The Lonely Lady (19 page)

“I hope Mother didn’t upset you. It’s only that she worries about you.”

“I know. She didn’t.”

“She has a lot on her mind. Bobby’s signing up upset her more than she admits.”

“And now me. I guess it doesn’t make things any easier.”

“We’ll manage. All we want is for you both to be all right.” He hesitated a moment. “You know that if there’s anything you need, anything, all you have to do is call us.”

I leaned over and kissed his cheek.

He patted my hair gently. “I don’t like to see you hurting.”

“It’s my fault,” I said. “And I’ll have to work it out myself. But it will get better now that I have the chance.”

He looked at me silently for a moment, then nodded. “I’m sure it will,” he said. “The last thing in the world you needed was another father.”

My surprise showed in my eyes. He didn’t wait for me to speak. “Walter’s problem was the same as mine. Neither of us wanted to believe that you were growing up.” His smile suddenly warmed his face. “I knew that the moment I saw you in his play. He would like nothing better than to keep you that girl forever. But the difference between life and the play is that life changes and plays don’t. That girl in the play is still the same age today that she was five years ago. But you’re not.”

I felt the tears running down my cheeks. He pulled my head against his chest. A thoughtful tone came into his voice. “Don’t feel bad, JeriLee. It could have been worse. Some people just never grow up at all.”

Chapter 4

I watched my father walk down the hall into his room before I closed the door. I lit another cigarette and went back to the window.

The girl in the play never grew up at all. But I had been the girl in the play. Was I still the same girl? Was the growing up I thought I did an illusion? I still remembered that afternoon, the second week of rehearsals, when my growing up began.

I didn’t want to do it. I kept saying I wasn’t an actress. But Walter and Guy kept pressing and finally I gave in. At first I felt strange and awkward. An amateur among professionals. But I learned bit by bit. By the end of the first week they could hear me in the balcony. Everyone was so nice, so considerate, I began to feel more comfortable, more sure. Until that afternoon when it came at me from out of the blue.

Beau Drake had come from Hollywood to make his first appearance on the New York stage since he had left fifteen years before. He was a star and he knew it. He was a professional and never let anyone forget it, especially me. He knew and pulled all the tricks. Half the time I found myself playing the scene with my back to the audience, other times I would be hidden by his broad shoulders or upstaged and left hanging while the attention of the audience was directed to another portion of the stage.

In the beginning I didn’t know enough to be bothered by it, but as I began to realize what he was doing I started to get angry. I didn’t want more of a role than the play gave me, but I felt I was entitled to what I did have. I began to fight back in the only way I could. By this time I recognized that he was a stickler for cue lines. The slightest variation in the reading would throw him off. And so I began to change the lines that Walter had written into my own language.

It was the second run-through of the afternoon and we were at the climax of the second act, the scene just before curtain, when he blew. “Goddamn it!” he suddenly roared.

We froze, Dan Keith, who played my father, stared first at him and then at me. Jane Carter, in the wings waiting for her entrance, stood with her mouth agape while Beau marched angrily down to the center of the stage and leaned over the footlights.

“I’m not getting paid enough money to be Stanislavsky,” he shouted at Guy and Walter. “If I wanted to run an acting school for stage-struck girls I could do better in Hollywood. If you can’t get Mrs. Thornton to say the lines that were written for her, you can find yourself another actor for my part. I’m walking!”

He turned and stalked off the stage. There wasn’t a sound or a movement until we heard the door of his dressing room slam shut backstage. Then everybody began to speak at once.

“Quiet!” Guy’s voice was firm as he came up on the stage followed by Walter. He looked at Dan and Jane. “We’ll break for a half hour.”

They nodded and left the stage silently. Guy and Walter looked at me without speaking. I remembered feeling just at that moment like a child defying her parents.

“You saw what he was doing,” I accused. “It wasn’t right. He was doing everything to make me look stupid.”

I had nothing more to say so I began to cry. “Okay. I never said I was an actress. I’ll go.”

