Гарольд Роббинс - The Raiders

Gib Dugan was one of the three male dancers in the chorus line, which meant he was not good enough to dance on Broadway. He was a big muscular good-looking guy, though; and, in Glenda's term, "hung like a horse." He satisfied her. She told herself she had learned enough to allow a guy to get in her pants but not to allow any guy, especially a goyish guy, to get into her head. Still, she had to admit she would be sorry if she lost this one.

"One or two won't hurt anything," he said. "C'mon. Ernie was a great guy, but — "

"No buts, Gib. We have to work." She glanced a final time at the corpse of her mentor. "Ernie ... How'm I gonna get jobs without him?"

They worked two shows, and when they went home to her flat in Brooklyn, she was again tearful. Performing exhausted her, and while she was in the shower, Gib poured her a heavy Scotch over ice and handed it past the curtain. She drank while the water was still pouring over her and managed to relax.

She sat then in her living room, naked except for the towel that soon fell down, with the Scotch almost exhausted. He put in two more ice cubes and poured her some more.

"Ernie," she whispered tearfully.

"There was a limit to Ernie, Glenda," Gib said. "There was a limit to his vision. You can do better than anything he could ever get you."

"C'mon. Meaning what?"

"You gotta get out of New York, baby. You've done all you can do here. Look at it. Things are changing. The hotels have quiet lounges. They want a gal who can play the piano and sing — but not so loud it interferes with the business talk over the tables. Clubs. There are fewer and fewer every year. The ones that survive have gone over to strippers. You wanta work with stripteasers? You wanta take off your clothes on stage?"

"So what the shit am I supposed to do?"

"Gotta get out of town," said Gib. "The Poconos. Miami Beach. Texas. L.A."

Glenda tossed back her Scotch. "Yeah, sure. I got an offer to make some party records."

"No," he said firmly.

"What do you mean, no?"

"That won't do your reputation any good. You got a name as a club act. You — "

She put her hand on his crotch. "Don't gimme advice," she said. "Gimme what you got better of."

"Sure. In a minute. But be serious, Glenda. You gotta get a new agent. Hey. Let me make a couple of calls. I know some people. Maybe I can get you something out of town."

"Maybe it was G-d's will," said her mother.

"God? The man was my friend ."

"You thought so. And what about this shegetz you are seeing now? Is he your friend? The Katholischer ?"

"He is my friend."

They sat together in her family's living room on a Thursday afternoon. Rabbi Mordecai Graustein was, as always when his daughter visited, absent. Glenda stared at the crocheted antimacassars on the chairs, which had seemed so natural, inevitable in fact, when she was a girl and looked so antiquated now. She had come to the house in a cab, her head uncovered — without in fact bringing anything to cover it. That year shorter skirts were in fashion — it was women's patriotic duty to save fabric — and hers crept back above her knees when she sat. She was out of place in her own home.

"It is not too late for you, Golda," her mother said. "It is never too late for hope, always too early for despair."

"Which means what, Mother?"

"You did not marry Nathan. You should have married Nathan. He is a fine educated young rabbi, with a reputation that will one day rival your father's. And he married a girl who knew how to respect him. But there is another. This young man came late to his studies, but he is devout in them. He is rich! His father died and left him more than two hundred thousand dollars, which is what allows him to leave business and take up his studies. He wants only a devoted wife. Your father is sure you could win him."

"I have no interest in winning him," said Glenda.

Her mother lowered her chin to her chest. "We try to save you, Golda. Even your father, who will not see you, prays constantly for you."

"For me to become what?" Glenda asked coldly.

"Do something then for your mother. Answer me this question — Are you happy?"

Glenda drew a deep breath. "I cannot say I am happy. I am not unhappy, but — "

"Then. If you will not try to earn the respect of this fine young man, then do something else for me. You remember Mrs. Gruenwald — the Gruenwald family? They had the delicatessen on — "

"I remember them, Mother."

"Mrs. Gruenwald's son, Saul, is a doctor. He helps people who are unhappy. Go see him, Golda. He is what they call a psychiatrist."

"It was done to you before you could prevent it," Glenda said to Dr. Saul Grünwald. (He used the form Grünwald, rather than Gruenwald.) She held his limp penis in her hand. "I prefer the ones that aren't cut, though. Gib's isn't."

"What's better about it?" the psychiatrist asked, unable to conceal a touch of indignation.

"Why tell you, since there's nothing you can do about it?" Glenda asked with a grin. "You can't have it put back. If you'd had a choice, though, I'd suggest you should have said no."

"Are you in love with the shegetz ?"

"I'll tell you this. I will never fall in love with anyone who uses the word shegetz . Or nigger. Or kike."

Dr. Saul Grünwald was thirty-five years old and almost wholly bald. His brown eyes were beady. His solemnity had not forsaken him even when he was astride her. "Forgive," he said. "Old habits die hard."

"No, they don't," she said disdainfully.

Dr. Grünwald, who had been putting his clothes back on during this dialogue, frowned and glanced around the room. "The question we are addressing," he said, "is whether or not you are happy."

"I am for the moment," she said. "Since you just screwed me good. How will I feel at midnight tonight?"

"You must not depend on that."

"Only for occasional therapy? For which I pay?"

"Golda, you are a prisoner of your resentments. Beginning with resentment of your father — "

"Have I no right to resent? I think I do."

"If I were you, I would put aside the goy and try to make peace with my father."

"Who speaks through you?" she asked. "Freud or Moses? Is it also your advice that I marry a rabbinical student and settle down to a quiet life of housekeeping and childbearing?"

"You would not have come to me," he said, "if you were happy. If you were satisfied with yourself and with your life, you would not have sought out a psychiatrist. I know, your mother sent you to me. But you would not have come if you hadn't felt you needed help."

"Make peace with my father ... It could only be on his terms."

"What do you want, Golda? What do you want more than anything else?"

"I want a contract to do five weeks in a first-class out-of-town club."

In December 1942, when Glenda was just twenty years old, she worked in a strip club for the first time, in Miami. Gib Dugan, in spite of his having spoken scornfully about working with strippers, had made the deal for her and talked her into taking it. The contract was for two weeks at five hundred dollars a week, far more than she had ever made before.

Gib had promoted her to Mel Schmidt, the club owner, by promising him her borscht-belt humor would delight the Jews who still came to Miami in December in spite of the difficulties of wartime travel. It would delight GIs on leave, too, he had promised.

The owner bought Gib's idea, but he was adamant that she must appear in a costume appropriate to the club — meaning very little costume at all. She had signed a contract that specifically said she would work in "abbreviated costume, such as is worn by other performers at Casa Pantera." Gib had argued to Schmidt and to Glenda that a borscht-belt singer-dancer-comedienne working in strip-club deshabille would be a "dynamite attraction." Schmidt was so much convinced that he was advertising Glenda Grayson in the newspapers.