce.

“What about cheese?” Loretta placed the wedge of Parmesan on the counter.

“Love it. But cheese is a luxury. Somebody has to make it. It takes time. Pasta, you can make from scratch if you have flour and eggs. Lemons—if you live in California, they're everywhere. Garlic, that keeps well, and olive oil—well, a home without olive oil is not a home. It's just a place where people sleep.”

“You have strong opinions on the subject,” Loretta said as she set the table in the kitchen.

“When Italian food catches on in America, look out,” Luca promised.

Loretta went to the stove and turned the sausage over in the cast iron skillet until it sizzled crispy brown.

Alda checked the pot of boiling water on the stove. “Should I throw the spaghetti in?”

Loretta checked her watch. It was almost 8:30. “I guess he's not showing up.”

“Oakie or Gable?” Clark Gable said from the doorway.

“Throw in the spaghetti, Alda,” Loretta said. “Mr. Gable, try as you might, you will never have the stature and sex appeal of Jack Oakie. So stop trying.”

Gable smiled. He got a kick out of Loretta. Usually women didn't make him laugh, and not usually at his own expense, but he liked her. A sucker for a pretty girl he had always been, but now, in his mid-thirties, he was beginning to appreciate the clowns.

For Loretta, the slow emotional tumble had begun. She felt the flutter of desire, and her heart raced as though it was trying to outrun her feelings. It didn't hurt that Gable looked divine, fresh scrubbed and eager.

“This is a celebration,” Loretta said as she placed a platter on the table.

“What are we celebrating?”

“We didn't drown in the river.”

“That? That was nothing. No harm was going to come to you,” Gable assured her.

“Because it came to Jack Oakie.”

“He's all right. He's in an all-night card game with Wellman. The only thing he's going to lose tonight is his shirt.”

“Your response to my invitation was funny.”

“I always sign my contracts and important correspondence with the name Jack Oakie.”

“Keeps the riffraff off your tail, Luca said.”

“That's right, Chet. It's the old dodge-and-weave.”

Gable went to the stove and peered into the pots. “What are you making, kid?”

“Spaghetti with olive oil,” Alda said.

“Never had it.”

“Please, sit down. We're almost ready.”

Alda and Luca worked together in the kitchen as though they had been raised in the same one. He lifted the boiling pasta off the stove and drained it into the sink, while she stirred the lemon and butter sauce. He brought the noodles to the pot and threw them in; she tossed them while he grated fresh Parmesan on top of the mixture.

“You two are like an old married couple,” Gable remarked.

“Do you think she'll have me?” Luca asked.

“I don't know. If she's as picky as you are, you may never get together. How many pictures have we worked on, Chet?”

“This is number eight.”

“Everybody wants Chet. Nobody paints like him. Nobody sees the world like he does. Wellman paid you double to come on this picture, didn't he?”

“I don't like the cold.”

Loretta and Alda and Gable laughed.

“I left Brooklyn because they have four seasons. I like one season. Sunshine. In this respect, I am a true Italian.”

“After this, I almost agree with you,” Gable said.

“I can't mix my paint, it's so cold up here.”

“You'll figure something out,” Gable assured him.

“I always do.”

Alda and Luca sat down at the table. Luca reached under the table, produced a jug of homemade wine, and poured it into lead-glass tumblers from the kitchen.

“Where'd you get the wine?” Loretta asked.

“I made it myself. Best part of living in California. I drive up the coast, buy my grapes, then make the wine in my basement in the valley. Go on, taste it.”

Loretta and Clark took a sip.

“It's delicious,” Loretta said.

Gable said, “I'm not much for wine, but I like it.”

“You can't eat macaroni without wine. It won't digest properly,” Alda said.

“She learned that in the convent,” Luca joked.

“I learned that in Italy,” Alda corrected him.

“Were you really in the convent?” Gable asked.

“Yes, I was. And they didn't think I had what it took to be a nun. So here I am.”

“In show business.” Gable laughed.

“I try to help Loretta.”

“And you do.”

Gable tasted the spaghetti. “This is good.”

“Do you think two Italians would make you dinner, and it wouldn't be?”

“Buddy, the food has been so bad up here, it's ruined my taste buds.”

“We wanted to make something special. It's Loretta's birthday.”

Gable turned to her. “Really?”

“Yes.”

“Happy birthday.”

“Thank you.”

“I didn't get you a present.”

“You sure did. You didn't let me drown today. This is my present. Good friends, good food, and homemade wine.”

“You're a simple girl,” Gable said.

“You have no idea.”

“When I was a kid in Brooklyn, we did this all the time. The whole neighborhood came over on a Sunday, and my mother would make manicotti, and another family brought bread, somebody else made meatballs, another family brought a cake, and we all had a meal together.”