relationship with her. He had grown to trust Beebo, as well as like her,
and as far as he knew, she was there only to help out with the horses
during the day and look over his homework at night. The fact that she
had been able to encourage Venus and Toby to try to know and respect
each other at last was the frosting on the cake.
But after he went to bed, Beebo would go to Venus’s room. They were
lovers at night, but during the day, if Venus was home, she had to be as
breezy and casual with Beebo as she was with everybody else.
As for Leo, Beebo didn’t meet him for nearly a week. He got up at six
A.M. and left the house by seven, before Beebo was stirring. He looked
in on her with Venus once. Beebo was awakened early by the click of the
bedroom door shutting behind him. But when she asked Venus about it,
Venus only said, “I told him you were a farm kid. He likes that. It
makes you a sort of walking health exhibit.”
“Does he like the fact that I’m a girl?”
“Not a bit,” Venus said with a grin, refusing to spoil the moment by
elaborating.
Beebo dodged around squads of empty orange-juice glasses for several
days with the eerie feeling that the ghost who emptied them would come
cackling out of the rafters at her before long.
* * * * *
The night they finally met, Beebo had been living under Leo’s roof for
over two weeks, using his hospitality without ever having seen or spoken
to him.
She was sitting in the huge recreation room with Venus and Toby,
watching TV and listening to Venus tell about the casting problems,
wardrobe, scripts she had read.
Beebo commented quietly, “It takes up your whole life, doesn’t it?”
Venus looked at her anxiously. “You’re lonesome during the day, aren’t
you, darling?” She threw a guarded glance at Toby, but he spoke without
taking his eyes off the TV screen: “What do you mean, lonesome, Mom?
She’s busy all day. Besides, I get home from school at four, and I’m
better company than you are.”
Venus smiled and reached out to hug him. She startled herself as much as
Toby, but he endured the embrace with less embarrassment than he would
have felt the month before in New York.
“When is that PTA thing at school?” Venus said. “I want to go with you,
Toby.” _Toby._ His name. The first time in memory she had called him
that when she wasn’t in a rage. Beebo saw the smile in his eyes.
“You can go if you promise not to call anybody ‘darling’ or wear a knit
dress,” he said.
Venus gasped and Beebo laughed at him, looking behind his back at Venus.
“All right, darling, I promise,” Venus said wryly. “If _you_ promise not
to ditch me this year, and tell lies to your friends about how I do the
dishes every night, like all the other mothers.”
Toby smiled without looking at her, and it was a bargain. Beebo felt her
own satisfaction at this bashful honesty between mother and son. And
then Venus surprised her by saying, “Beebo, I’m going to get you a car.
It isn’t fair to make you shovel manure all day.”
“What would I do with a car?” Beebo said, mystified at the sudden
generosity.
“You could ferry Toby around. Pick up the groceries for Miss Pinch.
Maybe we’ll get something to eat that isn’t poisonous for a change.”
“Miss Pinch doesn’t use poison,” said a gravelly voice. “Just too much
paprika. It’s her Hungarian heritage.”
Beebo turned around with a start to see, at long last, Leo Bogardus
coming down the wide steps to join them.
“Well, darling, you should know,” Venus said. “You and Miss Pinch have
such a beautiful thing together.”
Leo strode across the room, a solid, rather squarely built man; gray
hair and gray suit; neat and natty and silver-eyed behind his black
French-framed glasses. He was about Beebo’s height and attractive
without being handsome.
Beebo stood up to greet him, somewhat subdued. “Mr. Bogardus? I’m
Beebo,” she said and held out her hand.
Leo put a just-drained orange-juice glass on a table. “I know,” he said.
“I hope you’ll be comfortable with us, for as long as you stay, Beebo.”
He shook her hand briefly.
Beebo wasn’t sure if he meant to be sarcastic or not. She let her hand
drop awkwardly and sat down again as Bogardus settled in a chair, trying
to size him up. His face was clean-lined and his manner decisive. She
imagined him quick to anger, stubborn, and hard to handle when he was
mad.
“You’re picking them younger every year, Venus,” Leo said five minutes
later, without once having looked at Beebo in the meantime.
Venus grimaced a warning at him over Toby’s head to shut up. Leo nodded
wearily.
“I don’t pick them, darling; they pick me,” she said in a pointed
whisper.
To Beebo’s discomfiture, Leo gazed straight at her then and laughed with
a honk of mirth. Moments later he got up and left as abruptly as he
came, and Beebo spoke not another word to him for several more days. She
had just begun to hope she wouldn’t have to at all. It would have suited
her, not because she disliked him—she didn’t. Considering her position
in his house, he was more than decent. But he scared her. He was no
ghost, but he was still the unknown quantity.
