Chapter One Fran

Chapter One

Fran

The Hamptons, New York

1959

By September of 1959, Fran can spot the hopefuls from a mile away. Usually, they're men with manuscripts tucked away in their bags, working the room until some industry notable asks to see what they have. But tonight it's a woman in a low-cut dress. She's Monroe to Fran's Hepburn, the perfect hourglass with four-inch heels and overbleached hair.

"You seeing this?" Eva asks from her deck chair, using her wineglass to point to the window. The darkness frames an interesting scene inside the house: the famous lyricist, Oscar Hammerstein, standing next to the piano singing while Fran's boyfriend, Jack, plays, the two of them entertaining the crowd by composing funny limericks on the spot. Marilyn's look-alike has squeezed onto the piano bench, and while she's laughing at Hammerstein, her eyes are for Jack.

"It always seems to be someone, doesn't it?" Fran asks. She leans back and inhales the salty air of the Hamptons. It reminds her of home and she wants to drink it all in: the beach, the chatter, the breezy wraparound porch.

Eva leans forward and raises her brows. "You really aren't bothered by them, are you?"

Fran laughs. "Why? It's not like Jack can help these girls in any way."

"And what makes you think all they want is help?" In the light of the porch, Eva's face looks angelic, haloed by perfect honey-blond curls. For the last four years she's been cast as one young ingenue after another on Broadway, and she'll probably still be playing them ten years from now. Whereas Fran's mother says that someone with her coloring—brown hair, blue eyes, and freckled cheeks—will be a prune by twenty-five if she won't keep out of the sun.

They both watch as Marilyn scoots over on the bench until her thigh is brushing Jack's and Eva lets out a disapproving, "Hmmm. Peter avoids girls like that," she warns. And to make a point, she looks across the room to where her beau is standing in a circle of men. He's the tallest of the bunch, with loose brown curls he never slicks back and a giant smile. As usual, it looks like he's doing all the talking while the other guys laugh.

Now Fran takes a sip of her wine and shrugs, unconcerned about what's happening inside. "Guess I should be thankful she's not Jack's type."

But Eva lowers her glass. "Franny, easy is everyone's type."

Fran's not sure about that. Still, she's secretly pleased when Hammerstein takes Jack's place at the piano and Jack starts to sing. Three years ago, he'd been the most intelligent student in her seminar on James Joyce, with deep, intense eyes and an answer for everything. She'd pegged him as the snobby East Coast boarding-school type, and while she hadn't been wrong, she'd been surprised to find him singing at the campus bar one evening, part of a college a capella group. After their first set the group fanned out across the bar asking for requests, and after a long sip of her Old Milwaukee, Fran had offered a suggestion.

"How about ‘Mona Lisa'?"

Jack's dark eyes had lit up. "You mean, Nat King Cole?"

Fran had smiled. "Who else?"

The group was good, their baritone voices mimicking the bass notes of Cole's piano, and for a few minutes Fran was transported back to Norfolk, where her father was probably still listening to Cole belting out this same tune on their old phonograph.

When the group had finished, Jack returned to Fran's table to ask if he could buy her a drink. They spent the next three hours talking. She discovered he was the son of some hotshot politician. And he found out she was the daughter of Frank Connelly, the man who'd made the one-stop-shop grocery chain famous.

"So it was your dad who was responsible for putting all those butchers out of business," he'd teased.

Fran had taken another sip of her beer and shrugged. "Actually, it was me." Then she told him about the idea she'd had to build a grocery store with both a butcher and a bakery inside. Why go to three stores when you could shop at one? she'd asked her father. And he'd trusted her enough to try it out.

Jack had fixed her in his gaze, lost in the idea that she'd been the one behind this revolutionary change. And Fran recognizes it as the same look he's wearing now while he improvs near the piano as the same one he'd had then: like a man completely transported by the moment.

Jack continues to sing until Hammerstein is finished, then everyone claps wildly and they both take a bow. A moment later Jack and Hammerstein appear together on the porch and the blonde is back to making her rounds.

"Fantastic," Eva says, fluttering her fake lashes as she approaches the two men.

"Well, thank you, Miss LaRoche. That's very kind." Hammerstein smiles, and Fran doubts that anyone would ever pick him out as someone who owns Broadway. He's a funny-looking man, with a great big face, broad shoulders, and strong arms. He looks like the sort who would carve meat instead of words for a living. He casts around for his wife, and as soon as he spots her, the broad shoulders relax. "Well, fellas, you know the old saying…"

Early to bed, early to rise. Everyone else at the party will stay until one or two in the morning. But Jack, Peter, and the rest of Hammerstein's assistants are filing out the door, trying to look cheerful about abandoning the fun at nine o'clock. And it's not because it's Tuesday. Hammerstein's wife once told Fran that he never stayed later than ten o'clock at any party. And, of course, what's good for the goose is good for his staff.

