The Slipper (39 page)

Danny no longer had a father. CHICAGO HEIRESS AND HUSBAND KILLED IN CRASH, the headlines blared two months ago. Douglas and Cynthia Hammond had been flying back from Barbados in a small private plane, there had been a storm, the pilot lost control, all three of them had been killed instantly. When she saw the picture of Doug and Cynthia in the paper, Julie had studied her emotions closely, trying to gauge them, but the grief, the sorrow did not come. The man in the photograph had his arm slung around his wife's shoulder and there was a broad smile on his lips, and he was like a stranger. She felt nothing. The handsome, affluent man with his stylishly cut hair and three-hundred-dollar dinner jacket might indeed have been someone she had never known. Julie had never laid eyes on him again after he left the basement apartment that night before graduation. The divorce had all been handled smoothly and efficiently through lawyers, Julie refusing both alimony and child support. She had not contacted Doug when his son was born, and Doug had made no inquiries. For all he knew she might have aborted it after all, might have had a miscarriage like before. He simply hadn't been interested enough to inquire. One day Danny would ask questions about his father, and she would make up some pleasant, plausible story for him, but now she wanted merely to forget. She was sorry about the plane crash, of course, it was terrible and tragic, but she felt no grief, felt no loss. She had gone through that over two years ago, and she never wanted to suffer that way again.

Sighing, Julie removed her robe and dressed in her street clothes, a simple white cotton blouse, a full brown skirt a little too short, a pair of worn brown loafers. Smoothing her hair back from her face, she tied it in back with a faded pink scarf. It wasn't quite four o'clock. There would still be time to stop by for the cake and hang up the balloons and crepe paper streamers before Hannah brought Danny down. Bless Hannah. Julie knew she could never have made it without her. Hannah was paid well, but no amount of money could pay for the tenderness, the loving care and concern she lavished on her charge. Danny was closer to Hannah than he was to his own mother, and that worried Julie a lot. She didn't want it to be this way. She dreamed of a home in the country, a dog, a garden, a husband who would love her and Danny and give them a simple, uncomplicated life so her Danny could grow up strong and healthy and normal. Danny was the most important thing in the world to her, far more important than acting, becoming a star. She had realized that some time ago, but acting was the only thing she knew, the only way she could make a decent living for them.

Julie left her dressing room and started down the dingy hall toward the reception area with its phalanx of secretaries and security guards. Those dreams she had so tenderly nourished during her teens seemed foolish now. Julie loved acting, but she hated all that went along with it, hated the stress, the tension, the rivalry, the frustrations, and personal celebrity meant nothing to her. She hated the interviews, the attention, and although she was always charming and accessible, she hated the crowds of teenaged girls who waited outside the studio, swarming around her when she stepped out the door. I thought I wanted the slipper, she told herself, but … but now all I want is a simple life for me and my son. I'll never find it in this business. Oh God, if only Doug had loved me as I loved him. If only … Julie put on a pleasant smile for the secretaries and waved to her favorite security guard and, pausing to slip on her brown cloth coat, stepped outside into the icy January cold.

The cold didn't deter them a bit. They were all out there, at least twenty of them, most of them with familiar faces. “Meg!” they shouted and “Julie!” they cried, and they swarmed around her with autograph books and glossy studio photographs and she smiled and made pleasant talk and signed the pictures, signed the books, patiently answering their silly questions, gracious even when they lunged at her like salmon going upstream. What possessed them to stand out here in the cold for hours on end, waiting for a chance to see her? What mysterious glamor did they believe she was imbued with? The glamor was all an illusion in the eye of the beholder. This huge tan building that dominated a grimy corner on the West Side, the dusty hallways within, the hot lights, the coils of electrical cables, the gimcrackery sets that photographed far better than they looked. There was no glamor in these, no glamor in the hours and hours of backbreaking labor. A plump blonde teenager chewing a wad of gum told Julie she thought she was wonderful, and Julie smiled, thanking her. Another girl asked her if she and Steve were ever gonna get married, or were they just gonna keep sleeping together like they'd been doing the past three months. Julie told her that that was up to the producers and scriptwriters but, as far as she was concerned, she
enjoyed
sleeping with a man as handsome as Steve. The girls all giggled, adoring her, and it was then that Julie happened to look up and see the man again.

