“I’ll call Mrs. Amberson,” Scarlett said. “She’s supposed to be doing all the follow-up.”
“This is the good part about being this tired,” he said. “You stop fearing for your life. This is it, beloved sisters of mine. This is the day that it really all gets decided or it all falls apart. So do me a favor…”
He got up and left the Orchid Suite with a slow, dragging walk.
“…don’t wake me up. I have a bad feeling those Dutch twins are the only fans I’ll ever have.”
THE GIRL IN THE MOON
Mrs. Amberson had left a voice mail for Scarlett while she was asleep.
“Please tell your parents I will be coming along to family dinner night, as usual,” she said. “They very kindly extended me an invitation. I have some very exciting news.”
Scarlett’s multiple attempts at calling back to get this news were unsuccessful. Mrs. Amberson was simply not answering.
By five, she had to go rouse Spencer, who was deeply asleep fully dressed in his wet clothes. For some profoundly disturbing reason, he shouted the word “peanuts” when Scarlett finally shook him back to consciousness.
“Anything?” he asked, rubbing his eyes.
“Mrs. Amberson is coming over,” Scarlett reported. “Something happened, but she won’t say what.”
Spencer shook his head hard to get the blood flowing and blinked at her a few times. There were still tiny specs of white makeup around his ears that he hadn’t gotten off—the last evidence of the show that probably was no more.
“No matter what happens tonight,” he said, “even if I walk out of dinner as a culinary student and not an actor…I owe you. I want to tell you this now, because I have a bad feeling that I’m not going to be the best person to be around for a few weeks. I won’t forget what you did. And we had fun, right?”
He smiled, but it sounded like he was conceding defeat in his mind.
Downstairs, two pans of the lasagna of death had been roasted into existence. The rolls and salad had been purchased premade, so they were edible. A cab rolled up and Mrs. Amberson stepped out, wearing her brown karate ensemble. Scarlett met her on the sidewalk.
“I love these early dinners,” she said. “So serene, and good for the digestion. We should always eat this early.”
“What’s going on?” Scarlett asked. “Have any agents contacted you? Have you heard anything about where to move the show?”
“All will be revealed,” she said, in an irritatingly sly way.
She took out her cigarette case and opened it. It contained no cigarettes. Instead, it was full of long toothpicklike objects.
“Bamboo soaked in tea-tree oil,” she explained, popping one in her mouth and chewing on it ferociously. “I’ve given up smoking. My acupuncturist says these are very soothing.”
She looked like she was about to gnaw it up and eat it, which probably wasn’t the idea. She swanned along inside, leaving Scarlett to follow. She greeted the Martins effusively, even Marlene, as if she hadn’t seen them in decades.
“Funny thing,” she said, sniffing the air. “Quitting smoking has left me ravenous. I can’t wait for dinner.”
Much to Scarlett’s amazement, Mrs. Amberson took a huge helping of the scary lasagna, a chunk of bread, two scoops of salad, and she even accepted a large glass of the instant iced tea. She dug right in, eating and making small talk for a full half hour, rambling on about anything and everything but the show.
“I’ve been doing a little research,” she said, setting down her fork in triumph. She had cleaned two plates. She removed a book called J. Allen Raumenberg: Design for an Age from her bag. “The man who designed this hotel…do you know what he went on to do afterward?”
“Did he invent Jenga?” Spencer offered.
Mrs. Amberson clearly had no idea what Spencer was talking about, but smiled like she did.
“No. He went on to make things like this.”
She held the book out, story-time style, showing fabulous black-and-white pictures of stage and movie sets.
“J. Allen Raumenberg was one of the greatest set designers of the golden age of Hollywood and Broadway. Your home was essentially a test run for a dozen different sets. Here, do you see?”
She flipped a few pages and held up a photo from a film called Midnight Journey. It could have been a picture of the Empire Suite, except you could see the Chrysler Building through the window.
“You see,” she said, “I chose this hotel for two reasons. One, I wanted the lovely family atmosphere that was promised, and certainly delivered. The second was that I wanted New York glamour—real New York glamour. The kind you can’t just manufacture somewhere. I was so sad to leave…but I’ve developed terrible allergies. I’m sure Scarlett has told you. Absolutely terrible. I had to move to a place with a centralized air conditioning system with air filters. Hence the quitting of the smoking.”