* * *
‘I’ve never been to Paris,’ Alice confided to Horace, a faraway look in her eyes.
‘Haven’t you?’ He kept glancing over to see if Francesca appeared. She had forced him to go on ahead of her, claiming that he got in her way while she was trying to dress.
‘Gay Paree,’ sighed Alice. ‘Ohh la la!’ She snatched a hot canape from a passing waiter. ‘I shall probably go there with my son. He’s very proud of me. It takes talent to know talent, and he knows.’ She nodded to herself. ‘Ah yes, he certainly knows.’
‘I’m sure,’ agreed Horace.
‘Shortly I will be appearing on the
Merv Griffin Show.
’ She munched contentedly on a stuffed olive. ‘I love Merv. He’s such a
warm
man.’
‘Good.’
She leaned intimately toward him.
‘Very
good,’ she said, winking slyly. ‘Very, very good.’
‘Excellent.’
‘Yes.’
‘Yes.’
* * *
Olympia entered the bar. Paused. Look around. Spotted Lucky immediately. Did a double take. Could not believe her skinny little nothing friend had grown into such a beauty. And not an ounce of fat on the entire package.
Lucky saw her look, and for a moment their eyes met and they were kids again, playing hookey, smuggling boys into their dorm, and indulging in ‘almost’ – a game they thought they had invented.
All her life Lucky had been a loner. No girlfriends, no mother, no one to giggle or chatter with. Except once there had been Olympia.
She rushed across the room, arms outstretched.
Olympia backed off.
Instinctively Lucky knew she was not thrilled about the marriage, and who could blame her? It
was
kind of a crazy coincidence. She turned her outstretched arms into a pat on the shoulder. ‘Olympia! God, it’s been a long time. You look great.’
Olympia was at a loss for words. Too much coke was clogging her brain. She wanted to be cool and act like she didn’t care, but she
did
care very much that Lucky had dumped her, and never tried to contact her, even when they reached adulthood and could have seen anyone they pleased.
‘Little Lucky Saint,’ she said coolly, using the name Lucky had been known by at school. ‘You certainly grew up.’
‘I should hope so!’
‘You were always such a dumb jerk.’
‘Thanks!’
‘Does the truth hurt?’
Lucky lowered her voice. ‘Let’s not start off being hostile, huh?’
Olympia bridled, ‘Who’s hostile? Certainly not
me.
Why should I be hostile?’
Lucky was saved from answering by Francesca’s entrance. She wore a red ball gown which matched her hair. Around her neck was a magnificent ruby necklace.
Horace cringed. He had never seen the necklace before. He knew it must be a gift from Dimitri, therefore it signalled the affair was still going strong.
‘Damn!’ he muttered.
‘Has anyone ever told you that you look like Burgess Meredith?’ Alice fluttered her false eyelashes. ‘I always thought he was such an
attractive
man.’
* * *
Lennie hitched a ride back to the port with two sun-burned German homosexuals in a convertible. They didn’t speak English. He didn’t speak German. But a lot of polite nodding and smiling went on.
He skipped aboard the yacht and encountered Captain Pratt. ‘Did you have a pleasant look around, sir?’ asked the Captain.
Lennie didn’t know if it was his imagination or not, but he could have sworn the man gave him a lewd wink. ‘Thanks. Yes,’ he replied.
‘You
are
a bit late, sir,’ the Captain added. ‘They’re just sitting down for dinner.’
‘It’ll take me five minutes to change. Can you get a message to my wife?’
‘Certainly, sir.’
Was that another conspiratorial wink?
‘I must say, sir, your mother is a very fine woman.’
Oh, shit. The captain wanted to
schtupp
Alice. Sorry, my friend, you’re about twenty years too old for the likes of Alice the Swizzle.
‘Yeah,’ said Lennie vaguely, and made a dash for it.
* * *
Polite conversations took place as servants tended table and fine wine was poured into silver goblets. Olympia found herself seated next to Gino Santangelo. She thrust her chest forward and flirted with him outrageously. He might be an old man, but if Lucky could have Dimitri, why couldn’t she give Gino a tumble?
She leaned close to him. ‘Betcha don’t remember the last time we met,’ she whispered.
He did remember. Only too well. It was a picture fixed firmly in his mind forever. Sixteen-year-old Olympia Stanislopoulos, her bare pink ass stuck in the air, as she concentrated on giving her boyfriend of the moment a blow job. ‘You know somethin’ – you’re right, I
don’t
remember.’
She pouted. ‘Come
on.
How could you ever forget?’
He knew what he
did
want to forget. This trip. These people. Tomorrow he would arrange a cable summoning him urgently to New York.
* * *
Olympia had said, ‘We dress for dinner,’ whatever that meant. Reluctantly Lennie put on a suit. What bullshit. Why was he going along with it? One night was enough. From here on he planned to take Olympia off the boat to explore. There must be so many great restaurants around, and he had no intention of spending his vacation playing stuffed shirts with the rich folk.
He checked himself out in the mirror, and wondered if he had time for a joint. Reflected beside him he imagined he saw the girl, from the beach. Dark, mysterious, sexy . . . He had always gone for blondes, but she made him forget every blonde he had ever known – even Eden.
Free at last?
Yeah.
Why hadn’t he found out her name at least?
He loosened his tie, ran his hands through his hair, lit up a joint, took a couple of deep drags, and set off for dinner.
* * *
‘Business is business,’ Saud Omar said. ‘And women are women. And never the two shall meet.’
‘What antiquated crap!’ exclaimed Lucky. ‘Where have
you
been for the last fifty years?’
Saud blinked, unused to women answering back. Besides, he had not been talking to Lucky, he had been making a general remark.
‘I agree with
you,
Saud,’ Fluff squeaked. ‘I
never
want to work. Never ever! Ugh!’
