The Lincoln Highway (29 page)

Standing and straightening her skirt, she ushered Emmett into a second waiting room, one that was smaller but with better chairs, a water cooler, and no other people. Ten minutes later, Emmett was shown into Mr. McGinley’s office, where he was greeted with the warmth of an old acquaintance and offered a drink.

—So, said Mr. McGinley, resuming his seat behind his desk, Alice tells me you’re looking for a man for your rodeo!

Emmett had been skeptical when Mr. Morton observed that the hunt for a Shakespearean actor to cast in a rodeo was
even better
. When he explained himself to Mr. McGinley, he did so with some hesitation. But as soon as he was finished speaking, Mr. McGinley slapped his hands together in satisfaction.

—A nice twist, if I do say so myself! There’s no shortage of performers complaining that they’ve been pigeonholed into this, or pigeonholed into that. But time and again, the mistake that producers actually make is not pigeonholing their actors; it’s pigeonholing their
audiences
. This group only wants this, they’ll tell you, while that group only wants that. When, in all likelihood, what your theatrical devotee is hungry for is a little more horseplay, while what your fan of the rodeo craves is a little more
savoir faire
!

Mr. McGinley broke into a wide grin. Then suddenly serious, he put a hand on a pile of files that were stacked on his desk.

—Rest assured, Mr. Watson, that your troubles are behind you. For not only do I have an army of fine Shakespearean actors at my disposal, four of them can ride horses and two of them can shoot!

—Thank you, Mr. McGinley. But I am looking for a
particular
Shakespearean.

Mr. McGinley leaned forward with enthusiasm.

—Particular in what way? British? Classically trained? A tragedian?

—I’m looking for a monologist whom my father saw perform some years ago and has never forgotten. A monologist by the name of Harrison Hewett.

Mr. McGinley patted his desk three times, quietly.

—Hewett?

—That’s right.

Patting the desk one last time, Mr. McGinley pressed the button on his intercom.

—Alice? Bring me the file on . . . Harrison Hewett.

A few moments later Alice entered and handed a folder to Mr. McGinley that could not have held more than a single sheet of paper. After taking a quick look inside, Mr. McGinley laid it on his desk.

—Harrison Hewett is an excellent choice, Mr. Watson. I can see why your father has never forgotten him. And he’s a man who thrives on artistic challenges, so I am certain he would leap at the chance to perform in your revue. But by way of clarification, I should note that we represent Mr. Hewett on a cooperative basis. . . .

By Mr. Morton’s estimation, the chances were better than fifty percent that Mr. McGinley would say exactly this.

—If an agent states that he represents a performer on a cooperative basis, explained Mr. Morton, this means that he does not represent the performer at all. But not to worry. The agents in the Statler Building are in universal agreement that to get a bird in the hand, they would happily pay ten percent to the bush. As a result, they all maintain active lists of the performers who work with their competitors, so that, for the appropriate commission, they can send an interested party up or down the stairs.

In Emmett’s case, it was a trip up to a Mr. Cohen on the eleventh floor. As Mr. McGinley had called in advance, Emmett was greeted at the door and whisked straight into another interior waiting room. Ten minutes later, he was shown into Mr. Cohen’s office, where he was
greeted warmly and offered another drink. Again, the idea of introducing a Shakespearean actor into a rodeo was celebrated for its ingenuity. But this time, when the button on the intercom was pressed and a folder brought in, it was almost two inches thick—stuffed with yellowed news clippings and playbills and a stack of outdated headshots, one of which was given to Emmett.

Once Mr. Cohen had assured Emmett that Mr. Hewett (who was a close personal friend of Will Rogers) would be thrilled by this opportunity, he asked how Emmett might be reached.

Following Mr. Morton’s instructions, Emmett explained that since he was leaving the city on the following morning, he needed to hammer out any details right then and there. This sent the office into a flurry of activity as terms were agreed to and contracts written up.

