This, Scarlett felt, probably had a lot more to do with the origins of the cigarette case, and not this imaginary illness.
“We’re very excited to see the show tomorrow,” her father said, finally bringing the dreaded topic to the fore. “We’ve been waiting for weeks. Sounds like it’s going to be great.”
Spencer physically braced himself, then looked his parents and Mrs. Amberson right in the face, ready to take the bullet that was coming.
“Yes,” she said. “About that…A very funny thing happened. I ran into an old friend of mine, a very good friend named Donna. It was thanks to Scarlett that we got together, actually.”
Spencer shot her a look of confusion. This was going in an odd direction.
“Donna works for the tourist commission, for Broadway really, helping advertise the arts to tourists. I was telling her how your hotel is sadly empty much of the time. She had the most remarkable idea. It turns out there are loads of amateur theatrical groups who want a taste of real New York action, up close and personal with the performers. She deals with them all the time. ‘What if,’ she asked me, ‘what if there was a way to bring a show into a hotel? Let people see the process really up close? Spend time with the actors, see the preparation.’ An extraordinary proposition, really.”
There was a desperate, scary silence, which Mrs. Amberson moved quickly to fill.
“I couldn’t follow how that could possibly work either, but she pointed out to me that I, as the director of a theater company, could potentially join forces with you, bringing the production of Hamlet here.”
“Here?” her mom said. “But I thought this show was a very successful company, in a theater…well, some kind of theater downtown.”
“Oh, yes,” Mrs. Amberson said. “It is. That’s what I told her. I said, ‘Donna, it’s a nice idea, but we’re about to have a massive success on our hands right where we are.’ But she kept talking and managed to convince me that this just might work out. Why, I imagine that with a little rearrangement, we could perform in this room with no trouble at all!”
“But…” Scarlett’s mom said.
“Then I got to thinking,” Mrs. Amberson went on, skating over the interruption. “With the personal service you provide here, you’d really be able to give these people the trips they’ve been dreaming of! Large hotels are so impersonal. But here, they could get advice on the hottest shows to see—aside from Hamlet—right from the in-house actors.”
“And shopping,” Lola cut in. “People love to come here to shop. I could show them where to go. I could even take them around.”
“A personal shopping guide!” Mrs. Amberson said, clapping her hands. “A stroke of absolute genius!”
“It’s an interesting idea your friend had,” Scarlett’s dad said, trying to be polite, “but I’m not sure it would draw more people here.”
“It’s like you’re reading my mind,” Mrs. Amberson replied. “I said, ‘Donna, it sounds good, but can you actually get groups to come up and do this?’ And you know what? She typed some things into her computer, made a few phone calls…well, let’s see.”
She produced a thick swath of papers from her voluminous bag.
“A group from Florida,” she said, glancing through them. “They’d be interested in coming for a week. A Japanese tour operator is interested for three days. A small company from England, four days. Another from France. A community group from Ohio. All of these people are looking to book soon, before the rates go up in the fall. There’s probably enough here to fill this whole place for a month, if you were, you know, interested.”
She pushed the pages over, all innocence. Scarlett’s dad reached over for them, wide-eyed.
“I had another thought,” Mrs. Amberson said, allowing a triumphant smile to sneak onto her face. “My sudden attack of allergies could probably be remedied by one of those portable air filters. So if you were interested in doing this, I could come back and take my old room, if it’s available. In any case, purely for your information.”
She concluded this performance by taking a huge bite out of a roll. The others didn’t know it, but Scarlett could read her expressions now. This one said, “I’m so good, I’m going to eat this baked good made with bleached flour.”
There was a long pause during which Scarlett felt that many things about both their immediate and long-term futures were probably being decided.
“Mrs. Amberson,” Scarlett’s mom said, “would you mind giving us a minute?”
“Not at all! I’m used to taking smoking breaks, anyway. The habit is still there, even though the cigarettes are gone. I was just about to excuse myself for a moment.”
Scarlett’s mom snapped into action the moment she was gone.