Chapter 36
Thirty-Six
In the wider world, the three years following Gertie’s crisis were marked by the false promise of imminent economic recovery and by the very real threat of war. Japan attacked China. In Munich, the European allies betrayed Czechoslovakia to placate Hitler.
In the smaller world of the Bram, Lynette Rollins proved to be a superb estate manager.
She had hired a woman named Leda Zentner to take Victoria Symington’s place as head housekeeper and a younger woman, Peggy Powell, to assume the position from which Lynette had been elevated.
Leda and Peggy adapted to the Fairchild universe as though it had all the same habits and quirks as their own families.
Three years had passed without significant drama.
On the last Monday evening in June, the entire family, minus one, plus the estate’s seven employees and two of their husbands (Harmony’s Allen and Peggy Powell’s Tommy), boarded a chartered bus to be taken from the Bram to Los Angeles for dinner and a special treat.
The owner of the Palomar Ballroom billed the place as “the largest and most famous dance hall on the West Coast.” It was a restaurant, a bar, a nightclub, a dance hall, and a concert hall all in one, providing seating for ten thousand.
Although you might think a nightclub would remind me of my speakeasy days and conjure bad memories, I was excited and eager to see the fabled Palomar.
When we arrived, our driver angled to the curb in front of an illegally parked Cadillac limousine.
Two passengers exited the limo to greet us—Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn.
They had starred in a pair of hits that year—Bringing Up Baby, which had been released in February, and the recent Holiday.
They had come because they were friends of Loretta and Franklin; however, they were also here for a higher purpose.
In the twilight, the immense Spanish Colonial building glowed as if it were made of translucent alabaster, and signal lamps shone at the top of up-lighted minarets.
Here, in 1935, Benny Goodman’s orchestra broke through the wall of bad luck and pop arrangements that had hampered it and went full swing.
Their one-month booking was extended to two months, leading to their ascendance thereafter.
Two formidable men in suits and ties, Pinkerton security agents arranged by Franklin, waited for us at the VIP entrance, which was well removed from the hundreds who stood in line to receive tickets at the box office.
The two agents were in possession of passes provided for the Fairchild party by the developer-owner of the property.
Pinkerton’s finest, each as intimidating as the former heavyweight champion Max Schmeling, shepherded us into the Palomar.
A brief objection by the door attendants was quieted with a try-me glare from the agents and by the doormen’s sudden realization that Mr. Grant and Miss Hepburn, already Hollywood royalty, were with us.
Four tables were roped off to separate our party from others on the palm-lined Palomar Terrace.
We had direct access to the dance floor, which seemed as big as a football field, although we weren’t there to dance.
Directly across the room from us, the stage waited for the big band, while a house trio provided welcoming but far from hot music.
The Moorish decor featured lighting both dazzling and romantic.
Two-thirds of the tables were already occupied.
Glasses clinked. Flatware rang against china.
Young women’s laughter trilled through the arches between the columns that framed the dance floor.
I’d lived so many years in the smoke-free Bram, the cigarette haze was more pungent to me than to those who produced it, but it also possessed an exotic quality that enhanced the Moorish atmosphere.
Although I was as small as ever I had been, I could prove I was twenty-five, and although I seldom indulged in alcohol, I ordered a dry martini.
Gertie, only eighteen, knew how to use her beauty and her deformed hand to forestall any challenge from the waiter when she ordered a grasshopper “with plenty of hop.” Harry was okay with a Coca-Cola.
If he’d been eighty, he would have been content with a cola.
His continuing interest in military history and history in general seemed to have conferred on him a gravitas that would rule out intoxication even when, in four years, he reached the legal age to indulge.
If the waiters or the management would have challenged any of us, they would have focused on Chef Lattuada, for at that point in its history, the Palomar enforced a strict color policy.
The developer of the ballroom retained a partial ownership position, and he owed a series of favors to Franklin and Loretta, so he gave us VIP passes even knowing others in the management would not have done so as long as our Luigi was with us.
Chef would have stayed home without a fuss, but there was no way in hell we were going to see Isadora perform without her much-loved honorary uncle here to share the moment.
Two years earlier, after a dozen auditions with California-based orchestras failed to get her work, Izzy was more driven than ever to be part of the jazz scene.
She was a Fairchild, after all, and Fairchilds were motivated by rejection as much as they were inspired by success.
Although the big band sound swept the nation, the heart of the scene was the East Coast, which provided more posh hotels, nightclubs, dance halls, resorts, and suitable venues than the rest of the country combined.
Scores of bands stayed within that fruitful territory, though the best toured coast to coast. The Northwest birthed some good musicians but wasn’t a flashpoint for new sounds that excited the nation.
After doing research through music magazines, Izzy packed and moved, at eighteen, to Seattle, where it was said that most local bands avoided ballads because they couldn’t find vocalists who were equivalent to national sweethearts like Doris Day and June Christy and Helen Forrest. She was hired by a ten-piece band that had steady bookings from Seattle to Spokane and south to Portland.
Four months later, she was approached by Tommy Dorsey, whose band was in Seattle on tour.
Soon she sang with Dorsey when Edythe Wright had the night off and on other nights did a duet or two with her.
Tommy, “the Sentimental Gentleman of Swing,” created moods with music that made his orchestra one of the best of all dance bands and the very best for ballads.
However, Edythe had—and had earned—billing, while Isadora was an “also appearing” named only from the stage; her opportunities were limited.
This night, we were at the Palomar to witness what might be Izzy’s big break or at least the beginning of a slow move to bigger things.
This was also her first appearance close to home, and we Bramleyans were determined to be there in full force to support our girl.
Only Rafael remained at home, and we would have brought him with us if we could have figured out how to disguise a ninety-pound dog as Izzy’s grandmother.
Tommy Dorsey’s band was a great one, and Bob Crosby’s was near great at times.
The orchestra was owned by its musicians and run by Gil Bowers, the pianist. Bob, the brother of Bing, was the likable leader and singer.
They had gone through a series of girl vocalists during the previous year, but they signed Izzy as the only female singer for the length of this tour.
We had spoken on the phone with her earlier in the day, between rehearsals.
She had been excited but surprisingly composed.
She no longer sounded like the girl who left the Bram for Seattle little more than one year ago.
Of course I recognized her voice, but she seemed more than just a year older.
She sounded like a grown woman. Hearing her, I missed her more terribly, not solely because she had been away but also because I had not been with her to see her evolve from one Isadora to another.
She was most pleased that she’d become self-supporting.
Her parents had been sending her a monthly stipend, but in the Fairchild tradition, she’d needed to make it on her own, prove herself to herself rather than to anyone else.
As dessert was being served, the house trio concluded their session.
Minutes later, the MC introduced the Bob Crosby Orchestra.
The curtain rose, revealing all fourteen musicians ready to swing.
They broke into “The Big Noise from Winnetka,” a signature song of theirs.
At least two thousand people poured onto the dance floor, which the management claimed could accommodate four thousand couples.
Neither the music nor the dancers quite exhilarated me, but then I saw Izzy, and I could feel my heart pounding.
The piano stood to the left of the orchestra, with Gil Bowers at the keyboard, and Izzy sat to the right of the piano, left of Bob Crosby.
She looked beautiful and sophisticated, recognizably the young lady who had left home for Seattle but not much like the girl who led the Clyde Tombaugh Club on its late-night adventures.
The band played three more swinging numbers, and I could not recall ever having been more impatient in my life.