Stein drew a deep breath. "Well, how did you like Glenda? I'm sorry you don't like her, Miss Cord."
"I'd like to meet her," said Bat.
"She has to do another show," said Stein. "After that she'll be totally exhausted. I'll go back and speak to her. She might meet with you for five minutes tonight. Tomorrow ... maybe for lunch."
4
Sam was wrong. Glenda Grayson came to their table after her second show, sat down, and accepted a Scotch from Bat. They could not talk, though. People in the nightclub came to their table to say they had enjoyed her performance or to ask for her autograph.
"Let's go up to my suite," she said. "We can have a drink there without all this."
"Aren't you tired?" asked Sam.
"I want to talk to this man," said Glenda. "After all, he came all the way to Los Angeles to see me. I'll see you at lunch, Sam."
Jo-Ann was insightful enough to understand that she was being dismissed, too.
In her suite, Glenda poured Scotch for Bat and poured a shot of vodka into a large glass of orange juice. She was not wearing a costume from her act, just a rather ordinary white blouse and a black skirt.
"You are supposed to be totally exhausted," said Bat.
"I am," she said. "You might not believe this, Bat, but I lose two or three pounds during an evening. Then I gain it back the next day. It's loss of fluid, mostly. I sweat. Then I drink a quart of orange juice and — "
Glenda Grayson was a slender blonde with a good figure and an extraordinarily expressive face. Jo-Ann had called her performance on the stage frenetic, which it had been, and now, being alone with her, Bat saw that the woman was incapable of relaxation. She was possessed by a sort of irrepressible tension that perhaps released her only when she was asleep. It was difficult to think she was comfortable, or ever could be.
Her performance on the nightclub stage had been dynamic, as she danced, sang, and delivered comic one-liners in rapid-fire succession. When she began a line with her catch phrase "V wouldn' b'lieve it," her audiences began to laugh before she told them what it was they wouldn't believe.
She used no coarse language in her act. Her comedy did not rely on titillating or scatological references, but a heady eroticism was never far beneath the surface, meticulously contrived to achieve the maximum effect from subtlety. She was good at that. She changed costumes twice during each performance. The final costume was a form-fitting red dress that was fastened up the back with Velcro and could be torn off in one movement. At the end she tore it off and sang and danced in a red corselette with garters holding up dark stockings. People seeing her act for the first time felt sure she would tear off the corselette, too, and stand revealed at the end either naked or in something sensationally brief. But she didn't.
She was thirty-two years old and had been a star nightclub performer for thirteen years. She had appeared on network television a score of times, always as a guest on someone else's variety hour or talk show. She'd wanted a special of her own but had never had one. She had wanted a movie of her own but had never had one. Her name was known to nearly everyone — but at a level well below that of superstar. She was one of the top fifty performers in the United States, maybe, but certainly not one of the top ten.
"You like the act?" she asked Bat. She was not accustomed to having to ask the question, but he had not said anything.
"Oh, sure. You've got a lot of talent. I've just been wondering how it can be packaged for a television series — assuming it can be packaged."
"Cord Television?"
"No. Cord Productions."
"What are you thinking about?"
"I'm thinking about a weekly show. The Glenda Grayson Show. But I'm thinking about how to do it. You can't repeat the act once a week. Even if you could stand the strain, we couldn't come up with enough material to let you do a forty-minute performance once a week. You've got a great act. But you can't do it time and again, time and again, week after week."
She nodded. "I don't repackage at intervals," she said. "If you see my shtick a month from now, you'll see it's different. Next month, more different. By the time I get back to The Roman Circus for next year's show, it will be all different. Different songs, different dancing, new costumes — but all worked in gradually over the course of the year. That's how I work. I may try something different tomorrow night, just to see how it works. If it bombs, I fix it or drop it. That's the great thing about club acts. You can tinker with them. TV — " She shrugged. "You go on the air with a bit and it falls flat, you've fallen flat. You don't have a chance to fix it. Tough damned medium, TV."
She poured more orange juice into her glass, without adding vodka.
"Does Sam make your decisions?" he asked.
"Sam finds opportunities," she said. "I choose. I make my own career decisions."
"Would you be interested in trying to work something out?" he asked. "A weekly show. The Glenda Grayson Show."
"Sure."
"Then I work with you. Or Sam?"
"With me. And Sam. He's a great guy. I'm not gonna shut him out. But he's the business side of things. We make a deal, he'll negotiate the contract."
Bat reached across the table and took her hand in his. "We could come up with something real great, you and I," he said quietly.
Glenda put her other hand to her face and used a finger to wipe the corners of her eyes. "Hey," she whispered. "Careful. I'm a sucker for handsome shkotzim. I've made a fool of myself more than once."
"Shkotzim?"
She grinned and closed her hand around his. "Guys that're not Jewish," she said.
"Glenda ..."
He rose and walked around the little table to stand behind her. He put a hand on her curly blond hair and found it stiff. He realized he was touching hairspray. Throughout her energetic performance her hair remained in place because of spray lacquer.
"Another word," she said. "Shiksa. It doesn't just mean non-Jewish girl, like you may think. My family calls me shiksa. It means a Jewish girl who tries to act like a gentile. They spit the word."
"Glenda ..." He ran his hand along her cheek.
She turned and looked up at him, smiling tearfully. "My real name is Golda Graustein. But why do I tell you this? You didn't ask for an education in the peculiarities of my background and family. I'm sorry, Bat."
He bent down and kissed her forehead. "If it helps you at all, any way at all, then tell me," he said.
"Are you going to stay with me tonight?" she asked abruptly.
Bat nodded. He was surprised but was not going to pass up the opportunity.
"You don't know what you're getting into," she said. "Glenda falls in love. Glenda makes a fool of herself."
"So do I," he said.
She stood and began taking off her clothes. Besides the blouse and skirt she was wearing a bra and panties, garter belt and stockings. In a minute she was naked. She had a beautiful body, oddly white as if she never exposed it to the sun. She had no swimsuit marks. The contrast between her bright pink nipples and the white skin of her breasts was fascinating.
"C'mon, baby," she said. "I wanta see you, too."
Glenda grew visibly excited as Bat stripped. She winced when she saw the bullet-wound scar on his chest, but her eyes stayed on it only an instant before they dropped to his loins as he pulled down his shorts.
"Oh, marvelous!" she whispered. "Not mutilated. Not circumcised. My uncle is a mohel. He cuts little boys. I hate it. Bring it to me, Bat! Oh, God, I want it!"