Stardust Read online

  “So,” Lasner said, looking away. “Some story.”

  With everything Ben remembered left out. The good days in the big house on Lützowplatz. The parties, sometimes with just a piano, but sometimes with a whole band, the air full of perfume and smoke, Ben looking down through the banister. Faces even a child recognized. Hertzberg, the comedian with the surprised round eyes; Jannings, jowly and grave even with a glass in his hand. And afterward, sometimes, the quarrels—were there women even then?

  Sunday mornings, the room still smelling of stale ashtrays, his father got them ready for their walk. Scarves in winter. Umbrellas if it rained. But the walk without fail, because that’s what you did on Sundays in Berlin. Down Budapesterstrasse to the zoo, afterward a cake at Kranzler’s, his father desperate by now for a drink. Later, when they were too old for the zoo, they would head straight for the cafés, where his father met friends and Danny tried to sneak cigarettes. Then, a few years after that, they were on a train for Bremen, an American woman with her two boys, their father back on the platform at Lehrter Bahnhof.

  They were meant to go home, but stayed in London. Did his mother think Otto would follow, that it was somehow important to be near him, at least on a map? When it didn’t matter anymore, after the official letter, she lacked the will to leave, and they stayed longer. By the time Ben finally did get back to America, to the Army training camp, he was grown up. The accent they teased him about now was English so he lost that one, too. And then, full circle, the Army wanted the old language of his boyhood. They polished off the rust, and it came back, as fluent as memory, bringing everything else with it, even the smell of the cakes, until finally the war took him to Berlin and he saw that it was gone for good—Kranzler’s, the zoo, all of it just rubble and dust, as insubstantial now as his father, all ghosts.

  “Then what?” Lasner said, an old hand at story conferences. “She remarried? A woman like that—”

  “No, she died. During the war.” He caught Lasner’s expectant look and shook his head. “She got sick.” No drama, a daily wearing away, medicines to keep the retching down, then a final exhaustion.

  “So now it’s just the brother?” Lasner said, suddenly sentimental. “Let me tell you something. Stay close. What else have we got? Family. You trust blood. Don’t be like—” He took a puff on the cigar, moving farther away, drifting into anecdote again. “Look at Harry Warner. Jack makes him crazy. Screaming. Shouting. Sometimes, they’re in the same room, you don’t even want to watch. Don’t be like that.”

  “But they’re still—”

  Lasner shrugged. “Who else would work with Jack? He is crazy. You know, I said to him once, you hate him so much, come work with me, partners, your name first, I don’t care. At the time, this is worth a fortune to him. You know what he said? ‘You want that bastard to run my studio?’ His studio. So they’re stuck with each other, till one of them keels over. You put that kind of pressure here,” he said, touching his heart, “and sooner or later they wheel you out on a stretcher. Well.” He stood up, glancing at his watch again, then out the window. “What I hate, this time of night, is you never know where you are.” He put his hand on Ben’s shoulder, an uncle. “Remember what I said. Don’t be like Jack. Stay close.”

  And what was there to say to that? Danny had gone to California in ’40, using Otto’s name to get a Second Unit job at Metro. Just to see what it was like. And then the war had closed the door behind him, eight thousand miles away, so that all they’d had for years were sheets of blue tissue V-mail. Danny playing parent. Keep safe, out of combat. Their mother’s health. War news. But still Danny’s voice, the same wink in it. Stories he knew Ben would like, could pass on to his friends. Meeting Lana Turner. Going to hear the King Cole Trio. You have to come out here. The whole make-believe world real when Danny wrote about it, the same kid sneaking cigarettes, talking late at night from his bed across the room. About what? Anything. Ben wrapped up in the sound of it.

  He got up, feeling Lasner’s hand still on his shoulder. “Don’t forget to call Freeman.”

  “I don’t forget anything,” Lasner said, peering at him. “I’ll tell you one thing I don’t forget. Your father cost me a bundle. So maybe I’d better watch out—you’re an expensive family.”

  “No sets this time,” Ben said.

  Lasner nodded, finally dropping his hand. “We’ll talk. Where are you staying in Chicago?”

