The Girls in the Picture Read online

  She walked differently, too—her hips looser, almost as if she were mocking the seductive Theda Bara.

  As I approached the pair, whose horses were nuzzling each other in greeting, I tried to sort through the tumble of emotions stinging me like bees. It wasn’t that I begrudged Mary a romance; God knows, if anyone deserved a little sexual happiness, it was Mary! But that Mary had found happiness—if this was happiness; it was too soon to tell, but I knew Mary through and through; she’d never risk her public image for something that wasn’t so all-encompassing she simply couldn’t avoid it—in Douglas Fairbanks? Another actor—hadn’t she learned from Owen? Fairbanks was newly famous for his drawing room comedies, very amusing, extremely athletic, but he surely lacked the depth Mary displayed on-screen? And he wasn’t quite a star yet, at least not of the caliber of Mary Pickford.

  He was also, as everyone in Hollywood knew, married. With a young son.

  “Hey, Fran!”

  Shielding my eyes, I saw that Anita Loos was the figure on horseback beside Doug. I kicked my horse into a trot. I liked Anita, who was writing scenarios for Fairbanks; she’d followed him out to Los Angeles when he signed with Famous Players.

  “Ah, my fellow chaperone. Or should I say beard?” Anita’s ebony eyes gleamed beneath her glossy black bangs. She looked like she was fifteen, although she was in her early twenties. She was wearing a sailor blouse with a tie along with her riding pants.

  “Anita!” Doug glared at her warningly, looked around, but we four were quite alone on the path.

  Finally he seemed to register my presence. “Miss Marion.”

  “Mr. Fairbanks,” I replied just as dismissively, earning a swift, appealing glance from Mary. I ignored it.

  “Douglas, of course you know Frances, my dearest friend in the world. She was at Elsie’s, too, that—that particular day.” And Mary blushed, and I wondered what that “particular day” was at Elsie’s—and then I remembered. Just an ordinary party, nothing “particular” at all, at least not to me.

  But it obviously was to Mary and Doug, because they were now gazing at each other unabashedly with longing, which prompted Anita to turn her horse around and beckon for me to follow her. Which I did—while Doug and Mary, without a word or a wave or even an acknowledgment of what they were asking of Anita and me—steered their horses down a different path that disappeared into some woods.

  “His brother has a house nearby,” Anita finally said, after we settled our horses down to a languid walk.

  I heard, but didn’t reply; I was too angry, my chest tight with righteousness. How dare Mary involve me in this way? We’d said hello to so many people down at the stables, people who knew us. And here I’d been defending Mary’s innocence to all the gossips!

  Then my anger dissolved into hurt. Mary hadn’t wanted to spend the day with me, after all. She’d simply needed a decoy. When I thought of all I’d done for Mary in the last year or so, all the ways I’d made her life easier—ghostwriting a weekly advice column under her name because she asked, seeking no credit; leaving World Film, where I’d been head of the scenario department, to join her in Hollywood, where I was back to being one of a trio—oh, sure, a coveted, triumphant trio, but still…

  When I thought of how I always came running to Mary when summoned, no matter what I was doing, no matter my own ambitions…all those cozy evenings we’d spent together talking about our careers, how we’d wondered if we’d ever be able to truly love…but that was love, what was on Mary’s face just now. Love, as simple and true as if I’d written it for her in a script.

  Except—I hadn’t.

  Kicking my horse into a canter, I leaned down so that my face nearly touched his neck, breathing in the pungency of the stable. How could I feel jealous of Mary, of all people? How petty I was being.

  Finally the expanding warmth of the new day, the birds chirping, the rush of a stream nearby—along with Anita’s lively chatter—slowly worked their magic, and I began to relax, understand, and sympathize. These are the golden years, Fran, I reminded myself. Whatever Doug and Mary were doing today, I’d have Mary back to myself on Monday at the studio. And, of course, I never would have been here—trotting on a horse on a beautiful bridle path, one of dozens and dozens of movie people enjoying their day off like children released for recess; I’d never be looking forward to returning to a studio on Monday—if Mary hadn’t taken a chance on me in the first place.

