Sheri Cobb South (4 page)

Mitch wasn’t offended; heaven knew he’d gone on plenty of dates with less than pure motives himself. In a way, it was fascinating to watch an expert at work. He leaned back in his chair and gestured to a pretty cigarette girl in a short frilly skirt and high heels. She was probably an actress; if there was one thing Mitch had learned since getting off the train in Pasadena, it was that every passably good-looking female between fifteen and forty was an actress.

He bought one of her cigarettes for a nickel and lit it from the candle in the center of the table. Then he leaned back in his chair and blew smoke rings while he watched the show unfolding across the room. The older man’s hand had abandoned Pauline’s waist and crept upward to caress her bare back. If Pauline objected to his advances, she gave no sign of it. Mitch tried to imagine a certain Georgia peach allowing old men to paw her for the sake of a few seconds on the silver screen, and his eyebrows drew together in the fierce scowl that opposing linemen had once found so intimidating.

“Hey, pal, what’s eating you?” The youngish man leaning against Pauline’s abandoned chair wasn’t handsome enough to be an actor, but he seemed at home amongst the Hollywood crowd. “Artie Cohen beating your time with the lady? Or maybe she’s beating your time with him?”

Mitch bristled at the imagined slight to his manhood, until he realized that his companion had taken him for an out-of-work actor looking for his big break. He wondered fleetingly how a fellow hoping to be “discovered” might approach a producer, but quickly banished the thought. Considering the ladies’ tactics, he wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

“Not me.” He shook his head and gestured for the other man to sit down. “I’m an engineer, not an actor.”

“Engineer? No kidding?”

“A & M, class of ’35.”

The newcomer eyed Mitch appraisingly. “Know anything about electricity?”

Mitch shrugged. “I took a couple of courses in college.” He’d also disconnected the alarm on the dormitory door so he and his teammates could break curfew without fear of detection, but this hardly seemed the time to mention it.

“Cohen brothers are looking to hire a new best boy over at Monumental. Interested?”

“Depends,” said Mitch. “What’s a best boy?”

“Assistant to the gaffer—chief lighting technician. Might give you a chance to keep an eye on that skirt of yours.” He jerked his head toward Pauline, who was now perched on Arthur Cohen’s lap.

“Hmm.” Mitch pondered the possibilities, but keeping an eye on Pauline was not uppermost among them. “Would a—what did you call him? Best boy?—be in a position to help a friend get a job as an extra?”

“Hey, we’re talking about an assistant electrician, not an executive producer. Still, the suits are getting antsy.
The Virgin Queen
should already be in the can by now, but the leading lady hasn’t even been cast yet. Say, how would your friend look swishing around the set in a farthingale?”

Mitch tried to picture Frankie in the stiff brocade skirts of the Elizabethan era, and chuckled. “I dunno. Might be good for a laugh.”

“That’s no good, then. It’s a swashbuckling costume piece, not a comedy. Still, it couldn’t hurt to bring her along. Who knows? Maybe the big guy will take a liking to her.”

Mitch glanced at the table across the room, where Arthur Cohen’s pudgy hand cupped Pauline’s shapely rear. “Maybe,” he said doubtfully.

* * * *

“That must have been some party last night,” Frankie remarked, staring fixedly out the window of the secondhand roadster at the passing scenery. “I never even heard Pauline come in.”

“She may not have, for all I know,” Mitch answered, making his turn onto Sunset Boulevard. “Come in, I mean.”

“You mean you don’t know? Mitch, don’t tell me you just left her there!”

“Don’t blame me. She got a better offer.”

“Oh.” Frankie frowned over this revelation, reluctant to think ill of the most successful of her housemates. “Mama always says a girl should dance with the one who brought her.”

“Believe me, their minds weren’t on dancing.”

“Maybe she just wasn’t brought up right,” continued Frankie, struggling to be charitable. “Maybe she was never taught any better, and she’s a bit slow, socially.”

Mitch gave a bark of laughter, which he turned rather unconvincingly into a cough. “ ‘Slow’ is the
last
word I would use to describe Pauline!”

“I know she’s awfully pretty, and all the boys seem to go ga-ga over her, but doesn’t it ever occur to any of you that Pauline just doesn’t seem to be very
nice
?”

“I think probably a few guys have figured it out,” Mitch observed cryptically. “I’ll bet most of them consider it a big part of her charm.”

