Fortune Is a Woman

by Francine Saint Marie

  “Will that be all…no…okay…could you send up some cognac too?”

  “Some cognac. Of course. A bottle?”

  “A bottle, dear? A glass? Just send one glass, please.”

  “One glass of cognac. One shaker of martinis. We’ll send that right up. Is there anything else we can do for you tonight?”

  “Yes, please. We have a dinner guest.”

  _____

  “Three dinners, suite twenty-seven? Who else is up there?”

  “I don’t know. Says here ‘and guest,’ that’s all.”

  An interesting twist that had escaped Anna’s attention. “A guest of Kristenson-Beaumont? Tonight? You there! Hey! Yes, you. Come here. You delivered drinks to suite twenty-seven?”

  “I did.”

  “They have a guest?”

  “Apparently.”

  “You saw her?”

  “No, it was dark. Candles.”

  “But you’re sure they have a guest up there?”

  “Yes. I heard her.”

  “Heard–wait! Bring that cart here. I’ll deliver those myself. I want to see this mystery woman.”

  _____

  “What if I can’t?”

  “Darling, if you can’t, you can’t.”

  Lydia finished her martini and reached across the table for the shaker.

  “But I think you can.”

  Venus said nothing. It was a million yards to that bed. Only a few feet to the door.

  “You can’t make love to my wife,” Lydia tossed in her direction.

  Helaine chuckled.

  “Deal,” Venus answered from the dark corner where she sat nursing her cognac.

  “Deal,” Helaine whispered, sitting beside Lydia. “Not too many of those, they’ll be serving dinner soon.”

  What’s too many? Two? Three? “Helaine, I’ve never–”

  “Nor I,” Venus volunteered. “I’ve never even–”

  “But it’s done all the time, ladies. I can assure you.”

  “But not us, Lana. I’m not–”

  “I would rather it be with me than withou–”

  “It wouldn’t happen, I’m telling you!”

  Venus opted to say nothing.

  “It won’t,” Helaine replied, “if we do it my way. It might otherwise. I seek to prevent that, darling. I want it out of your system.” There was a knock on the door. She rose to answer it. “And yours, Venus, if that’s possible–well, hello, Anna.”

  “Dr. Kristenson. Working after hours?”

  “Anna, I wasn’t aware you did room service, too. How lovely.”

  “Dinner for three,” Anna announced jauntily. “My, it’s dark in here, Helaine. Do I get to meet your guest or should I just slide her dinner under the bedroom door?”

  “Hah…the table, please. Lydia, could you get the lamp?”

  Lydia fumbled for a light switch.

  Illumination. Venus was on her feet.

  “Well, aren’t you breathtaking? And this is?”

  “Venus,” Helaine said, removing the plates from the forgotten dinner cart and arranging them on the table.

  “Venus,” Anna repeated, holding Venus’ hand. “Of course you are.”

  “Meet Anna, Venus. A very dear friend of mine.”

  “A pleasure,” Venus said, her eyes searching for Lydia’s.

  This did not escape Anna’s notice. She dropped her hand and glanced at Lydia. “Astonishing, Helaine. The two most beautiful women in the world. What are your plans, I wonder?”

  “Dinner,” was all Helaine would say, giving Anna her cue.

  Anna bowed out gracefully and left them with a table set for three.

  “Shall we, ladies?”

  Chapter 20

  Overcome

  It takes courage to promise a woman you can please her with just your mouth and your hand. Especially if you’re in love with the creature.

  Three in the morning. Intrepid Venus gently closed the door behind her and tiptoed barefoot down the hall to the elevator, carrying her shoes as an exhausted athlete might after the big game, one in each hand.

  It was not clear by her posture whether she had won or lost. Neither could it be determined by her expression, which seemed to be one of sheer concentration, as if, right now, nothing was more important than leaving the hotel undetected.

  She was hoping to avoid the woman named Anna with the intimate eyes and the sensual voice who Venus feared didn’t sleep. She was hoping, as well, that she hadn’t woken Lydia or Dr. Kristenson.

  The hallway was dim, lit at this hour by a row of small, purple, shell-shaped sconces. She counted them as she walked. Seven purple shells to the elevator. When she got downstairs should she use the side door or should she go through the lobby? Should she walk home? Could she get a cab at this hour? Did the hotel perhaps provide car service?

  She was dazed. If she could speak, she had no idea what would come out of her mouth. Probably something to the effect that she had never, ever been in love like this, where just lying between someone’s legs, in her arms, hearing her orgasm, feeling it, had been enough.

  And that was just for starters.

  She pushed the button and waited for the elevator. Should she put her shoes on? Would it be cold outside? Did she need a coat? Had she left her coat? The elevator opened silently and she stepped silently inside.