  And then there was Owen Moore. I detested him. I couldn’t abide the abusive, proprietary way he treated Mary, even now, as his own career continued to spiral into decline as men—men like Douglas Fairbanks, not dainty little candy-box boys like Owen—became the popular screen stars. Of course Mary had no future with Owen; Owen didn’t deserve her. Whatever was going on with Fairbanks wasn’t simply a fling, I knew that already. It never could be, to Catholic Mary. But what it might be was still unknown, and so I couldn’t help but assume the worst. Or was it the best?

  “How long?” I asked Anita. “How long have they been—?”

  “Carrying on? Shacking up? Making love?” Anita’s dark eyes flashed suggestively. “A couple months. That I know of. Of course, it might have started back in New York.”

  “On that ‘particular day.’ ” Which had taken place in the east. “But no, probably not then. Mary isn’t impulsive.”

  “But Doug is. Doug’s like a little boy. He wants what he wants when he wants it. I’m not just his scenarist. I’m his babysitter.”

  “Scenarists.” I had to laugh. All the industry papers still referred to me as “Mary’s scenarist,” as if I had no name; as if I didn’t deserve one. In the eyes of the public, anyway, the person who wrote the films didn’t even exist; Mary’s fans assumed that Mary made everything up in front of the camera, she was so spontaneous, so natural. When we were mentioned, if you didn’t know the truth—and most outsiders didn’t—one would assume that “scenarist” was a fancy word for “secretary.”

  Anita laughed, too; she had a tinkling little giggle, bright as bells. “Scenarists, maids, beards. It’s all the same, isn’t it? Tidying up their image, on-screen or off.”

  I nodded, even as I yearned to contradict her. Because I’d thought—I’d assumed—that I was something more to Mary. We’ll never let a man get between us, will we, Fran? How many times had Mary told me this?

  I had to laugh at myself, my naïveté. It was ridiculous to think this could be true, completely. We were women, after all. Women, not schoolgirls. And women, even in this new, modern age, could never be completely independent of men. They would always shape us, I realized as I gave my horse an irritated little kick. For good or for bad. It was up to us to decide which.

  Two hours of riding and an aching back—not to mention backside—later, Anita and I met up with Doug and Mary back at the same location. With studied casualness, Mary and Doug wished each other a good day, in case anyone was within earshot. I blew a kiss at Anita, and merely nodded at Doug. He didn’t even look my way.

  Then Mary and I turned our horses in one direction, while Doug and Anita turned theirs in another.

  I vowed I would not say one word the entire way back to the stables, but Mary didn’t even notice. She smiled to herself the whole time, a dreamy, satisfied smile, and she sighed at intervals. So that’s how it is, I thought. She’s not even going to talk to me about him.

  However, after we handed our horses over to a pair of stable boys and walked back to our cars, Mary suddenly threw her arms about me, hugging me so tightly, I gave a little cry.

  “Thank you, Fran. Thank you! I’ve been wanting to tell you about this, but I was—I was afraid, you see. Afraid of what you might say. I was afraid of—well, everything. Everyone. But for some reason, especially, I was afraid of you. Isn’t that silly?” Mary looked up at me uncertainly, and of course, I wanted to reassure her—isn’t that how I always felt around Mary? As if I was responsible for her happiness.

  But strangely—unaccountably—I couldn’t.
Not this time—and how was that? How was this the very first time I couldn’t tell Mary exactly what she wanted to hear? Was I that resentful at having this sprung on me? At being forced into a role I hadn’t sought? Or was I jealous—petty, but still, I could admit to myself I was capable of it—to see Mary so completely blissful because of someone other than me?

  Because of a man?

  I didn’t know which it was. All I knew was that before I could stop myself, I blurted out, “But are you sure he isn’t using you to further his own career?”

  Mary froze, then she balled her fists. Her eyes glittered dangerously, and she took a step away from me, pretending to examine the soles of her riding boots. Finally, with some effort, she looked up.