He was standing beside a mailbox a few yards away, wearing the same nondescript blue suit, watching her with that same bland expression. His hair was a grayish brown, his face utterly unremarkable, everything about him insignificant and forgettable, but Julie recognized him at once. She had first seen him loitering on the corner outside the apartment when she left for work early one morning two weeks ago. He had pretended to be reading a newspaper, but she was conscious of his eyes on her as she hurried toward the bus stop. She had seen him again a few days later as she was leaving the Carnegie Hall building where Sonia conducted her classes in one of the studios. He was loitering on the steps that time, again with a newspaper, and again she had been conscious of his eyes watching her intently. He had no newspaper this afternoon. He stared at her openly, with a curious bland indifference, and Julie felt a chill that had nothing to do with the cold. It … it was no coincidence. He was definitely keeping track of her. He knew where she lived, where she worked and where she attended class. New York was a city of crazies, and even though there was nothing at all frightening about the man, no menace in his manner, she couldn't help feeling a twinge of alarm.

As the girls continued to bombard her with questions, Julie tried to retain her composure, tried to smile. She gradually edged her way toward the curb and felt a wave of relief when she saw the motorcycle roaring down the street, biker in jeans, brown leather jacket, sun shades and a flamboyant gray-and-yellow muffler wound casually around his throat, ends flying. He slammed to a stop at the curb, and the girls had hysterics, identifying him immediately. That windblown, coal-black hair, those handsome, chiseled features, that jaunty, carefree manner could only belong to the hottest young actor on Broadway.

“It's Jim Burke!” one of the girls yelled. “Jim! Jim! We love you, too! Are you and Julie going steady?”

Jim gave the girls a cocky grin as Julie climbed onto the back of the motorcycle, wrapping her arms tightly around his waist, and then he revved the motor, roaring away. Julie clung to him, resting her cheek against his broad shoulder as they darted through the congestion of West Side traffic. Jim zipped between grimy yellow taxis, soared around delivery vans, breezily passed a crowded city bus, in complete command.
Life
had featured a picture of Jim on his motorcycle after he won last year's Tony Award as best supporting actor for his performance as the psychopathic college student in
An Easy Murder
. The press had made much of his unconventional attitudes, his bike, his shabby loft apartment in the village, his cocky charm, his consummate professionalism onstage. A gigantic hit,
An Easy Murder
was still running, and Jim was being deluged with fabulous offers to do television and films. He was a star now, the most exciting new personality since Brando, and Julie was very, very proud of him.

Slowing down, Jim gently eased the bike onto the curb in front of the apartment, braked and, after Julie had dismounted, took out his chain and locked the bike to a lamppost near the front steps. Julie brushed an errant lock of hair from her brow, watching him. Success invariably changes a person, she knew, and success had certainly changed Jim Burke. He was less intense, more relaxed, at ease with himself and with the world. Despite the bike, the jeans, the leather jacket, he had abandoned all Brando mannerisms and developed his own style, easygoing, jaunty, engaging. Success, somehow, had brought all his best qualities to the fore, and she considered herself fortunate indeed to have such a friend. She smiled as he casually slung his arm around her shoulder and asked her what was on the agenda.

“I've got to put up the balloons and crepe paper streamers, pick up the cake from the bakery on Amsterdam, stop by Gristede's and buy the ice cream. Hannah's bringing him down at five-thirty. I want everything to be ready by then.”

“Tell you what, doll, you go on up and start with the streamers and balloons and I'll go get the cake and buy the ice cream. What flavors?”

“Danny loves chocolate. You might get some vanilla, too.”

“Consider it done. See you in a little while.”

