Platinum Doll

“Now what do you think of this fine street?” Chuck asked her. “It’s called Linden Drive.”

“Very posh,” she said, as they pulled over in front of a white stucco house with a terra-cotta roof. There was a small palm tree in the front yard and two bird of paradise plants framing the door. “Why are we stopping?”

“Because we’re home. God, I hope you like it. If you don’t, I’m in big trouble since I put a hefty down payment on the place, sight-unseen, a few weeks ago.”

Her mouth fell open.

“You did what?”

“Married people need a proper home, doll. I wanted to give you that as a wedding gift. Since you liked it so much out here near Hollywood, it just seemed a good place for us to officially start our new life. The real estate agent told me this is one of the best streets in the area. Lots of stylish young couples, and movie types, are buying here right now.”

In her mind, movie stars were like royalty. She and her mother had excitedly combed through all of the Hollywood magazines every month for as long as she could remember. They had read and knew every word of gossip about their exciting lives and careers. Like her mother, Harlean, too, had placed those glamorous icons on pedestals they could see but never quite reach. The prospect of actually living here among them was too spectacular to fully fathom.

He shoved his hands nervously into his trouser pockets. “So, do you like the place?”

“It’s adorable on the outside, Chuck, but can I see the rest of it?”

Of course she would love it, but this was all so sudden. It was hard to know what to think, or even how to react, to his cascading generosity. Most new husbands bought their brides flowers or jewelry, not pretty houses in Beverly Hills. It seemed as if there was nothing he would not do to make her happy.

As they stood facing the house, he took the key from a pocket in his trousers. “Here, take it. It’s yours.”

“The key or the house?”

“Both. And all of my heart, too.”

She kissed his cheek, and then he led her up the brick walkway. After he opened the front door, Chuck scooped her up and whisked her across the threshold.

Harlean found the house too charming for words. After he put her down, she first took in the beamed living room with a fireplace inset with indigo tiles. It was bright and sunny, and smelled new, like oil soap and fresh paint. Her heart was racing.

Next, they went into the dining room and on to the kitchen overlooking the back of the house. There was no furniture in the place yet, except in the bedroom, where a mattress was made up on the floor with pillows and a patchwork quilt. At the foot of the bed, Chuck had somehow placed a carved satinwood table that had belonged to his mother. A huge crystal vase sat on top, brimming with white orchids. They had always been Harlean’s favorite flower for how delicate they appeared, but how hardy they were if tended to properly. Her hand went to her lips as she stifled a gasp of surprise.

“It’s all just so perfect,” she said in a whisper.

“Are you sure you like it?”

“Of course! I can’t believe you did all of this for me.”

“Who else is there, doll? You’re everything to me, so you’d better get used to your husband spoiling the daylights out of you.”

Harlean melted against him, then twined her arms around his neck and kissed him tenderly. Passion was never very far off after a kiss between them. “Touch has a memory. O say, love, say.” The words of John Keats threaded themselves back through her mind. She had loved that poem since the first time she had read it and feeling Chuck’s touch often brought it back to her.

“I’ll never get tired of the way you taste,” he murmured as their kiss deepened, and he pulled her more tightly against him. “I really am the luckiest man alive.”

“What do you say we christen the place?” she asked.

“Right now?”

“Why not? I don’t know how you did all of this without me finding out, and on top of everything you made sure we’d have a bed.”

“I’m discovering there’s not a lot money can’t buy.”

“I’m not sure if you’re more handsome or more resourceful.”

“As long as we christen this new bed right now, I don’t care which one of those gets first place,” he said in a low voice thickened by lust.

Afterward, Chuck fetched a hotel picnic basket from the trunk of the car and spread a red-and-white-checkered tablecloth on the living room floor in front of the fireplace. They feasted on ham sandwiches, a cluster of purple grapes and a wedge of cheese. Chuck had brought along a bottle of Champagne from his father’s secret wine cellar in Chicago. Harlean flinched with surprise as the cork popped and he filled two teacups with the bubbly French nectar to celebrate the occasion. He stretched out, propped his head on an elbow and gazed over at her as she sat cross-legged in her bathrobe.