  “I’m just changing trains.”

  “The Chief? That’s seven fifteen. That gives you what? Nine hours to kill.” Everything measured and counted. “What’re you going to do for nine hours?”

  “See Chicago, I guess.”

  Lasner waved his hand. “You’ve seen it. You need a place to rest up, I’m at the Ambassador East. They get me a suite. Plenty of room.” He started to move toward the end of the car. “Otto’s kid. You live long enough—” He turned. “He was shot?”

  “That’s what the letter said.”

  “But who knows with the Nazis.” The unspoken question, a quick bullet or days of pain, clubs and wires, and screams. Years ago now.

  “Anyway, he’s dead,” Ben said. “So it doesn’t matter.”

  Lasner nodded. “No. It’s just my age, you think about the how.” He was silent for a minute, then looked up. “You got a budget on this thing?”

  Ben held up his hand, checking items off his fingers. “Hard costs. The footage we’ve got. Prints, I can req the raw stock from the War Production Board. You do the prints. And the sound—an engineer for the track, some bridge scoring, somebody to do the narration. American. Fonda, maybe?”

  Lasner shook his head. “Use contract. Frank Cabot?”

  “Fine. All I need is a cutting room and a couple of hands. We can do it either place, but yours would be better—Army studio, someone’s always taking your equipment. You provide the space, I can get the hands from Fort Roach. The stock would be an Army expense,” Ben said, looking at him directly. “We’ll make it for you. If you put it out.”

  “Nobody makes pictures for me,” Lasner said, looking back, the rhythm of negotiation. “At my studio.” He held Ben’s eyes for another second, then smiled. “You know, if your father had been like you, he’d still be—” He looked away, at a loss. “I mean—”

  Ben said nothing, waiting.

  Lasner held up a finger. “Don’t take advantage. People don’t forget that.” He lowered the hand, a dismissal, and walked away, followed by his moving reflection on the glass roof. “We’ll talk in the morning,” he said, the words in a slipstream over his shoulder.

  BUT WHEN the train pulled into LaSalle Street it was the scene from Grand Central all over again—Lasner surrounded by hats, tips given out, telegrams handed over, the group moving down the platform in a huddle. Ben followed behind, not wanting to interrupt, then lost him outside in the line of waiting taxis. Dearborn Street, where the Chief would pull out, was only a few blocks away, but what would he do there? He turned east instead, past the murky bars and shadowy streets under the El, light poking through the girders in latticework patches. Off the train, things seemed to pass in a plodding slow motion. Nothing whizzed by the window. He had all day.

  He crossed Michigan to the lakefront, hoping for a breeze, but the lake was flat, a sheet of hot tin. In the park, dogs panted under bushes. He thought of Warner being wheeled out on a stretcher in Lasner’s imagination. But anyone could have an attack, even someone as young as Danny. Except he hadn’t. What had his life been like? Maybe the same pressure cooker the Warners steamed in. Not the easy California you saw in magazines, men in open-necked shirts. Did he look like that? His wife would have pictures. Hans Ostermann’s daughter, the only thing Ben knew about her. She’d be at the hospital now, waiting things out.

  He got up from the park bench, restless. How could he not know Danny’s life? Ben had followed him everywhere, just wanting to be part of things. Wild, just like your father, his mother had said, meaning impulsive. But he wasn’t. A letter every
week, staying in touch, still taking care of him. And now gone, without even a note. Maybe he hadn’t really meant to do it, not at the very end. A fall. How did she know for sure it hadn’t been like that? He stopped in the street, caught not just by the heat and the night of half sleep, but a deeper weariness, tired of thinking about it, going round in circles.

  On State Street he saw an AIR COOLED banner running along a marquee and went inside. The picture was a Betty Grable on second run, something with snow. Caesar Romero danced. Charlotte Greenwood did her split high kick, right over her head. Betty was put out over some romantic mix-up with John Payne, all of it so airy that it melted away as you saw it, like touching beer foam. The newsreel brought him back with a jolt. Europe in grainy black and white, where he’d been just two weeks ago. People going through PX garbage cans. Then war criminals passing sentences on themselves before the courts could—cyanide capsules for the privileged, amateur nooses for the others. Not a botched accident, a Hollywood indulgence. Meaning it. In the camps, they threw themselves on electric fences. You never asked why, not over there. He stood up, desperate to move again.

