“Tell me something,” Irma said suddenly.
“Yes?”
“Was it true that you really didn’t remember Lakow’s wife?”
“No.” Sergei looked across the desk at her, his eyes gentle and in a way sad. “I remembered her very well.”
“I thought so,” Irma said with satisfaction. “I didn’t think you were the kind of man who ever forgot any woman.”
“I should be excited about it,” Sergei said after the waiter had filled their demitasse cups and gone away, “but I’m not.”
Giselle said nothing, just sat there looking at Sergei with her huge blue eyes.
“I’m thirty-five, and for the first time in my life I’ve found a place for myself. I don’t want to chance losing it. I guess it’s because I find it too comfortable. Or am I getting old?”
Giselle smiled. “You’re still a young man.”
Sergei looked at her somberly. “I feel old. Sometimes when I think of my daughter—she’s almost thirteen now—I’m reminded of how much time has gone by.”
“How is Anastasia? Is she doing well?”
“As well as can be expected. That’s another thing; I’d hate to leave her and yet I’m afraid to take her to a strange new place. Things are difficult enough for her as it is. New faces, a new language—it would be too much.”
“There are better schools for her in America than there are here.”
He sipped his coffee. “You sound as if you think I should go. I thought you didn’t like America.”
“Professionally America was no good for me. But for you it could be a whole new world.”
“You say that, but would you go back?”
“As an artiste, no. But if I were you, still young and in search of a world to conquer, I would not hesitate.”
Sergei thought for a moment. “No, it’s impossible. I cannot leave Anastasia alone.”
“Go,” Giselle urged, “try it for a year. If you do not like it you can return. I will look after your daughter while you’re away.”
The telephone began to ring while they were having breakfast in front of the bay window of the suite overlooking the Champs Élysées. Harvey Lakow got up and crossed the room. “Hello.”
“Mr. Lakow? This is Prince Nikovitch.”
“Yes?”
“I have thought about your kind offer, and I have decided to accept.”
Lakow’s voice filled with satisfaction. “Good, I’m very pleased. You won’t regret it.”
“I feel that way, too.”
“If you are free Monday morning I’d like to come by your office. Perhaps we can begin to set the wheels in motion.”
“I am at your complete disposal.”
Lakow put down the telephone and walked back to the table. “Well,” he said in a pleased voice, “he’s coming in.”
“I’m glad,” his wife said, looking up at him with a smile.
“Wait until the Allied Stores hear about this,” Harvey said triumphantly. “It will knock them for a loop.”
“I’m sure it will, Harvey.”
“It was a lucky thing that you thought about Nikovitch. All the others just looked down at us when we talked to them. As if our money wasn’t good enough for them.”
“Don’t you worry, Harvey. They’ll regret it.”
“You’re damn right they will! Especially when they see what we plan for Nikovitch.” He sat down and sipped his coffee again, then made a face and put it back on the table. “You’d think the French would learn to make a decent cup of coffee!”
She laughed.
“Strange, you remembered him but he didn’t remember you. I wonder why?”
“It’s not strange at all, Harvey,” she said gently, her eyes going past him to the window. “I was probably just one of the many Americans for whom he acted as guide. And he was such a young boy at the time, and frightened too.”
“If it were me, I’d never forget you.”
Her eyes came back to him and for a moment there was all the beauty of her life in them. She bent across the table and pressed her lips to his cheek. “That’s because you’re you,” she whispered, “and because I love you.”
146
The heavy roar of the engines forward in the nose of the chartered DC-7 muted suddenly as they reached cruising altitude and the pilot modified the propeller pitch. Wearily Sergei loosened the catch and his seat belt fell to one side. He pressed a button and adjusted the back of the seat, then lit a cigarette and glanced out the window. Below the lights of New Orleans flickered and then fell away behind them as they circled out over the Gulf of Mexico toward the Florida peninsula.
