MY INTRODUCTION TO DECADENCE

IN THE SPRING of 1940 I walked up Palm Avenue to Sunset Boulevard. Just as I reached the Club Bali, the owner Izzy Orthwaite stopped me.

"Hey, John, you wanna eam ten bucks?"

I eyed him speculatively. "What do you want me to do?"

He introduced me to Edgar Montillion Woolley, better known as Monty Woolley, the Yale professor tumed actor. Monty was loaded down with six heavy suitcases and was moving into the Chateau Marmont on Sunset Boulevard. All I had to do to eam the ten spot was carry those heavy bags up to his fourth floor apartment. At the time I was making 35 cents an hour at a name plate company, earning $10 every 28 1/2 hours.

Woolley had newly arrived in Califomia to play the arrogant Sheridan Whiteside in a film being shot at Wamers, "The Man Who Came to Dinner." I was impressed by his stentorian approach to life, but was more than taken aback when he offered me $100-to urinate and defecate on his chest.

I already had my ten, so I left his apartment in a speechless state of nausea. I had fought for my life against a pervert in a Pennsylvania box car, so I certainly didn't need the likes of Woolley.

I related the incident to Robert and he gleefully put the decadence to

song. To the old English air of "Come to the Fair," he wrote these lyrics:

There was an old man who came out to the West

Singing "Heigh ho, shit on my chest!"

I pulled down my trousers, unbuttoned my vest

With a heigh ho, I shit on his chest.

Whenever Bob and I spotted Woolley on the boulevard, strolling jauntily along, we would assume a Napoleonic stance with our hands in our shirts, and with Robert on the tenor and me on the baritone, we would belt out the cute little ditty.

In high dudgeon Woolley would wheel in the opposite direction and stride purposeful­ly toward an escape route, his nose high in the air.

I asked Robert the "why" of it all.

"Hard to imagine," he replied. "He went at it even before it was stylish. "

***

Jonesy met a strange fellow that summer who became an adopted member of our group simply because he was wealthy enough to afford martinis which he made for us by the pitcherful. Alfred Loudon was a very intelligent, knowledgeable gentleman from Virginia who was a buyer for one of the most prestigious furniture stores in New York. Although he was a trifle on the gay side, we got along amicably.

Since money was always hard to come by in the '30s, I accepted when Alfred asked if I would drive him allover Southern California for ten dollars a day. I drove him to lovely Lake Arrowhead, stylish Laguna Beach, elegant San Diego and other points of interest. Alfred decided he wanted to see a bit of Baja Mexico.

We went into the "longest bar in the world" in Tljuana, an establishment that, at that time, probably was. It was seven in the morning and we were the only patrons. Since neither of us spoke Spanish, Alfred pointed to a bottle of White Horse Scotch on a shelf behind the bar. The bartender broke the seal, poured us both a measure, added soda and eyed us passively; We had two more drinks, then Alfred put what seemed to be enough money to cover the tab on the bar and we started to leave.

All hell broke loose. The bartender informed us, in a torrent of Spanish and with mucho gesturing, that we had bought the bottle. Since I didn't have any cash, I waited for Alfred to pay. He adamantly refused. In a brief time, rifle-brandishing police herded us into a decrepit paddy wagon. We were unceremoniously locked into a dungeon of the medieval jail, remaining alone and stonily silent until about eleven o'clock.

Clink! Clank! Clunk! Clang! We could hear the jailor opening the doors

that led to our cell. He stood impassively before us. "You buy de bottle?"

Alfred's face contorted with anger. "I did not order the bottle. I ordered

drinks from the bottle. I will never buy the bottle!"

Clang! Clunk! Clank! Clink! The morose jailer retraced his steps. Alfred

and I sat in stoic silence until about one o'clock.

Clink! Clank! Clunk! Clang! The jailor returned, bringing us some debris

that he indicated was edible. I passed.

"I demand to see our consul," said Alfred. "I am an American. I have a

rright to speak to the consulate. I- "

The jailor interrupted. "You buy de bottle?"

"Never!"

Clang! Clunk! Clank! Clink! The morose one disappeared again.

At eleven that night, in quiet tones, I assured Alfred that if he didn't "buy de bottle," I would break his face. Loudon, a man of occasional perception, grudgingly handed me a ten-dollar bill. "You buy de bottle!"

The bottle, which had cost us fifteen hours of our precious freedom in that miserable hole, cost $2.50.