Jack slings his arm over Fran's shoulders and pulls her to his side. At twenty-three he feels as solid as he did when he was crew captain back at the University of Virginia. "Ready?"

She settles into his embrace, enjoying his light touch in the buttery warmth of the evening air. She had been right to go with the cap-sleeve sheath instead of the blue cardigan and skirt. The sweater would have been too warm, even with the breeze. Walking with Jack back to their car, their shoes crunching over the gravel, Fran thinks of how, when they first began dating, she'd been learning to drive and Jack had offered to help. He'd been the only student on campus with a convertible, and later, when she learned what it had cost, she took it as a sign of devotion that he'd been willing to teach her in a car that was worth more than her grandfather's house.

Fran slides onto the cool leather of the passenger seat, waiting for Eva and Peter to join them. Rolling down her window, she breathes in the last of the salty air. Jack seems quiet. They normally exchange gossip from the evening, but his eyes are pinched shut and she assumes he's thinking about the work he'll need to do for the new musical. It's supposed to be something sweet and pastoral. A true love story straight out of the hills of Austria. So it surprises her when he opens his eyes and asks, "You catch that blonde tonight?"

Fran doesn't miss a beat. "The one with the dress?"

"That was Freddie's girl."

" Really. " Freddie is a quiet guy from the office. "I didn't think he had it in him."

Normally, Jack would laugh, but his mind is somewhere else. "I couldn't believe Hammerstein on that piano tonight. I mean, sixty-four years old and still on fire. That's the kind of staying power I want someday, Fran."

This is different and Fran tries to make out where it's coming from.

"I just can't stop thinking about the new musical," he admits. "I don't know if I'll ever be able to write like that." But as Eva and Peter reach the car, Jack's stream of self-doubt is forced to take a break and he bangs his fist against the wheel. "I left my jacket inside." He jogs back to the house as the car fills up with laughter.

"You should have seen him," Peter says, and Fran turns around. Peter has ditched his jacket and his shirtsleeves are rolled up to his elbows. "He was doing an Elizabeth Taylor impression."

"Oh, be serious," Eva says, fishing through her pocketbook.

"What? It was great."

"It was juvenile," Eva rules, pulling out a fancy gold cigarette case and snapping it open.

Peter shrugs. "Well, he had everyone in stitches."

Eva lights up a cigarette and takes a long drag. "I'm just glad he's not working with you again." She exhales and the first tendrils of smoke curl toward Fran's window. "So, what are you boys doing at the office nowadays?"

Peter fans the smoke away from his face. "A new play."

"I had a copy on my desk and was tempted to read it," Fran admits.

"You should have," Peter tells her, rolling open his window.

"Why?" Eva wrinkles her nose, trying to imagine wanting to read for fun.

"Because she has a degree in English lit," Peter points out the obvious. "Plus, aren't you working on a book, Fran?"

Jack returns and starts the car. "Who's working on a book?"

"I hope you're kidding," Fran says, elbowing him in the side, since she's been writing A Northern Wind for the last two years.

"Oh, yeah. Yeah, she's gonna be the next Agatha Christie, right?" He slides his arm around Fran's waist.

"Well, I was telling her she should go ahead and read the play," Peter says, sitting back.

Jack glances at Fran as he backs out of the driveway. "Really? You want to?"

She can't believe he's asking her this. "Of course I do!"

Peter leans forward, his forearms propped against the leather headrests. "You said you liked South Pacific, didn't you?"

Jack frowns. "When did she say that?"

"Last week at lunch," Eva says dryly.

"Well, this play is even better," Peter promises. "There's only a few songs in there right now, but they're the catchiest lyrics Hammerstein's ever written."

Fran finds this hard to believe. "Better than the ones for The King and I ?"

Peter nods. "Yes."

"How about Show Boat ?"

"Definitely."

"So what's it called?" Eva asks, patting down her hair.

"Well, the book is called The Story of the Trapp Family Singers. "

Eva flicks a long ash out the window. "Now that's a mouthful."

Peter agrees. "The producers wanted to change it to The Singing Heart. But Hammerstein convinced them to go with something else." He waits, just like a little kid, making Eva ask.

"Well, what?"

