Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald (17 page)

*   *   *

Scott wrote the scenario with his usual gusto, and two weeks after he’d gotten the assignment, he’d finished it.

“Let’s get lunch out,” he said, moving the curtain aside to look out the window. Central Park was now a half-naked forest of faded golds and deepening browns. The sky above was steely gray. “I’ll see who’s free to join us. Grab your coat and we’ll go to that Irish place on Broadway for shepherd’s pie.”

He wanted to walk, saying that after being cooped up all that time, he needed fresh air and exercise. “I’m susceptible to lung ailments, you know.”

I didn’t know. What I
did
know was that outside, the biting wind stole my breath and gusted into my skirt and through the weave of my wool coat, and made my nose drip and my eyes water. With gloved hands, I dabbed my eyes frequently as we walked, hoping to keep my mascara from striping my cheeks.

At the restaurant, we entered the vestibule and I said, “Thank God! Another minute out there and my eyeballs would’ve frozen over.”

Ludlow was waiting inside the door, at the end of the bar. His cheeks were ruddy and he still had his scarf wrapped around his neck. I said, “Hello there, Ludlow! You look like Hans Brinker.”

“And you look distraught, though still beautiful—Fitz is beating you, isn’t he?’

“Torturing me, in fact. He insisted we walk here!”

“You brute!” Ludlow said.

Scott gestured for me to follow the maître d’, saying, “Obviously the South breeds sissies. Up North you build up a resistance.”

“I don’t need a resistance, I need a Caribbean villa. Right, Lud? I should have a villa.”

“And a new husband.”

“What you need,” Scott said as we were seated, “is a fur coat. Ankle length and, what, ermine? Otter?”

“Oooh, yes, that’s exactly what I need!”

Ludlow said, “What has he sold this time?”

“Nothing yet,” I said sorrowfully.

Scott frowned. “This woman has no faith in me.”

Ludlow declared, “This woman has too much faith in you.”

“This woman needs a fur coat,” I said.

After we’d placed our orders, I said, “How nice it must be to be covered in fur all the time. Animals have it good that way, don’t you think? A day like this is nothing to them; nature insulated them exactly right for their surroundings. Why do you suppose humans persist in living where it’s so cold that we’d want to cover ourselves up with another animal’s skin and hair? It’s sort of queer, isn’t it?”

Ludlow nodded. “Not to mention expensive.”

Scott had brought a bottle of brandy, which the three of us shared. As I polished off one glass and was into a second, the notion of actually owning a fur took hold of me as if of its own accord; I just couldn’t stop talking about the subject: all the kinds, who wore them, what I liked, whether men should wear them, and Scott and Ludlow encouraged me.

Our food arrived, and Ludlow asked Scott, “Say, have you had a chance to read the smash-hit novel
Main Street
? They say Sinclair Lewis started out like you, Fitz, writing popular stuff for the magazines—he really built himself a following that way.”

Scott’s mouth tightened. “Nope, haven’t gotten to it yet.”

“He’s been too busy,” I said cheerfully, “working so that he can buy me a fur coat.”

By meal’s end, I was nicely warmed in every way and ready to face the elements. Ludlow left for an appointment with some investment adviser, and we headed back to Fifty-ninth. I wasn’t paying any attention to the route we took home. We pushed against the wind, me chattering on about which movies I liked or didn’t and how I might like being an actress and what Tallu had done and what she’d written me and how everyone back home secretly found her exotic and wonderful while saying that she’d—
Oh, isn’t it so, so sad
—gone astray.

“What do you s’pose Montgomery will say about
me
? You can bet there’ll be gossips claiming I only married you so’s to get to New York, where I could get discovered.”

“I rather like that scenario; it recasts me as sympathetic.”

“Aw, the folks there all like you just fine—’specially now. It’s change they don’t like. And actresses.”

“Here we are.” Scott grabbed my arm and stopped some fifty feet from the corner, which confused me for a second. Then he tugged me toward a doorway and I saw that we were at a furrier.

“What are we—”

“You need a fur coat.”

“Deo, wow, that’s a wonderfully nice thought, and I know I went on and on about it, but
really
I just needed some brandy.”

