by Joan Wolf
I wonder if this was what he wanted? she thought. Is this joining of Harry and me the way for him and Isabel to rise above the lost years, the anguish of separation? Will they rest in peace at last?
Harry said, “You smell so good, like the old-fashioned roses I have in my garden.”
“It’s a special perfume I have made up just for me. I love roses.”
He lifted his head so he could look into her face. “Do you find this at all peculiar? This intense attachment when we have known each other for so short a time?”
“I don’t find it peculiar at all,” she said.
A faint line appeared between his eyebrows. “Neither do I. And that, perhaps, is the most peculiar thing of all.”
She hesitated, then brought out the question that she had wanted to ask him since before he went into the hospital. “Harry… Jon said something that bothered me, and I wish you would clear it up.”
“What did lover-boy say?” His voice was heavily sarcastic.
“He said that Dana Matthews called you for help on the night she overdosed, and that you refused to go to her.”
“And do you believe him?” he asked neutrally.
“I think that perhaps there was a phone call made, but it was not as Jon interpreted.”
He rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. “You’re right, she did call me, but I wasn’t home. I was out walking. By myself.” He shot her a look. “Needless to say, there were many people who chose to disbelieve me and think that I ignored her cry for help. It made for a good newspaper story.”
“Oh Harry.” She rose onto her elbow so she could look into his face. “I’m so sorry. It must have been terrible for you to hear her words and know that you were too late to save her.”
Two lines bracketed his mouth. “It was the most pitiable message, Tracy. I raced to her house as soon as I heard it, but she was already in a coma. I drove her right to hospital, and they worked over her for a half an hour or so, but it was too late. She died.”
“I am so sorry.”
The lines at the corners of his mouth deepened. “It didn’t help that she left me a wad of money. You can imagine how that made me look—I don’t get to her house until an hour after her phone call, and she leaves me money. The scandal sheets had open season with that one.”
“What did you do with the money?” she asked softly. “Donate it to charity?”
The bitter look left his face. “Thank you, darling. Yes. I donated it to several drug-rehabilitation programs.”
“I just wanted to know, Harry. Jon made the story sound nasty when he told me, and I just wanted to find out the truth.”
“Well now you know.”
“Now I know. But I still loved you even when I didn’t know.”
He looked at her somberly. “Dana had auburn hair and a great smile. I think I mistook her for you.”
They looked into each other’s eyes, and both of them thought of the ghosts they had seen, but neither one of them said anything.
Harry left at six o’clock, with great reluctance, and Tracy took a shower and dressed in jeans and sweater. They were shooting the second ball scene, and she was called for ten, which meant she had to be in makeup by eight. It would take almost an hour just to do her hair. She still had not got her new wedding picture, and all her albums were at home, but her sister had sent her a snapshot, and now she took it out of the drawer, sat on the bed, and looked at it. It was a picture of a young man in a basketball uniform. His eyes and every strand of his wiry dark hair looked electric with joy. She had taken the photo on the day Scotty had signed a letter of intent to play basketball for the University of Connecticut.
“I haven’t forgotten you,” she said softly to the photograph in her hand. “I will never forget you. But I have a new love, Scotty, and I’m so very happy.”
There was no dimming of the incandescent happiness in the young face she was looking at. Some words of familiar poetry drifted into her mind: Ah that it were possible to undo things done / To call back yesterday.
How many times since Scotty had died had she thought of those lines? If only… if only… if only she could roll back time to before the accident. If only she were able to put out her hand, to stop from happening those few terrible seconds when her entire world had been shattered. Ah that it were possible…
She had never doubted that, if she were given the chance to call back yesterday, she would do it in a flash. To have Scotty back, she gladly would have wiped away all of her success as a movie star, would gladly have become the obscure high school teacher she had always thought she would be.
But would she do it now? Would she call back yesterday if it meant she would never meet Harry?
Her mind shied away from the question the way a dreamer’s mind shies away from the endless fall into the abyss. I can’t think about that. It’s stupid to think about that. I don’t have to choose between them. It’s stupid to torment myself with choices that don’t have to be made.
Scotty continued to smile up at her, and other lines of poetry came into her head: Golden lads and girls all must / As chimney-sweepers, come to dust.
It was true, she thought. Scotty and Charles, golden lads both, were dead. And in the ineluctable progression of time, she and Harry would one day follow them into the darkness.
But not now, she thought. She felt her blood running strongly, mounting like sap in a tree, felt the beating of her heart, of her pulses. Now is our time, she thought. Now is the time for us to “roll all of our strength and all of our sweetness up into one ball.”
Slowly her eyes returned to Scotty’s face. Go ahead, his brilliant light-filled eyes seemed to be saying to her. Grab happiness while you can, Trace. Don’t worry about me.
She stood up and, with the picture still in her hand, crossed to the window. A shock ran through her as she saw the carriage drawn by four black horses standing in front of the house. As she watched, wide-eyed and with racing heart, a man dressed in a long, caped coat stepped out and went down the steps that had been set for him by a footman. For a wild moment she thought the film company must be shooting a scene from the picture, but then she realized that there were no cameras, no microphones, no people except for this single man getting out of the carriage, and the attending footman.