“Mr. Nikovitch?” Norman Berry, the thin, white-faced PR man, slid into the seat beside him, the usual sheaf of papers in his hand and the same worried expression on his face. “I thought we might take a moment to go over the plans for tomorrow.”
“Later, Norman. I want to see if I can catch a little rest.” Sergei saw the expression on Berry’s face worsen. “Leave the papers. I’ll look them over and call you when I’m ready.”
“Yes, sir.” Berry got up and, leaving the papers on the seat, walked out of the forward cabin. The voices of the models chattering excitedly came through the door as it opened and closed behind him.
Idly Sergei glanced down. The blue and red print of the multigraph was headed: “PRINCE NIKOVITCH PROMOTION. September 19th, 1951, Miami, Fla., Airport Reception, 9 A.M., Airport Reception Committee: The Mayor; Members of City Council; Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce; Bartlett’s (A-F Miami) Dept. Store; Reporters; Photographers; Newsreel and TV Personnel.”
Everything was there, logged and detailed, minute by minute like a train schedule. Nothing was forgotten. And so on through the entire day right up to midnight, when the plane would take off again on its final flight back to New York. Sergei turned the sheet of paper over and glanced across the aisle.
Irma Andersen was already asleep, her mouth slightly open. Sergei shook his head in mild wonder. He was younger than she, much younger, and yet he was exhausted. Where did she find the drive and energy for each day? There had been ten days of this, starting in New York. Then San Francisco, Chicago, Los Angeles, Dallas, New Orleans. Flying by night. A different major city every day.
And it wasn’t only this trip. The whole of the past year had been hectic. Now, only now, was he beginning to understand the power and drive of business in the States. No wonder American businessmen conquered the world, then died young. They never stopped. Not for a moment, not for anything.
It had all begun less than two months after he met Lakow in Paris. It started innocently enough, like a pebble dropped into the water, its ripples reaching out wider and wider. Only a line of black type. But suddenly it appeared in thousands and thousands of advertisements, placed by the various A-F stores all over the country.
Dress—or hat, or shoes, or whatever—from the Prince Nikovitch Collection.
Makeup by Prince Nikovitch, the Royal Look of Beauty.
And most of it long before a single item had been put into actual production. So that it always seemed to Sergei like a deadly race against time. Everything was happening at the same time in the penthouse offices on the seventieth floor of the A-F building in New York. There was a continuous pandemonium that made the most hectic day he had ever known in Paris seem like a vacation.
There were three conference rooms adjoining his office, and there were times when even three were not enough. He would race from one to the other. Everything was departmentalized and specialized and yet, somehow, coordinated in a way that only Americans seemed able to accomplish. And between all the office meetings was the press, the publicity which never let up.
He was the symbol, the name, the entire campaign. His pictures were taken at every important Broadway opening, at the opera, at every charity ball, at each important social event. Irma Andersen saw to that, just as she arranged for his name to appear in all the important columns at least twice a week. Not a day passed but somewhere in the Unite
d States at least one interview appeared. Not a week passed when his voice was not heard on radio or he was not seen on television in one of the many programs with a special appeal for women.
A few months ago Norman Berry had come into his office excitedly waving a copy of Advertising Age. “We made it! We made it!”
Sergei had looked up from the drawings on his desk. “Made what?”
“Advertising Age says that you’re now the best-known male in American advertising. Better known even than Commander what’s-his-name!”
“Commander what’s-his-name?” Sergei asked, puzzled.
“You know,” Norman said, “Commander Whitehead. The ‘Schweppervescence’ man.”
“Oh, him.” Sergei’s eyebrows lifted ironically. He looked at Berry quizzically. “Do you think we’ve been missing a bet? Perhaps we should add a vodka to our line. Prince Nikovitch Vodka.”
“That’s a hell of an idea! A natural!” Norman seemed enthusiastic, then he stopped suddenly and stared at Sergei. “You’re kidding!”
