Baby, Let's Play House Part 20

In closing, he told her their song from now on was "[Please] Love Me Forever," by Tommy Edwards. "Every night I play it just for you," Elvis wrote.

But he was also playing the record for Margit. He was seeing her several times a week now, either in Bad Nauheim or at the home she shared with her mother in Frankfurt-Eschersheim. He drove the thirty miles alone in his white BMW 507, parking his car in the American Forces Network lot, with the staff instructed not to bother him. As the relationship wore on, he sent a taxi driver, Josef Wehrheim, to Frankfurt for her twice a month.

Elvis and Margit went to the movies, to the Frankfurt Zoo, talked in back corners of nightclubs where they could hold hands undisturbed (he particularly liked La Parisienne), and cuddled at the parties Elvis held at the hotel. They were known to spend the night together on several occasions in both cities. But the romance was hampered by the fact that Margit spoke only minimal English, and so they communicated in other ways.

"He is shy and rarely speaks about himself," the teenager told reporter Mike Tomkies about her boyfriend. "He's not at all conceited. He doesn't like to go out often. We spend evenings listening to pop records, or he would play the piano and sing folk songs. . . . He plays the guitar, and says as little as possible about his success as a singer."

But if Elvis was modest, Margit was eager for attention and posed for cheesecake shots published in Overseas Weekly, Overseas Weekly, the American G.I. magazine. the American G.I. magazine. Look Look magazine, too, would feature them together, Margit saying, "He's so different from what I thought he'd be." Elvis was embarra.s.sed-it put him in more of a jam with Anita-and he felt exploited. magazine, too, would feature them together, Margit saying, "He's so different from what I thought he'd be." Elvis was embarra.s.sed-it put him in more of a jam with Anita-and he felt exploited.

"She went and got herself pinup pictures made," Red said at the time, "and spread them all over the front pages as Elvis Presley's German fraulein. Elvis doesn't like that. It made him mad. He certainly liked her a lot, but after that he never saw her again."

Lamar remembers it differently. "Elvis dated her on and off the whole time he was in Germany, but the heavy stuff lasted about two months. Then he got tired of her and went to somebody else."

When Memphis disc jockey Keith Sherriff asked him about her in a phone interview in early 1959, Elvis replied, "Don't get me wrong, she's a cute little girl and all of that, but it's mostly a lot of publicity."

Margit did not take it well. "I feel mad and humiliated," she complained. "All the girls who envied me so are now busy making jokes about Presley's ex-girlfriend."

Years after their relationship, Margit would suggest that it was she who broke things off, because Elvis insisted that he belonged to his fans, and therefore could not consider marriage.

"I'm a corporation, not a man," he told her. "Sure, I want to get married and have kids. But for me it's impossible."

Late in the fall, when Elvis was still involved with Margit, he received a call from Devada "Dee" Elliott Stanley, the wife of Bill Stanley, a much-decorated American master sergeant stationed in Frankfurt. Dee, the mother of three young boys, Billy, Ricky, and David, was unhappy in her marriage. Her husband, who had been one of General George S. Patton's drivers, was a mean drunk, and Dee found Elvis a delicious diversion. She invited him to dinner with her family, but Elvis had a good excuse-he was about to go to Grafenwohr, on the Czech border, for six weeks of reconnaissance maneuvers. He'd be up to his elbows in snow. Devada "Dee" Elliott Stanley, the wife of Bill Stanley, a much-decorated American master sergeant stationed in Frankfurt. Dee, the mother of three young boys, Billy, Ricky, and David, was unhappy in her marriage. Her husband, who had been one of General George S. Patton's drivers, was a mean drunk, and Dee found Elvis a delicious diversion. She invited him to dinner with her family, but Elvis had a good excuse-he was about to go to Grafenwohr, on the Czech border, for six weeks of reconnaissance maneuvers. He'd be up to his elbows in snow.

However, Vernon, who was growing a Boston Blackie mustache, offered himself as a stand-in for a coffee date. Dee, a bottle blonde given to showy clothing, had a come-hither tone in her voice that let him know she would make it worth his while. The fact that she was married didn't faze him, since he'd been carrying on his own escapades for years, and had begun fooling around with at least two women in Killeen in the days after Gladys's death. For her part, Dee wanted anyone who was close to Elvis. "Boy," says Lamar, "she stalked him like prize game."

Like Elvis, Vernon, who started hanging out in the little bars around Bad Nauheim, drinking vodka or bourbon and c.o.ke and buying rounds for women at Elvis's expense, could compartmentalize s.e.x and love. Before coming overseas, he and his son had gone to the Memphis Memorial Studio and ordered an enormous monument for Gladys's grave, replete with Italian statuary-a towering cross with a beckoning Jesus and attendant angels. In November, they were proud to learn that the accompanying marker had been completed. The inscription: "She was the sunshine of our home."

