What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (10 page)

“You call for me, huh?” he said, putting the phone back into her hands. “You do it.…”

J
ust as she reached the doorway she stopped and looked back at herself in the mirrored wall with an air of vague enquiry. She was wearing a dress of faded red lace, snagged just slightly beneath the right breast. Brilliants glittered at her neck and wrists, her face was feverish with rouge and lipstick. Her eyes showed, though, that she was not feeling well.

Not that the drinking accounted in any way for her present state of indisposition. People didn’t understand about that. You didn’t feel bad because you drank. It was the other way around. The liquor made everything brighter, and when there were bad things on your mind—like these last few days—you could just stop thinking about them. Taking her eyes from the mirror, she turned abruptly away.

She’d only had a couple of drinks so far today—three maybe—just enough to get awake with. Not enough to make her drunk, not half enough for that. In any case, she needed a little something to steady her nerves today. It made her edgy knowing that a stranger was coming here to the house. She frowned in an effort to remember. Flagg. Yes, that was his name; Edwin Flagg. Leaving the room, she made her way through the hall and out to the living room. The clock on the mantel showed that it was one twenty-five. Mr. Flagg was supposed to arrive at one thirty.

Actually, it was very disappointing about the ad; in all, there had
been only five replies. Or only five, at least, that she remembered answering. Three of the applicants had demanded at the outset to know if the job fell under union jurisdiction and when she had been vague on the subject they had hung up. The fourth call was from a mere child, a music student in some obscure academy. Only the fifth—this Mr. Flagg—had seemed sincere in his enquiry. He had asked his secretary to call and make an appointment.

Mr. Edwin Flagg. She liked the name. It sounded stalwart and patriotic. She glanced about, checking the room in preparation for the interview. She would sit just there on the divan, and he would take his place there.… She brought her hands quickly together in an effort to stop their trembling. She really ought to have just one more, just a bracer to be on the safe side. She didn’t want Mr. Flagg to get the impression she was nervous like this all the time.

She had only gone as far as the entrance to the hallway when she heard the approaching footsteps out on the terrace and stopped. Her gaze darted to the clock; Mr. Flagg certainly believed in promptness. Then the doorbell sounded, and even though she was listening for it she started slightly, as if with surprise. She made a small, flustered gesture with her hand and then, with a sigh of resignation, crossed to the door.

Her first reaction as she opened the door to him was one, purely, of shock. Surely this was not Mr. Edwin Flagg. There was no possible way to reconcile the sight of this pale, portly young man in his cheap, ill-fitting jacket and his baggy trousers with the vision she had held in her mind. Evidently there was some mistake: Mr. Flagg had undoubtedly been detained and…

“I—hello,” the young man said nervously, “I’m Edwin Flagg.” Producing a handkerchief from his pocket, he dabbed self-consciously at his glistening forehead. He had not driven up the hill, then; he had walked. “I had—uh—an appointment with Miss Hudson. For one thirty.”

For a moment longer Jane continued merely to stare. Then, aware of the lengthening silence between them, she smiled. “Yes,”
she nodded, “I’m Miss Hudson.” She stepped back, motioning reluctantly inside. “Come on in.”

The young man, however, did not immediately accept the invitation. His hand, bringing the handkerchief down over his cheek, stopped suddenly, arrested in mid-stroke. He looked at her more directly, as if striving to bring her features into sharper focus. Jane uneasily repeated her inward gesture.

“Come in.”

She showed him to a chair, the one to the right of the fireplace, then seated herself on the divan. Arranging her skirts carefully, she looked up with anxious anticipation only to be greeted with a similar look from Mr. Flagg. What was
he
expecting from her? Jane experienced a fluttering, panicky feeling in the pit of her stomach. He wasn’t at all the sort of person he was supposed to be, not the least bit what she had pictured. Suddenly she felt a positive loathing for this gross, pale-eyed young man, as if she had caught him out in a deliberate lie, and she only wanted him to go away again. Nonetheless, he was here now, and she had to say something to him.

“You saw my ad in the paper?”

The young man smiled mechanically. “Yes. I just happened to be glancing through—that part of the paper, you know—and since I happen to play both the piano and the violin…” He finished the sentence with a meaningless gesture of unease.

Jane nodded. “Yes. The ad said that—didn’t it?—piano and violin required.”

