Alexandra Waring

by Laura Van Wormer

  “Do you think it’s lovely, strong and expedient?” Alexandra said.

  “What?” Cassy said, laughing, looking at her as if she were crazy.

  “Do you think it’s lovely, strong and expedient?” Alexandra repeated, laughing too. Her eyes were bright, happy.

  “Okay—sure,” Cassy said, looking back at the gate. “But why?”

  “Lord Hargrave says I’m like that gate.”

  “What?”

  “He did. He said I was like the Alexandra Gate—lovely, strong and expedient. That’s what he said.”

  Cassy looked at the gate and then back at Alexandra. “Looks like the ‘No Trucks Unless Authorized’ Gate to me,” she said, referring to the sign on it.

  “No, come on—that must be it,” Alexandra said as the light changed, pulling Cassy across the road. “He told me where it was.”

  They walked through the gate and looked around on the other side. And, sure enough, there was a sign:

  ALEXANDRA GATE

  “Huh,” Alexandra said, standing there looking at it. “So that’s me. That’s what I’m like. Interesting.” She looked at Cassy, closing one eye. “Expedient?”

  Cassy was looking around. “I think the concept of traffic running through you may be appropriate. Where exactly are we, anyway?”

  Alexandra turned, pointing east. “I think that’s the Hilton over there.”

  Cassy looked. There were four tennis courts, and then there were people playing soccer, and there were acres and acres of grass and trees and way, way, way off in the distance there were some buildings marking the east end of the park. “So what does the Hilton mean?”

  “It means the Ritz is straight down there somewhere,” Alexandra said. “But let’s walk in the park some.”

  “The park?” Cassy said, looking at her.

  “The park,” Alexandra said. “But you’d rather go see Diana Rigg in something-somewhere, right?” She looked at her watch. “And I want to take a nap before going to the studio, so maybe—”

  “No, no, let’s walk some,” Cassy said. “We need to talk some more about DBS. And I need to talk to you too—about something else.”

  Alexandra looked at her. “About…?”

  “Me,” Cassy said.

  “Great,” Alexandra said, gesturing to the park. “There’s a restaurant in here somewhere. We can get something to eat.”

  They looked at a posted directory of the park and then followed Exhibition Road in to a rather unusual-looking complex overlooking the Serpentine. One half was a kind of concrete and glass space-age dwelling housing a restaurant; and next door was a one-floor glass structure that looked a little like a carnival fun house with its multicolored lights. The sign said this latter building was the Pergola Café, a family restaurant.

  They chose the presumably nonfamily restaurant and were immediately glad they did, for inside it was very quiet and had a wonderful panoramic view. The maitre d’ seated them at a small booth for two by the window, and they were very happy with it. They looked out over a grassy backyard, dotted with white wild flowers, the outer edge of which was beautifully landscaped with leafy trees and flowering bushes. And then there was a steep embankment, dropping down to the waters of the Serpentine. To the left was a stone bridge across the water; to the right, in the distance, there were boaters rowing in to shore.

  It was lovely and cool, the evening drawing quickly toward night.

  *

  The only surprise Cassy had about the concessions Alexandra wanted from Darenbrook Communications for DBS News, as she sat there making some notes—increased funding, moving up the schedule of expansion, overseas news liaisons, etc.—concerned Alexandra’s mysterious employees Mr. Graham and Miss Moffat, whom Alexandra had been paying out of her own pocket. Alexandra wanted them on the DBS News payroll, heading their own division called Research and Development, where they would recycle the DBS newscasts for subsidiary rights income, both domestically and internationally, and she wanted

  “But Mr. Graham is seventy years old, Alexandra!” Cassy said.

  “Seventy—one,” Alexandra said.

  “And Miss Moffat is like—like—”

  “Sixty-eight,” Alexandra said.

  Cassy looked at her.

  “And their one hundred and thirty-eight years of experience are going to make us some money—to say nothing of producing some very prestigious projects,” Alexandra said.