On November 20, 1958, Elvis and Rex Mansfield went to the movies at the post theater in Grafenwohr, which was often their habit. Rex, from the little town of Dresden, Tennessee, 120 miles north of Memphis, remained Elvis's closest army buddy. They'd been inducted together, gone through basic together, and traveled on the same train to New York and ship to Germany. Elvis called him "Rexadus." There wasn't much they hadn't shared. theater in Grafenwohr, which was often their habit. Rex, from the little town of Dresden, Tennessee, 120 miles north of Memphis, remained Elvis's closest army buddy. They'd been inducted together, gone through basic together, and traveled on the same train to New York and ship to Germany. Elvis called him "Rexadus." There wasn't much they hadn't shared.

Waiting at the theater that night was a nineteen-year-old German girl, Elisabeth Stefaniak, the modest and well-groomed stepdaughter of an American sergeant. Elisabeth was infatuated with everything about Elvis-his looks, his music, his voice, his movies, and his celebrity status. She'd read in Stars and Stripes Stars and Stripes that Elvis went to the theater every night in Grafenwohr, entering after the lights went down, and leaving shortly before the movie was over. She saw it as her chance to get an autograph. that Elvis went to the theater every night in Grafenwohr, entering after the lights went down, and leaving shortly before the movie was over. She saw it as her chance to get an autograph.

When she got there, "All the G.I.s were coming in, and in their crew cuts they all looked the same. So I asked the manager and he told me approximately where they were sitting.

"I saw one soldier who was sitting in that area get up, and he came back to get some popcorn. I was waiting in the lobby in the dark, and I asked him, 'Are you sitting anywhere near Elvis?' and he said, 'Yes, in fact, I'm sitting right next to him.' I said, 'Would you please just get me an autograph?' And he said, 'Sure,' and went back inside." Moments later, Rex appeared and told her that Elvis would like her to come down and sit with him.

Elvis took a shine to the dark-haired girl, finding her body, as he would later tell Joe Esposito, "voluptuous." He walked her home that evening and surprised her with a good-night kiss. For the next six nights, she met him at the theater, and then he dropped in at her apartment unexpectedly for Thanksgiving and met her parents.

"Everything was 'Yes, ma'am' and 'No, ma'am,' " Elisabeth remembers. "They were very impressed." He talked about his mother, of course, but surprisingly, the only time Elisabeth saw tears in his eyes was when he talked about his father. "He was hurt that his mother had just pa.s.sed away and his father was already dating."

After that first visit to her apartment, he came every day, often at odd times, sometimes for meals or talks with the family, and sometimes to take Elisabeth to the movies. Her family felt comfortable with him, and he liked the close, homey atmosphere. When his maneuvers were over, and he was about to return to Bad Nauheim, he gave her parents a 365-day gold clock. Elvis and Elisabeth's stepfather, Raymond "Mac" McCormick, spent hours putting it together.

It was a calculated gift, of course: He told Elisabeth's parents he had about fifty duffel bags of fan mail, and he needed a secretary who could read and write both German and English. Elisabeth was perfect for the job, since she had lived in the States for a time and was fluent in both languages. She could stay in her own private room at the Hotel Grunewald, he told them. "I a.s.sure you that she will be in good hands with me and my father and grandmother, and we will take full responsibility for her."

"You think about it," he said to Elisabeth as he left. "You don't have to give me an answer now, darlin'. I'll call you in a couple of days."

But she didn't have to think about it, and neither did her parents. Elvis had said her duties would start at the first of the year, but three days later he called and asked how soon she could come. "I can be there in one week," she told him, and arrived on the train the first part of December. Bad Nauheim was 351 kilometers from Grafenwohr, or 218 miles, and she'd never been away from her parents for any real length of time, or even taken a train ride that far by herself. It was all a great adventure.

Vernon, Lamar, and Red picked her up at the station and drove her to the Hotel Grunewald, and on the way, Vernon explained that she would be working for him, not Elvis, at a salary of thirty-five dollars a week, paid on Fridays. Minnie Mae would be her foremost companion. The old woman, who perpetually parked a toothpick in the side of her mouth for dipping snuff, was looking forward to some female companionship, and she insisted that the teen call her Grandma. Elisabeth thought she had a grand sense of humor.

"We hit it off that night, and I knew we would be great friends. She accepted me right away like one of the family."

But Elisabeth wasn't precisely sure what her relationship was with Elvis, since they'd only kissed in Grafenwohr. That first evening, he made it clear. He came downstairs to her room and said he would be spending the night with her. Elvis saw a look of worry cross her face and told her not to be concerned, that he didn't have full intercourse with girls "he was going to see on a regular basis," because he didn't want to run the risk of getting her pregnant. "Such a risk would damage his reputation and image," Elisabeth remembers him saying. "That first night we sort of played around. Over the course of the next weeks and months, I went to bed with him almost every night."