Sergei allowed himself a smile.
“I’m all wound up, nothing like this ever happened to me before.”
“Nor to me,” Sergei answered quietly.
The target date was September 10 in New York. The collection would be presented exactly as it had been in Paris. Even the models would be flown over by Air France for the showing. Then the entire cast would board a chartered plane and fly to another major city to present the collection again. Ten cities. Ten days.
Lakow had been right. Sergei bent down and picked up the copy of Women’s Wear Daily that lay beside him on the seat. The big black headline stared up at him:
NIKOVITCH! TWENTY MILLION THE FIRST YEAR?
Harvey Lakow himself was at the airport when the big plane touched down in New York the next morning. He was on the plane before any of them had a chance to get off. “I had to see you before the reporters got to you.”
“The reporters?” Sergei asked. “What do they want? The tour was over yesterday.”
“You don’t understand.” Lakow smiled. “They want to talk to you. You’re news. The biggest thing to hit the American fashion world in the past hundred years.”
“My God!” Sergei sank back into his seat. “All I want to do is get into bed and sleep for three days.”
“There’ll be very little sleep for you, my boy. We have to keep on the ball. It’s time to start planning things for the spring!”
Sergei stared at him wordlessly.
“And by the way,” Lakow added, “the directors and officers of A-F are throwing a little dinner for you tonight at ‘21’ in appreciation of the terrific job you’ve done. Besides, all our wives are dying to meet you.”
As it turned out, the day wasn’t long enough. Sergei barely had time to get into his dinner jacket and get to the restaurant. When the flurry of introductions had died down he found himself alone for a moment with Myra Lakow.
Very little about her had changed, her eyes least of all. They were still the same dark blue. “Thank you for remembering me,” Sergei said in a low voice.
Her smile was exactly the same. “Thank you for not remembering me.” The smile vanished. “Then I wanted to feel young. And free.”
He looked at her for a moment. “And now?”
“And now?” She looked across the room to where her husband stood talking. A warm gentle look came into her eyes. “Now I’m content. And quite happy to act my age.”
147
The model stood with the bored expression usual to her trade. The flowered chiffon blouse wrinkled awkwardly as she turned.
“Let’s see the unlined one,” Sergei said.
Her expression unchanged, she unfastened the blouse and slipped out of it. Her small, hard breasts were pushed up by the padding in her brassiere. Casually, without thinking, she settled them back into the cups and finished buttoning up the other blouse.
Sergei studied her. Now the blouse fitted properly, falling smoothly and outlining her waist without awkward wrinkles. But through the sheer chiffon could clearly be seen the brassiere, which was the crux of the problem.
In France it would not have mattered. French women expected their brassieres to be visible through their sheer blouses. That was why they wore such interesting ones—lace, frills, gay colors. But American women were different. They felt it was gauche if their brassieres showed. So over them they would wear slips, and as a result chiffon blouses, no matter how well made, never draped properly.
Sergei looked at the designer and shook his head. “I’m afraid we still haven’t got it.”
The designer dismissed the model and turned back to Sergei. “What do we do? These blouses are an integral part of our suits for the spring line.”
“Don’t blame yourself,” Sergei said sympathetically, “blame the American woman. Despite the fact that everyone knows she wears a brassiere, she refuses to destroy the illusion they create. Otherwise why would she go to such extremes to hide them?”
“I’ll go back and try again.”
“Do that,” Sergei replied, “but don’t expect too much. Unless—”
“Unless what?”
“Would it be possible to make a brassiere of the same chiffon as the blouse?”
“Not really. The material hasn’t enough support to it.”
“Then how about a covering of chiffon over the brassiere?”
“That might be possible.” The designer’s face began to brighten. “The print on the material would have to be selected very carefully though. If the flowers were too large it might not work.”
“Try it. If it works we might have a sensass for the spring line.” He smiled suddenly. “As a matter of fact, if it works we might even call it ‘Sensass.’”