  “Like what?” Cassy said.

  “Like packaging Gary’s weather segments as a natural phenomena video for junior high and high school science classes,” Alexandra said. “He’s already got a deal with Scholastic lined up.”

  Cassy looked at her.

  “And Sony’s interested in a series of videos depicting contemporary America on a regional basis. You know, edit together a year of stories pertaining to specific areas. They’re interested in using it in their orientation program for employees they send here to work—and Mr. Graham says there are fifty-six other international corporations that want to talk to us about it too.”

  Cassy’s mouth was open.

  “And then he has this whole airline deal cooking,” Alexandra said. “We’ll produce a weekly summary newscast—out of our regular ones —an hour long, and they’re going to use it on their international flights coming into the States, to catch people up on what’s going on in America. And so then he thought, well, why can’t we use the same hour video for schools and libraries? So then he started talking to a friend of his at—”

  “I don’t believe this,” Cassy said. “Mr. Graham?”

  “Oh, he’s wonderful, Cassy—and the stories he has to tell! He was in newsreels and he has that kind of mind—you know, waste not, want not. His whole mind is oriented toward using every little scrap of good footage for as many things as he can. He’s been doing a lot of those war series for cable, using the old newsreel footage. And some video series. And Miss Moffat is sort of his sounding board, but she also makes a lot of the calls—people are quite disarmed by her. And all they’re going to need is one young, smart producer and a couple of good secretaries. We can use our same editing staff. Actually, Hex has been helping them on the sly already. But I want them on the payroll. And I want to pay them well, Cassy. And I want them to have titles and I want to announce it in the press and really make a big deal out of it.”

  “Why?”

  Alexandra looked at her. “Because I think they’re wonderful and deserve to have a fuss made over them.” And then she added, “And DBS News is not staying at Darenbrook Communications unless you approve it. Now. And I know you can approve it because I was going to ask you to anyway before all this stuff started—and if you said no, I was going to do it anyway out of my syndication money from Jessica’s show.”

  Cassy threw up her hands. “Langley was wrong,” Cassy said, laughing, bringing her hands down to the table, “you are a tsarina.”

  They smiled at each other, gazing at each other across the table.

  “Okay,” Cassy said then, making a note on her pad. “Consider Research and Development approved.”

  They ate supper, talking over various other aspects of DBS News, but then that business was done and Alexandra asked Cassy what she thought was going to happen to Jackson. What he would do, and if there was anything she should or could do for him.

  Cassy stopped eating then, sighing, looking out the window.

  “What’s the matter?” Alexandra said.

  Cassy looked at her for a long moment. “You and I have to talk.” She paused. “There’s something I have to tell you before we talk any further.” She dropped her eyes to the table. “Something I have to discuss with you.”

  Alexandra put her fork down and patted her mouth with her napkin. “Go ahead,” she said quietly.

  “It may be that it will be…” Cassy began, stopping and frowning at how it sounded.

  “It may be that it will be,” Alexandra said, smiling, encouraging her to continue.

  Ca
ssy sighed and plunged ahead. “That it would be best if I leave DBS. Maybe at the end of the year.”

  Alexandra looked at her.

  Cassy glanced down at the table. “I…” She looked up. “Just tell me how that would affect you. My not working with you anymore. You brought me to DBS, Alexandra—to look after your interests. And I have to know what it would do to you if I left.”

  Alexandra thought a moment, looking out the window. “Well,” she said, turning back to Cassy, “it’s not as if you and I will be working very closely anymore anyway—not with you being network president.” She paused, looking at her. “But it’s not a matter of me needing you anymore—it’s a matter of everyone and everything at DBS needing you. And so my feeling is, whatever it is that makes you think you want to leave”—she swallowed—”I think is something that could somehow be worked out.”

  Cassy nodded, biting her lip and looking out the window.

  Alexandra was watching her. “I can’t believe you could work anywhere else. I can’t believe you’d give up DBS.”

