Darling Sweetheart (3 page)

Spader looked up sharply. ‘
The
Harry Emerson asks you on a date and you’re, like, blowin’ him out?’

‘I don’t have time to socialise, I need to work on my–’

‘Hey,’ Spader cut across her, ‘does the name Donna Wentworth mean anything to you?’

‘As in Donna Wentworth the actress?’

Spader nodded. ‘Who used to be married to…?’

‘Emerson?’

‘And before she married him, she was what?’

‘I don’t know…’

‘Right! A nobody!’

‘Holly, I have a boyfriend back in England.’

‘Is he, like, stinkin’ rich and awesomely famous?’

‘He’s in a band.’

‘A band.’

‘They’re called Lone Blue Planet. Everyone says they’re the next Coldplay, which I think is silly because they’re much more like Radiohead.’

‘Cold… day?’

‘Cold
play.’

With an exaggerated shrug, Spader resumed the study of her nails. Annalise realised that there was no prospect of being left alone with her anxieties.

‘Look, thanks for the advice, but I’m going home for a nap.’

But Spader did not move aside. Instead, she pushed her sunglasses into her hair, revealing a pair of hard brown eyes.

‘How do you do it?’

‘How do I do… what?’

‘How do you look so beautiful all of the time? I mean, Lord knows I’m not ugly, but compared to you–’

‘Don’t be silly, Holly, you’re gorgeous. To be perfectly honest, right now I feel like shit.’

‘Yet Harry Emerson still asks you out.’ A whinge entered her voice. ‘You feel like shit, but still he picks you. Never in a million years would Harry Emerson ask
me
on a date… you’re so fuckin’ lucky.’

‘If you want, I’ll say I’m sick and suggest he invite you instead.’

‘Yeah, right…’

Annalise had to sidle around her to reach the steps, but Spader followed her down. As they passed through the grand hall, she muttered, ‘This place sure needs decoratin’,’ but by the time they re-emerged into the airless heat of the keep, she seemed to have perked up. She grabbed Annalise’s arm and pulled her towards a taxi parked just beyond the arch.

‘Hey! I got an idea! Lemme take you inna Sarlat and we’ll hit the stores and find you somethin’ to wear for tonight! Then we’ll have cocktails at my hotel and get you good and ready!’ Sarlat was the nearest town of any size and Spader pronounced it with a hard
t
instead of the correct silent one.

‘Maybe,’ she enthused, ‘we could go see Emerson together, then you’d have me for, like, back-up. He’d be cool with that, wouldn’t he?’

Annalise smiled her friendliest smile. ‘Holly, you’re very kind but, really, I’m going to walk home now and sleep on it.’

Spader released her arm and reactivated the hardness in her eyes.

‘Girl, you’re crazy.’

She stalked over to her car; Annalise watched it go. Now she felt a headache coming on. She took her phone from her purse and dialled Jimmy. The signal connected but his phone diverted. His voice-greeting made her smile slightly, because she could tell he was trying to sound less middle-class than he really was.

‘It’s me. I can’t talk, but you know what to do.’ Beep.

‘Hello, pet, I’m finished for the day so I have my phone on. Ring me when you can, love you.’

She set off down a cobbled footpath that snaked through the steeply stacked houses of the upper village. All around her, trailing plants hung from hidden verandas and wooden shutters shielded secret interiors. She loved her route to work – Chemin
du Château, it was called. Everyone else came and went along the vehicle access road behind the hill, but Chemin du Château wasn’t just prettier and more soothing, it was better than any gym. Coinciding with the start of the tourist season, the arrival of the film crew in Beynac had caused a circus, but the twisting, near-vertical path made her think how she’d like to return in the winter with Jimmy, book in somewhere low key and spend a week exploring.

Sure enough, as the path ended so did the peace and quiet, for a riotous assembly of tourists and film extras clogged the main street. The extras were billeted in riverside campsites and when the cameras weren’t rolling had little to do except drink. Most had not bothered to change, so medieval knights, foot-soldiers, archers, rogues and ragged beggars occupied just about every café table, swilling pitchers of beer and hamming it up for the tourists, who gawped and took photographs. The atmosphere was one of a strangely menacing street festival.

She ducked down a side street and stopped outside a gate set into a beige-plastered wall. This admitted her into the forecourt of a modest, old house that had been converted into two apartments. Hers was the upper one.