He said, “All right, then,
I
need you to have a fur coat,” and led me inside.

Oh, didn’t I have the grandest time wrapping myself in every kind and color of fur! Some were little more than elegant shrugs; some fell to the waist; some were swingy numbers that hit midthigh. The one that went home with us, though, was substantial in every way. It was made up of gray-squirrel pelts, with a full collar and wide cuffs, big, round buttons at the waist, and went down to my knees. The moment I slipped into it, I knew we were meant to be together. Scott wrote a check for seven hundred dollars as if he bought fur coats every day of the week, and then when we left, we walked six blocks out of our way so that I could “try it out,” not to mention show it off.

Back in our apartment, we spread it on the floor in front of the fireplace and made love right there, right then in the middle of the afternoon.

I was blissfully certain that I had everything I could ever want.

17

Nov. 6, 1920

My Dear Sara,

Your account of that Woman Movement meeting almost shames me, as all I’ve been doing lately is crowing about how my husband’s novel was
the number one book for the whole entire United States in October
! If I were to die today, my headstone would read, “Proud Wife,” and my death would probably be at the hands of angry feminists.

I do realize I ought to consider doing something more with my time, but I can’t help it, I really am proud of him and I can spend entire days just on grooming and dressing and then meeting friends, whereby I tell them Scott’s fabulous news.

Besides which, it’s such great fun to have great fun—the few feminists I’ve met here wear long faces and dingy clothes and need hair dye desperately. Maybe I’ll buy a case and distribute bottles to these poor needy women. I want to do my part to support the effort.

You are the best of them, an exception in every way, and I’m proud of you. In fact, I’ll toast you at tonight’s dinner party—the hostess is some cosmetics heiress who’s sure to miss the irony of my doing so there.

Please stay out of trouble, for once. All my love,

Z~

*   *   *

Tilde and John invited us to their house in Tarrytown for the day. The last time we’d seen them was in summer, not long after the baby was born. Tilde had been tired and irritable at the time, and a bit skeptical, still, about Scott and me. We could see it in the way she studied us with that intense, piercing gaze of hers, like she was analyzing our every word and move. We hadn’t stayed long. Long enough, though, that now Scott felt the need to fortify himself before going over there again.

That fortification started with wine at lunchtime and continued with a steady stream of gin consumed throughout the drive, during which he sang Christmas-carol tunes but made up new lyrics to go with them.

“You should’ve been writing those down for me,” he said as we parked in Tilde’s driveway. “What was that line, from ‘O Little Town of Bethlehem’?” He paused to recall it, then sang, “‘How gayfully and playfully the Christmas gifts are given / We do our parts to spare the hearts of all those but the heathens.’ What do you think? A holiday music revue? That’d be right up George Cohan’s alley.” He grabbed his notebook and began writing down the lines.

Tilde saw us from the front window and waved. I said, “Can’t we do this later?”

Scott ignored me and kept writing, so I climbed out of the car and went inside without him.

Tilde and John’s baby, now six months old, was the sweetest thing imaginable. “Give him over,” I said the second I stepped into their little brick house. It was a chilly day, crisp and cloudless; inside, the scent of apples and cinnamon simmering on the stovetop made the house seem even snugger and more inviting than it was. The baby had his own snuggly smell, like warm milk and rose-scented soap. I was wearing the squirrel coat and opened it so that I could tuck him right up against me. His skin was pure silk velvet. I put my nose up to his soft neck and inhaled deeply.

Tilde’s older boy, little John, hovered close to her, one hand clutching her skirt—a skirt that was as long as ever, and more matronly than I’d seen her wear before. She was not even thirty yet, and already she looked middle-aged.

She said, “You remember Auntie Zelda.” He shook his head and pulled her skirt in front of him like a curtain. “Our nurse has the day off,” Tilde said apologetically.

“We don’t mind a bit, do we?” I said to the baby, who gurgled happily in reply.

Scott came in then, still humming the song’s tune. “Greetings, Palmers,” he said, shaking John’s hand heartily.

“How about it, you two?” my brother-in-law asked. “When can we expect a Fitzgerald cousin for our fellas?”