Fortunately, the next few times they saw each other there was only time
for small talk, and no more.
* * * * *
Venus got her the car before the end of the week—a silver sport
coupé—and Beebo and Toby cruised around Hollywood and the coastal
communities when he got home from school in the afternoons.
Toby kept on talking, confiding in her, and she began to see how much he
respected and liked Leo; how strongly he sided with his step-father in
any argument between Leo and Venus; what a source of strength Leo was to
him. Here was no dirty dog like the rest of the boys. Here was a man to
admire and emulate, and Toby did. Leo was good for him, and Beebo was
glad they had each other.
Beebo felt conspicuous, even though they rarely stopped the car or got
out. She was afraid somebody would recognize Toby, and she hated to be
stared at, with her short hair and slacks and casual cotton shirts.
Skirts looked wrong on her and men’s pants looked fake.
She looked the best in riding wear: a formal tight-waisted jacket and
white stock, hard velvet cap, smooth leather boots, jodhpurs. The kind
of clothes she used to wear at shows around Juniper Hill, when she won
ribbons for jumping other people’s horses. She had a lithe elegance that
the riding clothes dramatized.
But you can’t walk into Schwab’s drugstore in formal riding clothes. At
least not if you have orders to make yourself invisible. Beebo began to
feel hemmed in. The only safe place in the county of Los Angeles was the
Bogardus estate, and even there she worried about guests and servants.
Miss Pinch disapproved sniffily of her, but she’d probably hold her
tongue for Leo’s sake. Mrs. Sack was as plump and amiable as a currant
bun, and about as perceptive. The others were a shadowy and obsequious
crew whom Beebo rarely saw, yet she distrusted them all.
* * * * *
In the evenings, when she was alone, Beebo started writing to Paula and
Jack. They were short letters at first, though the ones to Jack were
longer and franker. To Paula, she described the flash of October across
the southern California landscape; the whipped-cream weather, the purple
hills, the flowers.
To Jack she said, “Venus is wonderful. She’s working so hard I hardly
ever see her, though. But she says she’d spend every minute with me if
she could. Nobody else exists but me. It’s funny—that looks so made-up
on paper. But she really said it, and I believe her.
“I almost never see Leo, either. When I run into him, I ask about his
diet and he asks me about the horses. I think he’s a good man—good for
Toby—but I’d hate like hell to have him mad at me.
“I guess the one thing I don’t like about it here is being alone so
much. Even Toby’s gone till late in the day. What a nice kid he is,
underneath the shell. He wants to be somebody in his own right, and I’ll
bet he makes it.
“How is that doll you room with? Please write and tell me _everything_
about Paula. Best—Beebo.”
* * * * *
There was no trouble between Leo and Beebo until the day she and Toby
picked Venus up at the studio in Television City. They knew she was
coming home early to prepare for a party, and they talked one another
into it like a pair of school boys ditching class for a day to have a
ball. It seemed quite innocuous, and yet rather worldly and exciting
when they discussed it, tooling around in the silver car.
But when they actually arrived in that principality of a parking lot,
they were rather abashed.
“What if she doesn’t see us?” Toby said.
“That’d probably be all for the best,” Beebo said.
But Venus saw them plain and clear when she emerged from the building,
surrounded by aides and admirers. She walked briskly to the car,
surprising the crowd which began to straggle after her, opened the door,
and pulled Toby out by his collar.
“Darling,” she said smoothly, “I want you to meet Mr. Wilkins and Mr.
Klein. Boys, will you introduce him around for me?” She smiled at one of
the men who quickly obliged her.
Venus thrust her head into the car. “Beebo, what the hell!” she hissed.
“I’m sorry—we thought it would be fun,” Beebo faltered.
“You thought—” Venus shut her eyes a minute and swallowed her temper.
“Oh, balls. I’m not going to get mad at you. I can’t, I’m too much in
love with you. But oh! you fool, _Leo_ can. I hope to God he doesn’t
hear about it.” She withdrew, collared Toby again, and popped him into
the front seat, sitting down beside him to wave and smile at the group
of people so charmingly that no one but herself was likely to be noticed
as they pulled away.
* * * * *
The sponsors for _Million Dollar Baby_ were openhanded, despite long
rehearsal hours and high rents and salaries, because they figured that
with Venus in the show, it had to be a smash. So Leo, anxious to live up
to their expectations, worked her unremittingly day and night throughout
October.
Venus not only had to act, she had to dance and sing. The big number for
the second show, then in production, was “I’m Putting My All On You.”