Guy’s voice was quiet. “No. I’ll decide that. I’m the director.”

“It’s the best thing for the play,” I sobbed. “He hates me. You won’t have any trouble with another girl.”

“Beau is right,” Guy said. “You were changing the lines on him. Why?”

“He had no right to do what he was doing.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“You didn’t answer mine,” I retorted.

“I don’t have to. I wasn’t tampering with the author’s lines.”

“If you objected to it, why didn’t you say something?”

“Because it wasn’t time. What I want to know is why you did it.”

“It was the only way I could get him to let me play my part.”

Guy and Walter exchanged a communicative glance. “That’s not a good enough reason,” Guy said.

Suddenly I was no longer intimidated. “Then how about this one? There was no way I could get myself to say those lines and still be the seventeen-year-old girl you want me to be. Those lines are written for a thirty-year-old woman. I don’t know any kids who talk like that.”

For a moment there was silence, then I caught a glimpse of Walter’s set and guarded face. “Oh, Walter, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like it sounded. I—”

“It’s all right,” he said stiffly. Abruptly he turned and walked off the stage.

I started after him but Guy held out a hand. “Let him go.”

“What are you talking about? That’s my husband walking out.”

“Not your husband. The playwright.”

“I hurt him. I’m going after him.”

“No, you’re not. He’s a pro, he’ll get over it.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Someone had to tell him. The lines weren’t right. It was becoming more obvious every day. If the dialogue were right, Beau would not have had the chance to do what he did. He’d be too busy working on his own part.”

Over Guy’s shoulder I saw Beau coming out of the wings. He seemed relaxed as he approached us. “Everything okay?” he asked in a casual voice.

“Fine, now,” Guy answered as if nothing had happened.

Suddenly I understood and I felt the anger surging within me. “You set me up for this,” I accused. “Because none of you had the nerve to tell him the truth.”

“You were the only one he would take it from,” Guy said. “Now he’ll go back and rewrite until he gets those lines right.”

“You’re a shit!” I snapped.

“I never said I was a saint.”

“The truth,” I said. “Can’t any of you tell the truth? Do you always have to manipulate others into doing your dirty work for you when the truth is so much simpler?”

“That’s show business,” Guy said glibly.

“I don’t like it,” I said.

“You better get used to it if you’re going to stay in it.”

“I have no intention of doing that either.”

“If you plan to stay married to Walter, you’ll get used to it whether you like it or not. Because he’s going to be around for a long time. This is the only life he knows or wants.” He started for the wings without waiting for a reply. “Rehearsal at two o’clock tomorrow,” he called back over his shoulder.

Beau and I were left alone on the stage. He smiled slowly. “Just you and me, baby.”

“I don’t think that’s funny.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for it to get so rough.”

When I didn’t answer, a look of contrition came over his face. “I couldn’t help it. I guess I’m a better actor than I thought.”

That broke the ice. I began to smile. “You’re pretty good,” I said. “But you’re also a prick.”

He grinned. “I’ve been called worse. But it’s all for a good cause. Can I buy you a drink just to show there’s no hard feelings?”

“I don’t drink,” I said. “But you can buy me a cup of coffee.”

It all worked the way they had planned it. By the time I got home that night Walter was working on the rewrite. He didn’t come to bed at all and the next morning when I came down for breakfast there was a note on the table.

I felt the warm glow of approval, and later in rehearsal I noticed that the changes had already been incorporated. For the first time we were all together.

It wasn’t until long afterward that I realized what that afternoon had cost me. By that time Beau and I had already picked up our Tonys for best actor and supporting actress, even though the award for the best play had gone to another writer. It happened the week the play closed on Broadway after a year’s run.

I had a suggestion to make to Walter about his new script and went into his study to give it to him. He listened to me impassively. When I finished he reached for the script I still held in my hand.

“You weren’t supposed to read this,” he said.

“I didn’t know that, Walter. I picked up the copy in the bedroom.”

“I forgot it.”

