Two more calls, one to Gunther, who said his tux was pressed and ready. Another to Varney, who still wasn't back in his room. I figured he was reasonably safe, at least if Jeremy was right and Spelling's clues did mean that he would go for Varney at the Oscar dinner.
It was after six by now, at least that's what I guessed. My father's watch said it was two.
I went out to a neighborhood diner for a pair of BLTs and a couple of Pepsis and talked to the waitress about her nephews in the army and the sorry state of her legs. Armed with a full stomach, the remainder of Clark Gable's advance, and the prospect of a hell of a time the next night, I got back in the Crosley, made a stop, and then drove to Anne's apartment building and rang the bell.
Anne and I had been married for five years. We'd been divorced for seven years. She had remarried Howard, an airline executive who met a death which some people thought was not untimely.
Nothing. I rang again. Beyond the glass door I could hear footsteps coming down the stairs and then I saw Anne peek around the dark-wood banister at me. She took another step and stood on the landing behind the door, about five steps up, hands on her ample hips.
I grinned and gestured at the locked knob. She didn't grin back. I pulled the bouquet of mixed flowers from behind my back and held it up to the door.
"Annie, Annie was the miller's daughter," I sang softly in a not-bad baritone. "Far she wandered from the singing water. Idle, idle Annie went a-maying. Up hill down hill went her flock a straying. Hear them. Hear them calling as they roam. Annie, Annie bring your white black sheep home."
She mouthed something. I think it was "shit," though Anne was always a lady. Then she came down and opened the door. I held out the flowers. She took them.
"Toby," she said. "We had an agreement. You call if you have to see me."
"And you say no," I reminded her.
"My right," she said.
"It's Phil's birthday," I said.
"So?"
"Can I come in?"
"I've got company," she said, blocking the way, posies in the port-arms position.
"I don't think so," I said.
"What makes you think I'm lying?"
"You're not dressed for company. You're dressed for a night in the bathtub, reading a book, listening to the radio, thinking about old times. Five minutes."
"It's never five minutes, Toby," she said, still barring the entrance.
She was wearing makeup but not much, just what she must have had on during the day. Her hair was dark and billowy and soft, but combed for comfort, not to impress.
Her blue blouse was clean but not new and she was wearing slacks.
"We talk here," she said. "We talk fast."
"You look great," I said. "You smell great. I miss you. How about dinner, breakfast, lunch, a hot dog, an ice cream, a walk on the beach, a movie? That cover everything fast enough?"
"Stop, Toby," she said.
"Did I say you smell great?"
"Yes."
"Looks like we're out of conversation."
"Looks like," she said, folding her arms, the flowers dangling. "Toby, please. I've got a new job, long hours, and I'm going to night school."
"School?"
"Law school," she said. "Ridgely Law in the valley."
"Ridgely Law?"
"I'm a little older than the others but I'm told veterans will be coming back and…"
"How did you?…"
"Marty Lieb knows some people, the dean," Anne said, shifting her eyes past me to the street behind my back.
"Marty? My lawyer?"
"I've gone to him for advice since Howard died and he's been…"
"You've been seeing Marty Lieb?" I asked.
Anne didn't answer.
"I need to make it on my own," she said. "And I don't need to go back to reminders of you or Howard. Now, I've got to go."
"Is Marty up there?" I said, pointing to the stairway.
"I told you I have company," she said. "What am I doing here? What am I hiding and apologizing for? Go, Toby.
Say happy birthday to Phil for me. Take your flowers back."
She held up her hand with a pushing motion to show that she wanted to close the door.
"I still love you, Anne," I said.
"That was never the problem, Toby. The problem was and is that you are a klutzy Peter Pan, an adult who won't grow up. A… oh, what is the use. We've been through this at least four hundred times. I've wasted too many days and nights in the forest about this. Good night."
"Ice cream at Ferny's," I tried as she pushed the door and I backed away. "What can it hurt?"
"I'm too fat now," she said.
"You are voluptuous," I said, holding out the flowers as she continued to ease me through the door.
Before the door slammed shut, she took the flowers.
"I'll call you," I said as the door clicked shut.
She stood there for an instant, eyes moist, or was that my imagination? Then she shook her head, turned, and hurried up the stairs and around the bend.
"Marty Lieb," I said aloud.
If I were a drinking man, I'd have gone out for a couple. If I had the heart for it, I would have called Carmen the cashier for a last-minute date for an Abbott and Costello and a late dinner, even if it meant bringing her son. Instead, I found a shop on Ventura where they sold radios and phonographs and albums. It was almost ten when I got to Ruth and Phil's house in North Hollywood. Ruth answered the door, gave me a hug, and touched my cheek. I was always careful when I hugged my sister-in-law, even before she had gotten sick. There wasn't much of her but heart.
"Kids are asleep," she said. "Phil's not home. Still at work. Some kind of problem."
"You feeling all right, Ruth?"
"Not bad," she said.
And she was right. More pale than usual. Thinner than I remembered. Three kids to take care of and my brother Phil for a husband.
"Come in for a coffee," she said.
She was wearing a robe and was definitely ready for bed and needing it.
"No," I said, handing her the package I was carrying, an Arvin portable in leatherette for Phil's office, if he still had one after the investigation.
"He'll be sorry he missed you," Ruth said, taking the package.
"I'll give you a call tomorrow," I said, taking a step back. "Maybe we can all go out to Levy's for dinner Monday or Tuesday. On me. Good night, Ruth."
The phone was ringing when I returned to Jeremy's model apartment. It was Clark Gable with the news that Jeremy, Shelly, Gunther, and I were to meet Mame Stoltz in front of the Coconut Grove at six-thirty.
"You'll be there?" I asked.
"I will not be there," Gable said. "But I won't leave town till you let me know what happens."
He wished us luck and I hung up, brushed my teeth with the spare toothbrush I carried in my glove compartment, and shaved with a Gillette razor I'd picked up on the way back.
And then I went to sleep. It had been a long day.
Chapter 13
Saturday, March 4,1943, was the fifteenth and last tune the Academy Awards were given at a more or less intimate banquet for about 200 people. It was also the last and only time someone was murdered at an Oscar-night celebration. The next year, the Academy would move to Grauman's Chinese Theater on Hollywood Boulevard. More than two thousand people would fill the theater. The next year, not only the best actor and actress would receive Oscars, but so would the best supporting actor and actress, who still had to be content with plaques this year.
Next year it wouldn't be an insiders' event anymore, but in 1943 it was still the way it used to be.
I woke up late, wondering what time it was, and realized I had a backache from sleeping in a bed instead of on the floor. I rolled off the side of the bed, sat up, considered cursing the massive Negro gentleman who had given me the bear hug that sent me sleeping on floors. The man who had given me the bear hug was a Mickey Rooney fan. My job had been to keep fans away from Mick at a premiere. I succeeded. It cost me a healthy back and I was paid twenty bucks for the night I crawled to the bathroom, wiggled out of my shorts, turned on the shower, hot and hard, and climbed up the wall. I didn't feel much like singing the score of No, No Nanette, but I did manage a medley of "It Seems to Me I Heard That Song Before" and "Always in My Heart."