“A penny for your thoughts,” he bid her.

“I just never thought life could be this good. If this is a dream, I never want to wake up. That’s exactly what I’m thinking.”

“Are you sure it’s enough?”

“A husband I love and a home? Why wouldn’t it be?”

“There must be something more. When you were a little girl, what did you want to be when you grew up?”

“Happy,” she said truthfully. “That was it. And I am.”

Harlean waited a moment to let that settle on him then, as it did, she watched his eyebrows knit together as his expression became a frown. “You don’t want to be an actress or anything, since we’re out here in Hollywood, do you?”

She could tell that the prospect was unsettling to him. They both knew that it was a difficult, demanding and largely disappointing dream for those determined to pursue it.

“Now, why would I want to go and do that? I saw how frustrating it was for my mother—the endless auditions and all those doors slammed in her face. That kind of rejection is for fools. No, thank you.”

Harlean may have inherited that stubborn streak from her mother, and an absolute iron will for getting things she wanted, but better to savor her books, her new home and her marriage, and to enjoy the glitter and glamour of Hollywood from a distance.

* * *

Late in the afternoon two days later, a group of their neighbors organized a party to welcome them. The neighborhood was comprised of a wealthy young society crowd. Fit, tan men wearing monogrammed oxford shirts, linen trousers and bow ties bantered with each other as they carried bottles of bootleg gin up Chuck and Harlean’s walkway. Beside them, their pretty wives and girlfriends wore a confectionary-colored array of cashmere sweaters and ropes of pearls. Each came bearing a casserole, a cake or martini glasses.

As the sun began to set behind the bristling palm trees outside, twenty people crowded into the living room, which was decorated so far with only a sofa, two folding chairs and a flea-market side table. Chuck whispered to her that he’d heard them talking, and two of the girls were heiresses, and one was the daughter of a studio boss.

Harlean herself had been raised in an upper-class group in Missouri and after her mother had remarried, she was educated at a posh private school outside of Chicago. But these people were a cut above that. There was a carefree air that surrounded them, and it was instantly intimidating. Harlean had a feeling that this party was actually designed more to size them up than welcome them.

Just when she was starting to think that this might’ve been a mistake, she saw someone she recognized. The mood lightened instantly as an old friend of hers came up the walkway carrying a bouquet of daisies. She wore a pretty floral dress cinched at the waist and a similar rope of pearls to the other girls.

“Rosalie McCray?” Harlean shrieked with surprise at the pretty, petite girl with the chestnut curls suddenly standing before her. “Gosh, what are you doing here? I remember you told us you lived near Hollywood, but I never imagined!”

“Who else do you think organized this little party?”

The girls embraced and Harlean took the flowers from her. “I wrote to your address in Chicago as soon as we all left the cruise, just like I promised I would,” Rosalie explained. Her accent was sugary sweet, and pure Texas.

“I suppose you didn’t receive it before you came out here? Anyway, Ivor heard that the two of you had moved in right down the street from us so we had to be the first to welcome you to our little corner of heaven.”

Chuck and Harlean had met Rosalie and her husband, Ivor, on their honeymoon cruise through the Panama Canal in January, and the two couples had quickly become friends. Rosalie and Harlean found they had a great deal in common since both of them had been teenage brides with rich young husbands.

“Good to see you again, Rosie,” Chuck said after he’d pressed a breezy kiss onto Rosalie’s cheek. “Like a toddy, kids?”

Chuck had solemnly promised Harlean just that afternoon that he was only going to drink a little today while they entertained their neighbors, but she could tell that he had already knocked back a couple of stiff ones. His voice always grew just a little louder when he was drinking. Knowing that he used alcohol to bolster his confidence, she could see that he felt well out of his league with these people, trust fund or not. Secretly, his drinking frightened her because she suspected his reason for it was deeper than just wanting confidence. She believed, probably subconsciously, it was to keep from confronting his grief over the death of his parents, but for now she tried to put her mind on happier thoughts.

“Gosh, I’m happy to see you,” Harlean exclaimed once Chuck had wandered off.