  Outside there was everything he’d been too preoccupied to notice before. Taxis. Buildings with glass. Stores. No debris in the street. Doormen walking dogs. The bar at The Drake, with silver dishes of nuts. A country so rich it didn’t even know its own luck. Where anyone could be happy.

  At the station, busy with redcaps pushing luggage carts, he saw flashbulbs near the Chief. Not Lasner this time, real stars. Paulette Goddard. Carole Landis. Two girls he didn’t recognize. All of them smiling, holding up a bond drive poster as they perched on the compartment car steps. Other passengers stopped to watch. You’ll never guess who was on the train.

  They left at seven fifteen exactly, sliding out so smoothly that it wasn’t until they began clicking over the points in the yard that Ben looked up to see they were moving. Past sidetracked box cars, then clotheslines and coal sheds and scrap metal yards, the backside of the city, until finally the open country of the prairie. Another day before they saw mountains. Los Angeles Monday morning, half a continent in under forty hours. He opened his bag to change. People dressed up for dinner on the Chief. A wash, a drink in the club car. He looked out again at the late summer’s light on the unbroken fields, a pale gold. Farther away from the newsreel with every mile. And then, not paying attention, he nicked his finger on his razor and watched, dismayed, as blood welled out of the cut. Had there been blood? She hadn’t said. A pool spreading under his head? Where had he fallen? But there must have been blood. There always was.

  THEY WERE three deep at the bar in the club car, talking over each other, a party roar of indistinct voices and ice tinkling against glass. Just a few uniforms, officers with their own money. One of the starlets he’d seen on the platform, lipstick refreshed, was taking a light from a man she’d obviously just met, all eyes and what-are-my-odds. The way every trip should begin, Ben thought, the air bubbling like the tonic in his drink.

  “So what happened to you?”

  Ben turned to the finger poking at his shoulder.

  “I thought you were coming up. Talk some more.”

  Lasner had changed suits but seemed to have kept the same cigar, now just a stub between his fingers. He was with a young man whose eyes darted around the car, a quick sweep, before they settled on Ben. He stuck out his hand.

  “Lou Katz. Morris Agency.”

  “Lou works with Abe Lastfogel,” Lasner explained.

  “I’m his number two,” Katz said, evidently a point. “You’re with Continental?”

  “The Army,” Lasner said. “He’s making pictures for the Army.”

  “Oh,” Katz said, his eyes beginning to move away. “You know who this is?” Lasner said. “Otto Kohler’s kid.”

  “Really,” Katz said uneasily, not sure he could admit the name meant nothing.

  “The director,” Lasner said. “Silents.”

  “Right, silents,” Katz said, relieved. “Let me get us some drinks. You’re fine?” He nodded at Ben’s hand and without waiting for an answer headed into the bar crowd.

  “Watch this,” Lasner said. “You want a drink right away, always travel with the Morris office.”

  “Sorry about today. I thought you’d be busy.”

  “So come now.” He glanced at his watch. “We’ve got the eight seating. It’ll be a help to me. You have dinner with Katz, you always feel a hand in your pocket. Look at this, what did I tell you?”

  Katz was slipping through the crowd, drinks in hand.

  “Looks like a full train,” he said. “You see Julie Sherman over there?” He nodded toward the starlet from the bond drive. “You know Fox isn’t picking up her option.”

  “Lou, don’t peddle,” Lasner said. “Anyway, what would I do with her?”

  “Nobody ever lost money showing tits. Your health,” he said, raising his glass.

  “Then what happened at Fox?”

  “Too much like Tierney. Who needs two? She should be somewhere they work with the talent. You know she can sing? Test her. See what she can do. You can’t run a studio on loan-outs.”

  “How many times, Lou? Contract talent’s okay for the programmers. That’s your base,” he said, demonstrating with his hands. “Up here you don’t want to carry around that kind of expense. You get top-heavy. For A pictures, buy what you need. How many A’s do I make? Sell her to Metro, they can afford it.”