  Chapter 21

  Fortune in the Affairs of Women

  Less than twenty-four little hours later, Ms. Angelo was off to Paris for three weeks and the only thing Joint President Beaumont had to say to her before she left was, “be good.” This she did scarcely moving her lips and with an almost imperceptible fluttering of her eyelids that suggested she was doing the very best she could to pretend that nothing whatsoever had happened.

  Venus chucked her luggage in the overhead compartment, stretched out first class.

  Be good. Now what was that supposed to mean? Thank you for fucking my brains out, have a nice day?

  _____

  “Ooh, Paula, how thoughtful of you.” (Cell phone for her birthday.)

  “Don’t be smart, Beaumont. It’s a discreet little thing just like you.”

  “Good. So now you can find me anywhere, huh?”

  “That’s the plan.”

  “Thank you. It goes perfectly with my shoes.”

  “What are you in such a good mood about today?” Paula asked. “What did you do last night besides completely forget about your most recent faux pas?” She reached into the waste basket and extracted yesterday’s paper from it. “Remember this?”

  THUMBS UP!

  “I said I was sorry. What do you think I did last night?”

  “Hmmm…you know they ought to make an action figure out of you. Keep it up and they will. Make an awful nice little stocking stuffer for your friend there, Mr. Goodman.”

  “Goodman?”

  “He’s seething. Weren’t your ears ringing?”

  “Sticks and stones. Anything worth repeating?”

  “How’s hedonist suit you?”

  Ummm.

  “You’re very lucky, Beaumont. Charm school’s really paying off for you these days.”

  Lydia folded the newspaper into her briefcase. Another day, another umpteen million dollars. “Paying off for Soloman-Schmitt, too, I’d say.”

  “Yes,” Paula agreed. “Through no fault of your own.”

  _____

  Helaine was home working in her office. Lydia tapped at the door.

  “Darling, you’re early. I could get used to this.”

  “Absolutely exhausted. Not you?”

  “I’m feeling sleepy now. So did you see Venus?”

  “Yes, just before she left for the airport.”

  “Is she all right?”

  “Seemed fine.”

  “Seemed? Are you sure? Why did she leave us last night?”

  “Helaine, please. I didn’t ask her that.”

  “But when did she leave, what time?”

  �
��I don’t know. We didn’t talk about it.”

  Helaine turned the computer off and leaned back in her chair. She was glad Lydia wasn’t her patient. It would take decades for a breakthrough. “I sometimes have no idea how you ever got enough courage to ask me out, let alone get married.”

  “It’s Thursday–you know I’m shy about those things–are we going to dinner? I’d like to eat out tonight.”

  “We can, if you like. Did she seem to want to discuss it with you?”

  “Helaine…I…don’t know.”

  Helaine shrugged in mocking. “Lydia, sometimes you can be a real jerk.”

  Lydia took it in stride. “Dinner anyone?”

  “Really, darling, it’s true. Where shall we eat then?”

  _____

  “Who’s that, Mommy? She’s pretty.”

  Sharon rolled up the newspaper and sent it through the air.

  “Mommy?”

  “Just a woman, little girl. Some woman.”

  Helen retrieved the paper from where it fell. “Do you know her?”

  Sharon chuckled bitterly at the irony of her daughter’s phrasing. DO YOU KNOW HER? Those were the headlines the press used in order to drive Jane Doe out into the open, once upon a time when no one knew who “the other woman” was. No one, that is, but Helaine. Sharon Chambers nodded, silently remembering. She knew Jane Doe Beaumont. She was aging well.

  “Mommy!”

  “Yes, Helen, I know her.”

  The child dragged her finger along the type. “Lydia Beeah–Bee–I can’t pronounce this. Say this for me.”

  “Helen.” She had no desire to speak the woman’s name. “Go play your violin.”

  “Cello–say it for me, please.”

  Christ, Christ, Christ. “Beau, as in bow and arrow. Mont as in… in mont…ah, ah sound…Beau…mont, Lydia Beaumont. Now leave it alone, please.”

  “Beaumont. What kind of name is that, Mommy?”

  “Helen!”

  The child put on a very moving pout.

  “Oh, Helen–French. It’s French. Please go play your cello.”

  “She’s French?”

  “No, she’s not French. It’s French. Her name is French.”

  “French,” Helen repeated.

  “A French name.”

  “Like une, deux, trois?”

  “Oui. One, two, three.”

  Helen processed this information before continuing. “Beaumont. What does it mean, mommy? Does it mean something in French?”

  Questions. Always so many questions.

  Helen smiled sweetly, aware that her mother’s patience was wearing thin. “Last question,” she promised. “What does it mean?”

  Sharon sighed. “Beau…beautiful, Helen. Like you. Mont…umm…oh, Jesus, it would be mount…umm…mountain, I guess. Beautiful mountain. Got it? Are we done here?”

