Five Fortunes (38 page)

298 / Beth Gutcheon

to
be
her in another life. Amy treated Eloise as if she were happy and capable, and to her own surprise this made it, apparently, possible for Eloise to be so. She found they were easily working through a long list of tasks that had to be managed perfectly—flowers, candles, cloak-room, towels and soap for the powder rooms, triple-checking the caterer’s arrangements and the rentals. Astoundingly, everything seemed to be going according to plan.

Rae arrived at sunset the next day, and Eloise watched the unaf-fected joy with which everyone greeted her. Rusty and Carol Haines had come in Carol’s Maserati convertible to join them for supper.

The five women sat outside in the soft blue Southern California night.

“You are looking extremely rad,” said Amy to Rusty, and Rusty preened. Her hair was growing back in.

“I have the cutest girl,” said Rusty. “She has about a hundred rings in her nose.”

“What girl is this, Mother?” Carol poured herself more coffee.

“I told you, the new one at…” She gave it a second and then made a fierce birdlike scissoring gesture with her fingers in the vicinity of her ear.

“Jacques’s,” said Carol.

“She has a name too. I’ll think of it. She wears black nail polish.

It looks just as though she slammed all her fingers in a door.” Rusty’s short hair had been spiked with mousse or gel, and she looked all set for a night of stage diving.

“Well, I love it,” Rae said.

“And Carol bought me a Wonderbra,” added Rusty. This brought a loud peal of laughter from Rae and Amy.

“Are you wearing it this minute?”

“She’s taking tap-dancing lessons,” said Carol. “She needed if for her recital costume.”

“Eloise, you should have been at the fat farm with us last fall. We did have fun,” said Rusty to her hostess.

“I bet you’ve never even seen your stepmother do a cartwheel,”

said Carol.

Five Fortunes / 299

Rusty added, “You better come along with us this year.”

“I’d love to,” said Eloise.
Cartwheel?

“Are we all going that week?”

“Well, I
hope
not,” said Amy. “I hope that Laurie and I will be otherwise occupied. But Jill says she’s going.”

“How is she?”

“She sounds great. She moved out of the house, you know.”

“Really!”

“Yes. She moved into the dorm in January. She’s making friends, and she sounds very cheerful. She’s lost an immense amount of weight.”

“Good for her!”

Somewhere inside a telephone rang. After a moment a maid came to the door with a cordless phone in her hand.

“Mrs. Amy?”

Amy identified herself, and was given the phone.

“Amy? Walter.”

“What’s up?” Amy asked him, hoping the sound of his voice hadn’t made her blush. With her lips, she shaped the word “Walter”

to Rae. “Your mother says hi.”

“Hi to her too,” said Walter. “And brace yourself. We just heard from Senator Lorenz’s office. She isn’t in California.”

“What?”

Amy gasped, and the others at the table fell silent.

“She
has
to be here, she’s in San Diego tonight for the…”

“She’s in Washington. There’s a vote tomorrow she can’t miss.

Can you get Streisand? Or Susan Sarandon?”

“Streisand?” Amy repeated lamely, and everyone else at the table echoed “Streisand?”

“Willie Brown? Kathleen Brown? Someone?” Walter asked in Idaho.

“What is it?” Carol asked, at Amy’s elbow.

“Walter…we’ll handle it. I don’t know how. Tell Laurie not to worry and we’ll see her tomorrow. Is Siobhan staffing her?”

“Yes.”

300 / Beth Gutcheon

“Good. I better get on this.”

“Thanks.”

They both hung up, and Amy stared at Carol and Rae and Eloise.

“A thousand bucks a head, and we don’t have a star attraction. This is not good.”

Carol said, “We’ll never get Streisand…”

“Oh god. I was hoping…I mean, who likes to go out to these things? Any fool would rather stay home and eat a baked potato in bed. And we need a hit here, we’ve got media to buy in the next two weeks…”

“I think I’ll call Megan Soule,” said Carol.

“The Movie Star?” Rae and Rusty said at once, in surprise.

“The people tomorrow night, they’ve already paid, haven’t they?”

“It’s not just the ticket price. A lot of them are on my prospect list, people we hope will raise money from
their
friends if they see we’ve got momentum…”

“Do you know how to reach her? Megan Soule?” Eloise asked.