  “You don’t know him like I do, Frances. I’ll ignore this, because you haven’t really had a chance to get to know Douglas.”

  “No, that’s true…”

  “And besides!” Mary shook her head and almost stomped her foot, like she did in her movies, but seemed to catch herself in time. “You’ve had yours! Why can’t I have mine?”

  My face burned and my eyes swam with furious—but not guilty! No, I had nothing to apologize for!—tears. Yes, I “had” mine; yes, I enjoyed sleeping with men. But never a married man. I’d never realized until now that Mary must have been envious of some aspects of my life and frankly, I never thought that was possible.

  All I knew was that I’d begun the day as Mary’s closest friend, and now we were on the verge of our very first argument—

  Because of a man.

  Carefully—oh, I chose my words with such deliberation; much more than I’d ever chosen any words before—I tried to end this before either of us said anything we could never take back.

  “I only want you to be happy, Mary. Truly, that’s all I want for you.”

  Mary nodded—also carefully, warily; we were studying each other as if we’d only just met—then I stepped into my roadster as Mary opened the door to her car. Adjusting the cracked rearview mirror outside the driver’s door—Oh, I must fix that thing one day!—I hastily dabbed at my eyes. With another cautious wave, returned as gingerly, I eased the car into gear and started to drive back to my bungalow in Hollywoodland.

  Now that I had an entire day ahead of me—a day without Mary—I decided to take the long way home. So I wound my way around canyons, up hills, occasionally marveling at the changes that had occurred to this part of California since I’d arrived five years ago. So many more buildings, neighborhoods laid out in winding grids, orange groves plowed under for studios. More roads, too; now I could easily drive either down to the sea or up to the mountains where before, it might take all day if you didn’t take the trolley.

  This was my home, my life; my career, that career I’d longed for, worked so very hard to achieve. I had it all now. These were the golden years.

  Weren’t they?

  I looked down and saw that my hands were waving, brushing the steering wheel, my fingers tracing the air. Restless hands to match your restless mind. Mother might also have added, and restless heart. For my mind and my heart, both, were in turmoil; leaping about, seeking more, always more. Yes, my career was fulfilling. Yes, I had worked tremendously hard to achieve this place. Yet my bed remained empty at night. And the movies we were making, while fun and creatively fulfilling, lacked a certain purpose. Mary might not mind the dismissive glance of a Cecil B. DeMille, but I did. Our movies were entertaining and beloved but I still hadn’t done what I’d dreamed of after seeing The Birth of a Nation; I hadn’t shaken things up, enforced my vision on a project. Always—always—I picked up my pencil with Mary’s image before me, Mary’s needs, Mary’s vision.

  Oh, Fran. Listen to you. I glanced down at my fashionable riding habit, newly purchased. The leather boots, which I took to the cobbler to have cleaned and polished every week. Entertaining films made money, pots of money, and I had to admit I didn’t mind the fruits of my labors. The roadster, the spacious house. Maybe someday I would buy a place of my own.

  But I couldn’t really envision it, buying a house of my own without someone to share it with. And then I realized that I must have been thinking that maybe, someday, Mary and I would buy a house together. How absurd, really. How childish. But truly, I wasn’t able to envision any life for myself in Hollywood without Mary the central figure in it. And how pathetic was that?

  Drying a few pitying tears, I pushed the starter, and shuddered along with the engine as it started up. Then I put the car in gear and nosed out onto the dusty road, this time heading home. Marion Benson Owens de Lappe Pike—I glanced at my reflection in that cracked mirror and had a good hearty laugh at my own expense. You are the luckiest woman in the world. Instead, you’re acting like a pathetic little schoolgirl whose best friend decided to sit with someone else at lunch.

  I pulled to a stop in front of my bungalow—yes, it was very nice, much nicer than the one I’d once rented next to Mary, proof that I had grown up a little, after all. I snapped the cracked mirror off and carried it inside; I would replace it first thing on Monday. Life was too short to spend looking into a disfiguring mirror. I deserved better.

