The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse grossed Metro five million dollars and saved it from bankruptcy. The studio was saved. Spirits were buoyed by the news all over the lot. June and Molly stopped by the Nazimova Productions’ office and asked me if I wanted to go to lunch – and to a real lunch; not just a walk across the lot to the commissary.

            I was delighted to spend some time with Molly again, even though it was painfully clear that she was madly devoted to June.

            We had lunch at Barstow’s, an upscale eatery not far from Metro – it was close enough to walk. It catered to studio big shots and department heads, like June. “So what is it like at home?” June started in. “What’s it like living with the pair of them?”

            I wasn’t expecting to be interrogated, least of all by someone as gentle and mild-mannered as June.

            “It’s – unusual,” I said.

            “But is it true that Natacha Rambova is acting as Valentino’s manager now?”

            “Yes, it’s true,” I said. “He’s agreed to it and he seems very excited about the idea.”

            June looked dismayed. “It’s a mistake,” she said. “That woman is nothing but trouble. The very least of it is that she’s not very nice. How you put up with her is a mystery to me – to both of us, frankly.” She indicated Molly in this pronouncement. I looked at Molly. “I couldn’t rightly stay on with Alla indefinitely,” I said. “I had no life there. You know that. At least I have a job now – I’m employed. It’s enough money to get by on. I can buy clothes, for one thing. And I can take my time figuring out who it is I might possibly want to marry.”

            Molly said quietly, “You don’t have to justify it, Rose. We know why you left Alla. We just wonder how you put up with it. It’s a bit like jumping from the frying pan right into the fire. Rambova’s a bitch. Madame might have been a handful, but she was never a bitch.”

            “No,” I agreed. “She never was that.”

            “But it’s just work, right?” Molly asked in earnest. “I mean, what do you really do for Rambova? Are you some sort of secretary or something? A personal assistant?”

            “Yes, that’s it.” I didn’t know why I felt the sudden need to lie to Molly. But it felt demoralizing, admitting to either of them that I was strangely attracted to a woman they held in such low esteem.

            “Well, that’s a relief to know.”

            “Why are you even asking me this? What’s going on?”

            June said, “Well, Rambova has a reputation for being one of the girls, but the only women she’s ever in the company of are Nazimova and you. Now that she’s living in that bungalow with Rudy and without Paul… Well, we were just curious what the set up was. How you factored into the picture. Are those two in love with each other now?”

            I sipped my iced tea and studied June’s face; really studied it. She was in love with Valentino, too, I realized.

            “Things have gotten unpleasant at the studio,” Molly went on in a voice just barely above a whisper. “Dick Rowland found Valentino so hard to deal with on the last picture that they don’t feel inclined to give him anymore work.”

            “It was Rambova who was making him behave so crazily,” June cut in. “It really was all her fault, feeding him those constant ideas that he was better than everybody and that Rex Ingram was favoring his wife in the scenes that they had together. Rudy really was behaving like a spoiled child – not like the Rudy I knew.”

            “What’s worse,” Molly cut in, “is that Metro has plenty of money now but they don’t want to give June her promised raise. There’s a very hot property she’s set her sights on adapting into a photoplay and she’s not sure she wants to stay at Metro.”

            I was shocked. I looked at June. “You want to jump ship?” I said.

            She nodded her head. “I want to take the property over to Lasky and – and this is strictly between us, Rosemary, we have to have your word on it.”

            “Okay, you have my word.” In fact, I was all ears; I couldn’t wait to hear.

            “I want to bring Valentino with me. I know he would be perfect for the role. It’s based on that E. M. Hull book, The Sheik.”

            I’d heard of the book; who hadn’t? It was a scandal. “But that’s practically pornographic,” I said breathlessly.

            “But it’s the kind of part that would be perfect for Valentino,” June insisted. “And if I take the property and Valentino to Lasky, both of us will more than likely start earning the kind of money we deserve now. But all of it could fall apart if Rambova gets mixed up in it. She has no finesse with studio bosses. I don’t want her to have any part in it.”

            I was floored by the news. And I was dying to tell Mitch – one of his dreams, to have Valentino over with Lasky, just might be coming true.

            June looked at me dead-on. “So?”

            “So?” I said.

            “Are the two sleeping together? Do they share a bed? Is it even going to be possible to orchestrate this sort of coup without Rambova getting wind of it beforehand?”

            “I give you my word they are not sleeping together.”

            “Really?” They were relieved but it was clear that both Molly and June found this bit of information strangest of all.

            “Really,” I said. “They have separate bedrooms.” I was quick to add: “We all do.” It created a very false impression of what actually went on in the bungalow, but technically, it was the truth. All of us had our own rooms. “Keeping Natacha from getting wind of this, though; that’s another story. He tells her everything.”

            “Then I’ll simply have to work fast,” June said. “I’ll have to pick him up in my car and take him over to Lasky without giving him any briefing beforehand about why we’re going.”

            It seemed like a crazy scheme; all this secrecy, just to keep Valentino’s so-called manager out of the picture in order to help further Valentino’s career.

            “Well,” I said. “He’s back at the bungalow right now, alone. As you well know, he has nothing to do -- he’s between pictures.”

                                          *    *   *

             It was Natacha’s turn to break things in the bungalow. Dishes flew across the kitchen and shattered against the wall. All the many animals scrambled under furniture for shelter – including little Zeta the lion cub who wasn’t quite so little anymore – and I fled to the safety of my room. I prayed that June hadn’t mentioned my name to Rudy in connection with any part of the Famous-Players Lasky plan. I didn’t want to be the target of any flying plates.

            “We had an agreement,” Natacha shrieked. “I make the decisions about your career – not that blasted June Mathis.” For emphasis, another plate shattered against the wall.

            “But they’ve offered me five-hundred dollars a week plus the lead in The Sheik!”

            “Five hundred dollars is not enough! And The Sheik isn’t art – it’s a piece of trash!”

            The argument went on all night, with Rudy claiming that the role of The Sheik appealed to him greatly, even if it wasn’t art. And that at least five hundred dollars a week was better than the four hundred dollars a week he’d been getting at Metro. He considered himself lucky that Jesse Lasky was even willing to buy out his contract.

            “That shows you what a fool you are! If he was that willing, you could have gotten more money – you ass!”

            “Stop calling me that!”

            “But you’re behaving like one!”

            “Then I’ll talk to Lasky tomorrow and get more money.”

            “I’m supposed to do that. Me – your manager!”

            “Just let me talk to the man!”

            Another plate went flying. “Fuck your mother the whore,” she screamed.

            And that sealed it. She’d called Valentino’s sainted dead mother a whore.  A hail of what sounded like Italian obscenities boomed through the kitchen, something heavy slid across the room and Natacha screamed.

            I couldn’t help myself; I worried that she was really in peril. I ran into the kitchen and saw Valentino with a fist full of one of Natacha’s unraveling braids. His other hand – it wasn’t choking her, necessarily, but it was indeed around her throat – and he’d backed her up against the kitchen wall. “In Castellaneta, where I come from, a man beats his wife when she gets out of line.”

            “I’m not your wife,” she said icily.

            “You’re lucky.” And then he finally did it; he kissed her, right on the mouth. My heart shattered like the porcelain dishes that had smashed into the kitchen wall. I so dearly wished I hadn’t seen that. I hurried back into my room, before they could see me. I heard the two of them go upstairs but I never heard any footsteps in the room up above mine, not once the whole night and I lay awake in my bed until the sun was up...

    © 2011 Marilyn Jaye Lewis