A moment later, though, he had dropped his gaze from me. I’d failed to keep his interest. He’d quickly browsed me and analyzed me— female, young, unconnected, inconsequential—and then dismissed me as useless to his needs.
Olive tapped one of the photos in front of her. “The gentleman in these photographs is married to our star.”
“I know exactly who that guy is, lady. Arthur Watson. Talentless sop. Dumb as a bag of hair. Better at chasing girls than he is at acting, by the looks of this evidence. And he’s gonna take one hell of a pasting from his wife when she sees these photos.”
“She’s seen them already,” said Olive.
Now Winchell was openly irritated. “How’d you see them, is what I want to know. These pictures are my property. And what are you doing, showing them all over town? What are you—selling tickets to these pictures?”
Olive didn’t answer this, but just fixed Winchell with her firmest stare.
A waiter approached and asked if the ladies would like a drink.
“No thank you,” said Olive. “We’re temperates.” (A claim that would have been soundly refuted, had anyone been close enough to smell my breath.)
“If you’re asking me to kill the story, you can forget about it,” said Winchell. “It’s news, and I’m a newsman. If it’s true or interesting, I got no choice but to publish it. And this item here is both true and interesting. Edna Parker Watson’s husband, running around like that, with two loose women? What do you want me to do, lady? Look down at my shoes demurely while famous people make whoopee with showgirls right there in the middle of the Street? As everyone knows, I don’t like to publish items on married couples, but if people are gonna be this indiscreet about their indiscretions, whaddaya want me to do about it?”
Olive continued to level him with her iceberg stare. “I expect you to have some decency.”
“You know, you’re really something, lady. You don’t scare easy, do you? I’m beginning to piece you together. You work for Billy and Peg Buell.”
“That’s correct.”
“It’s a miracle that junky theater of yours is still operating. How do you keep your audience, year after year? Do you pay them to come? Bribe them?”
“We coerce them,” said Olive. “We coerce them by providing excellent entertainment, and they, in return, reward us by buying tickets.”
Winchell laughed, drummed his fingers on the table, and cocked his head. “I like you. Despite the fact that you work for that arrogant louse Billy Buell, I like you. You got some nerve. You could be a good secretary for me.”
“You already have an excellent secretary, sir, in the figure of Miss Rose Bigman—a woman whom I consider a friend. I doubt she’d appreciate you hiring me.”
Winchell laughed again. “You know more about everybody than I do!” Then his laughter vanished—never having reached his eyes. “Look, I got nothing for you, lady. Sorry about your star and her feelings, but I’m not killing the story.”
“I’m not asking you to kill the story.”
“Then whaddaya want from me? I already offered you a job. I already offered you a drink.”
“It is important that you do not print the name of this girl in your newspaper.” Olive pointed at one of the photographs again. And there I was—in a picture taken just a few hours (and a few centuries) earlier— with my head thrown back in rapture.
“Why shouldn’t I name that girl?”
“Because she’s an innocent.”
“Got a funny way of showing it.” There was that cold, wet laugh again.
“Nothing about this story is further served by putting this poor girl’s name in your newspaper,” said Olive. “The other people involved in this kerfuffle are public figures—an actor and a showgirl. They are known by name already to the general public. To be exposed to public scrutiny was the risk they took when they entered a life of show business. They will be hurt by your story, to be sure, but they’ll survive
the wound. It all comes with the territory of fame. But this youngster here”—again, she tapped the photo of my ecstatic face—“is naught but a college girl, from a good family. She will be laid low by this. If you publish her name, you doom her future.”
“Wait a minute, is she this kid?” Winchell was pointing at me now. To have his finger aimed at me felt something like being singled out of a crowd by an executioner.
“That’s correct,” said Olive. “She’s my niece. She’s a nice young girl. She’s attending Vassar.”
(Here, Olive was reaching: I had been to Vassar, yes, but I don’t think anyone could accuse me of ever having attended Vassar.)
He was still staring at me. “Then why the hell ain’t you in school, kid?”
Right about then, I wished I were. My legs and my lungs felt about to collapse. I was never happier to keep my mouth shut. I tried to look as much as possible like a nice girl who was studying literature at a respectable college, and who was not drunk—a role for which I was uniquely ill-equipped that night.