Frankie nodded in understanding. “You mean they want to reform her, or something.”

“Or something.” Mitch swerved to avoid a milk truck parked along the street.

Frankie cocked her head, regarding him curiously. “You don’t seem awfully upset about it.”

He shrugged. “I wasn’t all that keen on her—didn’t even know her that well, really. Remember,
she’s
the one who asked
me
to escort her. Besides, if I’d been tripping the light fantastic with Pauline, I wouldn’t have the inside track on a job at Monumental Pictures.”

Frankie’s stomach flip-flopped at the mention of the studio where she’d had such a scare less than twenty-four hours earlier. But as Mitch wheeled the car into the drive, her fears faded. The Spanish revival stucco building looked just as it had before, but today its arched portico and red clay tile roof suggested nothing more sinister than stylish prosperity. Mitch exchanged a word or two with the guard at the gate, and a moment later they were inside.

Today a receptionist sat behind the front desk, a middle-aged woman with horn
-
rimmed glasses perched on the end of her nose
.

“Mitchell Gannon and Frances Foster, here to see Mr. Cohen,” Mitch informed her, giving her his most disarming smile.

She pursed her lips. “Which Mr. Cohen, sir?”

Mitch hesitated only a moment. “Artie—er, Mr. Arthur Cohen, if you please.”

Apparently the receptionist did
not
please. “Do you have an appointment?”

“No, but I believe Mr. Cohen is expecting me.” Mitch glanced pointedly toward the shiny black telephone on her desk. “Why don’t we ask him?”

With a disdainful sniff, she lifted the receiver from its cradle and dialed a number with unnecessary force. “Mr. Cohen, there’s a young man here by the name of Gannon who claims you’re expecting him.”

There was a pause during which Frankie and Mitch could hear the buzz of a masculine voice at the other end of the line, although the words were indistinguishable.

“Gannon. Yes, that’s right. Mitchell Gannon.” Another pause. “Yes sir, I’ll show him in.”

She replaced the receiver. “He says he can give you fifteen minutes,” she allowed grudgingly. “If you’ll follow me, please.”

As she emerged from behind the desk, Mitch took Frankie’s arm and fell in behind. “Charming woman,” he murmured in Frankie’s ear.

Frankie made no reply. She was retracing the steps she’d taken two days ago, down the same carpeted corridor lined with framed posters of previous Monumental films. She wondered which one she had knocked askew during her undignified exit. It was impossible to tell now, since it had apparently been straightened.

A moment later, the receptionist flung open the door, and Frankie had her first glimpse of Hollywood magnate Arthur Cohen. In fact, he wasn’t much to look at. He was at least fifty years old—ancient, in Frankie’s eyes—and his receding hair was slicked over his bald spot with brilliantine. When he rose to greet them, she saw he wasn’t much taller than her own five feet four inches. His lack of stature, along with the gold watch chain stretching across his bulging middle, gave the impression of a man almost as broad as he was tall. And yet there was something strangely compelling about the man, something that went beyond his pin-striped suit and the massive gold rings weighing down his fingers.

“Mitchell Gannon and Frances Foster,” the receptionist informed her boss, then backed away, closing the door behind her.

“Come in, come in,” Arthur Cohen said jovially, gesturing toward the two leather upholstered chairs positioned before his desk. “I believe you’re an engineering student?”

“Graduate, sir. Texas A & M, class of ’35.”

“Electrical engineering, you say?”

Mitch shook his head. “Not my specialty, but I’ve had a few courses.”

“And your specialty?”

“Civil engineering. I was on my way to Nevada and the Boulder Dam when I had a sudden change of plans.” He glanced at Frankie. “I guess you could say I was bitten by the movie bug.”

Mr. Cohen’s belly shook as he laughed aloud. “You’ll find plenty of fellow sufferers in this town, my boy. It happens to us all. But you do realize,” he added, growing suddenly serious, “however flattering the job title may sound, ‘best boy’ is little more than an assistant electrician. I like you, kid, but I’m afraid you’re overqualified.”

Mitch leaned back in his chair. “I’m not afraid of working my way up, sir. During my four years at A & M, I went from fourth string lineman to second team All-American.”

“I’m afraid I never cared much for football,” the older man admitted, shaking his head. “Horseracing is more to my liking, and one thing it’s taught me is that sometimes it’s smart to put your money on a dark horse. I can give you thirty dollars a week to start, with more to come if you show a knack for the business.”