Rosalie glanced around the crowded bungalow. “Chuck sure got you a swell place here, honey. You know, last month Miss Clara Bow herself moved into the neighborhood, just a couple of blocks from here,” she said in a gossipy tone.

“No! My mother would die of envy!” Harlean squealed, and then they both giggled. “Think she’d mind if we popped over for a cup of sugar?”

“So, how have things been between the two of you since the cruise?”

Rosalie asked the question so suddenly that Harlean was thrown off guard.

“Things are great,” she answered, and she knew that it had been too quickly.

Harlean’s friendship with Rosalie had been cemented when Chuck had gotten so drunk one night that he had passed out at the dinner table and had to be carried to his stateroom by two waiters. Rosalie had helped her outside as she’d wept, and the two had spent the rest of that evening up on deck watching the stars and talking about their childhoods.

She hated having to make excuses for Chuck but she couldn’t bear to have anyone think poorly of him.

“Honestly, he’s doing great now that we’re here. That one night with you guys was just a fluke. We’d had that quarrel after he’d had too much to drink. That’s all it was.”

Rosalie followed Harlean’s gaze across the room to Chuck. At the moment, he was telling an animated story with great gesticulations.

“Of course that was it, honey. They’re all like that once in a while. So what do you say to lunch tomorrow, just the two of us girls? I’ll show you around town.”

“Gosh, that’d be great.”

“Can we take your car? Ivor has to take ours for an early tee off time with a few of the boys.”

“Sure, but do you suppose Chuck can tag along to the golf course? I’m not sure what else he’d do around here all day while I’m gone.”

She didn’t want to say that she was nervous he’d sit alone and drink.

Rosalie’s smile faded a degree. “Gee, honey, I’d really like to tell you yes, but since they play at the country club, there has to be an invite from one of the swells over there. Real obnoxious, blue-blooded, East Coast types control everything. Ivor only just got his invitation a couple of weeks ago so he’s still on thin ice till they decide if he’s all right or not.” Rosalie lowered her voice and leaned nearer. “Between you and me, we both hate having to kiss everyone’s posterior around here, but that’s just the way it is when you’re new in town.”

“That’s okay, I understand,” Harlean forced herself to say.

She didn’t really mean it, but she wasn’t about to lose this chance with a girl who could show her the ropes. She would need determination in the coming days to get ahead with this tony group. Besides, she really did like Rosalie. She had an infectious laugh and a sweet, sincere disposition. She hadn’t grown up with many girlfriends so this meant a great deal to her.

“Let’s go see what you’ve got to wear to lunch. The Brown Derby is becoming pretty exclusive, so we’ve got to look the part if we don’t want a table back near the kitchen.”

“I thought you were an actress,” Harlean said.

“For now I’m just an extra. If I’m lucky I get a walk-on here and there. But that sure as heck doesn’t mean I can’t act! You’ll see what I mean tomorrow,” she said conspiratorially.

Even though Harlean couldn’t imagine what Rosalie meant, she was certain lunch was going to be interesting.

* * *

Harlean and Rosalie drove to lunch just before noon the next day. Chuck had washed the car until it gleamed because he knew how important it was that his wife had a friend in California and they were going off to do something together. Even though it was a warm day, she decided not to put the top down so she wouldn’t ruin the careful wave she’d given to her usually fluffy blond hair.

The Brown Derby on Wilshire Boulevard looked just like its name: it was whimsically constructed in the shape of a huge hat. She had read all about the restaurant and the stars who dined there in Photoplay magazine, so she was almost as excited to see the building as to lunch there.

“Have you a reservation?” the maître d’ asked, using a slightly snotty French accent. Harlean knew enough French from her school days to know that it was fake. The tag on this lapel read “Francois.”

Rosalie met his gaze unflinchingly. “Lady Helen Crumley, table for two. My secretary phoned. As usual, we’ll have a booth.”

Harlean watched his reserve dissolve faced with Rosalie’s hauteur and her believable English accent. “Yes, of course, your ladyship, here it is right here. Lovely to see you again. Please, follow me.”

He fumbled nervously with the menus, and Harlean was relieved that he turned away to usher them inside, or her stunned expression would have given them away. They were shown to one of the coveted booths along the side of the restaurant. After he had bid them a “bon appétit,” Harlean looked at Rosalie over the top of her menu.