I held the baby overhead and kissed his tummy, which made him giggle. “No time soon,” I said. “I’ve got to hang on to this figure a little longer. John Emerson—he’s a director and producer—is thinking of me for one of his pictures.”

“What?” Tilde said. “You, in the movies?”

“Why not? Everyone at home was always saying I had every bit as much talent and looks as any star. And Scott’s just turned in a scenario for Dorothy Gish—she’s Lillian’s sister, you know—and we’re chumming with lots of movie folks nowadays.”

John offered to take our coats and then, as we gave them over, said, “What about books? I thought
that
was your thing, Scott.”

“If I was among the independently wealthy, maybe. But I’ve got bills, and books won’t pay them.”

“Not unless it’s Sinclair Lewis’s book,” I said—a glib mistake that I realized too late.

Scott glowered at me. By now we’d heard from almost every one of Scott’s literary friends how that new book,
Main Street,
was selling so fast that the printers literally couldn’t keep up, exceeding
Paradise
by far. Worse, Lewis was, like Scott, a Minnesotan. This novel that Scott had declared dreary and bleak when he’d read it, finally, a few days earlier, was usurping his book’s place—
his
place, actually. He wanted to always be the favorite son.

He told John, “I’m awaiting word from a very powerful producer—head of
United Artists,
” he said, as if Tilde and John would be impressed. “Then we’ll have ten thousand to pay off our debts and start setting a little something aside.”

“Start?” Tilde said, directing little John to a set of building blocks. “What happened to all the money you’ve gotten from selling all those stories and things? Mama wrote that Zelda said you can’t stop making money. I’ll suppose a lot of it went for that coat—”

“Now, Tilde, dear,” John said, “that’s not our business—”

“That’s all right,” Scott said too heartily. “We’re
family
. It’s true, I’ve made a tremendous amount of money, with which we’ve had a tremendously good time.”

“The money’s just irregular,” I said, and Tilde gave me a look like
I’ll say it’s irregular!

“You should buy bonds,” she said. She took the baby from me before either he or I wanted her to, as if remembering that I was irresponsible. “Children need a secure, stable home—and heaven knows they’re not inexpensive. A good nurse or nanny is worth her weight in gold.”

“I told you, we aren’t having any yet.”

“You will, though—”

“Your sister makes a tremendously valid point,” Scott said, and clapped me on the shoulder. “It’s time we started acting like adults. No more of this lavish spending. No more John Emerson seduction scenes. It’s tremendously improper—we know that,” Scott told them with his sincerest frown.

Tilde looked alarmed. “Seduction scenes?”

“Not literally,” I said. I glared at Scott; he was performing, putting on an act not for Tilde and John but for me, to punish me for having dared to utter Sinclair’s name.

“I can’t imagine telling friends in St. Paul that my wife’s an
actress,
” he continued. “Though I’m sure your good friend Nathan wouldn’t mind it at all.” When I started to speak, he held up his hand. “No, no, I’m going to have to put my foot down this time. I’m calling Emerson the minute we get back.

“Imagine!” he added, then leaned close to John as if to confess. “It’s awfully embarrassing to think I was almost as swept away by the idea as Zelda was.”

“
Almost?
You’re the one who arranged for it!”

“Dearest,” he said as he took his flask from his pocket, gave it a testing shake, uncapped it, and downed what little gin was left while my sister and John watched, eyes wide, mouths open. “Say, John,” Scott interrupted himself, “what do you have on hand? I’ll want a refill for the return trip.”

Tilde answered in a huff, “We’re not lawbreakers!”—but John’s expression wasn’t quite so definite.

Still, he kept silent and Scott went on, “Dearest darling wife, look at that magnificent little creature in your sister’s arms. Don’t you want one of those? I can’t wait to be a father.”

*   *   *

We fought the whole way home, and then he got right on the phone with John Emerson, saying I’d had second thoughts and was pining for motherhood—so no movie career for me. This wasn’t a problem in itself, because in most ways what he’d said was actually true. I didn’t actually want an acting career, and I did actually want to have a baby. I just resented Scott manipulating my life.