“Jeremy!” She heard the name called because she had opened the window slightly before her shower. A woman dressed in a long blue afternoon dress and wearing a shawl around her shoulders came into Tracy’s sight at the bottom of the stairs. “I am so glad that you have come!”
The man kissed the woman on the cheek in an unmistakably brotherly fashion, and said, in the English accent used by Charles, “What the devil has happened, Caroline, to cause you to send me such a message?”
“Come into the house and I will tell you,” Charles’s wife replied.
As Tracy watched, the brother and sister disappeared from her view on their way into the house, and the coach vanished in the direction of the stables.
Tracy put her hand over her pounding heart. I’m afraid, she thought. I’m so afraid. What do all of these visions mean? Have they something to do with the fact that someone is trying to kill Harry?
Before Tracy left for her appointment in makeup, she called Gail with new instructions for the private detective. “See if he can find out if money was transferred from Robin Mauley’s account into the account of a man named Howles, who works for English Heritage,” she said, and Gail promised she would relay the order.
The morning’s filming went badly. At first they were delayed because Greg couldn’t find Liza Moran, who was needed for the shoot.
“Did you check her dressing room?” Dave asked his assistant director tensely.
“I did,” Greg replied. “The door was closed, but I knocked several times, and there was no answer.”
“Did you hear anything inside?” Dave said.
Greg lifted his brows. “I thought I did, but no one answered my knock. I could hardly burst in on her
, now could I?”
Tracy got up from her chair. She didn’t want to be delayed, she wanted to finish early so she could spend some time with Harry. And she was sick to death of Liza Moran. “Perhaps you can’t, Greg, but I can,” she said ominously.
Everyone on the set stared at her.
“I’m fed up with Miss Moran and her nymphomaniac ways,” Tracy announced. “I don’t care what she does on her own time, but this is the third time I have been kept waiting while she indulges herself, and I’ve had it.” She looked at Dave. “I’ll get her.”
Speechless, he nodded.
As Tracy stalked off, Greg said to the electrician standing next to him, “I almost pity Liza when Tracy lights into her.”
Liza’s trailer door was still closed when Tracy reached it, and she ruthlessly pulled it open and went through. Inside, Liza was standing by the clothes rack, pulling her costume over her head. A young man was seated on the couch lacing up a pair of sneakers. Tracy said, her voice like ice, “We have been waiting for you for fifteen minutes already.”
Liza’s face emerged from her dress, and she stared at Tracy in stunned amazement. “What are you doing here?”
The young man, whom Tracy recognized as being one of the catering staff, charged by her with one sneaker still untied and his shirt still open. He left the door open behind him.
In the same icy voice, Tracy said, “Since you didn’t respond to Greg’s call, I thought you might respond to mine. ” She looked with disgust at Liza’s mouth. “Your makeup is smudged. It will have to be fixed.”
Liza had finally pulled herself together. “How dare you,” she shouted. “How dare you walk uninvited into my dressing room. Who the hell do you think you are?”
Tracy’s eyes narrowed. “I’ll tell you who I am. I am Tracy Collins, and I do not like to be kept waiting while one of the cast members is screwing the caterers. So— this is the last time this will happen, Liza, or you will never work on one of my pictures, or my friends’ pictures, again.” Her eyes narrowed a fraction more. “And I mean never.”
Liza looked furious, but she was afraid of Tracy’s power and tried to be conciliatory. “Sorry,” she muttered. “I didn’t realize what time it was.”
“In the future make sure that you do,” Tracy said grimly. “Now, go over to makeup, get fixed up, and report to the set.” She turned her back on the seething Liza and went out of the trailer.
When Liza finally arrived on the set, she was looking subdued. “I’m sorry,” she said to Dave. “I didn’t have my watch on. It won’t happen again.”
They started filming and, for the first time since the movie had started, Jon was distracted. He missed his lines in all of the first seven takes, almost, but not quite, causing Dave to blow up in a rage. Finally, Jon got them right, and Dave called, “Print,” but Tracy knew, and Dave knew, and Jon had to know as well, that it was not his best work. It was good. Jon could sleepwalk through a role, and it would still be good. But his performance lacked the intensity of his earlier work.
At lunch break, Tracy called Gail, who put her in touch with Mark Sanderson, the private detective she had hired. “As far as I can see, Miss Collins, the Honorable Anthony Oliver is clean," the detective reported over the phone. “His lifestyle is certainly above his income, and he has a big credit-card debt, but nobody is after him to pay up. There’s no doubt that additional money would be welcome, but he’s not pushed to the wall, if that’s what you wanted to know.”
“Yes,” Tracy said. “That was what I was wondering, Mr. Sanderson. Did my secretary speak to you about possibly tracing a bribe?”
“She did. It’s rather a delicate operation, and I’m not sure if I can do it. Mauley is a big name.”
“I will be willing to pay extra if you can manage it,” Tracy said.
“All right, I’ll get on it immediately then.”