He called her "Foghorn," because her voice was so low in the mornings, and she took it as a term of endearment. She worked hard on answering the mail, practicing his signature for a week (though eventually reverting to a rubber stamp), but she also wondered how long she would be on the job, or even if he would continue to be her lover. As she soon learned, "No woman could hold Elvis Presley's attention for very long." Only days after her arrival, he took another girl to bed, and after he dispatched Lamar to drive her home, he knocked three times on the wall between their bedrooms, signaling Elisabeth to come to him.

At first she had her reservations about seeing him at all. He was still involved with Margit, and often Elisabeth had to be the translator between them, which hurt her heart. "He was the man I adored, and the last thing I was interested in was helping their relationship blossom."

She would hear him with other girls through the walls, too, and even if she thought he was not doing any more with them than he was with her, it made her feel empty inside.

"There would be at least a couple of girls each week, more on weekends. . . . These were often very beautiful girls [but] although I resented them, I knew they were not staying . . . I did not let him see me cry [and] all the time I was telling myself how lucky I was."

Elvis never apologized or tried to explain his actions. "I guess he never felt he owed me an explanation. I do remember the pain of getting into bed with him maybe ten or twenty minutes after another girl had left. Many times we never made love. He would sometimes just give me a good-night kiss and go to sleep. It was like a comfort thing for him."

Elisabeth could see that the combination of events-his mother's death, his father's fling with a married woman, his being away from home, friends, and family back in the States, and the potential loss of his career-served to make a private, much darker Elvis emerge during his time in Germany. His hot-flash temper seemed nearer the surface, "mostly when he would say harsh things to you. I never saw him throw things at me, but he could say some hurtful things."

The worst of it came one day on a shopping trip. There were things he needed for himself, and he wanted to buy Elisabeth some clothes. While they were out, he picked a waste can he wanted for his bathroom. "I said, 'Elvis, you already have a basket in your bathroom.' Well, that was the wrong thing to say. He turned to me and said, 'Don't you ever tell me what to buy or not to buy! If I want to buy a thousand thousand trash cans . . .' " trash cans . . .' "

It was an awkward moment, a terrible moment, and when they walked out of the store, he was still angry. "I was going to buy you some clothes, but you ticked me off," he told her. "Then for two days he didn't speak to me very much."

She never got the wardrobe, but Rex put such behavior down to his friend's natural complexity, now exacerbated by his pressures, including the expectation of being the perfect soldier, one who could never grumble or gripe like any other G.I. He had no real way to blow off steam when he was tired, discouraged, upset, lonesome, or bored. The press would have a field day with it, and Colonel Parker would have threatened to leave him-the last thing Elvis wanted when he was so insecure about his future.

He bought a Grundig tape recorder to make some home recordings ("Danny Boy," "Mona Lisa"), thinking music would be his outlet. But Rex thought it was more than just situational circ.u.mstances, that Elvis was in a serious psychological slide. "Elvis," Rex says, "had two definite and distinct personalities."

He was promoted to private first cla.s.s during the holidays, the army saying he was a soldier of "above normal capability." But since it was his first Christmas without his mother, he was not in much of a mood to celebrate. It was "dismal," as Lamar remembers. They set up a tree, and everybody went through the motions of giving presents. But it didn't seem like Christmas, not even when Elvis sang an affecting rendition of "Silent Night" for the other soldiers. The guys bought some fireworks to cheer him, and Elvis, caught up in the moment, blasted German civilians from the balcony of the Hotel Grunewald, which got him in trouble with the owner, Herr Otto Schmidt.

They were already on thin ice. Red had accidentally shot Herr Schmidt with a spring-loaded stopper gun, leaving a wooden stick dangling from a suction cup on his forehead. And Elvis had been reprimanded for other crazy stunts-water gun duels, wrestling matches, and noisy pillow fights in the hallways. Then Lamar bought a cane to torment an old lady who beat her own cane on the ceiling to tell them to pipe down. "It like to drove her crazy. She'd pound on that ceiling like there was no tomorrow, and I'd beat back on the floor like there was no tonight."

But the worst of it was when they nearly set fire to the hotel. In the middle of a shaving cream fight, Elvis locked himself in his room, and Red put a paper soaked with lighter fluid under the door and lit it. It coaxed Elvis out, all right, but smoke billowed out into the hallway, alarming the ultraconservative guests. That prompted an eviction notice, as well as a cautionary letter from Colonel Parker.

It was time for Elvis to find his own house.

Elvis and the frauleins of the Moulin Rouge, Munich, 1959. Dancer Angie Zehetbauer, with whom Elvis was involved, stands at right. She would later commit suicide. (Courtesy of Andreas Roth) (Courtesy of Andreas Roth)

Chapter Eighteen.

House Full of Trouble.

