he: A Novel(52)

They have golf courses in Scotland, says Babe.

– I believe they do.

– It’s a long way to England.

– I believe it is.

– Maybe you’d like some company.

And he would, because now he does not wish to be alone without distraction from the dissolution of his marriage. If the presence of Myrtle draws further attention to Lois’s absence, so be it.

My wife’s a drunk, says Babe.

– I know. Mr Hardy informed me.

– Mr Hardy did not tell a lie. My wife could dig up a bottle in the desert.

– They ought to set her looking for oases.

– It would do no good, unless the oases were fed by booze.

– Which is ultimately dehydrating.

– Which it is.

– My wife is difficult to monitor alone.

– Your wife is most adept at the concealment of liquor.

– I won’t stand for my wife being insulted by anyone but me.

– Then take a seat. If they’re all full up, take a ticket.

– You sound like Groucho.

– Never that bad.

– So?

I’d like your company, he says. And I’ll help you keep an eye on Myrtle.

– Thank you. Myrtle is okay, you know.

– I know.

– She hasn’t touched a drop, not since Rosemead.

Yet still Babe is afraid to leave Myrtle unguarded. This cannot go on. They both know it. Babe cannot be a father to his wife and a lover to another woman.

Babe takes in the setting of the sun. It is late. The crowds are gone. No one is watching them. Theirs is the only table still occupied in the commissary.

And Lois? Babe asks.

– We’re getting divorced. We’ll start proceedings as soon as I return.

In a corner, a colored janitor has begun mopping the floor. Somewhere, Henry Ginsberg is contemplating ways to deprive the janitor of a nickel.

I miss Edgar Kennedy, says Babe.

– Kennedy’ll fix it.

It is Edgar Kennedy’s catchphrase. If only Edgar Kennedy were still here. If only Edgar Kennedy could fix such predicaments as these.

Did you hear that Jimmy Finlayson has a new girlfriend? Babe asks.

– I didn’t, but I’m glad of it. It means that there’s still hope for us, whatever happens.

– It’ll be all right, you know.

Yes, he says. In the end.





106


The arrangements are made. In July, they will travel by train to New York via Chicago, and from there will take the RMS Aquitania to Southampton. It is a vacation. They make this clear to all. They are paying for it out of their own pockets.

MGM publicizes the dates of their trip.

MGM announces a celebration of their work.

This celebration, coincidentally, will take place in Britain.

The dates of the celebration, also coincidentally, will cover the period of their vacation.

A deal is struck: ten days for publicity, and the rest to themselves. It is less time than he and Babe would have wanted for leisure, and less time than MGM might have desired of them for promotion.

Well, says Hal Roach, as long as everyone is unhappy.

Henry Ginsberg comes to the station to see them off. They have no idea why Henry Ginsberg’s presence is required except that someone in the publicity department probably thinks it a good idea to have a studio representative on the scene as the boys depart for their first big trip abroad. Babe says that being sent on their way by Henry Ginsberg is like the Titanic being waved off by an iceberg, with a promise that the iceberg will catch up with it later.

When the picture eventually appears in the newspapers, Henry Ginsberg has been excised and replaced by a cutout of Hal Roach.

Because nobody likes Henry Ginsberg.

He and Babe have rarely ventured beyond California in five years. Babe goes to Agua Caliente to gamble, and to be with Viola Morse, but Mexico is different.

He and Babe have a conception of themselves as motion picture stars, but this conception is circumscribed, and understated, and completely mistaken.

The crowd that bids them farewell as they climb on board the Los Angeles Limited is large, but familiar to them from premieres and theater appearances in the city.

The crowd that waits for them in Chicago throngs the platforms, fills the station, and spills out to the streets beyond. Thousands of people want to glimpse them, to touch their clothing, to shake their hands. He has never experienced such adulation, such need. It frightens him, and he starts to panic as he and Babe are jostled and tugged on their way to the crimson carpet of the 20th Century Limited, while police and railroad staff attempt to hold back the hordes. At last the train pulls away, and he and Babe manage to wave farewell, but their faces are strained, and when the station is behind them they can only stare at each other and wonder at what they have become.

In New York, the multitude is so great that Broadway becomes a single mass of people through which it is impossible for any individual to pass. He wonders that nobody is killed. Only by hiding in Minsky’s Music Hall do they avoid injury to themselves.

They have to be smuggled on board the Aquitania.

They did not know it until now, because nobody has told them.

Hal Roach did not tell them, because Hal Roach might have been forced to pay them more money. But even if Hal Roach had told them, they would not have believed it. They would not, and could not, have believed it until they experienced it for themselves.