The File on Bobby Darin, Chapter 14

Chapter 14

Bobby watched as the phone was placed back on the receiver.  He stepped back toward the doorway and said, “Oh, I’m sorry, Walter, I didn’t mean to interrupt your call.”

“No matter,” Winchell said brightly (perhaps a shade too brightly), “I was just fussing with my bosses, as usual.  What can I do for you?”  Seeing him now, off of the Copa stage, Winchell was struck, as he often was, by Darin’s almost diminutive stature and slim build.  Physically, he had not much heft to him.  In motion, it was Darin’s dynamic quality that impressed one, and then he seemed like a giant.  In Winchell’s rather Spartan office, in the gray newspaper building, Bobby looked to him like some rare tropical bird, like a hothouse orchid, something not quite of this world.  How could such a delicate creature have been born and bred in the Bronx, he wondered?  Even so, Darin was no effete.  As he paced before Winchell’s desk, his fists jammed into his coat pockets, his bottom lip turned up in a frown, he exuded a kind of psychic strength that was larger than his physical body.  Winchell was already on heightened alert as he heard the voice over the telephone line, and when Darin rushed into his office, he felt himself almost lifted out of his chair with excitement.  And yet he remained motionless, waiting for Bobby to speak.

It was clear that Bobby was working hard to control his anger.  Looking down at his feet as he spoke, he said, ”Two things.  First, your information about Jo Ann and me is wrong.  If you had asked, I would have told you that she is breaking off our engagement, but you didn’t ask.  Second thing.  If you had asked, I would have told you not to print anything about my private life.”  Bobby took in a deep breath as he finished speaking and paused to look at Winchell.

Walter remained in his seat, looking back at Bobby.  Between the mystery phone call and Bobby’s surprise appearance in his office, his brain was working on overdrive, its gears about to fuse into a pulp of metal.  But Winchell had been in the hot seat many times in his career, and he did not mind it in the least.  Actually, he lived for such moments as these.  A gossip columnist could not operate otherwise.  He realized, and not for the first time, the danger of becoming friends with the subjects of his column.  It always would tie his hands to a certain extent, and because of that, he usually kept his distance.  But he had been swept up in the show at the Copa, and now he had to face the music. 

“Gee, I’m sorry, Bobby,” Winchell said, and meaning it.  “I sure hate it when I get a wrongo in the column, and I am the first to admit it.”  This was not true; Winchell reluctantly printed retractions only when his red-faced, screaming lawyer informed him of the legal necessity of doing so, and sometimes not even then.  But this involved Bobby, and this was different.  He said, “I will be happy to print a correction in the next column.”

Bobby’s brown eyes widened with alarm.  “No,” he said, putting his hands out in front of him in a gesture used to stop a runaway horse, “I really would prefer it if you just did not say anything more about this at all.”  Bobby suddenly looked drained of energy.  He pulled Rose Bigman’s stool over to him and sat gratefully down upon it.

“I see,” Walter said.  “I understand, and I’m really most terribly sorry about this.”  Walter thought for a moment and then said, “You know, Bobby, this issue of the column that you read this morning, that has not been published yet in every newspaper that carries me.  It gets in the Mirror first, then it travels down the line to lots of other papers.  Some of them cut parts of the column for length, and some don’t even run it at all, if you can imagine!”  Walter smiled at this notion.  Bobby merely watched him in silence as Walter let this information sink in.

Winchell continued, “I can stop it running in other parts of the country, if you would like me to.  I realize it doesn’t make up for the original mistake, but at least I can keep a few million more people from reading it.  What do you say?”

Bobby considered for a moment.  He did look somewhat mollified by this offer.  He nodded gravely and said, “Yes, I would like that very much if you can arrange it.”

Walter Winchell broke into a smile, slapped his hand on his desk and called out to his Girl Friday, “Rose!  Call Sid and tell him to cut the Campbell bit from today.”

“Right you are, chief!” Rose responded from the outer office.

Walter and Bobby now looked at each other.  Walter stood up to take Bobby’s hand and said, “Once again, Bobby, I’m very sorry about this, and I give you my word that it won’t happen again.  I won’t print anything more without running it by you first.”

Bobby rose from the stool and said, “Thanks Walter, I’m sorry to get on you, I realize this is your job, but it’s just, this thing with Jo Ann,” and he did not finish his sentence.

Walter batted away the awkward emotion hanging in the air between them, “Say no more, my boy, I understand entirely when it comes to the ladies!  I will see you tonight at the Copa.”  Bobby nodded silently, gave Walter a small smile that turned his hardened old heart right over, and he left the room.  It was true; this was Bobby’s closing night at the Copa, and he had to get back to his preparations for it.  Walter placed an arm on Bobby’s shoulder as he walked him out of the room, past Rose’s desk, and to the door to make another goodbye with his young friend.  Bobby went up the half flight of stairs and out the building to meet Charlie, who was waiting with the car in the street.  Winchell turned on his heel to go back to his labors in the inner office, and Rose Bigman remarked idly, “What a good-looking young man,” as she picked up the phone to send her boss’s marching orders to Sid the copy editor. 

Continued in the next chapter

ID: 1467740   (Rated: ASR) Title: The File on Bobby Darin, Chapter 15  Description: Closing Night at the Copa, Part 1 By: Gisele