He gave her shoulders a squeeze and started on foot for Amsterdam, and Julie went inside and up to the apartment. Although they could easily afford something better now, a nice place on Central Park West or a nice address on the East Side, neither she nor Nora had considered moving. Hannah was here, for one thing, and since the gigantic success of
The Slipper
Nora spent a great deal of time in California, working on the screenplay with Terry Wood and Nunnally Johnson. Hanging in the foyer was an enormous poster featuring a radiant, beaming Nora in black-and-white and, in color, a copy of the book and three words, THE SLIPPER SIZZLES, below, in smaller print, Simon & Schuster, $3.95. Beside the poster was a framed blowup of
The New York Times
best-seller list with
The Slipper
in the number one slot. Beneath this, also framed, was a cover of
Publishers Weekly
featuring
The Slipper
and another photograph of a grinning Nora. Rarely had a book received so much promotion, rarely had one leaped onto the lists and stayed there so long a time. It had been number one for twelve consecutive weeks, in the top five for eighteen more, and although the book had been published early last spring, it was still hanging in there, number nine this past Sunday. Nora had received reams of personal publicity, the most talked-about young writer since Françoise Sagan, and she thrived on her celebrity, loving every minute of it.

Locking the door, removing her coat and hanging it up in the hall closet, Julie stepped into the living room and was startled to see the Hottest Young Writer of the Decade standing on a kitchen chair, taping the end of a crepe paper streamer onto the light fixture. Nora was wearing a summery yellow dress printed with gold-and-beige flowers, her sleek black pageboy falling across her cheeks as she secured the tape. Her suitcases and a large package from the post office were in one corner.

“Nora! I thought you were in California.”

“Jesus!” Nora exclaimed. “You scared the shit out of me!”

“You didn't hear me come in?”

“I've been concentrating on these bloody streamers, love,” Nora said, climbing down from the chair. “I got in around two-thirty—did you think I was gonna miss my Danny's birthday party? Terry said they wouldn't need me again till next Monday, so I hopped the first plane.”

“How's the screenplay going?”

“We finished the bible a couple of weeks ago, Nunnally's working on the actual script now. He's a love, not only brilliant and literate but charming as hell to boot. I'm working very closely with him as ‘technical advisor,' informing him of salient little items such as the fact that girls living together in a New York apartment never have enough closet space and that while they might frequently borrow each other's clothes, they'd never use each other's perfume and makeup.”

“It sounds like you're having a marvelous time.”

“I am, love.”

Nora smoothed back her pageboy, surveying her handiwork. Bright crepe paper streamers were looped across the ceiling, along with clusters of colored balloons. Everything was done. She must have been working ever since she arrived.

“What do you think?” she asked.

“It looks lovely,” Julie said.

“It was a thrill blowing up all those balloons, I can tell you. Where's Claymore's gift to Broadway?”

“He's gone after the cake and ice cream.”

“Thoughtful of him. Want a drink?”

Julie nodded. Nora went over to the portable bar and poured them both glasses of white wine. Although they hadn't moved, they had dressed the place up considerably with new drapes, new furniture. The bar was black lacquer, vaguely Chinese, and the couch Julie sat down on was smoke-gray velour, very plush. A bright red leather hassock made a striking contrast. Nora handed Julie her wine and then curled up on the other end of the couch, folding one leg under her.

“I needed this,” Nora confessed, sipping her wine.

“So did I.”

“Rough day?”

“I blew my lines. We had to retape an entire scene.”

“I've been watching the show almost every day. There's a portable set in the office. You and Steve going to get married?”

“He's going to be seduced by a rich matron who wants to put him into politics and I'm going to be wooed by a handsome, sinister Chinese warlord who wants to use me to get back at Steve, who wrecked his smuggling operations.”

“Jesus. What will they think of next?”

“There's not much telling.”

Success had changed Nora, too, Julie thought. There was a new glow, an indefinable aura of glamor and sophistication that hadn't been there before. Like Jim, Nora was more at ease with herself now, the insecurity and driving need to succeed replaced by a confident air she wore well indeed. There was a new maturity, too. The girl had become a woman, poised, self-assured, lovely, too, in her way. Little of the awkward college student remained in the chic, polished, highly successful young novelist.