‘You’re getting off the point,’ she said sharply. ‘I’m still puzzled about why you picked us up.’ She could still see the other car right behind them, reflected in the wing mirror on her side, and that helped keep the sense of alarm in her under control. They could hardly kidnap six of them – at which thought she relaxed a little. Crazy notion, kidnapping. Why should anyone want to –
‘What do you want?’ She said it loudly, and he looked at her, turning his head briefly and then looking back at the road quickly, too careful a driver to be distracted for long.
‘Why, Miss Dundas, just to take you to the Waldorf. That’s all.’
The car slowed down for the toll booths and he opened the window and reached for coins from the dashboard and she put her hand on the door, thinking confusedly, ‘I’ll get out, run for it – Josh will see and realize, and they’ll get out too –’
‘No need to worry, ma’am, I locked the door. No risk of falling out, I promise you,’ he said, and smiled again as the car picked up speed.
‘Look, it was kind of you to offer a lift, but I’ve changed my mind. I want you to stop, please, and let me out. Do you hear. I want you to stop and let me out –’
‘Here? On the freeway? Why ma’am, then what would you do? I guess you must be tired and nervous, huh, after your flight? Why not lean back, close your eyes? We’ll be around another twenty minutes or so, I guess, traffic being what it is –’
‘No! I want out. Now – you hear me?’
He shook his head smilingly, and she turned in her seat, and waved furiously at Josh behind. He was still talking across Dave, who looked lugubrious and it was a moment or two before he saw her, and then waved back, grinning, happy, monkey-stupid.
‘Now, Miss Dundas, you really should relax, you know,’ Greening said. ‘You’ll get yourself all worn out before this evening – and you with a concert to play – you need all your energy, surely!’
He was all sweet reason, and underneath her panic she felt common sense stirring. She must be mad to get into such a state; all he was doing was giving her a lift. He showed no signs of trying anything odd, he was taking the right and fastest route into the city – she remembered enough of that from her last trip – and behaving in a perfectly normal way. She was the one being stupid, wasn’t she?
She sat back in her seat and tried to loosen her shoulders, but never took her eyes from his mirrored reflection in the windscreen, seeing the shadowy dimpled face through the passing buildings.
And when they arrived at the Waldorf, sliding down the side street and in under the building into the car bays she wanted to cry, she was so relieved and so ashamed.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, not moving, as he switched off the engine and the doorman moved towards them. ‘I was rather foolish there, I think.’
‘Like I said, Miss Dundas, tired and nervous. Flying makes a lot of people that way. We’ll have you settled in no time.’
He was out, fussing with luggage, helping her out and then the other car arrived and the bustle was on as Komo bawled at the doorman who manhandled his big double bass with less reverence than Komo demanded and Josh soothed him and all was hubbub. She was swept into the hotel and the lift and up to the check-in desk in a welter of noise and Komo’s loud expostulations and Dan laughing, and it wasn’t until they were walking through the big ridiculous Disneyland lobby that she realized that Greening and Salmon were gone.
‘Where are they?’ She stopped in the middle of the lobby, looking round. ‘Josh, where did they go?’
‘Who? Oh, those guys? Left ’em downstairs.’
‘I should have said –’
‘Don’t worry, don’t worry. I gave them tickets for tonight.’ He was all expansive generosity. ‘Good seats. Told ’em we’ve got a sell-out, but they could have these two. Come on – check-in time. Then you’ll need a rest, huh? I’ve got to go check at the Center that everything’s OK, but it should be, it should be, they’ve been told just what’s what –’
He bustled her through the checking-in procedures and saw her to her room on the seventeenth floor, tipping the bellhop who brought her luggage, ringing down for room service for her, but she told him as politely as she could she didn’t want a thing, please, just to rest, no, not a thing and at last he was gone, and she stood alone in the hotel room, her luggage piled on the stand by the door and stared out of her window into the well at the rows of more windows on the other side of the building.