As Tracy hung up, she didn’t know whether to feel relieved or disappointed. On the one hand, she didn’t want to have to face Harry with the news that his own brother was scheming against him, but on the other hand, it would be an enormous relief to have a culprit so she could stop being terrified for Harry’s safety.
She was free after lunch. They had finished with the scenes in the drawing room and were moving into the magnificent bedchamber that had once belonged to the resident Earl of Silverbridge. It would take at least the afternoon to light the set, and her stand-in would substitute for her when they needed a body to pose for the technicians.
Tracy was hungry and was trying to decide if she wanted to eat first or get her makeup and costume off first, when Jon came up to her, and said, “Finally, we’re both free at the same time! Will you have dinner with me tonight, Tracy? I understand there’s an excellent restaurant in the village.”
She looked into his face and saw that he was trying to disguise his hopefulness. “I don’t think so, Jon,” she said gently. “I rather promised Meg that I would go shopping with her this afternoon, and I don’t know when we’ll be back.”
His hazel eyes looked very green against the lawn that stretched out behind him. “I’ll wait for you. We won’t need a reservation in the middle of the week.”
“I’d rather not. If I can get Meg to eat out, I will. It’s good for her to be forced to eat from a menu.” To soften her rejection she reached out and touched him on the arm. “I’m sure you understand.”
An emotion that might have been anger flickered behind Jon’s eyes. “You really have fallen for him, haven’t you?”
Tracy waited a moment before replying in an expressionless voice, “What do you mean?”
He shook his dark head impatiently. “Don’t play games, Tracy, you know what I mean. You’ve fallen for Silverbridge.”
Tracy let another pause develop while she thought about the best way to respond to this comment. At last she decided on honesty. “Yes, I’m afraid I have, Jon. I’ve fallen rather hard, as a matter of fact. So you see, I’m just not interested in spending time with other men right now.”
He crossed his arms over his burly chest. “I suppose I can’t blame you. He has everything going for him: an ancient title, a fabulous house, money, looks, charm. Why wouldn’t you fall for him?”
He was making her attraction to Harry sound so superficial, but she shut her mouth on her initial impulse, which was to inform Jon that Harry was a farmer with much less money than Jon himself, and said instead, “Neatly put.”
The tautness of his facial muscles relaxed at this forthright reply, and he forced a smile. “Well, you know I don’t approve, but I most certainly do understand. However, if something should ever happen, and you need a friend, please know that I will be here for you.”
Tracy tilted her head fractionally. “What could possibly happen?”
“He could dump you, my dear.” Jon’s tone was dry. “Shocking as that thought may be, it’s happened to other beautiful young women who became involved with Silverbridge.”
Tracy forced herself to maintain a pleasant expression. “That is kind of you, Jon, but I don’t think I need to worry.”
He patted her shoulder. “That’s what they all say, my dear. But I promise faithfully that I won’t say I told you so.” And on that less-than-encouraging note, he walked away.
24
Harry sat in the morning room waiting for the six o’clock news to start. Ebony was draped across his lap, purring with pleasure as he petted her, and he was staring at the empty screen going over in his mind his afternoon interview with the local English Heritage officer.
“English Heritage believes that it is the tout ensemble of the English country house that defines its contribution to art history,” the obnoxious young man with the Midlands accent and dreadful tie had said. “This includes the furnished house with its collections as well as its garden, green park, woods and, in the case of Silverbridge, stables.”
“I can rebuild the stables to look authentic,” Harry had said. “But surely you must see that the cost of the origin
al materials is prohibitive—not to mention the exorbitant fees I would have to pay to the skilled craftsmen who know how to work with those materials.”
“I understand and sympathize with your predicament, Lord Silverbridge.” The Howles fellow had actually made an attempt to look down his nose at Harry. “But you should have had the stables insured for the correct amount of money to allow you to rebuild in the original style. Unfortunately, you did not do that, and now you must deal with the consequences.”
Harry had made a heroic effort to hold on to his temper. “I’ve got the house insured for four times its market value. Do you know the cost of that kind of insurance?”
“The cost of insurance is not my concern, my lord. My concern is the preservation of England’s great heritage.” The young man had fingered his dreadful tie. “The fact that you underinsured your stable cannot be allowed to figure into my decision on this matter. My mission is to protect our heritage.”
“Silverbride is my heritage, not yours,” Harry had replied grimly. “And this is not the tune you were singing the last time I spoke to you. In fact, you led me to believe that there would be no problem with my rebuilding the stable with modern materials as long as I kept the appearance correct.”
Howles’s superior expression disappeared. “I have since changed my mind.”
“And may I ask what caused you to change it?”
The young man gave an elaborate shrug. “You are a very persuasive man, my lord. When I was out from under the influence of your charismatic personality, I realized that I had made a mistake.”
Suddenly Harry had had enough. “That’s not the only mistake you have made, Howles.” He stood up. “That tie of yours is an affront to good taste everywhere. How the devil the government could put a man like you in charge of ‘England’s Heritage’ will always remain a mystery to me.”
He had exited upon that note, and now he wondered if he should have remained to further exercise his “charismatic personality” upon the obnoxious Howles.