Inside, it was airy, thanks to a balcony overlooking the river. The production had offered her a suite in the same Sarlat hotel as Spader, but she had declined it precisely because most of the cast were staying there and Sarlat was not within walking distance of the main location. If she had to commute by car every day and socialise every night, she had no chance of finding Roselaine.

She kicked off her sandals, opened the balcony doors, fetched a bottle of water from the fridge and curled up on the sofa with a dog-eared copy of the script, as if poring over it for the thousandth time might somehow help. She tried to concentrate, but it was hot and she was tired, and within five minutes she was fast asleep.

She was floating up the stairs – those stairs, the ones with the sandstone balustrades and steps so big she’d been twelve years old before she’d been able to climb them more than one a time. Her mother knelt before an altar on the return, but instead of her customary purple robe, she wore a short grey zipper dress. She looked lovely, with her long legs and shapely back and her thick, brown hair. But that couldn’t be right because her mother had only looked like that in photographs from when Annalise was little. The religious stuff started after Darling Sweetheart left for good, when her mother was older and more broken. Then, Annalise reached out to touch her mother and her hand was small and podgy, poking out from the sleeve of her
Rainbow
pyjamas – the ones with Zippy, George and Bungle on the front. And she understood; in this dream, her mother was young, so she too was very young.

‘Nun will help you.’ Her mother nodded at the statue on the altar. It had a man’s body, but a frog’s head. ‘Nun will guide you. More than anyone ever did for me…’

Her mother jerked suddenly, then fell backwards down the stairs, tumbling like a rag doll towards the black-and-white tiles of the hall. Annalise screamed and tried to grab her, but
Bzzzzzzzzzzz
.

She opened her eyes; the balcony window framed blue dusk.
Bzzzzzzzzzz
. She sat up, her dress cold with sweat. Her script lay where it had fallen on the floor.
Bzzzzzzzzzz
. That bloody noise! She looked towards the kitchen, thinking the timer on some device had gone off.
Bzzzzzzzzzz
. Wait – it was her apartment door. She discouraged visitors, so she’d never actually heard it before. She stumbled into the hallway and opened up. The landing was filled by a black giant.

‘Miss Palatine?’ The bass voice. ‘Your car is outside.’

‘Oh. You’re Emerson’s friend.’

‘Levine, Miss. I work for H.E., yes.’

‘H.E.?’

‘Mr Emerson.’

‘Look, I’m sorry. You’ll have to tell Harry that I can’t come. I fell asleep. I’m not ready.’

‘Miss Palatine, are you tryin’ to get me fired?’

‘Eh? N-no…’

‘Good, because that’s what I’ll be if I go back to H.E. without you in that car.’

‘But–’

‘I’ll call ahead and say we are delayed,’ he set off down the staircase, ‘but try to hurry. If you knew H.E., you wouldn’t keep him waiting.’

She stood for a second then slammed the door.

‘Bloody hell!’ she told herself. ‘Bloody hell!’

She fell into the shower. The water woke her up, but her tummy felt swollen and her breasts were sore. She had a good mind to… what? Pull on a bathrobe, go down to the street and tell Emerson’s goon to bugger off? Would an American understand ‘bugger off’? Or maybe she should turn the television on loud and refuse to answer the door again. But as she dried, she admitted what she had known since Emerson had sprung his invitation – she had to go. She flung outfits around her bedroom, and she nearly did storm outside to tell Levine to bugger off, but eventually chose a demure, chocolate-brown Rozae Nichols dress that hung to the knee. She hadn’t a hope of drying her hair so she pulled it into a ponytail and didn’t bother with makeup, other than a quick flick of mascara. She lifted her purse and tried to picture the look on Holly Spader’s face at the idea of ‘dating’ Harry Emerson without any make-up. Still, she donned flat shoes so as not to tower over him.

Levine’s Range Rover was almost too wide for the narrow streets, but he drove rapidly out of the village and climbed the forested hills beside Beynac Castle, which, lit by yellow spotlights, looked like something from a dream – a much more pleasant dream than hers. Then, the darkness closed in and she realised she had absolutely no idea where she was being taken.

Levine stopped at a grand set of gates, gilded spikes arrayed between pillars, each pillar topped by a stone orb. Another big man, also dressed in black, stepped from the shadows. Levine’s window hummed down.

‘Bernstein. Just me and the package.’

Bernstein looked at Annalise, nodded, then opened the gates, admitting them onto a gravel drive.