  Cassy shrugged, still looking out the window. “Dexter Halloway wants me to come back. He wants me to buy some more stations for Rogers, Dale—build a chain.” She looked at Alexandra. “While prices are down.”

  When Alexandra didn’t say anything, Cassy looked down at her water glass, pushing it around, and continued, “With so many takeovers of the consumer goods companies, as you know, the first thing to get slashed is their ad budgets. In ‘86, stations were going for fifteen times their cash flow. Now,” she shrugged, “some are lucky if they can get ten. And it’s going to be worse next year—and it’ll be a good time to buy.”

  Alexandra looked at her for a moment and then said, “Forget it!” making Cassy jump. “Just forget it, Cassy,” she said, batting the idea out of the air with her hand. “No way. Whatever it is that you’re afraid of—don’t be. You’re staying at DBS and that’s it. We’ll work it out.”

  “But it’s not that simple,” Cassy told her. “Because it’s for personal reasons. And I think you might feel entirely different when I tell you what they are.”

  Alexandra looked at her, face turning a little red.

  Cassy dropped her eyes. “And everything’s at sixes and sevens right now. It’s not the best time to be trying to make decisions. Not for any of us.”

  Alexandra was smiling slightly now. After a moment she said, gently, “Maybe you should just tell me what your personal reasons are, Cassy.”

  Cassy looked out the window. “I didn’t realize how difficult this would be.”

  “It’s just me, Cassy,” Alexandra said softly. “You can tell me anything. We can work out anything. I know we can. But you have to tell me first.” She paused. “I need for you to tell me.”

  Cassy hesitated and then took a sip of water. Finally she looked back at Alexandra. “I’ve fallen in love with Jackson.”

  Alexandra’s expression did not change.

  “I know,” Cassy said, dropping her eyes. “I’m not the type to be sleeping around the office, but…” She smiled, shaking her head to herself. “I don’t know.” She looked up. “It all started the night of the boat party.”

  The color was draining from Alexandra’s face.

  “Actually, it started before,” Cassy said, picking up her fork and playing with it on her plate. “And then we—we slept together.” She dropped her fork, her face blushing scarlet, her eyes down on her plate. “I know it seems ridiculous at my age—to carry on the way I have been—with Michael scarcely out of the house—but…” She swallowed, timidly looking up at Alexandra. “I don’t know. I think he really might be in love with me too.”

  “Of course he is,” Alexandra said, voice faint.

  “I’m sorry, what?” Cassy said, leaning forward, anxious.

  Alexandra cleared her throat. “I said, he is. I’m sure he’s very much in love with you. He’d be a fool not to be. So don’t worry about that, Cassy.” She reached over the table to touch Cassy’s hand. “I’m very happy for you,” she said. “You so badly deserve someone wonderful—a very wonderful man. And you’ve found him.” Her voice faltered and she cleared her throat again. “There are few people I love more, respect more, than Jackson. He’s right for you.” She looked down, adding, “Perfect for you.”

  Cassy’s eyes were full of tears. “Oh, thank you for saying that,” she said, taking her hand in both of hers. “Sweetheart, thank you. I’ve been so scared about what you would think—about whether I’m some sort of fool in a middle-age crisis.”

  Alexandra withdrew her hand, shaking her head. “You’re no fool,” she said. “And Jackson’s certainly no fool.”

  They left the restaurant soon after that, Alexandra pleading a headache and a need to rest before going to the studio. A cab was hailed for and Cassy dropped Alexandra off at the Ritz. Alexandra hugged her, assured her one more time that Jackson was the right person and how Cassy should not worry about things, how it would all work out, and then she went into the hotel, picked up messages and her key, and went up to her suite.

  She dropped her things on the table in the living room and went into the bedroom, turning on a light. Then she turned the light off and just stood there awhile, in the doorway, the light from the living room coming in from behind her. She slipped off her shoes. She walked over to stand by the dresser and look out the window. Then she turned around, walked toward the bed, but then stopped a few feet away, simply standing there, looking at it. And then, very slowly, she brought her hands up to cover her face. There was a high-pitched sound from inside her throat and then she took a step forward, leaning over, blindly reaching for the bed. She found the edge of it and sank to her knees beside it, putting her arm on it and burying her face in her arm.