“Yes. Yes, it did. It seemed almost coincidental—in a way, it did—and so of course…” He concluded again with the same stiff gesture.

The silence between them resumed. Jane shifted slightly and then, in a paroxysm of nervousness, made a brief giggling sound. The young man looked up, his pale eyes startled. She moved her gaze yearningly in the direction of the kitchen.

“Tea?” she said with sudden inspiration. “Why don’t I go fix
us some tea? And then we can have tea and—and talk. Do you like tea—Mr. Flagg?”

“Oh, yes!” Edwin Flagg started eagerly forward. “Yes, I do—very much.”

With a frown of perplexity Edwin watched her as she made her escape into the hallway. Again he produced his handkerchief and finished mopping his still-moist brow. He had been right at the outset. A silly, drunken old woman, got up like a Main Street harlot. What kind of a job did she have to offer anybody? He wondered if he could possibly manage to get up and leave without her hearing.

In the end, it was the room, the house itself, which restrained Edwin from leaving. The house was old, that was true, and it had been badly neglected, but it was still a good house, a well-built house which, when it was new, had cost a great deal of money. Edwin could respect expensive things, simply for their ability to command a price. The drapes, for instance. They clashed with the rug, and even the room, but they were custom-made. Edwin noticed things like that. The paintings he had glimpsed up on the gallery he was certain were originals.

Everything was good, if old; there were several things, too, which were quite valuable. The statuette of carved jade on the library table was an excellent piece. The lamps on the end tables had been made of a pair of large metal candlesticks which were authentic Oriental altar pieces. And the silver frame on the mantel…

Edwin’s eye caught briefly at the frame, moved beyond it, then darted back again. The frame was empty. Where there should be a picture, there was only a rectangle of brown cardboard backing. He stared at it with sudden conjecture. Divested of its subject, why had the frame been left on display? Had the picture been removed in anger—in grief? And where was it now? There was a sound behind him and he looked around toward the doorway.

The old girl was teetering toward him, carrying with desperate
uncertainty a large tea tray weighted down with an ornate silver tea service. Pulling his girth as quickly as he could from his chair, Edwin hurried forward to relieve her of this burden. The gleam of silver bright in his eyes, he experienced, as he took the tray from her, a curious and unexpected feeling of expansiveness.

“Such a large burden,” he said with sudden gallantry, “for such a little—girl.”

He colored slightly, dismayed at his hesitant and patently arch use of the word “girl.” Somehow it seemed to have been demanded of him, forced from him. Turning quickly, he carried the tray to the fireplace and put it down on the coffee table.

The old girl had been having a nip or two out in the kitchen. He could tell this as he accepted her invitation to change his chair for a place beside her on the divan. Settling himself into the deep cushions, he turned to meet her smile and return it. The liquor, at any rate, seemed to have vastly improved her mood. What a ridiculous old trull she was, how like old Del.…

“I always think it’s nice for strangers to—to break bread,” she was saying with vague chattiness. “It helps a lot. Don’t you think?”

Edwin nodded, his eyes seeking out the plate of small frosted cakes he had noticed on the tray. They weren’t from the grocery; they were bakery cakes, fresh probably and very rich. As wacky as it all was, this was an improvement over being at home with Del.

She poured a cup of tea for him, spilling some in the saucer. Then, taking up a pair of tongs, she tried to place one of the cakes on a plate, but dropped it.

“Here,” Edwin said, “let me.”

For a moment her eyes met his and her smile broadened. “Thank you,” she simpered, with a wavering attempt at elegance. “You’re very kind—very nice.”

When he had served them both, Edwin sipped briefly at his tea. Then taking up his cake, he bit into it. Drawing deeply upon the comfort of its sweetness, he leaned back on the divan with an increased sensation of opulence.

“You mentioned your act in the ad,” he reminded her with sudden courage and directness. “What kind of act is it?”

Abandoning her teacup to the table, the old girl pulled her feet up under her and, with grotesque kittenishness, leaned back.

“Well,” she said slowly. “I suppose I ought to tell you I’ve been retired—for a time. I had to give up my career for a while because of—illness in the family.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.”

“There just wasn’t anything else to do.”

“But now you’re free again—to return to your profession?”

“Oh, yes—yes, indeed.”