‘What package?’ she asked.

Levine’s eyes found hers in the rear-view mirror. ‘’Scuse me, Miss?’

‘You said, “Me and the package.”’

‘You’re the package, Miss. Don’t be offended; it’s just security talk.’

‘Is all this really necessary?’

‘Is all what really necessary?’

‘Anyone would think we were in one of your boss’s spy movies.’

‘When you as famous as H.E., you gotta have security.’

‘H.E.!’ she copied Levine’s deep voice. ‘Hey, H.E.! You the man, H.E.! You gotta have total security!’ Levine laughed.

A mansion came into view, spotlit like Beynac Castle. It had a pillared portico and tall windows framed by white shutters. The car stopped by the entrance steps and a man with silver hair and a tailcoat appeared at her door, opened it and, in a perfect Home Counties accent, said, ‘Please, Miss Palatine, follow me.’

She gave Levine a little wave. ‘See you later, maybe.’

‘I hope so, Miss.’

She followed the butler up the steps.

‘Annalise! So glad you could come!’

Emerson strode towards her through a brightly lit hallway, hurrying as if he had been summoned from a distant part of
the house. He wore a plain, grey suit with a navy shirt and looked taller than he should have, almost the same height as her. Elevator heels, she guessed. Still, his man-boy features split into such a joyful grin that it was hard not to respond in kind. He embraced her; lightly, barely touching.

‘I’m real sorry we haven’t had a chance to talk sooner, but I’ve been up to my ass… hey!’ He took a step back. ‘My gawd, you look amazin’!’ She blushed and suddenly wished she’d made more of an effort. ‘That dress… Talbot! Doesn’t Miss Palatine look amazin’? Where
did
you get that dress?’

‘Oh,’ she realised that Emerson was actually waiting for an answer, ‘just some place in London, when I was promoting my last film.’

‘Popular Delusions?’

‘You’ve seen it?’

‘Course I’ve seen it! You deserve an Oscar, let alone a BAFTA!’ She blushed some more. ‘May I?’ Holding her fingertips, he guided her along the hallway towards a pair of double doors. Talbot swooped ahead and opened them. ‘I thought we’d eat in the library.’

He released her into the room, which was two storeys high and ornate in a sterile sort of way; slender bookcases around the walls alternated with elongated gilt mirrors and hanging from the ceiling was a chandelier the size of a small car. A circular table was set for two, beside a patio door that looked out onto the night. Casually, she inspected the nearest bookcase, tapping the spine of a volume with her fingernail.

‘False,’ she noted.

‘Huh?’

‘The books – let me see…’ she tapped another, ‘yes, they’re false. Strips of wood, painted to look like books. It’s an old-fashioned decorative technique…’

‘Gawd.’ Emerson frowned and rapped one, accusingly. ‘I never noticed. I thought they were, like, books.’

‘It’s such a lovely place.’

‘My people organised it for me, I told them to pick somewhere nice. Used to belong to some count.’

‘I’m sure it did. May I?’

Cursing herself inwardly, she fled through the patio door. He followed her into a darkened garden; the only visible feature was a fountain, lit by underwater lamps. As she approached it, a large black object leapt into the bright pool, making her start. The silhouette swam away; it was a frog. ‘Oh look, a f– such a beautiful evening. So warm at this time of year.’

His answer was reflective, as if he were talking to himself. ‘I guess you’re not wowed by a joint like this ’cos you grew up in that big old place in Ireland. Me, I grew up in a one-bedroom apartment in New Jersey.’

‘How do you know where I grew up?’

A discreet cough wafted through the patio door.

‘Ah, Talbot.’

‘Aperitif, Sir?’

‘Not for me, but perhaps Miss Palatine would care for somethin’?’

‘If you have a cold beer, that would be lovely.’ The butler withdrew. ‘So tell me,’ she persisted, ‘how do you know where I grew up?’

‘What do ya think of Peter Tress?’ he countered, ushering her back inside the ersatz library, where he took up a pose against the fireplace. He rapped it, as if to check it really was marble, then fixed his eyes on her. He uses those eyes, she thought, to pin people down, like butterflies in a display case.

‘What do I think of Peter? Gosh. He’s great.’

‘Ya think so?’

‘I loved his last film,’ she offered.

‘Yeah, but this is a much bigger movie we’re makin’ here. Do ya think he can handle it?’

‘I’m sure we’re all feeling our way a bit, but–’