“Thank you, sir. And Miss Foster?”

Mr. Cohen studied Frankie for a long moment. “She’s an ingénue,” he pronounced at last. “The trouble with ingénues is that it’s all or nothing with them. Either they fall apart at the idea of kissing a man for the cameras and look stiff as a board on film, or else they lose it to the first pretty-boy actor to cross their path, and then three months later they find themselves in trouble and come crying for the studio to fix it. I’m sorry, Miss—Farmer, was it?”

“Foster,” said Frankie, crestfallen. “But I—”

“—But I’ll have to pass,” concluded Mr. Cohen in a voice that brooked no argument.

“If you’ll give her a try, sir, I’ll vouch for her good behavior,” Mitch promised, raising one hand Boy Scout style
.

Frankie was not exactly sure what it was that Mr. Cohen thought she might do, but she was highly indignant at the idea that Mitch—who smoked and gambled and ran around with fast women—should be hired while she was not. She opened her mouth to protest such an injustice, but before she could utter a word, Mitch kicked her in the shins. She bit her lip to keep from crying out.

“Well—” Arthur Cohen picked up a fountain pen and twiddled it between his fingers
.

“If she doesn’t find work soon, I’ll have to turn down your offer and take Cousin Frances back to Georgia,” Mitch continued. “I promised Aunt Beulah I’d look after her.”

Frankie added lying to the catalog of his sins.

“I won’t promise her a contract, but maybe there’s some work available for her as an extra
.
” He slapped the pen down on the desk. “We’ll be shooting exteriors tomorrow on the back lot. Be there at seven o’clock, both of you.” Turning to Frankie, he added, “Tell the CD I said to work you into a crowd scene or two.”

“Yes, sir! Thank you, sir!” Frankie took his hand in both of hers and shook it vigorously. “You won’t regret it, I promise.”

Mitch made his own more restrained goodbyes, and he and Frankie soon filed past the receptionist (who squirreled away a well-worn copy of
Photoplay
at their approach) and out into the blinding brilliance of the spring sun.

“I can hardly believe it!” Frankie exclaimed, flinging her arms wide. “At this time tomorrow, we’ll both be working in the movies!”

Mitch regarded her enthusiasm with one ironically arched eyebrow. “You’re welcome.”

“Of course I appreciate what you did for me,” Frankie said hastily, returning to earth with a thud. “Still, I would have been even more grateful if you could have managed it without kicking me in the shins. You probably ruined my last pair of stockings, to say nothing of leaving a nasty bruise.”

She lifted her skirt to the knee to survey the damage, wholly ignorant of the fact that twelve inches of shapely, silk-clad calf had the power to fire Mitch’s imagination in a way that Pauline Moore’s elegant overexposure had not.

Mitch sighed and looked resolutely away. It wasn’t his “cousin’s” good behavior he was worried about.

It was his own.

Chapter 4

There’s No Business Like Show Business (1954)

Directed by Walter Lang

Starring Ethel Merman, Mitzi Gaynor, Dan Dailey, Donald O’Connor and Marilyn Monroe

Frankie arose before dawn the next morning, eager to begin her career as an actress. She knew working as an extra was unlikely to be very glamorous, but then, Frankie had no intention of remaining an extra, so she was determined to look as glamorous as possible. Unfortunately, she was obliged to perform this minor miracle in the dark so as not to wake up Kathleen, still buried beneath the covers of the other twin bed. With this admirable goal in mind, Frankie groped her way to the dresser in search of the new padded brassiere designed to make the most of her modest assets. She sat down on the edge of the bed to slip on her silk stockings, snapping the garters to hold them in place and then feeling the backs of her legs to make sure the seams were straight. Finally, she threw a floral print dress over head, smoothing the trumpet-shaped skirt over her hips before snatching up her stack-heeled shoes and tiptoeing from the room in her stocking feet.

A line had already formed outside the bathroom at the end of the hall; apparently Frankie was not the only one at the Studio Club who hoped to find work that day.

“Pauline’s in there,” Roxie said, jerking her thumb in the direction of the closed door. “We’ll be lucky if she’s out before lunch.”

This was an exaggeration, of course; a mere half hour passed before the door flew open and Pauline sailed out, stunning as always in a crimson Elsa Schiaparelli suit. Roxie ducked in behind her, promising to hurry, and, true to her word, was out in five minutes, leaving Frankie in sole possession of the bathroom.