The traffic noise came muted and blurred, taxi horns and police sirens and the squeal of brakes merging into an almost pleasant din, and she began to unlock her bags, wanting to unpack. But she was restless and edgy and after a moment made for the door and down to the lobby again.
The place still looked Disneyesque and she stood for a moment staring at the inverted cupolas over Peacock Alley and listened to the tinkle of Cole Porter’s piano and smelled the richness of cigars and cream cakes and gin and then, irritated, made for the coffee shop. She ordered a club sandwich and then couldn’t eat it, but pretending to gave her something to do, and after a quarter of an hour she went upstairs again, feeling more relaxed, though not knowing why.
The red light on her telephone was flashing as she let herself in and she picked up the handset and dialled the number for messages. Trouble at the Center? Was Josh ringing her about problems already? Only four more days to go, and home again. Three more concerts and home again – ‘You have a message for me? Maggy Dundas, in 17 Y.’ ‘Miss Dundas, one moment, please – will you please call 737 8765.’
‘Who is that?’
‘We do not have that information, Miss Dundas. Just the message you should call this number, 737 8765. Have a good day.’ And the phone went dead.
She dialled for a line, automatically, and when it buzzed, dialled the number she had been given and then, as the first burr of the ringing tone hit her ear hung up again, sharply. Who the hell was she calling, anyway? Why should she call a number she’d been given just because someone told her to? I don’t talk to anyone unless I know who I’m talking to, she told herself and after a moment, dialled for a line again, and rang the Lincoln Center number. It took a while to track Josh down, but she found him at last and told him succinctly to call the number she’d been given.
‘I don’t know who it is or why, and no way do I call people unless I know who they are. But I’m curious –’
‘It might be press,’ Josh said fussily. ‘Might be a publicity thing – I’ll get on to it right away – I’ll call you – right away –’
She unpacked the bare essentials she’d need that night, shaking out the silver lurex dress and hanging it up. It looked good on her, fitting tightly, shimmering over hips and breasts, lighting her hair to a richer-than-ever red, and she scrabbled in her make-up bag, looking for the silver eyeshadow that went with it. She’d show ’em tonight! The day’s tension, the moment of panic there on the freeway hadn’t tired her after all. She was wound up now, feeling a mainspring of energy radiating from her hands deep into her belly. She’d knock them for a million tonight.
She showered, and then rolled herself in the counterpane and fell asleep, and woke, sharply, when the phone bell trilled. It was dark now and she reached for the light sleepily before answering.
‘Maggy? Josh. This call – it’s some guy says he knows you. Old friend, he says.’
‘Hmm? Oh, the message – yes. What’s his name?’
‘Wouldn’t say. Wants to surprise you, he says. You’re to call him.’
‘Like hell I will. Some goddamned nut, probably.’
‘Well, maybe, though he sounded OK. Still, it’s up to you. Listen, honey, you’re OK? Resting and all?’
‘I was.’
‘Go back to sleep, get a real rest there, you hear me? We’ve got a sell-out here, no question, a sell-out. And the TV people are here – NBC. I tell you they’re setting up for a live extract! It’s some documentary they’re doing, but I told ’em, you want my lady on a documentary, g
reat, but you see to it she gets exposure on the programmes where it matters, right? And they said sure, they said and it’s all fixed –’
‘You said to rest, Josh.’
‘Oh, Jesus, yeah – look, hon, you sleep, OK? I’ll have the desk call you at six. That’ll be soon enough to get dressed, down here for seven? Great, great –’
To her surprise she did manage to sleep again and woke just before the phone rang with her alarm call, and dressed and made up quickly, feeling good. Even her false lashes went on at first try, and she felt obscurely that that was a good omen. It would be a good night, she knew it in her bones.
Walking across the lobby from the lifts, wrapped in her silver dress, trailing her silver bomber jacket over her shoulder, she felt heads turn to look at her, and for once enjoyed it. Usually the staring aspect of being a performer irritated her. It was her music that mattered, not her clothes or her looks, but at other times, like now, it all came together, the excitement of having music hovering on the edge of performance and looking and feeling good, making the whole world seem to sparkle and shimmer about her. Tonight it shimmered double and she swept out into Park Avenue and into a taxi feeling like the greatest performer New York would ever see.