In February 1959, Vernon found a white three-story, five-bedroom stucco house for rent at 14 Goethestra.s.se in Bad Nauheim. By American standards, the home was not well appointed or extraordinary, but it suited Elvis's needs, mostly because it was roomy enough to accommodate his family and friends-two bathrooms, a large living room, a gla.s.sed-in porch off the kitchen, and a bas.e.m.e.nt for storage. The house also offered a retreat from the restrictions of hotel life and separated him from the image of elitism a.s.sociated with the Grunewald. Now he could maintain his posture as a regular G.I., living off base with his dependents. rent at 14 Goethestra.s.se in Bad Nauheim. By American standards, the home was not well appointed or extraordinary, but it suited Elvis's needs, mostly because it was roomy enough to accommodate his family and friends-two bathrooms, a large living room, a gla.s.sed-in porch off the kitchen, and a bas.e.m.e.nt for storage. The house also offered a retreat from the restrictions of hotel life and separated him from the image of elitism a.s.sociated with the Grunewald. Now he could maintain his posture as a regular G.I., living off base with his dependents.

The downside was that he paid an exorbitant rent, roughly $800 a month, at least five times the going rate. However, the landlady, the obstinate and rotund Frau Pieper ("a b.i.t.c.h and a half," in Lamar's view), knew that she could command it and made hay of her opportunity. Moreover, as part of the deal, she insisted on staying there as the housekeeper, mostly to keep an eye on her tenants and her property. Fans kept a constant vigil, some camping out in tents a hundred yards from the house, others covering the wooden fence with lipstick confessions of torrid desire. When he sings, one girl said, "gold comes out of his hot throat."

Even a house as large as Frau Pieper's could not always accommodate two female heads, however, and Frau Pieper and Minnie Mae, who shopped together, cooked together, and drank together in local cafes, often b.u.t.ted heads. They made quite a pair-one tall and skinny and cursing in English, the other short and fat and cursing in German-chasing each other around the house with a broom. Then they'd make up and swap recipes, Minnie Mae learning to fix Wiener schnitzel, and Frau Pieper serving up a plate of southern "cat head" biscuits.

Lamar found it hilarious. "Frau Pieper mouthed off to her one day, and Grandma threw a skillet at her. She missed her that time, but later on she decked her." Elvis offered to rent her an apartment, but she refused. Then Lamar threw a firecracker under her bed. But Frau Pieper was not moving: She now had romantic designs on Vernon and couldn't keep her hands off Elvis, either. When she'd catch him in a bear hug, he'd smile and hurl insults at her ("Get away from me, you fat slob!"), knowing she hadn't a clue what he'd said. When Frau Pieper asked Elisabeth to translate, she covered for him: "He said you look nice today!"

Elvis left the house at five-thirty each morning to report for duty, which meant he was up by four-thirty for breakfast at five. But since he was hosting parties or playing music with Charlie and Red until late into the night-he had rented a piano and was trying to expand his vocal range-he found it hard to stay awake.

A sergeant in Grafenwohr gave him amphetamines on maneuvers, but he was out of them now, and he went in search of a pharmacy mate who could get Dexedrine, his mother's drug of choice, in quart-size bottles. It was amazing what money and fame could do, and almost no one said no to Elvis. He seemed to do everything to excess these days, from buying uniforms (as many as a hundred) to bedding girls. Pills were no exception.

If Elvis got up at dawn, everyone had to get up at dawn, so all the guys took Dexedrine to match his schedule and energy level. He a.s.sured Rex the pills wouldn't hurt him.

"Truck drivers back in the States use these all the time to stay awake on long trips," he told him. The only side effects were good ones-Dexedrine was an appet.i.te suppressant, and doctors prescribed it to overweight people every day. Plus, uppers increased your s.e.x drive, gave you pocket rockets. He washed his down with hot coffee for an extra caffeine jolt, he said, and recommended Rex do the same.

"After taking my first pill," Rex later wrote in his memoir, Sergeant Presley: Our Untold Story of Elvis' Missing Years, Sergeant Presley: Our Untold Story of Elvis' Missing Years, "I actually felt the hair on my head standing up and a surge of energy bolting through my body. Elvis was completely right about one thing-that white pill provided me with an abundance of strength and energy I didn't know I had. I could take them and stay awake an entire weekend. I was astonished that after taking only one pill, I could easily go 24 hours without food or sleep. And they were harmless!" "I actually felt the hair on my head standing up and a surge of energy bolting through my body. Elvis was completely right about one thing-that white pill provided me with an abundance of strength and energy I didn't know I had. I could take them and stay awake an entire weekend. I was astonished that after taking only one pill, I could easily go 24 hours without food or sleep. And they were harmless!"

Any time Rex ran out, Elvis handed him a hundred.

Vernon knew about the amphetamines and on occasion took them himself. Elisabeth, too, was aware of them, as Elvis gave her some on the nights they went to the shows and clubs in Frankfurt. He particularly liked the Holiday on Ice extravaganza, as he'd become enamored of several of the skaters, who numbered among the women who came home with him. "Beautiful girls were constantly coming and going," Elisabeth found. "I had to painfully accept this, and just grin and bear it."

With Gladys's death, says Lamar, "he just let loose s.e.xually. He was after everything he could get. I watched it change. But he had no compunction about that kind of stuff. To him, it was just banging. He had absolutely no guilt and no trouble balancing his behavior with his religious beliefs."

