Inheritance (46 page)

Ginny sighed with envy, remembering a time when her own face had been fresh and smooth, her color high and her eyes large without the help of makeup, her hips slim and her waist narrow without inhuman diets and diabolical exercise equip-I ment. But her envy faded. It was absurd for a woman of sixty-one to envy a girl of twenty-five, but also, in all honesty, she had to admit Siat even at her best she wouldn't have looked like Laura in that dress: she didn't have Laura's catlike grace that made the fabric flow like liquid gold when she moved.

The hostess brought their drinks and, for Rosa, an English porcelain teapot wifli a matching cup and saucer. Beside diem she set a George V silver tea strainer fitting snugly in a silver receptacle. She opened a polished wooden box divided into small compartments filled with tea leaves and, when Rosa had chosen the kind she wanted, she spooned the leaves into the teapot, closed it and covered it with its own quilted cozy to

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steep. Finally, she arranged a plate of cookies and a basket of fruit in the center of the table, and set out fruit plates with mother-of-pearl fruit knives at each place. Rosa sighed. **There aren't many places where that's done so well. She's remembered everything I taught her, and then some."

A dog barked. The sound was so startling that all conversation stopped. Heads came up, glances darted about, the barking grew louder and more frantic, and then everyone realized it was not a dog but a man, sitting on a love seat near the harpist. His head back, his mouth wide, the muscles of his necic rigid, he growled and woofed and yelped while his com panion, a young girl, by now in tears, tried to shut him up.

"Son of a bitch," Ginny muttered. "Britt Farley. Coked to the gills. He never could hold it, especially when he drinks." a,

"Who?" Kelly asked loudly, competing with the barks ansj yowls. "

"Country-rock singer; hit it big in one of those television series." She stood. "He went to high school with my ex-husband; they both liked to drink and screw. Maybe I can gei him out of here before he messes up Laura's weekend."

But as she started toward Farley's table, she saw that Laura was already there. People were talking again, their voices raised in outrage or embarrassment; dishes and silver clinked, the harpist played rapid trills and runs, and everyone tried to pretend nothing was amiss. As Ginny reached Farley's table she saw Laura sit beside him, her arm around him, talking to him with her lips close to his ear. She talked steadily, without pausing, her fingers digging into his shoulder. And all the while his young companion was sobbing beneath the baiking that had begun to quiet down: "I asked him not to do any coke. See, £ey all think he stopped; he told them he did after they said if he didn't they'd write him out of the show, have bis character run over or something, and he couldn't stand that, he couldn't stand it if they killed him off, and he promised them he'd stop, he promised me he'd stop, but he doesn't pay me much mind usually, I mean, he thinks I'm like a little girl—that's what he calls me, his litde girl who's silly enough to stick with him. . . ."

Her voice trailed off. Ginny bent down beside Laura, listening. ". . . good, you're very good," Laura was saying, her

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voice a steady hypnotic monotone. "Good sound, good timbre, good volume, but no one appreciates it; there's no market for it, no market for country-rock singing dogs in television— '*

A giggle broke from Ginny. Laura flashed her a look of warning, and she cut it off.

"—or romantic ones, either, and you're so good at country-rock and romance, they wouldn't let you change even if they appreciated you. Maybe someday, someday soon, someone might recognize your other talents, but right now you're so big the way you are, so good, so important to the network they couldn't let you change, they couldn't let you be any-diing but the hero you are. . . ."

Slowly, as she talked, she eased him up, her arm still around him, her lips still beside his ear. He was much taller than she, and she had to walk on tiptoe, talking, talking as she led him through the room. Trancelike, his eyes half-closed, at last completely silent, he went with her.

Laura glanced back at Ginny and made a small gesture with her head asking Ginny to stay with the young girl, and then, as some of the guests watched and others turned away, she led Britt Farley from the lounge, down the two steps to tfie lobby, and into the elevator.

"I'm taking you to your room," she said, her voice like ice. At her abrupt change, his eyes flew open. "I'll have dinner sent to you there. I don't want to see you downstairs until you're sober. If that means brunch tomorrow, and I think it probably does, then you won't come downstairs until brunch tomorrow."