21
And for a while, she was. The audience, huge, lifting and heaving like a single vast creature, murmuring and muttering and smelling of tobacco and, somewhere, a hint of charred grass, good-humoured and asking to be entertained, sent out a wave of welcome and interest that wrapped her warmly as though in a fur rug, and her skin felt moist and alive as though it were sending out sparks.
The boys had picked it up too, and stood in the wings jigging a little, Komo softly whistling between his teeth, Chalky grinning inanely at the lights, Dan relaxed and peaceable, and they turned as she joined them, smiled, touching her, murmuring a little. Four such different characters, not even particularly liking each other very often, when they made music they merged into a whole, just as the audience did, forming a unit that communicated within itself without any effort, no words, occasional looks and touches, that was all. Usually they didn’t reach that stage of union until they were on the stage, maybe half-way into the first set, but tonight it was there already. Even Josh, fluttering and jabbering on the periphery, fussing over details with Dave, couldn’t touch them, couldn’t get inside the enchanted bubble that was the Dundas Band ready to make music.
And such music they made; it was better than it had ever been. The sounds rose and fell, tangled and untangled, created worlds of their own and then destroyed them ready to be built up again, and the audience swayed and went with it and almost dreamily she watched her fingers dancing on the keyboard, saw the glitter of the lights leaping off her dress and reflecting in the polished wood of the Steinway, and felt whole and good and right. It was marvellous and when the audience exploded into applause she just sat there, looking at them, grinning, her head up, feeling every bit of herself responding as though each hair on her head was standing and cheering back at them.
And the next set and the next – it built and built until she was floating, almost, and Dan caught it and went off into one of his soaring drum experiences and she let him go and then followed him and twisted in and out with him and the audience screamed its excitement and adoration and Komo roared and laughed and twirled his bass and Chalky just smiled peaceably and blew his clarinet like an angel. Oh it was great music, the greatest ever, and Maggy, entranced, lifted her head and walked offstage three inches off the ground and left the boys to take the rest of the applause. She had the next half to get ready for; she had to hide in her dressing-room and protect this fragile bubble of perfection, to make it last until the end of this unique and glorious evening.
‘You didn’t call that number, Miss Dundas.’ The voice was soft and she turned her head, blinking in the dim light backstage, peering.
‘What? Is that you, Josh?’
There were people everywhere, bustling, calling, and above the noise there was the din of the audience lifting its vast corporate voice in worship, but she couldn’t see clearly, for her eyes were glazed with the lights of the stage.
‘Why, no, Miss Dundas. Not Josh. It’s such a pity you didn’t call that number, Miss Dundas. I know you got the message, because your friend Josh called there, and he couldn’t have done that if you hadn’t given him the number. Could he?’
‘Who the hell is that?’ The bubble was bending, losing its perfect roundness, threatening to explode and she tried to hold onto it, turning to go away, back to her dressing-room.
A hand reached out of the dimness and took her elbow. ‘Miss Dundas, you have time to call now, I think. There’s fifteen minutes break, and if you choose to stretch it, no one can object, I reckon. They seem to like you –’ He cocked his head to hear the audience, still shouting, though with less noise now, and his face came into a shaft of light. The Ail-American boy.
‘Greening?’ she said, and the bubble burst, splattering shards of joy around, making them turn into sourness in her mouth as they landed. She felt flat and little bit sick. I wish I’d eaten that sandwich, I feel empty.
‘That’s right, Miss Dundas. Now, can I find you a phone?’
‘No, you bloody well can’t!’ Anger moved in now, filling the emptiness, and she was glad of it and encouraged it, fanning her rage to a blaze. ‘Who the fucking hell do you think you are, coming back here? Jesus God, is there no way I –’
‘Why, Miss Dundas, there’s no need to get so –’ He shook his head reproachfully. ‘I just came to give you a message, that is all! From an old friend.’