Hit-and-run s.e.x, then, was a way for Elvis to shut out his grief, forfeit his past, and quell his inhibitions. He was the most famous man on the planet, a millionaire several times over, with the world at his feet. But he had lost the only thing in life he truly loved. It was as if the devil himself had set a price for him to pay. But the excitement and arousal of a young girl made a lot of things go away-the a.s.sembly of G.o.d church, Judge Marion Gooding, and his regret over Dixie and June. In the dark, skin on skin, everything felt good and right. It made him feel alive. It made him feel that Satnin' was still alive, and he could pat on her and call her baby. That's all he knew, and that's all he wanted to know for the moment.

Several of the guys, especially Rex, felt sorry for Elisabeth and wondered about the cruelty and callousness with which Elvis paraded girls in front of her. "Sometimes she looked like she was about to cry," Rex later wrote. She was completely in love with Elvis. And it was deflating and degrading for her to spend all day answering his love letters, and then hear his m.u.f.fled moans with others through the walls.

Near the end of 1958, he had told her that a girl named Janie Wilbanks was coming to visit, and he wanted Elisabeth to make her feel at home, even share her office-bedroom. Janie had been the girl George Klein introduced him to at the train refueling in Memphis. George had only just met her himself that day, when she walked up to him at the station. Even George was taken with her ("I don't know if she went to Ole Miss at the time, but she was a typical Ole Miss beautiful girl"), and he figured Elvis would like her, too. She had coal black eyes.

A photographer had captured their kiss and put it on the newswire. But more important, Elvis had called George two weeks later, saying, "Who in the h.e.l.l was that girl? Man, she was good-looking! Tell her to send me some pictures and write to me." That December, she came to Germany to see her uncle, an army captain, and stayed with Elvis for a week. Elisabeth was "instantly jealous" but ended up making friends with the pretty eighteen-year-old, as they both realized they were just two of the thousands of girls vying for his affections.

The next glint in his eye was an eighteen-year-old actress, the delicate, green-eyed Vera Tschechowa, whom he'd met in January 1959 while doing publicity pictures for Vera Tschechowa, whom he'd met in January 1959 while doing publicity pictures for Confidential Confidential magazine, building on a session he'd done in late 1958 for the March of Dimes. In this latest calculation of the Colonel to keep Elvis in the public eye, Elvis posed with a young polio victim, Robert Stephen Marquette, the son of Master Sergeant John Marquette, stationed in Friedberg. Robert wore leg braces and was confined to a wheelchair. In the first session, Elvis was photographed bending down next to the chair, his hand on Robert's, his hat on the boy's head. In another picture from that same session, the two plaintively held a sign that said magazine, building on a session he'd done in late 1958 for the March of Dimes. In this latest calculation of the Colonel to keep Elvis in the public eye, Elvis posed with a young polio victim, Robert Stephen Marquette, the son of Master Sergeant John Marquette, stationed in Friedberg. Robert wore leg braces and was confined to a wheelchair. In the first session, Elvis was photographed bending down next to the chair, his hand on Robert's, his hat on the boy's head. In another picture from that same session, the two plaintively held a sign that said GIVE GIVE.

But a third photo, taken in January, involved Vera, who had just made a film in America and who conveniently spoke English. Now only thirteen years after the end of World War II, it seemed a perfect moment of GermanAmerican alliance. Vera and Elvis stood on either side of Robert, Vera holding one of the boy's hands, and Elvis the other. But the way Elvis looked at the comely brunette, Robert might as well have not even been in the room.

Vera was far more worldly than Margit Buergin. Her grandfather was the nephew of Anton Chekhov, the famous Russian playwright, and her grandmother Olga one of the most popular stars of the silent film era. A favorite of Adolf Hitler (she always called him "The Fuhrer"), Olga was reputedly a Russian agent in n.a.z.i Germany. ("They had handwritten notes from Hitler on their walls in Munich," says Lamar.) Vera's mother, Ada, was likewise an actress in films, and Vera was following in their footsteps. She had just been voted Germany's number one pinup girl, with some sixty-five fan clubs, and the German papers were keen to turn her slight involvement with Elvis into a romance, whether it really blossomed into one or not.

When interviewed about Elvis in the 1970s, Vera seemed to find the entire subject distasteful, beginning with the notion of posing with Elvis and a disabled boy. Her involvement with the photographs came about because "somehow they were missing a woman to be used like parsley or tr.i.m.m.i.n.g."

"We took these horrible pictures," she said. "What terrible trash. The child bound to a wheelchair, and Elvis standing with the child. I was somewhere with the nervous parents. I talked a little bit with him. Not much, just a couple of sentences."

"Vera was a strange girl," in Lamar's view. "The longer you were around her, the crazier she got." He warned Elvis to stay away from her, he says, but Elvis, who called her "Kitty Cat" for the shape and color of her eyes, was intent on pursuing her. "Once Elvis had her in his crosshairs, there was no turning him back."