A grin spreads across his face. " The Sound of Music. "

—

Eva and Fran listen as Peter describes the script to them, from Maria von Trapp's time preparing to become a nun to her fortuitous meeting of the very wealthy and practically single—well, except for seven children—Baron von Trapp. The way Peter tells it, God Himself arranged for their meeting. Two lovelorn birds finally alighting on the same empty branch.

"Come on. You're telling me this girl was about to become a nun but— oops! —a wealthy Baron fell in love with her, and then look at that, now she's a Baroness?" Fran gives Peter her best I-don't-think-so look and Eva laughs with her. "And where'd he get all those kids?"

"I know. It sounds ludicrous," Peter admits. "But she's not what you think. Just read it for yourself."

He seems pretty convinced. And now Fran has to admit, she's curious about what kind of a woman finds herself married to a Baron after almost marrying herself to God. So Jack makes a detour by his apartment and returns with the script and the book that it's based on. "Just read the script," he prompts, probably not wanting to take up too much of her time. But the moment she's back in her apartment, she snuggles under her blanket and lingers on the book, running her hands over its cover. She knows what they say, but the look and feel of books are important to her.

The cover is nicely done. It's been published by J. B. Lippincott & Company, so she's not surprised. In the center is a photo of Maria sitting outdoors at the head of her family, her children arranged neatly behind her in traditional Austrian outfits. Fran imagines that if the image were in color the hills behind them would be emerald green, but she's left to wonder about their hair and eyes. The write-up inside is compelling:

With more than 1,000 concerts in the United States and Canada, the Trapp Family Singers are in the second decade of a career that has brought them far since their almost penniless arrival in this country as refugees from Hitler.

So after marrying a wealthy Baron she lost everything. Yet still remained married. Fran admits that the cynic in her is intrigued. She puts away the book and starts on the script and by two in the morning she's turning the last page. She must look terrible when it's time for work, because Jack takes a step back as soon as she opens the door to her apartment.

"When did you go to sleep?" he asks.

She tries to remember. "Two? Three?"

He comes inside and slides his briefcase across the kitchen table. "Well, we have ten minutes to get to the office." He makes his way to the kitchen and Fran sees him wince at her package of Bushells instant coffee. Not everything can be Greenwich Village's fancy espresso, Jack. Not on a secretary's salary. Four years ago, when Fran's father surprised her with this apartment, she had told him it was far too fancy for her. "It's in such a nice part of the city," she'd protested. "Maybe you should just rent it out."

"We bought it for you, " her father had said.

But she had two younger sisters who'd be off to college in another few years. Were they going to buy them apartments, too? What about their retirement?

Her father gave her one of those big Connelly smiles. "You worry too much, Fran. You think I haven't been saving for all these years?"

"Sure. But look at this place." Fran turned around, taking in the expansive windows and high French doors opening to a terraced view of the park. "And the furniture—"

"Yes," her father said proudly. "Your mother picked it out."

So Fran had moved in and, a few days later, Eva's parents bought her a place in the same building. "A full-floor aerie," Eva had gushed, showing off her new apartment on the twenty-second floor.

Now Fran hurries into her bedroom and shuts the double doors, putting on the first dress she comes across in her closet. It's a miracle she's able to get ready in time. She pauses in front of the mirror just long enough to adjust her usual pillbox hat—a gift from her sister when she was eighteen—then they're both out the door, her black stilettos clacking down the hall to the elevator. In the cab, she dashes on some lipstick, then waits.

"Well?" Fran asks as she settles into her seat.

Jack frowns. "Well, what?"

Her voice rises. "Aren't you going to ask me what I think about the script?"

He stares at her, a real-life Captain America with his chiseled jaw and head of blond hair. "Fran, I'm actually kind of busy in my own head this morning." He must realize how this sounds, however, because immediately he apologizes. "Look, I'm sorry. What did you think about the script?"

Fran is quiet for several moments. Then finally she allows, "It's good."

"That's it?"

"He could have changed a few lines in ‘My Favorite Things,'?" she adds testily.

Jack is surprised. "Like what?"

"?‘Pink satin sashes.' It would sound better if he changed it to ‘blue.'?" She shrugs. "It's a longer vowel."

It looks as if Jack wants to know more, but they've reached Sixth Avenue and the cab is pulling up to the curb. In front of them is the high-rise where Hammerstein has his office with Dick Rodgers. Over the past four years, Fran has become increasingly impressed by the empire Rodgers and Hammerstein have built, made possible because they realized early that their work was as much a business as an art. They no longer simply compose and write. Now they produce, publish, market, publicize. And all of it requires an army of clever assistants—young men like Jack, who secretly hope to become the next Rodgers or Hammerstein.

