Jessie Keane: Playing Dead

‘But you’re with her.’

Rocco stood up. They’d had this same conversation many times; it never got them anywhere. ‘I’ll see you here on Friday. We’ll take the boat out on the Sound, how’s that?’ he said hopefully.

His companion was hard-eyed for a moment. ‘What, and you’ll screw me again in the cabin, where no one can see?’ Then the look faded to a faint smile, remembering . . . ‘Ah, all right. You got me, you know you have.’

Smiling, Rocco moved out of the booth. He looked around and then dropped a quick kiss onto Frances Ducane’s almost effeminately smooth cheek.

‘It’s you I love,’ Rocco repeated, against Frances’s skin. ‘Goodbye, my darling.’

And then he was gone, leaving the young man sitting alone at the table, wondering why he always, always had to play second fiddle in life. Now it was to his lover’s wife, but before that he had lived in the long shadow cast by his father, Rick Ducane.

Chapter 6

1938

Before Rick Ducane became a big Hollywood star and household name, he’d been Lionel Driver, a struggling British actor. Frances had inherited his russet hair; he had the identical penetrating grey eyes. Lionel had looked like an aristocrat. He had his own father to thank for that, a good-looking chancer who had married and then cheerfully abandoned his mother with her bad nerves and her whining little voice.

Lionel’s voice was the first obstacle of many he had to overcome. Born within the sound of Bow bells, he had a pronounced Cockney accent, and it was a bugger to lose. But lose it he did, practising his vowel sounds hour upon hour in the stone-cold and stinking privy in the backyard behind their tenement building.

‘Fuckin’ toff ,’ his schoolmates snarled at him.

They’d shoved him against a wall, kicked him, then stolen his meagre pocket money.

Lionel didn’t care.

He had plans.

He worked in a series of dead-end jobs until his twenties, then, without regret, he left his mum and the slums of the East End to go to Stratford-upon-Avon and start trying his luck in auditions. He worked hard, even if it was mostly unrewarded, painting backgrounds, helping with props. But then he got a small break, and started treading the boards in walk-on parts, and was approached by an agent.

On the advice of his new agent, he then abandoned the stage and went to try to make his name in Hollywood. Once or twice he even hung out hopefully around the constellation of bright stars that haunted every party. Lana Turner, Spencer Tracey, Clark Gable – they were all there, and all far too high-powered to acknowledge the existence of a handsome starstruck stranger from quaint little England.

‘What we need here is an angle,’ said his agent.

Or for you to get me some fucking work , thought Lionel. But he asked, ‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, you’ve been a Shakespearean actor. A real thespian. ’

‘Only in walk-on parts though.’

‘Who cares?’

So Lionel’s résumé now stated that he’d played the lead in King Lear to rave reviews. But even that didn’t get him off the breadline. Nobody wanted an English hero right then, and he was too good-looking to play the part of the hero’s chubby best friend.

One day he was waiting with around twenty other hopefuls at yet another audition, this time for a small part – a destitute man – in a Warner Brothers movie. It was only a walk-on, but he was desperate and bloody near destitution himself.

As usual, his bowels turned to liquid at precisely the wrong moment – he was next but one up – and he had to go off to find the toilet. He passed two men fiddling with one of the new smoke machines. A crowd of people hurried past. Was that brilliantly stylish blonde at the centre of them Barbara Stanwyck . . .? He walked on, looking back, entranced by the allure of stardom, the way that cluster of people stuck to her like iron filings around a powerful magnet. He wanted that. But was he going to get it?

He was starting to seriously doubt himself. Maybe these endless rejections were a sign that he was never going to make it. And Warners were a bunch of slave-drivers anyway. Everyone in the building called the place San Quentin after the notorious prison. Did he want to work for people who drove their staff – even their stars – so hard?

Well . . . yes. He did. Anything they wanted, he’d do. He had to get there. But this was getting to be the last-chance saloon now. This was his last audition, he’d promised himself. If he didn’t succeed today, then he was going home. Not to his old mum in the East End, sod that ; but back to England, to try his luck again there.

He missed England. There’d been trouble there, he knew, rumblings from Europe over a jumped-up little German leader – Führer, he called himself – Adolf Hitler. But now Chamberlain had the new Anglo-German accord in his hand, everyone was relieved and peace was guaranteed.

But maybe – just this once – he’d break the mould, get the part . . .?

‘No fucking chance,’ he muttered, and found the john, did what he had to do, and then emerged. He might have missed his place, but if he hurried . . .

‘I don’t care what you say, a deal’s a deal,’ said a tearful female voice from further down the corridor.

Lionel hesitated and peered into the dimness. A vivid blonde was standing there with a man, and for a moment he thought it was Stanwyck herself, but he quickly realized it wasn’t; this was a red-nosed, teary-eyed kid, no shining star.

‘And I don’t care what you say.’ The man leaning over her was a big bruiser, dark-haired and red with fury, shouting into her upturned face. ‘There’s no job. There never was.’

‘You said there was,’ she insisted.

‘You got proof of that?’ He let out a bark of laughter. ‘No? Thought not. So why don’t you just fuck off, sweetheart. Don’t come around my place of work making accusations again or you’ll be sorry.’

‘You bastard ,’ she sobbed. ‘You promised . . .’

‘I promised nothing.’ Now he was grinning down at her. He slipped one hand inside her blouse and roughly squeezed her tit. The girl let out a yelp of pain. ‘But if you want to try and read through again, be my guest. The last reading was shit, but baby, you were hot .’

Lionel stepped out from the dimness of the corridor. ‘What the hell’s going on here?’ he asked loudly.

Stupid question. It was clear as day what was happening.

‘What’s it to you?’ asked the man, instantly pushing the girl away from him.

Lionel found himself going forward, even while his brain was saying: The audition, you’ll miss the audition . . .

Are you all right?’ he asked the girl.

‘She’s fine,’ said the man bullishly. ‘Just sore ’cos she didn’t get the part.’

‘He promised me a part,’ said the girl. She was pretty, Lionel saw. Her tears had dried and now she just looked furious. ‘If I . . . you know.’ She went red and stopped speaking.

‘What we have here is a little misunderstanding,’ said the man. ‘We had some fun together and the lady thought that meant—’

He didn’t even finish the sentence before Lionel hit him, hard. He went crashing back against the wall, and slid to the floor.

‘Come on,’ said Lionel, grabbing the girl’s hand.

‘Is he going to be all right . . .?’ They were walking away, but she was glancing back, worried.

‘Do you care?’ asked Lionel, hurrying away.

‘No.’ A smile appeared briefly on her face.

‘I’m Lionel Driver, by the way,’ he said.

‘Vivienne Bell.’