‘I have no old friends. No one I want to talk to now or ever. Now get the bloody hell out of my way. I’m going to my dressing-room –’
‘But a phone call takes only a moment or two, you know. No more –’ He was still smiling, still full of dimpled charm, and she threw her head back and bawled, ‘Josh!’ at the top of her voice and at last he was there, coming out of the horde of people in the wings, bustling and blessedly ordinary.
‘Maggy, Maggy, Maggy, that was unbelievable, unbelievable! I’ve never heard anything like it. I tell you, you were the greatest – you made me cry –’ And indeed his face was streaked with tears. ‘– and they’re going to eat you in the next half, eat you. I’ve never heard anything like it, you were –’
‘Josh, get this bastard out of here, will you?’ she said, her voice loud and hard. ‘He’s pestering me. Get him off my back –’
‘Eh?’ Josh turned, peered, and then grinned. ‘Oh, it’s OK, Maggy! It’s that guy that picked us up at the airport –Green or something – hi, there, George –’
‘Gregory,’ the young man said, still looking at Maggy. ‘Gregory Greening.’
‘He’s pestering me. Get rid of him,’ she said again and turned and went, pushing through the crowds into her dressing-room, throwing herself down on the couch.
But the damage had been done. The magic of the evening had gone, that special quality that had filled her as well as the music had melted away and when she went back it was as a showman, a performer, not a musician eaten with the glory of her own sounds. The boys were still good, the audience still screamed, as intoxicated as ever, but it was different and she knew it. She felt as edgy and flat as if she’d been making love and was on the point of exploding over the top, only to find it fizzing out in a series of tired twinges. A sneeze in the loins, no more. No glory, no glitter, nothing. Just a sneeze.
They were besieged afterwards, newspaper people, fans wanting autographs, other musicians, and she couldn’t get off the stage. The concert had been a fantastic hit, had had an impact that the first half had deserved, and the second half hadn’t. Not that the besieging crowds seemed to have noticed the difference; for them the magic she had woven was still there, and faces came and went, beaming, excited, bright-eyed, and she nodded and smiled back, but inside her the weariness built and built until she felt like a lump of lead. Whatever had happened to the bubbles? A lead bub
ble, she thought absurdly and then – if I don’t get away soon I shall scream –
The crowds at last began to drift away, and the scene men came on, began to clean up, shifting the drums and covering the piano, and Josh came back, grinning from ear to ear.
‘There’s a chat show, Magggy, we’ve got it all set up –’
‘Not now, Josh. Please, not now. Tell me later. Tomorrow. I’m bushed.’
He was all solicitude at once. ‘Of course you are. Jesus, of course you are. You were fantastic, great – of course you are –’
‘It was great, Maggy.’ Dan stopped on his way out and stood beside her grinning, but there was an undertow of grimness in him. ‘Not much longer now, eh?’
‘Not much – what do you mean?’
‘You’re a solo lady, Maggy. Every inch a solo lady. You need the really big stuff now. We made a good noise tonight, but you – you took off.’
‘I did, didn’t I?’ She looked up at him, smiling, almost shy. Whatever anyone else said, it was people like Dan who mattered. Professionals like herself.
‘Next time you’ll be able to hold it all through. Not just the first half. Then you’ll be on your own. You won’t need us then – oh, well. That’s this stinking business all over.’ He grinned even more widely, and bent and kissed her, noisily. ‘You’re a great girl, Mags. See you at the party?’
‘Party?’ she said vaguely, wanting to argue with him, wanting to tell him not to worry, they’d always be together, but knowing that he was right. Soon, now, very soon, she’d be on her own.
Josh patted her shoulder. ‘At a new place on Seventh Avenue. There’s a singer there – great – I’ll take you over –’
‘No – not yet. I – give me some time, OK? Where is it? I’ll come on myself. No need for you to wait.’
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