In early March, he got a three-day pa.s.s and went to Munich to see her, planning also to take in the nightclubs with Red and Lamar. The driver, Josef Wehrheim, motored them over in Elvis's new 300 Mercedes four-door sedan, and they accepted an invitation to stay with the Tschechowas in Obermenzing. A photographer from Bild Zeitung, Bild Zeitung, Germany's answer to the Germany's answer to the National Enquirer, National Enquirer, accompanied Elvis and Vera on their dates. According to Lamar, the magazine had already photographed the two in Bad Nauheim at the Hotel Grunewald. And Rex remembers that she invited the whole group to a local movie theater to see one of her films, Elisabeth translating the dialogue. accompanied Elvis and Vera on their dates. According to Lamar, the magazine had already photographed the two in Bad Nauheim at the Hotel Grunewald. And Rex remembers that she invited the whole group to a local movie theater to see one of her films, Elisabeth translating the dialogue.

Now Vera was performing in a minor play, The Seducer, The Seducer, in Munich's Theatre unter den Arkaden, a small boulevard venue in the Maximilianstra.s.se. Elvis told Vera's mother, Ada, that he wanted to see it. in Munich's Theatre unter den Arkaden, a small boulevard venue in the Maximilianstra.s.se. Elvis told Vera's mother, Ada, that he wanted to see it.

"You won't understand a word of it," she said.

"That doesn't matter," he replied, and then rented out the entire theater for himself and Red and Lamar. It was more of a grand romantic gesture than a practical act for a star who might be mobbed. And when Elvis sat in the first row, beaming up at her, Vera found it embarra.s.sing and "miserable" to perform with only three people in front of the stage. Afterward, he took her mother and her theatrical friends to an expensive dinner at the Kanne restaurant, Red and Lamar tagging along.

"Red and I felt funny around Vera," Lamar remembers. "It was like she was already looking down her nose at us." Vera and Ada, however, found it odd that Elvis's bodyguards, as they called them, stood around him like walls and went with him everywhere, even to the toilet. Elvis, Vera thought, "was incredibly shy, a typical American middle-cla.s.s boy, well bred with a crease. No hooligan at all." But after the three spent the night at the Tschechowas' home, Vera was less complimentary about Red and Lamar, whom she considered uncouth.

"They were very ordinary, with belching and farting and everything that belongs with it." And her mother objected to their foul language, their refrigerator raids, and their penchant for putting their feet on the table. Elvis suggested his friends check into the nearby Hotel Edelweiss, where they got caught and were evicted for bringing women in through the window. Elvis, meanwhile, remained the Tschechowas' houseguest.

In the next two days, Elvis and Vera watched a Viking movie in production at the Bavaria Film Studios in Geiselgasteig, and took a boat ride on Lake Starnberg, a popular recreational area. "Elvis was after her, all right," Lamar remembers, but in the photographs, neither looks especially happy to be there.

Elvis's trip to Munich would be far more memorable for his three visits to the Moulin Rouge, a strip club, where he was photographed in suggestive poses with a number of scantily clad dancers, B-girls, and hookers. In several shots, he is shown aggressively kissing twin showgirls, the Orkowskis, first pushing one back along a stair rail, and then mashing the other against the opposite wall. He was also photographed in similar situations at another location, the Eve Bar, on his first night there.

In contrast to the playful and s.e.xy tone of Al Wertheimer's famous photograph, The Kiss, The Kiss, shot in Richmond, Virginia, only three years earlier, the German pictures, most of them taken by Rudolf Paulini, the house photographer of the Moulin Rouge, have a seedy, depraved, and somewhat p.o.r.nographic feel about them. Elvis seems dazed, almost in a trance, and the women, predatory and reptilian, have a nightmarish look, as if sprung from a vampire's dream. The photographs run totally at odds with Elvis's wholesome, all-American image and are, in fact, so sensational and shocking that they might have ruined him had they been published at the time. They look, says rock critic Dave Marsh, like "the answer to a question no one thought to ask." shot in Richmond, Virginia, only three years earlier, the German pictures, most of them taken by Rudolf Paulini, the house photographer of the Moulin Rouge, have a seedy, depraved, and somewhat p.o.r.nographic feel about them. Elvis seems dazed, almost in a trance, and the women, predatory and reptilian, have a nightmarish look, as if sprung from a vampire's dream. The photographs run totally at odds with Elvis's wholesome, all-American image and are, in fact, so sensational and shocking that they might have ruined him had they been published at the time. They look, says rock critic Dave Marsh, like "the answer to a question no one thought to ask."

Vera found her Moulin Rouge evening unpleasant for another reason. While Red and Lamar always understood that part of their role was to protect Elvis in all ways, Vera resented how they cautioned him to reel in his behavior. They tossed a comb across the table at him and told him to straighten his hair, she said, and when he got up to sing with the band, Red reminded him that the Colonel had prohibited public performances. Even a gla.s.s of champagne was off limits, Lamar insisted, and embarra.s.sed him, Vera thought, by suggesting he drink tomato juice instead. Yet ironically, Elvis enjoyed more freedom in Germany than he did at any other time in his life.