They stood close together in the richly paneled elevator while Laura tried to control her fiiry. This is my house, the first Vve ever had that's really mine, and I have guests here, and this damn fool dares to get drunk! And bark! Who the hell does he think he is, to come into my house and make my guests uncomfortable? The elevator reached the eleventh floor and she held his arm, propelling him down the short corridor to his room. "Hold on," he said thickly, trying to come to a stop. "Can't force me to leave the pauty . . . paid my money . . ."

"Not this time, you didn't; you're here as my invited guest,

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and you'll do as I say. Give me the card for this room." He hesitated. "Give it to me, Britt. You're in real trouble if you don't."

He squinted at her. "Britt doesn't get into trouble; Britt makes trouble."

**Call it what you want; if you don't unlock this room or let me do it, I'll call the poUce and have you arrested for disturbing the peace."

'*Oh no. No siree. Wes wouldn't let you do that. Knows me from way back. Bad publicity for hotel."

She looked at him with contempt. 'Try me."

He tried to stare back, but his eyes wandered, and after a moment his shoulders slumped. "Fuck it." He took from his pocket the plastic coded card that fit into a narrow slit in the door, releasing the lock. Laura used it and pushed him inside. The room looked as if a tornado had ripped through it: in the hour between returning from the Art Institute and going to the lounge for cocktails, Farley and his girl had J9ung clothes and shoes in all directions; scotch and bourbon botdes were on tables and amid the tangled sheets on the bed, and white powder was scattered over the dressing table, along with a deck of cards, men's and women's jewelry, and the girl's cosmetics. "And I worried about which room style you'd like best," Laura murmured. "Get undressed, Britt," she ordered bluntly. "Get into bed, sleep it off. I'll call later to see if you want dinner sent up. And don't worry about your friend; we'll take care of her."

"Silly little slut," he murmured sleepily, trying to unbutton his shirt. "Hangs around when nobody else cares whether I shit or shine. Even when I bark. You were right, you know; I'm good at it. Makes everybody pay attention to me. You see their faces? Ha!"

Gently, Laura pushed aside his frimbling fingers and unbuttoned his shirt. He stood quietly, his large body slack as she undressed him. Once, automatically, his hand came up and clutched at her breast. She pushed it aside without friss, as if it were a fly, and he made no protest; he acted from habit, not desire. She pulled back the tangled sheets. "Sleep well, Britt," she said quietly, and left the room, his heavy breathing filling the silence even before she closed the door.

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Our American hero, she thought caustically as she walked back to the elevator. But though her anger had faded, she was shaken. What had occurred would do more damage to Britt Farley's social reputation than to her hotel, but what shook her most was the gross falling away of the facade of Britt Farley. She had met him once in New York, with Currier, and had seen only the public man: a rugged, swaggering figure who had built himself into a mythic hero whose songs were about the dreams of everyday people and the ways to make them come true against all obstacles.

But then there was the man she had just put to bed: weak, frightened, probably on his way out of a job.

Every face has another face behind it, she thought as she took the elevator back to the lobby. Every scene has another one that's hidden until something reveals it to us.

She thought of Paul's photograph of the three children and their sand casde: a peaceful scene—but the children weie quarreling. If Paul photographed Britt, she thought, he'd know how to show the face behind his pubUc one.

Paul. She stood in the lobby, alone in the empty space, wanting him, remembering the times m the past months when she had longed to share with him anecdotes about the people who worked on the renovation, neighborhoods she was discovering in her soUtary explorations of Chicago, and the men and women of other cultures whom she met in grocery stores and restaurants where she could not speak their language, nor they hers, but somehow they communicated and laughed together. She was alive, she was busy, she loved what she was doing, but none of it was as rich as it might have been, because she could not share it with Paul.

She wanted him so overwhehningly she ached all over. She could feel his arms around her, she heard his voice inside her as clearly as if he stood next to her in the lobby, she felt the wonderful security and completeness she had felt whenever they were together.