—If they actually prepare contracts, Emmett had asked Mr. Morton, should I agree to sign them?

—Sign anything they put in front of you, my boy! Make sure the agent signs them too. Then insist upon receiving two executed copies for your files. For once an agent has your signature, he would give you the keys to his own mother’s house.

The address that Mr. Cohen gave Emmett for Harrison Hewett led him to a dingy hotel on a dingy street in downtown Manhattan. From the well-mannered man who answered the door of room 42, Emmett learned to his disappointment that Mr. Hewett was no longer a resident, but he also learned that Mr. Hewett’s son had been there the previous morning and had apparently checked into the hotel for the night.

—Perhaps he’s still here, said the gentleman.

In the lobby, the clerk with the pencil-thin moustache said sure, sure, he knew who Emmett was talking about. Harry Hewett’s kid. He showed up asking about his old man’s whereabouts, then booked two rooms for the night. But he wasn’t there no more. He and his daydreaming pal had left around noon.

—With my fucking radio, added the clerk.

—Did he happen to say where he was going?

—He might have.

—Might have? asked Emmett.

The clerk leaned back in his chair.

—When I helped your friend find his father, he gave me ten bucks . . .

According to the clerk, Emmett would be able to find Duchess’s father by speaking to a friend of his who drank at a West Side saloon every night after eight. With time to spare, Emmett walked up Broadway until he found a coffee shop that was busy, clean, and well lit. Sitting at the counter, he ordered the special and a piece of pie. He finished his meal with three cups of coffee, and a cigarette that he bummed from his waitress—an Irish woman named Maureen, who, despite being ten times busier than Mrs. Burk, had ten times her grace.

The information from the hotel clerk sent Emmett back to Times Square, which in the hour before dusk was already incandescent with brightly lit signs announcing cigarettes, cars, appliances, hotels, and theaters. The sheer scale and garishness of it all made Emmett disinclined to buy a single thing that was being advertised.

Emmett returned to the newsstand on the corner of Forty-Second Street, where he found the same newsman from earlier in the day. This time the newsman pointed to the northern end of the square, where a giant sign for Canadian Club whiskey was shining ten stories above the street.

—See that sign? Just beyond it, take a left onto Forty-Fifth and keep walking till you’ve run out of Manhattan.

Over the course of the day, Emmett had grown accustomed to being ignored. He’d been ignored by the commuters on the subway train, by the pedestrians on the sidewalks and the performers in the waiting rooms, chalking it up to the inimicality of city life. So he was
a little surprised to discover that once he was beyond Eighth Avenue, he wasn’t ignored anymore.

On the corner of Ninth Avenue, he was eyed by a beat cop in the middle of his rounds. On Tenth Avenue he was approached by one young man offering to sell him drugs and another offering to sell him his company. As he approached Eleventh, he was beckoned by an old black beggar, whom he avoided by quickening his pace, only to run right into an old white beggar a few steps later.

Having found the anonymity of the morning somewhat off-putting, Emmett would have welcomed it now. He felt he understood why the people of New York walked with that purposeful urgency. It was a dissuasive signal to the vagrants and drifters and the rest of the fallen.

Just before the river, he found the Anchor—the bar the clerk had told him about. Given its name and location, Emmett had imagined it would be a spot that catered to sailors or members of the merchant marine. If it ever had, the association had lapsed long ago. For inside there wasn’t a man you might call seaworthy. To Emmett’s eye, they all looked one step above the old beggars he’d dodged in the street.

Having learned from Mr. Morton how reluctant the agents were to share whereabouts, Emmett was worried that the bartender might be equally tight-lipped; or perhaps like the clerk at the Sunshine Hotel, he would expect to be handsomely reimbursed. But when Emmett explained that he was looking for a man named FitzWilliams, the bartender said that he’d come to the right place. So Emmett had taken a seat at the bar and ordered the beer.