“I never sang before in my life!” Venus yelled at Leo.
“Marilyn Monroe can do it,” he said softly, infuriating her.
“Leo, _I can’t sing_!” she cried, trying to explain fundamentals to him
as if he were retarded.
“Well, don’t,” Beebo said, surprising both of them. She was watching the
scene in the Bogardus rec room. Leo threw her an irritated look, and
Beebo explained quickly, “_Talk_ the song. Whisper and wiggle like
Marlene Dietrich. Venus, Leo’s right. You have to live up to the title.
_Million Dollar Baby._ God, you ought to be able to do anything for that
price, including grand opera.”
Leo laughed, a clattering jangle of a sound, while Venus salved her
wounds in prim silence, peeved at Beebo for backing up her husband.
“Now, you see?” Leo told her, waving at Beebo. “That’s it. Beebo can see
it. Why can’t you? I tell you the same damn thing and you squawk at me
like a fishwife. Okay, I’m not young and handsome, but I’m smart. That’s
how you got where we are today. You do this right, and you’ll get more
than that million.”
Beebo watched him with interest as he directed Venus. He was
electrically alive, cunning in the way he teased and bullied and loved
the song out of her. Beebo could almost feel the tune, the words, Venus
herself, coming to life. Leo was a good seat-of-the-pants psychologist.
After several run-throughs he turned to Beebo. “You’re helping,” he said
laconically. “She sings better for you than for me. I show her what to
do. You make her feel it.” He scratched his head, then let his
shirt-sleeved arms drop. “That’s okay, as long as she doesn’t lose it at
the studio,” he decided. “Maybe we’ll let you watch some other scenes at
home, Beebo.”
Beebo grinned. It was a relief to participate at last in the paramount
sphere of Venus’s life.
“It helps to have her in love again,” Leo observed candidly. “Makes her
much more responsive.”
“Don’t talk about me as if I were a machine,” Venus flashed at him. “And
don’t laugh at me. I know how silly you think it is. I _know_ Beebo’s
too young.”
Leo sat down on a leather-topped bar stool. “You’re happy, Beebo?” he
asked.
Beebo nodded, wondering where he was going.
“It’s rough, isn’t it? Venus isn’t home much these days. And you have
nothing to do but goof around in that car.”
“I get along,” Beebo said cautiously. “Are you against the car, Leo?”
“No, just the taxi service.” There was a deadly pause, and Leo’s face
folded into a heavy frown. Beebo was lost for a moment, till Venus
sighed and lighted a cigarette with angry movements. “Who squealed?” she
said.
“It doesn’t matter,” Leo said crisply. “I don’t like the idea of you two
ladies consorting in public.”
“Leo, don’t pull that solemn face on me,” Venus said. “She and Toby came
together. They picked me up at work. Nobody saw her face—”
“Nobody had to,” Leo said, taking a drag on his cigarette.
“Look, Leo, let’s not fight over it,” Beebo said. “Be reasonable. Things
are working out all right. I’m discreet and I swear I’ll never—”
“I know, you’ll never do anything to hurt darling Venus,” Leo said
acidly. His eyes narrowed, and he began to pace the room. When either of
the women tried to speak he silenced them with a gesture.
Finally Venus said, “That poor kid never goes anywhere. She deserves—”
“She deserves to torpedo your career, just to alleviate her ennui?”
“Well, damn it, Leo, if you turn her out, I’m going with her. I happen
to be in love with Beebo and I don’t give a damn what you think of it.”
“Venus, go upstairs,” Leo said. He lighted a cigar—a concession to his
mental distress. When Venus objected he said, “Will you please go?” as
if she were a naughty child. He was almost fatherly with her. “I can’t
talk to Beebo with such a distraction as you around.” He made her hope
he and Beebo would understand each other. She left slowly, telling Beebo
not to believe a word Leo said.
* * * * *
Leo stopped his pacing and sat down to face Beebo. “There’s too much at
stake, Beebo,” he said at once. “I can’t tolerate even small slip-ups.
Venus is silly, but that’s no excuse for you. You’re a sensible kid.”
“But Leo, such a little thing—”
“Nothing is little, Beebo,” he said. “Let’s be frank with each other. It
worries me enough that you’re so young. At least her other lovers were
nearer her own age. But to have you a girl....” He puffed rapidly on the
cigar. “I won’t disguise the fact that I find you rather ... well,
unsympathetic. I think most normal men would. Partly from masculine
resentment, I guess. A natural revulsion for women who parade as poor
imitations of men, but—”
“You liked me well enough when you got home and found Venus acting like
a lovable human being,” Beebo interrupted him heatedly. “I’m the same
person now as then. I just happened to pick her up in a parking lot and
drive her home.”