“Where’d you learn to pull that off?”

“You know what they say about necessity being the mother of invention.”

“Well, I certainly believed you, and so did he.”

“People believe what they want to believe, Harlean. I’ve seen him at auditions, so I know his name is Frankie, not Francois. It mattered more to him that he might have seated some distant royalty that he could brag about than the fact that I might be the same kind of struggling, out-of-work actor he is.”

Incredulous, Harlean shook her head and tried not to smile too broadly. “I can’t believe the table, either. We can see everyone coming and going from here, and most everyone has to pass right by us.”

“Speaking of that, you’ll never believe who just came through the door.” Trying not to show the awe she felt, Harlean lifted her menu again and carefully peered over the top of it. “Jimmy Cagney himself is coming our way.”

“I may just die,” Harlean said quietly.

“Indeed you will not. Lady Crumley and her sister are never cowed by lowly Hollywood players. We, after all, are from the land of Shakespeare and Milton.”

Harlean glanced up just in time to see the matinee idol pass right beside them. The spicy scent of his cologne lingered. “Jeez, he’s handsome! But not nearly as tall as he looks in the pictures.”

“That’s because directors have been known to stand him on a crate. I saw it for myself when I was an extra last year in a picture with him.”

Harlean wished she could order a drink with lunch to tame her open sense of awe and keep it from getting out of control. Her mother had taught her to have a love of gin, although hers was not Chuck’s great passion for it, certainly.

“Don’t look now,” Rosalie said. “But that’s William Powell sitting across from us. He was just in that picture called The Last Command. And I’m fairly sure that’s Greta Garbo and Irving Thalberg with him. Thalberg is a huge producer over at MGM, even though he looks like a kid.”

Harlean was certain that Powell was the most attractive man she had ever seen, far more so than on-screen. He had a thin, perfectly groomed mustache, a winning smile, and such strikingly bright blue eyes that she could not stop staring. There was something so debonair and sophisticated about him, not matched by any other Hollywood matinee idol.

When the waiter came to take their order, Harlean could only follow Rosalie by muttering, “I’ll have the same.” She had no idea what they had ordered, and she could not have cared less. She couldn’t quite believe she was actually here.

A few minutes later, the striking ingenue Joan Crawford was shown to a table nearby. Harlean would have recognized her anywhere for all of the magazine covers she had graced this past year. She was dressed casually in loose-fitting trousers and a cardigan. It was an easy style Harlean longed to emulate. Casual elegance, her mother called it. If she were a star like Crawford, she would dress just exactly like that. Though the idea of comparing herself, even privately, to a girl like Joan Crawford was slightly absurd.

Before today, her movie idols had seemed only fantasy beings. Yet here they were, real and wonderful, eating steak and salad, chattering away at lunch tables that looked just like hers. She was a part of it all.

After lunch, they went down to the Bullocks Wilshire department store, a luxury art deco palace. The display windows along Wilshire Boulevard were full of the latest styles from New York and Paris. Inside, Harlean found a temple to fashion, complete with travertine floors and crystal chandeliers. There were as many fashionably dressed sales clerks as customers, and more attitude than ambiance. She could hardly quell what she knew was her awestruck expression.

Rosalie led the way straight through the vaulted first floor Perfume Hall as though she absolutely belonged. Harlean hurried behind her, trying in vain to match Rosalie’s confident stride.

Upstairs in one of the showrooms, Rosalie selected two dresses from the mannequins and asked to see them modeled for her, as was the custom, since the store considered a clutter of hanging racks gauche.

She marveled at how Rosalie simply refused to be undone by the world, no matter the circumstance, and she understood now that her friend truly was the essence of an actress. She had promised yesterday that Harlean would see it, and she had delivered in spades.

“It would look great on you,” Harlean said to Rosalie as the model paraded before them in a belted celery-colored dress with a lace collar and cuffs.

“That’s an awfully expensive ensemble, my dear. Perhaps you would prefer to look at something a bit more...practical,” the middle-aged store clerk suggested.