Edwin paused, feeling a kind of bubbling amusement. It was as though they were playing a game, playing tea party. Picking up a second of the cakes, he popped it whole into his mouth, chewed it and swallowed it recklessly. He looked at the old girl with veiled speculation: she must have some money tucked away somewhere, an inheritance probably if there had been a recent death in the family.

“Can you describe your act?” he asked with great seriousness.

Into the flushed, sagging face came a kind of teasing waggishness. She was withholding something from him now, playfully, some bright surprise. She seemed to him, at that moment, ludicrous beyond all imagining, beyond reality itself. He longed to reach out and slap her across the face and see what her expression would be then.

“I’m Baby Jane Hudson.”

His first thought was that he had surely misunderstood her. Either that or she had meant it as some sort of joke, a kind of family joke that he couldn’t know about. Her eyes, however, intent upon his face for his reaction, said all too plainly that she was not joking.

“Baby Jane Hudson?” he said cautiously.

She nodded, looking at him now with doubt and disappointment. “Uh-huh.”

“Well,” he said. He hesitated, then went quickly on. “Well, I just don’t believe it!”

With this bogus show of astonishment he saved the day. Her face came instantly alight, and she leaned forward, clasping her hands about her knees in a gesture of girlish enthusiasm. Her breath, rank with whisky, assaulted his nostrils.

“I’m going to revive my old act. Just the way I used to do it—exactly.” Her gaze reached beyond him to some bright scene visible only to herself. “Oh, I know some of the old arrangements are way out of date now. Music, you know, it changes so much, the way you do it and all.”

Edwin nodded. “Yes,” he murmured.

“Everyone’s desperate for good acts, you know. There’s Las Vegas. And television. Do you read the trades,
The Reporter
and
Variety
?”

Edwin stared at her blankly.

“Everyone’s looking for acts. They’re just desperate. And there are people who still remember me, lots of them.” She turned to Edwin for confirmation, and he nodded. “A lot of the old-timers are already back. Ed Wynn and Jimmy Durante—a lot of them. You remember Baby Snooks?”

Edwin smiled stiffly. Baby Snooks. Yes, he remembered Baby Snooks—Fanny Brice. A comedy kid act. He looked at the old girl from a new perspective. If she had a real comedy talent like Brice’s…

“It ought to have a good chance,” he said bravely. “I don’t see anything against it.”

She leaned back again, looking upon Edwin now with unmistakable favor. “You know, I had a feeling about you. You know, a kind of—feeling—the minute I opened the door and saw you standing there. I just knew we were going to turn out to be friends.…” Her smile seemed to turn inward, and she ran a hand aimlessly over her skirt. “Of course I’ll have to get rid of a little weight. But I’m going on a diet anyway. Tomorrow, I am, first
thing. I was thinking about the costumes. Don’t you think I ought to have all my old ones copied?”

Edwin turned his attention evasively to his tea cup. “Well—of course I don’t quite remember——”

“Oh, of course not. But I do want your opinion, Mr. Flagg. Before you came I put out all the pictures in the rehearsal room so you can look at them and tell me what you think.” She turned to him, her smile suddenly brilliant. “Oh, I wish Daddy could be here right now! You can’t ever lose your talent, he used to tell me. Once you’re born with talent, you have it all your life long. You can lose money, youth and looks, but——You want to see the pictures?”

In the rehearsal room, she led him to the piano and showed him a large leather-bound scrapbook.

“This one has nothing but pictures. I have lots of others with all my notices and the handbills and all that sort of thing if you want to see everything.” As she spoke, he noticed, she watched herself covertly in the mirrors. “While you’re looking, I’ll just go clear away the tea things.” She turned and started toward the door.

“Why don’t I come and help?” Edwin offered, half in malice.

She turned back in the doorway. “Oh, no! I can do it.” She steadied herself momentarily against the doorjamb. “Your first name is Edwin?”

Edwin nodded. “Yes.”

“Edwin,” she murmured and then, returning his nod, as if in confirmation, she swung about and left the room, closing the door very carefully after her.

Edwin gave his attention first to the piano. A baby grand, good make, expensive. He opened the lid over the keys. He struck a few notes, letting them fall and die as he struck them. The instrument was woefully out of tune; even worse than his old upright at home. He closed the lid and reached out for the scrapbook.