Fran opens her own door and steps outside. It's one of those perfect September days: the air is crisp and the trees are just beginning to turn. But there's no time to appreciate the scenery. She hurries into the building, where the bellman is all smiles this morning, making her feel terrible that she's probably still scowling. "Morning, Mr. Mayer, Miss Connelly." He punches the button for the fifteenth floor.

"Good day so far, Mr. Jones?" Fran asks.

"Any day I wake up is a good day, Miss Connelly."

Fran chuckles, because this is what her grandfather used to say. He'd been a shoemaker by trade and used to tell his sons there were two things a person would always need: shoes to wear and food to eat. Which was probably why her father ended up in the grocery business. Twelve chains later, each one bearing the name Connellys, Fran figures it was probably solid advice.

When they reach the office, there's a hum of activity already going on. Rehearsals on the new script started on Monday even though Hammerstein's still finishing the lyrics. It's taking him longer than usual. With Flower Drum Song it was a song every few weeks. But it's different this time, and Fran wonders if maybe there's something wrong. It's not just how long it's taking him to write. It's the fact that it's nine o'clock and there's no one behind the giant mahogany desk. Usually, he's there two hours before everyone else.

"Well?" Peter says as soon as he sees her. Jack has already disappeared into his own office and shut the door. But Peter perches on the corner of Fran's desk, completely at ease with himself. "You read it last night, didn't you?" he asks.

"Until two a.m. "

"I knew it!" He laughs at his own certainty. " And? "

"You were right." She slides her pocketbook into the top drawer and takes out the day's schedule, smiling up at him. "It's simple and sweet and impossible not to like. Makes you wonder how much of it is actually true."

The office door opens and Hammerstein appears, carrying his lunch in a paper bag. "Good morning, Mr. Rickman." Peter slides off the desk. "Miss Connelly," he adds brightly. "Still working on your book?" There's no underlying hint of amusement in his voice. Not like when Fran's mother asks the same question.

"Just editing now," Fran says. "But I did have some good news last week." Hammerstein stops to listen. " The New Yorker accepted one of my stories."

A slow smile spreads across Hammerstein's face and she can tell how genuinely pleased this makes him. "From the very beginning you've surprised me, Miss Connelly. Yet for some reason this doesn't surprise me at all. Well done. I'd like to read it when it's out."

"Of course," Fran says. "Thank you, Mr. Hammerstein."

Hammerstein continues to his office and Peter gives her a secret thumbs-up behind his back, following him inside. It's Roundtable Wednesday, when all of the assistants give advice on the current script. If Hammerstein's written any new material, this is when they'll go over the placement of those lyrics in the script.

Fran makes her way to the ladies' room and hangs her jacket on the rack next to her hat. Richard Rodgers has his own assistant, a girl named Rhonda, but she hasn't come in yet, otherwise one of her fancy pillbox hats would be perched on the rack as well. Fran pats her hair back into place and returns to the desk. It's just after nine o'clock and the phone is ringing.

"Rodgers and Hammerstein." She cradles the phone against her ear, freeing her hands to type up the press release she didn't finish yesterday. The voice on the other end nearly deafens her, but Fran just rolls her eyes. Another crisis at the Lunt-Fontanne. So what is it today? she thinks. Missing prop, angry talent, sick actor, locked dressing room? But when she hears the words "Maria von Trapp," she snaps to attention. "I'm sorry. What? Can you say that again?"

Richard Halliday draws a long breath on the other end of the line. "The author —as in the woman who wrote the book this play is based on—is standing here demanding changes to the script!"

Now this is a crisis. Fran glances at Hammerstein's closed door. Nothing is to disturb Roundtable Wednesday short of a flood or a fire. But it could be a third type of disaster if Mrs. von Trapp goes to the press with her concerns. "I'm calling in to Mr. Hammerstein and sending someone over," she says.

"No."

Fran leans back against her chair, surprised by Mr. Halliday's vehemence.

"Maria's not going to listen to just anyone. Oscar needs to come."

Not happening, Fran thinks, but tells him, "All right. I'll see what I can do."

"And if he can't come, Fran, it needs to be you."

Hammerstein picks up on the second ring and Fran can hear the Roundtable voices go quiet on the other side of the door. She quickly explains the situation unfolding at the Lunt-Fontanne.

There's a moment of tense silence.

"Take her to the St. Regis for lunch and find out what's bothering her," Hammerstein says. "Bring a pad and write it all down."

"And if she insists on seeing you?"

"It's the first week of rehearsals. You can tell her we're still working things out."