There are conflicting stories about how Elvis and Vera felt about each other, and why they never saw each other after March. Thomas Beyl, a family friend, reported that Ada Tschechowa found Elvis and Vera together upstairs in Vera's bedroom and kicked him out. And Elvis was quoted in the press as saying, "Sure, I've got a new girlfriend . . . I've been to visit her family in Munich . . . but it's just good fun."

Yet Vera steadfastly denied that anything romantic occurred between them ("I've got tired of all the fantastic stuff they write about Elvis and me-it seems hard to get through with the truth"), and suggested that she was interested only in the publicity value of being photographed with an American rock star. She insisted that her mother asked him to leave because he had "bothered our animals, canaries, dogs, and cats long enough."

Besides, he was more interested in one of the Moulin Rouge striptease girls than he was in her, Vera said. And, indeed, according to Andreas Roth, author of The Ultimate Elvis in Munich Book, The Ultimate Elvis in Munich Book, Elvis had an affair with a Moulin Rouge dancer named Angie Zehetbauer, and took the blonde to a hotel, though probably on a subsequent visit. On their one night together at the Moulin Rouge, Vera apparently left early with Walter Brandin, the songwriter, who acted as her chaperone. Elvis, she said, turned up for breakfast the next morning with "bits of tinsel everywhere, in his hair and his eyebrows." She asked him where he had been, and he said only, "I stayed there." He would go back the next night, too. Elvis had an affair with a Moulin Rouge dancer named Angie Zehetbauer, and took the blonde to a hotel, though probably on a subsequent visit. On their one night together at the Moulin Rouge, Vera apparently left early with Walter Brandin, the songwriter, who acted as her chaperone. Elvis, she said, turned up for breakfast the next morning with "bits of tinsel everywhere, in his hair and his eyebrows." She asked him where he had been, and he said only, "I stayed there." He would go back the next night, too.

When Elvis returned from Munich, he made a number of lengthy phone calls to Anita Wood. But it was clear to Red and Lamar that he was outgrowing her. He also seemed less considerate of Elisabeth Stefaniak, who did everything she could to please him, even improving on his favorite snack-mashed-banana-and-peanut-b.u.t.ter sandwiches-by frying them in a skillet like a grilled cheese. Anita Wood. But it was clear to Red and Lamar that he was outgrowing her. He also seemed less considerate of Elisabeth Stefaniak, who did everything she could to please him, even improving on his favorite snack-mashed-banana-and-peanut-b.u.t.ter sandwiches-by frying them in a skillet like a grilled cheese.

In late March, Vernon and Elisabeth were hurt in a car crash on the autobahn, returning from a shopping trip at the PX in Frankfurt. Vernon, driving the big Mercedes, attempted to pa.s.s another car, when a vehicle pulled out in front of them. He slammed on the brakes, but the Mercedes fishtailed and spun out of control, rolling several times before slamming into a tree and landing on its roof. The car was a total loss. Elisabeth suffered head wounds from broken gla.s.s, and at first she couldn't move, fearing her back was broken. She arrived home on a stretcher.

It was a terrifying ordeal, and both Elisabeth and Vernon might have been killed. But Elvis's reaction shook her up almost as much as the wreck. He raced out to the accident scene in his BMW, but later he took her aside. "Foghorn," he said. "Be straight with me. Were you and my daddy messing around with each other while he was driving the car?"

Vernon had no romantic interest in Elisabeth, but his relationship with Dee Stanley had escalated from a fling to a full-fledged affair. At first Elvis and Vernon fought about it, and then Elvis realized that his father was lonely and needed company. "Bring her over to the house," he said.

But when Vernon did arrive with Dee, they almost always disappeared into his bedroom, right off the living room. Elvis confessed to Anita Wood that he had once peeped through the keyhole. "I have hated Dee ever since then," he told Anita. Not only did the affair come too soon after Gladys's death, Elvis thought, but his father also embarra.s.sed him with their antics.

When Dee was in the throes of s.e.xual pleasure, Lamar reports, she was not a quiet woman. "When they started banging, Dee would start screaming. G.o.d, Almighty, she'd scream so loud you could hear her all over the house. Elvis would turn sixteen shades of red. We'd be in the living room, and he would look at me and say, 'I can't stand this. It's driving me crazy!' Sometimes he'd just go upstairs. Or Vernon would come out of the room about twenty minutes later, and he'd be real c.o.c.ky, and he'd sit there.

"One time Elvis said, 'Daddy, you need to take her in a car or take her out somewhere. Don't do it in here. Everybody in the house is hearing this.' But it got worse and worse. One time, they spent over an hour in there, and Elvis had about fifteen people in the house. When Dee started to holler, Elvis got up and started playing the piano so d.a.m.n loud it made Liberace sound like a paraplegic. He beat that piano to death, man."