“She’s just a visitor to the city,” said Olive. “She’s from a small town, from a nice family. She took up with some dubious company recently. It’s the sort of thing that happens all the time to nice young girls. She made a mistake, that’s all.”
“And you don’t want me sending her to the glue factory for it.”
“That’s correct. That’s what I’m asking you to consider. Print the story if you must—even print the photos. But leave an innocent young girl’s name out of the papers.”
Winchell riffled through the photos again. He pointed to a picture of me with my mouth devouring Celia’s face, and my arm wrapped— serpentlike—around Arthur Watson’s neck.
“Real innocent,” he pronounced.
“She was seduced,” said Olive. “She made a mistake. It could happen to any girl.”
“And how do you propose that I keep my wife and daughter in mink coats if I stop publishing gossip, just because innocent people make mistakes?”
“I like your daughter’s name,” I blurted out right then, without thinking.
The sound of my voice shocked me. I truly hadn’t planned to speak. It just came flying out of my mouth. My voice startled Winchell and Olive, too. Olive spun around and stared daggers at me while Winchell drew back a bit in puzzlement.
“How’s that?” he said.
“We don’t need to hear from you now, Vivian,” said Olive.
“Zip it,” Winchell said to Olive. “What’d you say, girl?”
“I like your daughter’s name,” I repeated, unable to break his stare. “Walda.”
“What do you know about my Walda?” he demanded.
If I’d had my wits about me, or if I’d been capable of making up an interesting story, I might have given a different answer—but as it was, all I could manage in my terrified state was the truth.
“I’ve always liked her name. You see, my brother’s name is Walter, just like yours. My grandmother’s father’s name was Walter, too. My grandmother was the one who named my brother. She wanted the name to carry on. She started listening to your radio broadcasts a long time ago because she liked your name. She read all your columns, too. We read them together, in the Graphic. Walter was my grandmother’s favorite name. She was so happy when you named your children Walter and Walda. She made my parents name me Vivian, because the letter V is half a W, and that was close to Walter. But after you named your daughter Walda, she said she wished that Walda were my name, too. It was a clever name, she said, and a good omen. We used to listen to you all the time on the Lucky Strike Dance Hour. She always liked your name. I wished my name was Walda, too. That would have made my grandmother happy.”
I was running out of steam—running out of tattered sentences—and also, what the hell was I talking about?
“Who invited that compendium?” Winchell joked, pointing at me again.
“You needn’t pay any mind to her,” said Olive. “She’s nervous.”
“I needn’t pay any mind to you, lady,” he said to Olive, and turned his chilling attention to me again. “I feel like I’ve seen you before, kid. You’ve been in this room before, haven’t you? You used to hang around with Celia Ray, didn’t you?”
I nodded, defeated. I could see Olive’s shoulders deflate.
“Yeah, I thought so. You come in here tonight, dressed all sweet and pretty like Little Mary Cotton Socks, but that’s not how I remember you. I’ve seen you up to all sorts of hanky-panky in this room. So I think it’s pretty rich—you trying to convince me that you’re a decent young lady. Listen, you two, I’m on to your racket. I know what you’re doing here—you’re campaigning me—and I hate like hell to be campaigned.” Then he pointed at Olive. “Only thing I can’t figure out is why you’re making all the effort to save this girl. Every soul in this club could testify that she’s no fainting virgin, and I know for a fact that she ain’t your niece. Hell, you’re not even from the same country. You don’t even talk the same.”
“She is my niece,” insisted Olive.
“Kid, are you this lady’s niece?” Winchell asked me directly.
I was terrified to lie to him, but equally terrified not to. My solution was to cry out, “I’m sorry!” and to burst into tears.
“Ack! You two are giving me a headache,” he said. But then he passed me his handkerchief and instructed, “Sit down, kid. You’re making me look bad. The only girls I ever want crying around me are showgirls and starlets whose hearts I just broke.”
He lit two cigarettes and offered me one. “Unless you’re temperate?” he said, with a cynical smile.
I gratefully took the cigarette and gulped down the smoke in a few deep, shaky breaths.
“How old are you?” he asked.
“Twenty.”
“Old enough to know better. Not that they ever know better. Now, listen—you say you used to read me in the Graphic? You’re a little young for that, aren’t you?”
I nodded. “You were my grandmother’s favorite. She read your columns to me when I was little.”