  Katz shook his head. “You got it backwards. You should do the loan-outs. Look at Selznick—he’s living on his contract list. Every time he loans out Bergman, he’s making what? A couple of hundred?”

  “There’s a name for that.”

  “Producer.”

  “Producer. What’s he doing now, some farkakte Western with that girl played the saint? One picture. You know how many pictures Continental’s releasing this year?”

  “That’s my point. You’re not a small studio anymore. People should be coming to you for the talent.”

  Lasner held up his hand. “You got something going with her, is that what?”

  “Just ten percent.”

  “Do you believe this guy?” Lasner said to Ben. “She’s gone down on half the Fox lot and with him it’s still business.”

  “You’ve got her wrong. She can sing.”

  “You remind me of Gus Adler. The way he was with Rosemary. All he could talk about. Test her, test her.”

  “And you did. And signed her,” Katz said smiling, sending a ball over the net.

  Lasner shrugged. “All right. Set it up with Bunny. Then we’ll see.” Katz started to speak, but Lasner stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. “Now take a step back. You push too hard, you knock people over. Learn from Abe. You know what he decided? Act like a gentleman, people always take your calls. There are ways to do things.”

  “Jesus, Sol. I was just trying to say thank you.”

  There was a stirring in the car, a shift in the air, as if someone were holding a door open. Paulette Goddard was walking toward them, people pretending not to notice as they let her pass. The bond drive dress was gone, traded up for a dark silk top that glittered with sequins, almost as bright as the diamond earrings setting off her face. It wasn’t just being beautiful, Ben thought, amused—she seemed to have brought her own lighting with her, a spot following her through the car.

  “Sol, I had no idea you were on the train,” she said, kissing him, the air denser now with perfume.

  “You look like a million,” he said fondly.

  “I should,” she said, holding up her wrist to show off a strand of diamonds. “You like?”

  “If I don’t have to pay for it. What is it, from Charlie?”

  “Are you kidding? He still has the first dollar. Well, from him in a way. The settlement.” She laughed, an infectious giggle. “Imagine his face.”

  “So everything’s friendly?” Lasner said, a concerned relative.

  “Darling, it was ages ago. You know Char
lie. He’s wonderful. He’s just impossible to live with.”

  “You two go way back,” Lasner said.

  “Not that far, Sol,” she said, laughing again, then turned to Katz. “Hi, Lou. How’s Abe?”

  “Busy,” he said, almost blushing, grateful to be recognized. Ben smiled to himself. No one was immune to stardust, not even those who lived on it. “Can I get you a drink?”

  “Can’t. Date with the Major. To celebrate the end of the drive. Sol, would you believe it, we set a record? And it was just me and Carole and a few other girls.”

  “Julie Sherman,” Katz said, getting the name in.

  “Yes, Julie.” She had turned her head to him and now took in Ben, her smile as bright as the bracelet. “I’m sorry—”

  “Ben Kohler,” Lasner said, the way he now remembered it. “Otto Kohler’s boy.” Ben could tell from the fixed smile that the name meant as little to her as it had to Katz. “He makes pictures for the Army.”

  “Really?” A glance to the other wrist, another flash of diamonds. “God, look at the time. I’ll call Fay.” Evidently Mrs. Lasner. “We don’t start shooting for another week.” She looked up at him, suddenly serious. “Milland. What do you think?”

  “You’ll make him look good,” Lasner said, then leaned over and kissed her forehead.

  “Liar,” she said, smiling. “Love to Fay. If you want to buy a bond I’m in car twenty-two. At least I think it’s twenty-two. Just go to the end and holler. Lovely to meet you,” she said to Ben, grazing his hand with the tops of her fingers. And then, to Katz, “Give my best to Abe,” and she was off, turning heads again.

  “That’s a nice girl,” Lasner said.

  Ben looked at him, surprised at the word.

  “Paramount signed her to seven years. Seven years, Sol,” Katz said.

  “So let Freeman buy the bracelets.”