Rosalie lifted her chin a fraction as she turned around to face the clerk. “I’m the least practical person you’ll ever meet. So, no, I don’t think so. I’ll take this one. And you can wrap up the other one, too.”

The woman’s mouth fell open. “My dear, have you any idea the cost of those two dresses?”

“Since I have a rich husband who loves to spoil me, no, actually I don’t,” Rosalie replied breezily. “You are all on commission here at this shop, I assume?”

Harlean watched the silver-haired woman’s demeanor change abruptly and her expression soften. “Why, yes, we are, but of course—”

“Then today I’ll be buying them from that sales clerk over there. And next time I decide to shop here, you would be wise to leave your attitude in the stockroom if you plan to wait on me, since I almost always buy something expensive, but not from someone with a chip on her shoulder.” She met the woman’s gaze unflinchingly as she tossed a business card onto the countertop. “Charge the dresses to my husband’s account and have them sent to my home.”

Both girls linked arms proudly once they had gotten a few feet away from the store outside. Harlean was fully realizing just how much she could learn from Rosalie, and she was duly impressed.

“You really are amazing,” Harlean said with a zeal she could no longer contain.

“Aw, thanks, honey, but it’s nothing you can’t pick up. No telling where a little ingenuity can take someone like you, too. You’ve got that something extra inside of you, I can tell.”

Harlean thought that it might just be true since she was quite adept at wrapping her mother and Grandpa Harlow around her finger with ease. In spite of their blustering threats, they both had eventually given in on the subject of Chuck. Her gaze, her pout and her ability to summon tears always won the day. Until now, Harlean hadn’t fully considered the power potential in that. It reminded her of what her mother always said about star quality: it was as elusive as it was indefinable. If you had it you had it, and if you didn’t there was nothing in the world that could change that. Perhaps Rosalie was right.

“You need to try it,” Rosalie said as they neared the car. “See what that smile of yours, and those brains, can bring you.”

Men stared at them both as they passed. Some nodded and smiled, another tipped the brim of his fedora.

“I’m not sure why I’d ever want to find out, since I’ve already got everything I want—Chuck, the new house, certainly plenty of beautiful clothes.”

“A little adventure, maybe? Nothing against my sweet Ivor, he’s swell, but I just can’t sit around the house all day baking cakes and waiting to have a baby. That’s why I audition. When I get a walk-on or a part, I feel like I did something all on my own—that somehow for just a moment, I stood out.”

Harlean looked over at her friend as they got in the car. “Chuck is enough adventure for me at the moment. Besides, I watched my mother try and try to get parts all over this town and all she ever got was rejection. You know the studios are absolutely crawling with gorgeous girls, one prettier than the next. For me, there wouldn’t really be any point in an adventure like that.”

“I see what you mean.” Rosalie paused for a moment, and then she said, “But do you think tomorrow you could drive me over to Fox to check the casting-call roster? Ivor needs the car again.”

“Sure. What else have I got to do?” But then she had an idea and suddenly she hopped out of the car.

“Where are you going?”

“I’m putting the top down. All of a sudden I feel like being a little crazy,” Harlean exclaimed with a carefree laugh. “To heck with my hair!”

Chapter Three

She had meant to stop and ask where to park but, to her shock that next day, with Rosalie beside her, the uniformed guard waved her car in past the imposing scrolled Fox Studios gates. He even had a smile for them as he tipped his navy blue cap.

“What the heck just happened?” Harlean gasped in amazement as she kept driving, afraid even to glance back.

“See what beauty and confidence will get you?”

“But that wasn’t meant to happen! I’ve been here before and this place is like Fort Knox!”

“Well, honey, I’ll go out on a limb and say he assumed you were someone else. Clearly, he thought two well-dressed knockouts belonged here. Or maybe you reminded him of someone’s demanding girlfriend who he was afraid of offending,” Rosalie opined on a tinkling little laugh. “Either way, we’re in.”

Nothing like this had ever happened when she had come here with her mother. Back then, extras had been herded onto the lot like cattle, lined up and made to wait.

“You can park right over there by the soundstage.” Rosalie pointed with an authoritative air. “I won’t be long so that’ll be fine.”