‘And you’ll never have to, pumpkin tush,’ Jenkins Wilder joined in. ‘Smart girlies never have to lift a finger.’
‘Only their ass,’ murmured Lucky.
Alice cackled.
Francesca threw Dimitri a simmering look.
Susan said, ‘I think females should all learn domestic arts in school. Cooking, sewing, and general housekeeping.’
‘How about screwing?’ Lucky suggested. ‘I mean, shit Susan, if you go to school to learn how to take care of a guy, you may as well learn to do it properly, don’t you think?’
Dimitri gave Lucky a warning glare which she ignored.
Susan blushed beet red.
Gino said, ‘Hey, kid . . .’
The Contessa laughed.
Olympia scowled. Skinny little Lucky had developed a mouth.
Lennie entered the room, saw Olympia, and headed straight for her.
‘Where have you been?’ she demanded crossly.
‘Sorry I’m late. I couldn’t get a ride back from the beach,’ he explained.
‘The beach!’ Olympia sneered, as if it were a dirty word.
‘Yeah, y’know. That’s the place where the peasants hang out – not everyone has a yacht to throw themselves about on.’
‘Very funny. Why don’t you sit down.’ She addressed herself to the table. ‘I’d like you all to meet my husband – Lennie Golden.’
He saw an array of jewels and old men. He also saw Alice, which filled him with dismay.
‘Now, let me see,’ continued Olympia, playing the perfect hostess. ‘This is Contessa Zebrowski and Saud Omar. Mr and Mrs Jenkins Wilder, Susan and Gino Santangelo, Francesca and Horace Fern, and you met my father earlier.’ She paused, wondering if she could get away with snubbing Lucky. Too obvious. ‘Oh, yes, and this is Lucky.’ She refused to give her billing.
‘My wife,’ Dimitri said.
‘Your wife,’ Lennie repeated.
He stared at her. She stared back. It was as if time stood still.
Returning to the real world was just what Steven needed. He had always resisted the temptation of working in a big expensive law firm – preferring instead to do time as an assistant D.A. and public prosecutor, where the money was by no means great. But he was getting older and wiser by the moment, and now security and making it seemed a whole new challenge. It wasn’t as if he had to grab anything that came his way – Jerry assured him he could take his pick of the many rich clients who needed help.
‘Just because they’ve got bread doesn’t mean they’re all bad,’ Jerry explained amenably. ‘Why don’t I give you the Mary-Lou Moore case? She’s the cute black actress on TV with the large family image. She’s suing some porn magazine who just printed naughty photos of her taken before her big success. We go into depositions this week.’
Mary-Lou Moore. Steven had watched her show a few times. A funny sit-com set in Connecticut in which Mary-Lou played the adopted daughter of a white family. She was a kid, eighteen or nineteen tops, and very pretty.
‘Am I going to get all the black clients?’ he asked bitingly.
‘Only if you want ’em. This is a juicy case. The put-upon heroine against the bad boys. Your kind of action.’
‘She signed nothing. In fact she says the pix were taken by her boyfriend when she was fifteen, as a lark. You think we’ve got a case?’
‘I would say we can’t lose.’
‘Go for the big bucks. These guys can afford it.’
After getting settled at the office, Steven informed the tenants who were renting his brownstone basement apartment that he planned to move back. His luck was in. The man, an engineer, had just landed a job in the Middle East, and was prepared to vacate at once. An adjustment on the rent took place (more borrowed money from Jerry – but it would soon be pay-off time) and Steven moved in.
He really was coming home after three lost years. It felt wonderful.
* * *
Carrie met with Anna Robb, the ghost writer Fred Lester had recommended. She was a small precise woman of forty, who wore sensible shoes and big woolly sweaters. She appeared to be physically attached to her Sony tape recorder, which she switched on the moment she entered Carrie’s life.
‘Just talk,’ she said reassuringly, ‘about anything you like. I’ll be able to extract exactly what we want.’
So Carrie talked. At first about clothes, then about style, and onto the subject of entertaining. Soon she was reliving her life with her first husband, Bernard Dimes. ‘We had such interesting parties,’ she recalled with pleasure. ‘People from the arts, ballet stars, writers. Bernard knew everyone. He was a fascinating man.’
‘How did you two meet?’ Anna asked, sipping the lemon tea Carrie had fixed for her.
‘I don’t think I want to speak about that,’ Carrie replied quickly.
Anna was a skilful enough interrogator to move on to something else immediately.
They did three taped sessions within a week – each one of four hours duration. By the end of that time Carrie felt at ease in Anna’s company, and had told her all she could possibly dredge up on fashion, beauty, diet, and exercise. Anna said she had everything she needed.
‘But it was easy!’ Carrie exclaimed.
‘For you,’ Anna said. ‘For me the real work comes now. First I write the book, then set it into sections. We go over what I have written to make sure you approve. Then we begin to choose the pictures and decide what new ones are to be taken.’
‘It’s so exciting!’ Carrie said.
‘If the book is a best seller it’s the most exciting feeling in the world.’ Anna smiled. ‘If it flops, it’s the worst.’
‘How do we make it a best seller?’ Carrie asked naively.
‘If I knew that, Fred Lester would be working for me.’
‘Tell me about him’, Carrie said. ‘He seems such a nice man. Is he married?’
‘Are you interested?’ Anna teased.
Carrie was taken aback. Why on earth would she be interested? She had given up on men when she divorced Elliott Berkeley and now she was too old and set in her ways to start thinking of another relationship. Besides, if she did become involved with a man again she would have to be truthful about her past. And who would want her when they heard the truth?
No. Involvements were out. She had Steven back, thank God. She had a few friends. What more could she possibly want?
‘Certainly not,’ she said, primly.