“‘Sensass’?”
“That’s French slang for ‘sensational.’”
The designer laughed. “Good night.”
“Good night.” Sergei picked up the phone. “Would you ask Mr. Berry to come in?”
He got up from his desk and stretched. The clock on the cover of his engagement book read six o’clock. He walked over to the window and looked out. It was almost dark and the lights of New York had begun to come on.
He turned as Norman came in. “I just wanted to check. What are my plans for tonight?”
“Tonight?”
“Yes, tonight.”
“I thought they had already told you—you have no plans tonight.”
Sergei went back to his desk and sat down. “You mean I have nothing to do?”
Norman held out his hands.
“You mean I’m off, I have an evening to myself?” Sergei asked sarcastically. “I can even get laid if I want?”
The sarcasm was wasted on Norman. “My God! I never thought of that.”
“Thought of what?”
“Broads,” Norman answered. “Somehow I was under the impression you were getting all you wanted.”
Sergei laughed. “How could I? When did you allow me even a minute to myself?”
“I’ll remedy that right now.” Norman went over to the telephone.
“Don’t bother, I’m too tired anyway. All I want is to go home, take a hot bath, and have dinner. I’ll be in bed by ten o’clock.”
“Sure?”
Sergei nodded. “Positive.”
Later when he came out of the office building the chauffeur jumped out of the black-and-gold Rolls-Royce the company had placed at his disposal.
“Home, Johnny,” Sergei said, smiling pleasantly. “You can have the rest of the night off.”
“Good, boss. I sure could use it.”
Sergei looked out at the street. Traffic seemed unusually heavy and the sidewalks were jammed. “There seem to be a lot of people out tonight. What’s up, Johnny?”
“Be that way every night for the next three weeks, boss. Christmas. That’s why I’m glad to get the night off. Gives me a chance to get some things for the kids and the old lady.”
Sergei leane
d back in the seat thoughtfully. Three weeks until Christmas. It was almost fifteen months since he had left Paris.
It was nine forty-five. Sergei had had dinner sent up and he was sitting over the remains watching television when the door chimes sounded. “Come in,” he called, thinking it was the waiter.
A moment later the chimes sounded again, and he got up and went to the door. When he opened it a tall beautiful girl was standing in the hall.
“Prince Nikovitch?”
Sergei nodded.
“May I come in?” Without waiting for an answer, she crossed in front of him into the living room. “I’m Jackie Crowell. Norman Berry sent me, he said to give you this.”
Sergei took the small envelope and opened it. It was a calling card. One word was scrawled across it. “Enjoy.”
In some strange way he was embarrassed. He felt a blush creep into his face for the first time since he had been a boy. “I’m afraid there’s been a mistake. You see, I’ve just finished dinner.” He gestured toward the table. “I didn’t expect to go out.”
“That’s all right.” The girl smiled. “Neither did I.” She took off her mink coat and dropped it casually across a chair. Apparently she knew her way around the hotel because she went directly to the bedroom.
By the time Sergei got to the door she had already slipped out of her dress and was standing there smiling, clad in nothing but a brassiere and a pair of panties. She reached behind her back to unfasten her brassiere.
“Please,” he said, “don’t.”
She hesitated a moment, a puzzled look in her eyes. “You’re not queer, are you? I usually can tell right away.”
“No, I’m not queer, I’m just tired. Very tired.”
“Oh.” The smile started coming back as she finished unhooking her brassiere. “That’s all right. Norman told me you’d been working hard. Don’t worry, you won’t have to do a thing. Just lie back and enjoy it.”
Sergei stared at her breasts. It was not until that moment that he realized how Americanized he had become. They were firm, full, strong-nippled, sex-symbol kind of breasts, and he felt the heat suddenly rise inside him. Almost as if mesmerized, he stepped into the bedroom and kicked the door shut behind him.
Harold Robbins Thriller Collection Page 144