  Sorting through the mail inside my front door, I was delighted to spy a letter from Elsie Janis among the bills—too many bills—from the dressmakers. Pouring myself a glass of lemonade, I opened it, my mind not really on the contents. Once more, I was thinking of Mary. Should I telephone to apologize? Or let things blow over, wait until we were back on set on Monday and let our shared work, which had brought us together in the first place, heal the rift? Sighing, I scanned Elsie’s letter.

  Hey Fran, fearless cavewoman in arms! Don’t you know there’s a war on? Leave Hollywood and its tinsel behind and get your ass over here to Europe where everything is awful and heartbreaking but so much more REAL than anything you will ever experience in California. What are you waiting for?

  Movies, romance, publicity, hurt feelings, petty jealousies—what did any of it matter now that America was headed to war? What was I doing, hiding out in Hollywood and missing out on the most important experience of my generation? This was exactly what I needed to shake me out of myself. There had to be a way to use my skills and my connections to record the heartbreak, the cataclysm, of war. No—to record the heartbreak of women at war. Because there already were enough movies being made about the soldiers. But surely, there were plenty of women “over there.” Women like me who needed something important to do. Something bigger to contemplate than our own petty sorrows.

  I raced to the telephone. But who should I call? I didn’t know anyone in Washington, at the War Department, but surely I knew someone who did—

  Of course. Yes, I certainly knew someone who had connections in Washington. Someone I knew who could help me; I had only to ask.

  Picking up the phone, I didn’t even have to look it up. I knew Mary’s number by heart.

  Mary, too, drove home from the stables with her mind all aflutter—even more than her heart. Unlike her friend, she did not possess the gift of storytelling, at least not with words. She’d always found it difficult to articulate her innermost thoughts; she had learned the lesson, far too well, of saving everything for the camera.

  But if she could have talked to Fran, dear Fran, she would have told her that she couldn’t help it—and she’d tried! Oh, how she’d tried to forget him! But there was no forgetting the moment that Douglas Fairbanks had, on a miserable November day in 1915, literally swept her off her feet. Although at the time, she’d been more concerned about ruining her very best pair of boots, Russian kid and white as snow.

  What had driven her, that “particular day,” to grab Douglas’s wife by the arm and declare, “Beth, we’re not going to let Elsie get away with that, are we? We need to protect our property!” Normally, Mary would never have been so bold. And, frankly, she hadn’t wanted to be at the party, anyway; this was back when she was worried about the Famous Players–Jesse Lasky merger, and would have preferred looking at her
grosses rather than going to a farewell party for Elsie Janis. But Owen had insisted they had to attend, to wish Elsie well before she left for Europe to entertain the British troops. And Mary refused to give him the satisfaction of saying “My wife couldn’t be bothered to join me.”

  So what had possessed her, on that particular day, to be so rash, so daring?

  It was the way Elsie had simply stolen her husband, and Beth Fairbanks’s husband, too. Owen Moore and Douglas Fairbanks were marched away from their wives by little Elsie Janis, who linked arms with the two of them and called over her shoulder, “I hope you don’t mind me borrowing your husbands, ladies!”

  And Beth Fairbanks hadn’t appeared to mind at all! A sweet, rather placid cow of a woman, she’d been content to stay inside in front of the warm fire and gossip with the other guests, which included Fran.

  But Mary had not.

  “C’mon, Beth! We have to go after them!” And so she found herself—in her best white kid boots—tramping after Elsie, Owen, and Douglas in the miserable, rainy weather, desperately trying to keep up. But the grounds of Elsie’s rented estate in New Jersey were muddy and rutted; the three, laughing and chatting gaily, were far ahead when Beth simply gave up.

  “I’m cold, Mary,” she announced. “I’m going back.”

  “Well, I’m not!” And Mary’s Irish was up; she may not have wanted Owen for herself, but she most certainly didn’t want anyone else to have him.

  The trio had disappeared around a bend when Mary, plunging on, came to a little creek. It wasn’t very deep, but it was wide, and there was no way she could get across it without ruining her boots. But there was a log—a narrow, precarious log—that had fallen across the creek. She stepped gingerly on it and felt it sway back and forth.