When the door of the Anchor opened shortly after eight and a man in his sixties entered, the bartender gave Emmett the nod. From his stool, Emmett watched as the old man made his way slowly to the bar, picked up a glass and half-empty bottle of whiskey, and retreated to a table in the corner.

As FitzWilliams poured himself a drink, Emmett recalled the stories that Duchess had told of his rise and fall. It wasn’t easy to imagine that this thin, shuffling, forlorn-looking man had once been paid handsomely to play the part of Santa Claus. Leaving some money on the bar, Emmett approached the old performer’s table.

—Excuse me. Are you Mr. FitzWilliams?

When Emmett said the word
mister
, FitzWilliams looked up with a touch of surprise.

—Yes, he admitted after a moment. I am Mr. FitzWilliams.

Taking the empty chair, Emmett explained that he was a friend of Duchess’s.

—I gather he may have come here last night to speak with you.

The old performer nodded, as if now he understood, as if he should have known.

—Yes, he said in a tone that verged on an admission. He was here. He was trying to find his father because of a little unfinished business between them. But Harry had left town, and Duchess didn’t know where he’d gone, so he came to see Fitzy.

FitzWilliams offered Emmett a half-hearted smile.

—I’m an old friend of the family’s, you see.

Returning the smile, Emmett asked FitzWilliams if he had told Duchess where Mr. Hewett had gone.

—I did, the old performer said, nodding his head at first, then shaking it. I told him where Harry went. To the Olympic Hotel in Syracuse. And that’s where Duchess will go, I suppose. After he sees his friend.

—Which friend is that?

—Oh, Duchess didn’t say. But it was . . . It was in Harlem.

—Harlem?

—Yes. Isn’t that funny?

—No, it makes perfect sense. Thank you, Mr. FitzWilliams. You’ve been very helpful.

When Emmett pushed back his chair, FitzWilliams looked up in surprise.

—You’re not going, are you? Surely, as two old friends of the Hewetts, we should have a drink in their honor?

Having learned what he had come to learn, and certain that Billy would be wondering where he was by now, Emmett had no desire to remain at the Anchor.

But having initially looked like he didn’t want to be disturbed, the old performer suddenly looked like he didn’t want to be alone. So Emmett got another glass from the bartender and returned to the table.

After FitzWilliams had poured their whiskeys, he raised his glass.

—To Harry and Duchess.

—To Harry and Duchess, echoed Emmett.

When they both had taken a drink and set down their glasses, FitzWilliams smiled a little sadly, as if moved by a bittersweet memory.

—Do you know why they call him that? Duchess, I mean.

—I think he told me it was because he was born in Dutchess County.

—No, said FitzWilliams, with a shake of the head and his half-hearted smile. That wasn’t it. He was born here in Manhattan. I remember the night.

Before continuing, FitzWilliams took another drink, almost as if he needed to.

—His mother, Delphine, was a beautiful young Parisienne and a singer of love songs in the manner of Piaf. In the years before Duchess was born, she performed at all the great supper clubs. At El Morocco and the Stork Club and the Rainbow Room. I’m sure she would have become quite famous, at least in New York, if it weren’t for becoming so sick. It was tuberculosis, I think. But I really can’t remember. Isn’t that terrible? A beautiful woman like that, a friend, dies in the prime of her life, and I can’t even remember from what.

Shaking his head in self-condemnation, FitzWilliams raised his glass, but set it back down without taking a drink, as if he sensed that to have done so would have been an insult to her memory.

The story of Mrs. Hewett’s death caught Emmett a little off guard. For in the few times that Duchess had mentioned his mother, he had always spoken as if she had abandoned them.

—At any rate, FitzWilliams continued, Delphine doted on her little boy. When there was money, she would quietly hide some from Harry so that she could buy him new clothes. Cute little outfits like those, what do you call them . . . lederhosen! She would dress him up in his finery, letting his hair grow down to his shoulders. But when she became bedridden and she would send him downstairs into the taverns to bring Harry home, Harry would . . .