“The guy who told me about it,” Leo said thoughtfully, “said Venus was
picked up by a good-looking boy. A friend of Toby’s he supposed. Of
course, you were hard to see inside the car. But Venus had told him,
when she saw you pull up, that you were one of the servants. So he was a
little surprised to see her jump in the front seat with you ... and you
didn’t have a uniform on, either. He was giving me the old
elbow-in-the-ribs treatment.” He blew cigar smoke at the ceiling without
looking at her.
Beebo cleared her throat. “It was so innocent,” she said.
“Nothing is innocent,” Leo said flatly. “Especially a classy young butch
on the make.”
“Damn it, Leo!” she said. “I’m clean, I’m healthy, I’ve worked hard all
my life. And so help me God, I’m not ashamed of being what I can’t
_help_ being. That’s the road to madness.” Her cheeks were crimson.
“Well said, Beebo,” he acknowledged calmly. “You’re right—but so am I.
You might as well face up to the world’s opinion. I speak for the
ordinary prejudiced guy, too busy to learn tolerance, too uninformed to
give a damn. We are in the majority. I admire your guts but not your
person. As for the intolerance, it’s mostly emotional and illogical. I
can’t help it and neither can most men. I apologize. I warn you that
it’s there. I add: it’s beside the point.
“What I think of you is less important than what the people in Venus’s
world think. I don’t care what you say, somebody in this world besides
the Bogardus family knows you’re living here and laying my wife. It’s no
secret from the servants, you know.”
Beebo caught her breath and Leo looked at her piercingly. “I’ve heard
them laughing about it,” he said. “And our servants bat the breeze with
the other stars’ servants. They know more guff about us—what we eat,
when we pee, who our lovers are—than all the gossip columnists rolled
into one and stashed behind the keyhole. All I can say is, I pay them
and most of them like me. Not Venus, not you. But _me_. I hope they
respect my privacy, but I know human nature. Sooner or later they’ll
blab.”
Beebo rubbed a hand over her eyes, angry and frightened. “Well, if it’s
so bad, why the hell did Venus bring me out here? She must have known
how it would be.”
“Venus isn’t very big for denying herself what she wants,” Leo said.
“Besides, there’s a lot to be said in your favor. Venus is more stable.
She means it when she says she loves you. I believe that, Beebo, and I
hope you do. Her love is a unique gift, and I tell you honestly that I
envy you it. It has transformed her.”
Beebo was flattered and surprised to hear this coming from Leo. She felt
suddenly sorry for him. He seemed gray all over, from his damp shirt to
his strained face.
“I struggled for years to win her love ... my God, just to win her
attention. I finally decided there was no love in her, not even for poor
Toby. You proved me wrong, and in a way I’m grateful to you. Venus will
never be an easy woman to live with, but she’s improved measurably with
you, and I think some of it will last long after you’ve left us.”
“Left you?” Beebo opened her mouth to protest but was bull-dozed by his
rush of words.
“Her tantrums now are kid stuff compared to the blasts we used to get.
Now, I get a sort of half-assed cooperation. Toby gets some affection.
The servants get some peace. And that’s a lot when you’re starting from
zero.”
Beebo was taken aback by it.
“I thank you for that, Beebo. I thank you for being discreet most of the
time, when it’s boring and humiliating. But I have to look at the other
side of the coin. Venus has survived some potentially filthy scandals
because she has the smartest director and press agent in the world: me.
But it took all I’ve got and more to keep them out of the papers.
Sometimes the only way was to jump in front of her and take the crap
meant for Venus on my own kisser, just to keep her clean. I’d do it
again if I had to, but I don’t want to do it for you. If it gets out
she’s sleeping with a girl, we’re dead. All of us.
“Venus makes a touching speech about walking out of here with you if
anything goes wrong, but she won’t, Beebo. Don’t kid yourself. Don’t get
hurt worse than you have to be when the end comes.”
Beebo was too mad at him and too proud to admit any such thing. “The end
won’t come, Leo,” she flared. “She’s in love with me and that makes her
a different woman from the one you’ve always known. You can’t make
predictions about her.”
“I can predict anything about that woman, Beebo,” he said in a sad voice
that mourned the passing of mystery in his love. “I wish there were
something left in her for me to worship. You forget that there was a
great love in her life before Beebo Brinker came along and that love
will last to the end, long after Beebo falls by the wayside. That’s
self-love. She loves herself more than she loves you.”
“You’re unjust, Leo. She’s told me—”
“Sure—that she only loves the money, the career. Why, Beebo? Because
they glorify the _woman_. The woman she loves—herself.”
