“You heard her!” Mrs. Amberson said. “Let’s get these tables out of here.”
It took all day, even with everyone working at once.
First the carrying of all the tables—out of the dining room, through the lobby, down the steps. Then the van was unloaded, and all of the contents spread around. There was just so much. The stage was made of a dozen or so small platforms, each one only a few feet square, plus the supports that held them together. It took ten people to assemble. In the meantime, Scarlett carried all the bags and costume pieces up to the second floor and set up one room for girls, the other for guys. Scarlett kept passing Mrs. Amberson in the hall. She was ducking in and out of the various guest rooms and spiriting away objects.
By the time Scarlett got downstairs, the actors were in a full rehearsal, reblocking all their moves. She tried to watch as much as she could, but there was so much to do. She brought up the rain and snow mats that they usually put down in the winter to protect the lobby floor. These would provide a path for the unicycles to ride on. There were at least a dozen calls to answer about the where and when of the performance, fragile objects to move out of the way. The actors kept popping out needing hammers and water glasses and pieces of string…so Scarlett had barely noticed the time going by until an arrangement of flowers as big as her leg turned up. A half hour later, a truck rolled up, and two caterers stepped out, carrying crates of champagne and glasses.
“Social lubricant,” Mrs. Amberson said, waving them in. “There are few problems in this world that a case of decent bubbly can’t fix.”
Scarlett tried not to give in to her nerves as Mrs. Amberson ordered them back to the kitchen with a seemingly never-ending amount of booze and ice.
“We’re only having fifty people,” she said. “Isn’t this a lot?”
“I always figure on a bottle a person,” Mrs. Amberson said. “Plus a little extra. And I invited a few more, just some people I thought of at the last minute. Don’t worry. That room can easily seat a hundred…”
“Seventy-five,” Scarlett corrected her. “With the stage.”
“Close enough. Time for you to change, O’Hara. Put that nice black dress on. You’re a host tonight. Make it snappy. You have twenty minutes.”
As Scarlett went to the elevator, she heard Mrs. Amberson cheerfully barking out commands to the caterers.
“You can set the bar up here—and you have one basic instruction for tonight. Refill. I bought this stuff, and I want to see it used. No half-pours…”
She headed up with the general crush of people going to the second floor, stopping in to make sure they had everything they needed. Everyone was doing their makeup, so the mirrors were all full to capacity.
The fifth floor seemed comparatively silent. Scarlett dressed quickly, taking just a moment to get into the dress, apply her lipstick, and give her curls a fruitless shake. When she emerged, she heard voices coming from Spencer’s room. Spencer emerged, wiping makeup from his fingertips. He was completely transformed—full white on the face and black lining around his eyes. He held up a warning finger.
“This is silent-movie makeup,” he clarified. “Not mime. We had to apply more heavily because the light is different downstairs.”
“Sure,” she said. “Whatever you say.”
Eric emerged a moment later. He had the same makeup on. The white only brought out the beautiful shape of his face, and his eyes looked darker. Scarlett felt the familiar lump rise in her throat, that ache that his beauty caused her. She swallowed it down hard.
“I’m going to go down to get things ready,” she said, ducking past him. “See you there. Good luck.”
Back downstairs, Scarlett was astonished to see that the front desk had been converted into a full bar, complete with an ice sculpture of a book as the centerpiece. It was already dripping a bit onto the parqueted floor. Bottles of champagne were lined up and ready to go, along with a small pyramid of glasses.
“Okay,” Mrs. Amberson said. “I’m going to go gather the troops. It’s your watch now. The guest list is behind the desk. When they’ve all arrived, or at quarter to seven, come and get us in my room.”
She repeated her demand about no half-pours, then vanished, leaving Scarlett to fend for herself.
The guests started arriving a full half hour in advance. They were normal looking enough people, casually dressed. Most of them were happy to accept a glass of champagne and mill around, making phone calls or talking to one another. At quarter of, Scarlett went back upstairs to the Empire Suite. The entire cast was stuffed in there, squashed into every possible nook, with Mrs. Amberson on her normal perch in a black dressing gown and looking newly showered. Eric sat at the moon dressing table. The were all holding hands in a big lumpy circle and doing some kind of actor chant to get themselves ready.
“They’re here,” she said.