“I was only trying to help.”

“When I want help I’ll ask for it.”

It was not until then that I really believed they had found the only way to get him to make the changes. He didn’t care any more for the truth than the others in the business. All they were really interested in was their own egos.

“I’m sorry,” I said stiffly. “It won’t happen again.”

“I don’t mean to sound harsh. But you can’t know what it is until you do it yourself. You have some idea how difficult it is. You tried to write once yourself.”

“Then I’ll find out,” I said. “Now that the play is closed and I have the time to spare, I have an idea of my own that I want to try.

“Good. If you have any problems you can talk to me about it.”

I didn’t answer. But when I left the room my mind was already made up. He was the last person in the world I was going to go to for help.

That had been four years ago and the beginning of the end of our marriage. After that in a thousand subtle ways I became aware that he felt challenged. Now it was over. I hoped that he was no longer threatened.

I heard the telephone begin to ring downstairs and glanced at my watch. It was after two in the morning. I had been sitting at the window for over an hour. An impulse made me go downstairs to answer it. My parents were old-fashioned enough to believe that extension telephones were a needless extravagance.

The voice on the phone was harsh and strangely familiar. “Veronica?”

“No. This is JeriLee.”

“JeriLee, I didn’t know you were home. This is Chief Roberts. Do you own a blue Jaguar?”

My heart began to pound but I tried to keep my voice calm. “Yes.”

“There’s been an accident.”

“Oh, no!”

My parents had suddenly appeared behind me. My father reached and took the telephone from my hand. “This is John Randall.”

He listened for a moment, then his face went white. “We better get dressed,” he said as he put down the phone. “There’s been an accident and Bobby’s in the hospital at Jefferson.”

Chapter 5

My brother never went to Vietnam. The car went off the road on the same curve that killed my father fifteen years before. He lived only long enough to apologize to my mother.

“I’m sorry, Ma,” he whispered through the maze of tubes that ran in and out of his body. “I guess I had too much to drink.” Then he turned his head away and went to sleep. And never woke up.

Mother seemed to turn to stone. For her it must have been like a nightmare revisited. No matter what we said or tried to do we received no response. The only question she addressed to Chief Roberts. “Was he alone in the car?”

“Yes, Veronica. He dropped Anne off at her house fifteen minutes earlier. She said she asked him to stay and have a cup of coffee before he went home but he said he wanted to get JeriLee’s car home so that she wouldn’t worry about it.”

She nodded without speaking.

“Anne said they were planning to get married before he went off to training camp,” he said. “Did you know she was pregnant?”

My mother stared at him.

“He hadn’t said anything to us,” my father said.

“She said he was going to tell you this morning.”

“You spoke to her?” my father asked.

The chief nodded. “The accident went out on the one o’clock news flash on the Jefferson radio station. She called here and I spoke to her. She’s pretty broken up.”

“The poor kid,” I said. “She’s got to be scared to death.”

My mother turned on me angrily. “Don’t feel sorry for that slut! I warned Bobby that she would do anything to trap him.”

“I don’t know the girl,” I said. “But it can’t be—”

“I do,” my mother cut in in an icy voice. “I’m almost glad that he’s beyond her reach.”

I felt my heart swell up and almost choke me. Suddenly I realized something I had never known before. I had never seen my mother cry. Never. Not even now. I couldn’t stop the words. “Don’t you know how to cry, Mother?”

She looked at me for a moment, then turned to my father. Her tone was almost normal. It was as if I had said nothing. “We’ll have to make arrangements for the funeral, John…”

I couldn’t stand it. I forced myself between them and looked deep into her eyes. The tears were running down my cheeks. “Bobby’s dead, Mother. Your only son is dead. Can’t you spare him any tears?”

Mother’s voice was cold and calm. “You have no right to speak like that, JeriLee. It’s your fault this happened. You shouldn’t have given him the car.”

It was too much for me. In tears, I turned and walked down the short flight of stairs to the main floor, then out of the front door.