  “Oh, God,” Alexandra whispered, crying, “oh, God—help me, please. I cannot bear this—I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.”

  The studios of the British International News Service—a subsidiary of Hargrave World Communications, Ltd.—were located right there in the West End of London on the corner of Great Titchfield and Riding House streets. The ITN studios (Independent Television News) were right around the corner on Wells Street, and ABC (the American Broadcasting Company)—which had a “friendly news liaison” with ITN—had offices just up on Carburton Street. CNN (the Cable News Network), who had a “cable—friendly news liaison” with ITN, had an outpost in the neighborhood too, just a bit east on Newman Street.

  Alexandra arrived at the BINS studio promptly at eleven. Will was there with a crew waiting for her. Cassy arrived shortly thereafter and went off with the production executive while Alexandra and the crew ran studio tests with West End.

  After the tests were finished, Alexandra went into the newsroom, where she talked on the phone first with Kyle and then with Dan, the news editor, and then with Dick Gross, the director. Then she sat down at a computer terminal, which one of the BINS news assistants called in to a tie line with the West End computer, and within moments she was scrolling through the working newscast script. She got Kyle on the phone and he, on the computer too at his end, watched as she flagged and queried some places in the copy. In about forty minutes they were through and then Alexandra wrote her opening, including the headlines of the day, a midway intro, and a closing, and sent it off to West End. Dan’s and Kyle’s approval flashed back minutes later, and then seconds later the news assistant was catching the final script as it came out of the printer.

  It was 1:15 AM. Alexandra went into makeup where a nice man named Luddy went to work on her. She emerged at one thirty-four, was handed her script by Will as she came into the studio and took her seat behind the desk on the BINS set. Her mike was clipped on, her earpiece connected. They had mini-rehearsal with West End. Alexandra told the TelePrompTer operator he was good.

  At 9:00:15, after the opening, Alexandra appeared on television across America with the greeting, “Hello and good evening from London, England, where I am currently on special assignment…” S
he proceeded to offer the day’s headlines and then turned the newscast over to Chester Hanacker and John Knox Norwood at West End as coanchors. (Her being in London prompted an ad-lib remark or two from some of her colleagues, i.e., “The dollar fell against the pound today,” Paul Levitz said in the finance segment, “and we’ve been assured that Alexandra had nothing to do with it.”) Alexandra appeared briefly to do a lead into the second half hour, and then at the end of the newscast Chester led back to her in London for the close.

  At DBS, some said they got goose bumps watching the close, seeing Alexandra sitting so very far away—blue eyes blazing, smile so familiar—saying, “From the West End of London to the West End of New York, to the western end of the world in Hawaii—this has been the DBS television news network, wishing you a very good night and an even better tomorrow.”

  They called it a wrap, congratulated each other and struck the set. Cassy took a cab to her hotel and Alexandra and Will shared one back to the Ritz. Alexandra gave him a kiss on the cheek good night in the hall and went into her suite. She sat down in the living room, pulled out her address book and placed a long-distance call to New York. It was 3:46 AM, 10:46 PM in New York.

  “Hello, John? It’s Alexandra calling. I’m sorry to call so late, but I think you’ll understand why I thought it worth while to risk waking you.” She smiled, nodding. “Thank you. Anyway, John, I’d like you to call Lord Hargrave tomorrow. He’s made me a separate offer—” She nodded. “Separate from DBS. To launch his global newscast. From London. He’ll attach an offer to Gordon as well.” She listened. “Right. I just want you to listen to what he has to say and then call me back and tell me what you think.”

  She talked with him for another fifteen minutes, hung up the phone, and then sat there for a moment, looking at it. Then she sighed—running a hand through her hair—and got up and walked into the bedroom.