“I’ll call her buddy, who came to the spa with her.” Carol had her electronic agenda out and was punching buttons in the torchlight.

“What is that thing?” Rae asked.

“Address book. Phone book. Calendar.” Carol handed it to Rae and started to dial the cordless phone.

“She’ll never do it,” Amy said softly to Rae.

“I’m afraid you’re right…”

“I mean, she hardly deigned to talk to
us…
”

“And we’re so nice…” said Rae. “Look what she was missing.”

“Babes like us,” said Rusty.

“I know someone who knows someone who worked with her.

When you work with her on a movie you have to sign a thing promising you won’t touch her.”

“
What
?”

“Grips, gaffers, ADs, everybody. Heaven forbid you should lay a hand on her shoulder when you say ‘Good morning.’”

“But she does give a lot of money to noble causes…”

Five Fortunes / 301

Carol had gotten up and walked a few feet away with the phone.

She was talking to an answering machine.

“Yes, Brenda, it’s Carol Haines, from The Cloisters? I’m here with Rae Strouse and Amy Burrows and Rusty, my mom. We have an emergency. Could you call me back whenever you get this message?

I don’t care what time, or fax me and let me know how and when I can reach you?”

And she began reeling off her beeper number, her home phone number, her car phone number, her car fax number, and her home fax number, and was starting on the office numbers when Rae said to Amy, “What about Carter? Maybe she can help.”

“She owes us. Imagine missing dinner with us because of the baby.”

Rae said, “Don’t worry,
I’ll
deal with her.”

A
my and Rae were on Carter’s doorstep at eight-thirty the next morning.

“General!” Carter cried. “Rae!” They exchanged hugs, awkwardly, laughing and bumping into each other.

“All we’re missing is the Voice of Reason,” said Carter, and Amy said, “I
know
, and I miss her. Oh, isn’t this nice!” She had marched into Carter’s shambles of a living room, looking around happily, taking in the PlaySkool toys, and the stacks of kid videos, and the ruined packs of playing cards with which Carter had been teaching Flora to play slapjack.

Please don’t tell Mom, Jill had written to Carter on the computer after the attack.

Instantly Carter had been on the phone to New York, but Jill still insisted. “I can handle it. If you tell her, she’ll come back, and she can’t do that to Laurie.”

“Laurie will manage fine,” Carter had said.

“But it’s not necessary. Dad is hovering around, bringing me worms in his beak and stuff.”

“That doesn’t sound like your dad.”

“I know it doesn’t. Having Mom leave has really shocked him. If she had to come back because of me, it wouldn’t be right. Let her do what she has to do.”

302

Five Fortunes / 303

Carter had dropped the matter of telling Amy, but she checked in with Jill even more often, and made her tell the story over and over, looking for signs of panic or depression or obsession. She didn’t hear them.

“If I were a tree and you cut me down to look at the rings, the year I was thirteen would look like Armageddon. This one would look normal. A mild hurricane, lost a few limbs, no major damage.”

She’s being kelp, Carter thought as she hung up. She had that exact image, the wave and the kelp. Jill had been hit, but not broken. She was up again and waving in the current. Far out.

Amy and Rae had found their way to the kitchen and were introducing themselves to Flora, who was sitting at her little play table, in her bite-sized little chair. Rae got down on her knees on the floor beside her and chattered goofy nonsense until Flora gravely offered her a Cheerio from the dry pile she had emptied onto the table. Rae thanked her, equally grave, and ate it.

When Carter had produced coffee, and hauled Rae to her feet so they could sit on chairs, Amy said, “Carol thinks she can get through to The Movie Star, but so far no luck.”

“Walter’s trying to get to Michelle Pfeiffer, but somebody said she’s in Mexico on location.”

“Jerry plays tennis with Megan Soule’s agent,” said Carter.

“Does he?” Rae asked.

“Let me give him a call.” She looked at her watch, then dialed his car phone.

“Sorry, are you on the other line?” she said when he answered.

This was a pro forma question; Jerry was always on the other line.

She explained the crisis.

“Give me a couple minutes,” Jerry said.

“I’ll give you all day,” said Carter. “We’re desperate.”

“It won’t take all day,” said Jerry. “Tom Lewis owes me, big time.”

“So what’s on the docket for you today?” Amy said after Carter had hung up. “Describe your life, little mother.”

