Elsa lets me rave on and on. She strokes my hair, compassionately. Then she pulls on my ears until I moan with excitement—and stop complaining.

“Maybe things will change now,” she says.

I have no idea what she’s talking about. It just seems like a thing one says. But there is no time to discuss it. I hastily agree. I beg her for one last good hard smack. Then I am off to Jerry and she is off … where?

She won’t say. Elsa enters my disgusting bathroom. When she emerges, she has changed into a fetching sundress. The chambermaid is just a memory.

And what a memory it is! I keep Elsa in my mind as I slog through my final paces on the film. During lunch, I cannot sit down without wincing, then weeping, then smiling. The other extras stare at me. But I don’t care! I flip them off. Let them get their own wonderful pain!

She never returns to the set. I hear a producer or some big shot complain about his errant girlfriend, who’s left town without a word. It must be her.

But Elsa has been right. From that moment on, there is no more extra work for Graus. My talent and my legend only grow (see Chapters 15–27). There will be Wenders, Fassbinder, Macaroon Heart (with that hideous brat, Gratey McBride, who was dubbed by a dwarf).

Accepting myself, what I am, what I need, makes it possible for me to force other people to accept me, too. The realization makes me a finer actor. A bigger star. A better man.

I begin to re-create the original Elsa with other chambermaids. While it is usually good, it is never the same. I can never forget the woman who made me grovel and made me great.

Elsa doesn’t forget, either. Years later, I am in Paris, staying in the best hotel, playing a leading role.

When I return to the hotel at night, there is a package waiting. No return address.

“Who left this?!” I demand of the mousy clerk who calls himself a man.

“A beautiful woman,” he says. “She didn’t give her name.”

As if it’s the finest heroin, I clutch the package to my breast. In my room, my fingers trembling, I rip it open.

It is a tape. A copy of all the footage shot on The Day the Clown Cried.

My eyes fill with tears. It is her way of remembering.

Over the years, the legend of Jerry Lewis’s film has grown, as has Graus’s. It has never been finished or released, only gossiped and dreamed about. I had read that the studio in Stockholm owned the negatives. Now Elsa has given me this priceless object as a gift.

I know it would be a windfall, but I have no interest in making money from it. I will never give it up. Telling no one, I will take it with me wherever I go. It will matter to me only as a memento of that wonderful woman, of that first spanking hand.

It may have been the day the clown cried. But it was also the day Graus Menzies cried out—in wonderful, unforgettable agony, truly, for the first time: “I am Graus!”

“NO ONE ELSE HAS EVER SEEN THIS?” I SAID, EXCITEDLY, LAYING DOWN THE last page.

Watching me read, Leonard Friend had gone from shuffling papers to flipping a pen in the air. Now, startled, he sent it sailing behind a cabinet.

“What? Oh, no,” he said, bending to recover it. “Except for … well, you know. Katie.”

“And why didn’t you include it in the book? Afraid you’d be arrested for knowing about a stolen film?”

Leonard shook his head. “Graus changed his mind. Actually, that’s putting it mildly. He demanded I give him the pages back. He swore me to secrecy. Then he … head-butted me.” Leonard pointed to a small scar in his left temple, one that I hadn’t noticed. “You would think he meant to keep it secret so he could sell the film himself. But he really had … as you can see … sentimental reasons.”

Leonard sighed, as if reflecting on his own. At least Graus wasn’t being mercenary in hoarding the film; I almost respected him for it. Almost. And Leonard had been equally moony in holding on to the chapter.

“But still you … disobeyed him and kept it?”

“I had had a Xerox made. I …” Leonard was actually perspiring. “I thought it might impress Katie.”

“And did it?”

The dissipated man seemed relieved to finally unburden himself. “No. She didn’t care much. That’s why I was frightened when she went to work for Graus. I was sure she’d tell him, and he’d come looking for me and kill me. But I guess she never said a word.”

No, but casually, at some point, she must’ve told Johnny, I thought. Someone who was willing to kill for it.

“You won’t … reveal … where you got this?” he asked, suddenly frightened.

“Don’t worry, no.”

He relaxed again. “Good. Now, if you don’t have any more questions … you might give me the information I asked for. Where is Katie?”

Leonard’s tone had changed from the pathetic to the slightly threatening. It reminded me that his mission in life wasn’t benign, that he used his grudges to deprive others. It made me suspect that I couldn’t stall him forever.

Luckily, I didn’t have to.

Behind me, I heard someone enter the office. I turned and saw the pert secretary again. She avoided my eyes completely and looked only at Leonard.

“I’m afraid I went ahead,” she said.

For a second, the guy didn’t understand. Then, surprised, he checked out his window. In the street below, a cop car was pulling up.

I had gotten what she meant right away. Immediately, I had risen. Instinctively, I still held the chapter.

“You idiot!” Leonard yelled at her, face crimson.

I bolted from the room, pushing harshly past the girl. Then I powered my way through the waiting room and out into the hall. As I left, I distinctively heard the intercom buzzer going off. The cops were in the building.

I avoided the elevator, the down arrow of which already shone. Instead I flew into the stairwell, slowing my pace as I started downstairs.

I had been on the third floor. Now, beneath me, I heard someone coming up.

What did I have to be afraid of? I wasn’t sure. Then I felt the chapter in my arms and understood. If I had arrived innocent, I was no longer.

The footsteps were coming closer, only one flight away. Reaching the second floor, I only hoped the stairwell door was open.

It was. I slipped through it, finding myself on a bland hall in the small office building. I stood to the side of the door, hoping whoever was on the stairs—and I assumed it was a cop—hadn’t heard me come or go.

After a sweaty second, the feet passed by and continued up.

I disappeared back into the stairs and quietly took the last two flights. I emerged from the building, the chapter rolled and held inconspicuously in my hand.

I turned onto the Avenue of the Arts, and tried to get lost in the lunchtime crowd. I hoped I could make the walk to Thirtieth Street Station without being stopped. It was in Leonard Friend’s interest, I knew, to keep the cops at bay. His organization teetered on the edge of illegality and would soon, I bet, be pushed over by irate filmmakers.

But, maybe by stealing from him, I was only being interactive.