CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

As the jolly yuletide season approached, Bonnie Parker and a queen named Garbo were wandering down Third Avenue doing some Christmas shopping when they were approached by a cute boy. He said hello, so they said hello. The cute boy then pulled out a badge identifying him as a plainclothes policeman and arrested them on the charge of impersonating women. Luckily, Bonnie was wearing Mad Daddy’s raincoat, which he had lent to Gerry one night when it stormed and which Bonnie had mopped from the apartment, and it had a label in it from a men’s store. She was also wearing boy’s jeans. Therefore it was decided at the station house (where they were unceremoniously hauled, as Vincent/Bonnie later gleefully told Gerry, “along with all these rapists, muggers, Negroes, and other criminal types!”) that Vincent Abruzzi was not impersonating a woman after all, and just happened to have an unfortunate feminine appearance. As for his make-up, make-up was not illegal. He was let go, but poor Garbo had to raise bail. Neither Vincent nor Gerry told Mr. Libra, of course.

Gerry Thompson decided after some deliberation that she would not go home for Christmas, so she did her shopping early and mailed all the Christmas packages home by December fifteenth. She was busy planning her wedding to Mad Daddy. They decided it would be small and intimate, in a judge’s chambers, to be followed by a wild party at P. J. Clarke’s, which they would take over completely for the occasion. They thought a Third Avenue bar was just the right combination of informality and sophistication, although Mad Daddy rather leaned toward the zoo. (Gerry vetoed the zoo—Valentine’s Day would be too cold, and besides, who could get a permit?)

Sam Leo Libra was too fastidious to let anyone but himself do his Christmas shopping. He bought a white fox jacket with shoulder pads for Lizzie, because that was what she wanted, silver money clips with his own initials for each of the clients—except Sylvia Polydor, who got a silver goblet with his initials on it, to add to her collection—and a Gucci bag and wallet for Gerry. He had Gerry send out his usual five hundred Christmas cards, this year bearing a message of peace.

Although Bonnie Parker had not yet taken her screen test, Libra was negotiating for Dick Devere to direct her first film in a package deal, whatever it turned out to be. Libra was surprised and rather baffled when Dick flatly refused to direct Bonnie in any film, but after the success on Broadway of Mavis!, Dick could write his own ticket and there was nothing Libra could do. Dick Devere accepted a sophisticated tragi-comedy, and planned to leave for the Coast directly after the first of the year. He was going to spend Christmas in the Bahamas, where he had rented a bungalow on a deserted patch of beach.

The King James Version appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show, doing two numbers from their hit album of the Songs of Solomon, and received 2451 letters of praise, 1552 letters of condemnation, and a fifty-dollar check for “their church” from a confused viewer.

Shadrach Bascombe started costume fittings for his first film, in which he played a former boxer who was now a spy, and Libra engaged a ghost writer to pen Bascombe’s memoirs, highly expurgated.

Lizzie Libra’s analyst, Dr. Picker, left for two weeks in Acapulco, where the in-analysts were going this year, and included Lizzie in his Christmas-card list so she would remember to come back.

Lizzie was seriously considering returning to her doctor because of the unfortunate turn of events with Jared–Paul Newman. The joke had been a great success and had made all the columns, but Jared, for some crazy reason, had been very annoyed. He had decided that being passed off as Paul Newman was going to be the death of his embryonic career as an actor, and he had walked out of Lizzie’s life forever with some very harsh words. Lizzie telephoned him repeatedly, but he refused to have anything more to do with her. She was not upset, only confused. She felt lonely after he was gone, and thought it would be nice to have someone to talk to, so she phoned Dr. Picker’s office, found he was away for the Christmas holidays, and made an appointment for the first week in January.

Silky Morgan wheedled money out of Mr. Libra from her account for Christmas and bought Bobby La Fontaine a mink-lined raincoat. She would have bought him a mink coat, but he wouldn’t wear it. She sent her family gifts costing ten dollars apiece, because they hadn’t been very nice to her lately, she decided.

Bobby La Fontaine, who’d given up his former clients, took a set of diamond studs he was particularly fond of and had them set into a dainty little bracelet for Silky. He’d managed to set aside a bit of money because Silky was paying all their living bills, but as it turned out he didn’t have to pay for the work on the bracelet after all because the jeweler liked him.

Mad Daddy wrote out his first of many future checks to Elaine, a down payment on her attorney’s fee. He was glad it was only one ex-wife now, plus child support, of course, for the others. He bought Gerry a huge Christmas tree that was too tall for her apartment and had to be cut off above the trunk so it looked silly, but neither of them minded, and they spent an entire night trimming it with every bauble and toy they could find in the Village. They even strung popcorn on it, the way Gerry remembered from her childhood, although Bonnie the Boy ate the popcorn almost as fast as they could pop it. That kid really could eat! No wonder he was growing. Mad Daddy could hardly wait until he was married to Gerry and they had an apartment of their own so they didn’t have to have these strange people hanging around. He was counting the weeks.

The B.P.’s were invited on a yacht belonging to a middle-aged millionaire couple, which was cruising the Greek islands for the Christmas holidays. Penny Potter was delighted that Mr. Nelson was also invited, for that meant he could do her hair every day after she went swimming. She was only sorry that her mother couldn’t come too, but her parents always went to Palm Beach this time of year to escape the holiday festivities because her father was not well.

A young man Franco knew inherited a good deal of money and took Franco and two other young men to Lake Tahoe for sun and gambling. While there, Franco ran into Elaine Fellin and went to bed with her, as a change from the three young men he was traveling with, who were becoming boring. He was furious when Elaine asked him afterwards for a free dress, but he spent several amusing evenings telling the story.

Sylvia Polydor spent Christmas in Beverly Hills, doing what she always did, going to the same parties, seeing the same people, and doing a half-hour documentary of her life and career which Sam had arranged for television.

Arnie Gurney spent the holidays performing in a New York night club, and Christmas Eve he and his wife gave a small, intimate party for fifty people in their apartment, which they kept all year because he had to have some place to vote from.

The Satins went home for Christmas and had a housewarming party for the new homes they had bought for their families.

Ingrid the Lady Barber packed up her hypodermic needles and went to Switzerland for a minor face lift around the eyes, sending a silent assistant to give her patients their shots so they would not suffer confusing withdrawal symptoms.

Sam Leo Libra decided not to give a cocktail party this year because so many of his clients and friends were out of town, so he and Lizzie attended several parties given by other people instead, and he decided it was high time he did this all the time because he saved so much money.

All in all, it was a nice Christmas for everyone, even for Vincent/Bonnie, who managed to forget the trauma of his arrest when he went home to his mother for Christmas dinner and the new husband of one of his high-school girl friends made a pass at him. Vincent gave the initialed silver money clip Mr. Libra had given him to his father, because it was a shame to let anything so expensive go to waste.