She crossed her arms over her breasts, willing the pain to stop. It's over. He's married, I have a whole life of my own, what we had is ended. Damn it, affairs end all the time; why can't I get used to the fact that ours is over?

One of the guests bumped into her; someone else adroitly

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stepped around her. "Sorry/' she munnured, and moved away from the elevator.

"No problem," said a tall, bearded man, one of New Yoik*s leading Broadway producers. "I'm glad to have a chance to tell you what a splendid job you've done here."

Laura smiled, grateful to him for bringing her back; she belonged here, in this lobby, not in her memories. Praise was as good as a fur coat, she thought wryly; it makes one feel warm and admired, no matter what else is going on.

She walked across the lobby and saw Currier waiting for her. "Well done," he said, putting his arm around her waist. "Ginny told me all about it; Vm sony I wasn't there to help you."

"Where were you?" she asked. This is where I belong: in this hotel, with Wes, with the life I'm making for myself 'There was a small problem in the kitchen. Nothing serious."

"What problem?"

"I told you, nothing serious. The chef had a small tantrum and I took care of it. You got Farley to his room?"

"Yes; he's asleep. I'll have to rearrange the seating for the show tonight; I don't want his girlfriend to have to sit with someone who'll tear Britt apart."

They walked up the two steps to the landing at the entrance to the lounge, and Laura smiled at the young woman who stood behind a long table at one side of the landing, wrapping Christmas gifts the guests had bought that day on Michigan Avenue. It was one of the services Laura would be offering until Christmas to guests of the hotel. She glanced at the long rolls of garlanded and tinseled wrapping paper. "It looks like you'll need more, Mary. And ribbons, too. I'll make sure it's here by morning."

In the lounge, guests stopped her to ask about Farley and compliment her on getting hhn out peacefully. Others stopped her to invite her to dinner parties in their homes. "And Wes, of course, if he's m town," they all said. She talked to each of them for a few moments, making her way closer to the fireplace. When she reached it, she sat on the arm of Rosa's chair. "How wonderful that three of my favorite people are getting to know each other."

"Getting to be friends," Kelly said. "And Ginny's filling us

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in on all die gossip. She wasn't surprised by your barking actor; he's done it before."

"I wish I'd known," Laura said. "I'd have bought a leash and a muzzle, to be ready."

"You did fine," said Ginny. "He's been known to knock heads together." She contemplated Laura. "Are you enjoying your party?"

"Of course." Laura's eyebrows rose slightly. "Don't I look as if I am?"

"You look beautiful and calm. You ought to look beautiful and triumphant. You've got this crowd smiling like a happy bunch of Eagle Scouts who just discovered what it's like to feel up a girl. Do you have any idea how miraculous it is to make them look happy about anything?"

"I'll look triumphant when I know I am. Ginny, it's only five o'clock on Saturday. We still have to get through dinner tonight, and then the Jacques Brel show at Chez Fromage and tomorrow's brunch."

"You can't miss; you're on a roll. There's a kind of rhythm to these things—trust me, this I do know—and once all these too-rich, too-finicky folks decide they're having a good time, they stop looking for things to complain about. Last night's dinner was a gem, and so was that knockout show of gold this afternoon. You're doing everything right, honey; you've made them light up like a Las Vegas strip."

Laura smiled and looked about the room. Ginny watched her, knowing that there still was something unexplained about the magic she had worked with her guests. Tliey'd come, these two hundred blase, demanding world travelers, because of Currier, or because of friends of friends, or because of the curiosity that sometimes sparks from the ashes of ennui, but Ginny knew they also had come to pass judgment and criticize. And somehow, before they could gleefully tear into the newest hotel on the scene, Laura had made them feel part of her celebration, part of her success.

It isn't just that they're being catered to and coddled with little innovations they haven't seen anywhere else, Giimy decided; it's because of Laura. They look at her and see a sophisticated beauty, and then, almost hidden, there's a little girl who isn't part of them, and who won't be. She's separate, cut

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off from all the bustle of people attaching themselves to other people. They may not understand that that's what they see, but whether they do or not, they want to help her to succeed, to belong, to be one of them instead of standing outside, peering in.