But the son had learned from the father. When Freddy Bienstock arrived in Bad Nauheim a few months later to help Elvis pick songs for his first postarmy movie, G.I. Blues, G.I. Blues, he found himself in the middle of a southern gothic novel-he could hear he found himself in the middle of a southern gothic novel-he could hear both both Elvis and his father having s.e.x in the house. Elvis and his father having s.e.x in the house.

In June, after Dee had gone home to Virginia with her three sons, leaving her husband in Germany, Vernon followed her to persuade her to seek a divorce. The relationship had grown so serious that on this same trip, he drove her to Louisville to meet his father, Jessie. Then he returned to Germany and told Elvis they'd decided to marry.

Red, too, left the country, going home about the same time for good. He had come to Germany with Elvis fresh out of the marines, where he'd spent two years in Spain, and he was tired of military life. But he also complained that Elvis treated him like a "Chinese coolie." Vernon, with whom Red was constantly at loggerheads over his temper and his habit of getting in fights at Beck's Bar, gave Red and Lamar only a pittance in spending money-a couple of marks at best, barely enough for a beer-and Elvis refused to do anything about it. Around the time of his departure, Elvis was hospitalized with what was reported to be tonsillitis, though the inside story had it that he suffered carbon monoxide poisoning from a jerry-rigged heater in his jeep.

In Red's absence, Elvis got antsy for another of his pals from home, and instructed Lamar to "call Cliff and tell him to get the h.e.l.l over here."

Cliff, being Cliff, accepted Elvis's plane ticket but took his time getting to Bad Nauheim, flying first to Paris to visit friends and then going on to Munich and staying several weeks. "Where is is the son of a b.i.t.c.h?" Elvis asked. Cliff finally showed up in Bad Nauheim and then took off in Elvis's Volkswagen. He was gone for a month. Eventually he came back and announced, "I'm not going to stay around and shine some f.u.c.kin' shoes." He took Elvis's Mercedes 220 and moved in with Currie Grant, a clerk for Air Force Intelligence at Schierstein, near Wiesbaden, for three months. the son of a b.i.t.c.h?" Elvis asked. Cliff finally showed up in Bad Nauheim and then took off in Elvis's Volkswagen. He was gone for a month. Eventually he came back and announced, "I'm not going to stay around and shine some f.u.c.kin' shoes." He took Elvis's Mercedes 220 and moved in with Currie Grant, a clerk for Air Force Intelligence at Schierstein, near Wiesbaden, for three months.

Soon Currie and Cliff would be regular fixtures at the parties at the house, along with a smart Chicago street kid named Joe Esposito, part of the Twenty-seventh Artillery. Joe, whose parents had immigrated to America from Calabria, Italy, was friends with the family of Tony Accardo, Chicago's last great mob boss. He was also a decent touch football player in Elvis's weekend games, and the man to see for a bit of loan sharking. Chicago's last great mob boss. He was also a decent touch football player in Elvis's weekend games, and the man to see for a bit of loan sharking.

That June, Elvis took off on a fifteen-day furlough that mixed a bit of business and sightseeing with a large sampling of s.e.x. He first returned to Munich, where he checked into the Hotel Bayerischer Hof, and spent his nights at the Moulin Rouge, making time with his favorite dancers, including one named Marianne, who demonstrated a strip routine wearing nothing but an Elvis record. Then along with Rex, Lamar, and Charlie, he took the train from Frankfurt to Paris. There, Freddy Bienstock and his cousin, Jean Aberbach, another of Elvis's music publishers in Hill & Range, met them at the station. Bienstock and Aberbach, Austrian emigres, knew Paris well, and gave Elvis and his friends a tour of the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre. After that, they settled down to discussions of music for his upcoming films-Elvis, now influenced by European songs, wanted a larger, more operatic sound-and Elvis gave a press conference in the lounge of the Hotel Prince de Galles. A room service waiter told the press that during Elvis's stay in a top-floor suite overlooking the Champs-Elysees, young women were seen "going in and out of Monsieur Presley's suite, in and out, like a door revolving."

In the day, Elvis was mobbed on the streets, which boosted his ego and eased his fears about being forgotten. At night, he enjoyed himself at the famous Parisian burlesque houses and nightclubs-Le Bantu, the Folies-Bergere, Carousel, the original Moulin Rouge, Le Cafe de Paris, and the Lido, with its famous seminude revue featuring the high-kicking, London-based Bluebell Girls, who performed the cancan in "glittering clouds of sequins, ostrich feathers, voluminous headgear, and not a great deal else," as the New York Times New York Times once noted. once noted.

When Elvis took the guys backstage after the first show, Rex was astonished to see girls roaming around naked "without batting an eyelash. I just about fainted at the sight," he said. Later he learned that Elvis and Lamar had put the girls up to having a little fun with him.

The Bluebell Girls, considered the most glamorous chorus line in Paris, inspired Elvis to indulge his friends in a smorgasbord of s.e.x.