“Flora and I are going to work. I’m doing more of the in-house stuff now, and DeeAnne is more on the street. It’s working out.”

304 / Beth Gutcheon

Flora was standing beside Rae’s knee. “Hello, pet,” Rae said, and Flora solemnly presented her with another Cheerio.

Rae thanked her effusively, and Amy said, “I guess I’ve lost my touch, I don’t rate a Cheerio.”

“Don’t worry,” said Rae, “no one can compete with me, I’m a dancer.”

“Flora, I wish I had a Cheerio,” Amy called. Flora was back in her chair. She looked Amy over.

“You gave my friend a Cheerio, and she ate it. If you gave
me
a Cheerio, I would put it in the bank and take it out and look at it once a year. Or I might frame it. I might hang it on the wall with gold letters underneath: ‘Sacred Cheerio Presented to Amy by Flora.’”

Flora, looking as if she might actually smile, began studying her pile of Cheerios. Finally she chose one and marched to Amy with it.

“Thank you so much, what a wonderful little girl you are. I will keep it always.”

“I’m sure she’ll give me another one soon,” said Rae.

“Goodness, you are competitive,” said Amy.

“So does Flora have her own desk at the office?”

“She shares a desk. My partner Mae Ruth has a daughter who’s taking a semester off from school. She comes in to take care of Flora.”

“So now she has a whole roomful of mothers?”

“Exactly. And she doesn’t even mind if I leave the office, as long as I’m not gone too long. Big progress.”

The phone rang.

“Hello, is this Carter Bond?” said the female voice on the line.

“Speaking.”

“This is Megan Soule. We met at The Cloisters.”

Rae and Amy nearly got whiplash turning to stare as they heard Carter say, “Oh, Megan. It’s nice to hear from you.”

“My agent tells me you have an emergency.”

Carter looked at Rae and Amy with her eyes popped open. They stared back at her. Rae made a thumbs up and rubbed her hands together.

Carter said to the phone, “You remember Laura Lopez?”

Five Fortunes / 305

“Of course,” answered the famous voice. “I knew her husband. I don’t know how she’s done what she’s done. It’s the bravest thing I ever saw.”

Carter made another surprised face at Amy and Rae. She said, “I agree. Would you mind if I put you on with Amy Burrows? She’s working on Laurie’s campaign.”

“Not at all, I’d love to talk with Amy,” said The Voice.

Looking amazed, Carter handed the phone over.

Amy explained the evening and the crisis. She was starting her speech about how much money Laurie’s opponent was spending, when Megan Soule said, “There won’t be any press?”

“Absolutely none.”

“And no one but you and Carter would know I was coming?”

Amy looked at the other two, crossed her fingers, and said, “Right.”

“You guarantee?” Her voice sounded, Amy told them afterward, almost as if it held a note of panic.

“Personally,” she said.

There was a pause.

“I can’t make speeches,” said The Voice.

“Honey, if all you did was sit in a chair and look gorgeous, it would mean the world to us.”

“I can do a
little
better than that. Is there a piano?”

When she had finished giving the address, the description of the back entrance, and the timing of the evening, Amy hung up and said to the others, “I think she’s going to do it.”

“Whoopee!” cried Rae.

“You
think
so? What do we do if she doesn’t?”

“You know—she sounded genuinely terrified. I always thought that was an act.”

“Why shouldn’t she be terrified?” asked Carter. “I’d be terrified if every time I went out of the house I was greeted by hordes of strangers who thought they knew me.”

“She knew us all. She knew which classes we’d taken together.

She’d worried about Laurie.”

306 / Beth Gutcheon

“The thing I want to know,” said Rae, “is, has that piano been tuned or voiced in under a century?”

Carter and Amy looked at her.

“You can’t just sit down and play if all she uses it for is to hold up picture frames. It’ll sound like a load of dishes being thrown down stairs.”

“Where do you find a tuner?”

“I have no idea; I get mine from the symphony. But I book way in advance, and I
did
build them an auditorium.”

“Annelise will know how to get it done,” said Amy. “But listen.

We are not telling anyone why. Not Eloise, not Carol, not anyone.

Let’s get the piano tuned, and then start filing plan B, to tell the others.”

“And in case she doesn’t show…”

“Carter, you start right now finding a baby-sitter,” said Rae.

“I don’t go to things like that. Especially not alone,” said Carter.