Fran is tempted to ask if this is true, then realizes it doesn't matter. She retrieves her pocketbook from the drawer and grabs one of the steno pads that Hammerstein keeps in large stacks around the office. Then she nips back inside the ladies' room for her jacket and settles her hat back into place. A moment later she's out the door again.

As she makes her way down Sixth Avenue, Fran rehearses what she's going to say to Maria. Summers spent working in her father's store have made her comfortable with confrontation. There was never any shortage of irate customers. When Fran is sure how she's going to approach the woman, she lets her mind wander.

It's an easy game to guess where most people are going. This is because New York is the only place she's lived where fashion can be so accurately decoded. Take the men from the financial district, for instance, in their expensive suits and dark felt hats. Or the men going to their pub jobs dressed in casual trousers and oversized sport coats. There are young guys ambling late to class in their Converses and jeans, and your typical high school girls in twinset sweaters and ballerina flats. But Fran doubts anyone would be able to pinpoint where she works. The robin's-egg blue of her dress complements her eyes, but otherwise she's unremarkable. Just another one of the thousands of women headed to a typewriter somewhere.

When Fran first arrived in the city, she had tried to find a job in the publishing industry. But it turned out no one was excited about a girl with a southern accent at their front desk, and all the desks that really counted—the ones behind closed doors—were reserved for men. But that was four years ago and things are changing. She thinks of her acceptance letter from The New Yorker back home, lying open on her bureau beneath her father's fountain pen. When it arrived she ran her fingers over the fancy stationery, the embossed letters moving like puffy clouds across the page. Perhaps by the end of the year her book would be ready for submission. Maybe sooner if she stopped going on so many trips to the Hamptons.

Fran is so lost in thought that she almost walks past the Lunt-Fontanne. She backtracks a few steps, then takes a moment to pause and look up. Last year the sprawling building had been a movie theater. Today, the rows of wide velvet seats and sparkling chandeliers host some of the best shows on Broadway. Her eyes rest on one of the long red banners with a picture of the actress Mary Martin. She's dressed in a traditional Austrian costume, her hair braided and pinned back to look like a young Maria von Trapp.

Fran has met Mary Martin half a dozen times since working for Hammerstein and knows that the actress is admired throughout the business for the extraordinary dedication she has to her work. If Maria is inside fuming about her portrayal, it will absolutely crush Mary. Not to mention derail the entire production. Because it's Mary Martin and her husband, Richard Halliday, who have the rights to the story.

A red-suited man with white hair opens the door for Fran, then shakes his head.

"Trouble?" Fran asks, and Gene just whistles one of the tunes that she's been hearing around the office. She recognizes the song as Hammerstein's, the one with the lyrics that ask how a problem like Maria should be solved. "Great," she mutters.

"Good luck, ma'am. 'Cause you goin' to need it."

Fran braces herself as she crosses the lobby and enters the theater. It takes a moment for her eyes to adjust to the dimmer light, but nothing unusual seems to be happening inside. The stage is crowded with actors preparing for a scene in Nonnberg Abbey, where the Mother Abbess is seated behind an austere desk, surrounded by nuns who have come to talk about Maria. She can see the costume designers pinning and tucking the robes of several of the nuns and a group of technicians adjusting the lights. But there's no sign of anyone causing trouble.

Fran crosses the theater and continues looking around. She doesn't spot Mary Martin, but Richard Halliday, who is not only her agent but her husband and the show's producer, is there, tugging at his mustache as he paces the stage. A faint hope springs up that maybe the storm has already passed. Then a group of nuns disperses and Fran sees her.

She's standing in the middle of the action, dressed as if she's just wandered in from an alpine meadow. Her gray hair is held back by a dark green kerchief and her dress—the same traditional Austrian costume pictured on the front of her autobiography—stands out among all the black robes and mantillas. She's been giving directions to a group of nuns and has now turned her attention to the set designers.

"Nonnberg looked nothing like this," she pronounces. "You have a fountain over there and I have no idea why. There were no giant fountains!"

Fran reaches the stage as Halliday is actually beginning to turn purple.

"Fran!" he cries. Then he tells Maria, "Look," drawing the woman's attention away from the offensive prop to Fran.

Fran stands at the bottom of the stage and smiles up at the older woman in the white apron. A large cross dangles from her neck and the pendant is nearly blinding in the stage lights. "Mrs. von Trapp?"

The woman straightens. She's tall, with piercing blue eyes and cheeks like little red apples. "Yes?"

"I'm Frances Connelly. Mr. Hammerstein sent me to find you."

Halliday places his palm on the small of Maria's back and ushers her off the stage. At the bottom of the stairs, Fran holds out her hand.