Beebo stared at him, silenced.
“You flatter her, you kid her, you make a good try at understanding her,
despite your blind spots. And you’re also nuts about her, which she
finds very ingratiating. Plus the fact of your femininity ... something
I will never understand. You know, she’s tried this Lesbian stuff
before.”
“She said you objected pretty violently.”
“Hell, yes. It’s much more dangerous than a normal affair. I’m no
blue-stocking. I’m for falling in love and making it work, as long as it
doesn’t hurt other people. It has nothing to do with my emotional
prejudices. Intellectually, I’m damned fair. The only two people Venus
hurts are me and Toby. I give her hell about Toby; I try to protect him.
But letting Venus hurt me is the abiding condition of my life. The rock
on which our marriage is built.”
Beebo listened, rooted with fascination, shock, pity, distaste. He was
making an accomplice of her by revealing the secrets of his life with
Venus; putting her in a spot where she would be virtually obligated to
help him, if only to save all their skins.
“But when I see disaster coming,” Leo went on, “that will crush our son,
destroy her career, ruin all our lives—I have to act. Beebo, you’re
eighteen. You’re among the adults. I lay this on the line to you. I’d
ask you to leave of your own free will, if I thought you had any left.
But you’re too infatuated for that. All I’ll say now is, stay out of
sight, watch the servants, and do as I say.”
“Look, Leo, I know you’re bending over backwards for me,” Beebo said. “I
appreciate it. Since I’ve been here you’ve been just a face to me, but a
kind enough face. Now I see you’re not just an operator—you’re an
intelligent and honest man. And it’s too bad Venus won’t admit it. I
think she could have loved you if she had.
“But if you’re working up to telling me that no matter how good a kid I
am, I’m going to have to pack up one of these days and blow, I’m sorry.
I can’t go.” _Unless_, she thought, _I go for Paula. I’ll never go
because I’m pushed._
“No,” he said. “I’ll tell you precisely what the situation is. I should
have talked to you about this before. You should know where I stand. It
must never—under any circumstances—get out that you’re queer, much less
involved with Venus.” He spoke without self-consciousness, his voice
coming sharp and sure. Beebo wondered if his long experience with
“artistic” types had made him a little wiser than other men.
“I found Venus when she was about your age: just plain Jeanie Jacoby
from Fostoria, Ohio,” Leo said. “She wrote me a letter saying she was
beautiful, available, and hated her family, and would I please make her
a star. She enclosed a snapshot. And she added that she was writing me
because I was the biggest agent in Hollywood. It was pure guff, but her
picture got me.
“Later I found out she wrote the same letter to twenty other guys. But I
was the one who fell for it and sent her a ticket for L.A. I figured if
only half of what I saw in the pic was for real, I could still sell her
and make a fortune. Well, she came. I saw. She conquered. I named her
Venus for the obvious reason, and Bogardus because I guessed I’d never
have the chance to give her my own name any other way. I never thought
we’d marry.
“I loved her the day we met, for all the wrong reasons, and I love her
still. My reasons haven’t improved any.
“I was just an agent, but I went out and worked my ass off and got her
going. I launched her. She would have sunk after a couple of the flops
she made if they hadn’t let me direct her finally. I made an actress out
of her and saved her career.
“When her star rose, so did mine. Her success was the only thing we
loved together and cried over and cherished—together. I watched her run
through five lousy marriages in ten years. And when she was weary and
demoralized, I stepped in like Sir Galahad, thinking I could make her
happy. I was delirious when she said yes, and I think even Venus was
pleased. Till the honeymoon was over.
“I suppose she’s told you what it was like. Things have been more
peaceful with you around. But we’ve driven each other to mayhem in years
past. She thinks she wants her freedom. But she’d come back to me,
Beebo, even if she got it. She needs me as much as I need her. (Don’t
tell her that, she won’t believe it.) I’ll never divorce her. I love her
enough to prefer the torment of living with her to the torment of living
without her.”
He stopped a moment, fixing Beebo with his silver eyes to impress his
next words on her. “That is one hell of a terrible lot of love, Beebo,”
he said slowly. “I doubt if you could top it. There’s one thing Venus
and I agree on: I made her and I’m keeping her on top. If she didn’t
care about that, she wouldn’t care about me, either.
“Listen, Beebo. I don’t want her ever to love you more than herself. And
if I see it coming, I’ll fight you. I’ll bring out every drop of
self-love and self-pity and money-lust in her system—and she’s got more
of it than she has blood. Because if she drops her career, she’ll drop
me with it.” He paused and they looked at each other.