  “Beautiful moun…tain.” The child seemed content with that. She stood up. “Mommy?”

  Another question. “Mmm?”

  “Is Lydia Beaumont a bad woman?”

  This had reached into the realm of unbearable. “Helen, she’s…no, she’s not. She’s not a bad woman.”

  Interrogation over, Helen skipped off to her room. “Beautiful mount,” she chanted in flight, “beautiful mount.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “To play my violin!”

  Sharon threw the paper again. Beautiful mount! She felt especially unfortunate this afternoon. Fuck you, Dr. Kristenson. Fuck you, Jane Doe.

  _____

  No stopovers in the seven-hour flight to France. If she was lucky, if the winds were mild tonight, she’d be there in as little as five hours and maybe, since she had lost so much sleep the night before, she wouldn’t get jet lag on this trip. Wouldn’t that be nice? Take a cab from the airport to the Latin Quarter, freshen up, grab a bite, catch some cabaret later, or just stroll Quai de Montebello and take in the lights of Ile de la Cité, marveling, like anyone would, at Notre Dame, the grand dame of Paris.

  Or wouldn’t it be fun to skip a stone across the Seine, or drop a coin in it, or just stand on the footbridge above the water counting the lovers below kissing on the banks? Counting the lovers, un, deux, trois, their French kisses ending the day, and she ending hers alone, sitting at an outdoor cafe sipping hot chocolate and “being good”?

  How romantic.

  The passenger across the aisle was dozing off at his laptop, a slumber brought on by one too many vodka tonics and accompanied by a terrific snoring, a sound which Venus despised. She put the headphones on and fiddled with the stereo until she found some classical music.

  No snoring last night. That’s not what had kept her up past her bedtime. Thinking of it made her heart jump again, as it had been doing all day.

  “Come ladies,” Venus could still hear above the violins and snores. Dr. Kristenson’s playful dare. “Let’s fall in love.”

  Oh, let’s. Venus cranked up the volume. Let’s be stupid and fall deeper in love, you mean. She knew now what she should have known then. That a prudent woman would have declined the doctor’s invitation. That you can get someone and still not have them.

  _____

  She was deafening herself with the headphones. She shoved the seat back and closed her eyes tight.

  _____

  “Are you sleeping?”

  She was sleeping. “I’m sorry, what?”

  “Your seat belt, please. We’re experiencing a little turbulence.”

  “Okay, thanks.” Venus sat up and put the belt on.

  “Sleeping is one thing, Venus, but please don’t mention love. She’ll freak.”

  Venus wiped the sleep from her eyes. God forbid she should cause any turbulence. She had followed the doctor’s orders there. It’s not so difficult to avoid mentioning love when you’re in bed with someone who won’t kiss you or say your first name.

  “Are you sleeping?”

  Well past midnight and the ladies had fallen asleep. Or so Venus thought. She lay with them, planning to leave.

  “Angelo?”

  “No,” Venus answered into the pillow. “I was listening to you breathe.”

  There had followed a silence to that. And then, “Can you turn over?”

  Venus rolled over. “You want me to hold–”

  “No.”

  “You want to hold m–”

  “Sort of.”

  The scent of perfume and gin and sex hung humid in the air. Venus drew it deep into her lungs. “Can you be a little more specific than that?”

  “I want this.”

  Venus was silent. She had given up all hope of “this.”

  “Do you mind?”

  “I didn’t think you’d–”

  “I know.”

  Dr. Kristenson slept beside them, curled in a ball like a kitten. Venus could swear she glowed in the dark. She pulled the sheets tight around Lydia’s shoulders. “How could I mind?”

  “You should probably just say yes or no.”

  “Yes…always yes.”

  A hand closed over her mouth. Venus kissed it. “You understand?”

  “I think so.”

  There was more to say to this woman who wore a wedding ring to bed, who wouldn’t kiss her. Venus caressed her lips thoughtfully and let it pass. In the darkness she made love to the mouth that couldn’t speak her name and then sighed pleasantly as it dallied near her breasts.

  _____

  FASTEN YOUR SEAT BELT. Venus felt shaky and adrenaline had begun to build in her arms and legs. She checked the buckle of her belt.

  “Are you going to make it?”

  The plane lurched. She shook.

  What a tease, Venus discovered. “NO.”

  “Uh-oh, then.”

  “Beau–”

  “Hold on.”

  Venus lurched. The plane shook.

  “I can’t.”

  The airplane was buzzing. Nervous chatter.

  “Can,” Lydia assured, bearing down.

 
Turbulence. It felt like they had hit a rock. Dozens of them.

  “Pop it, Beau–”

  “Shhhhh.”

  “Now.”

  “Hah.”

  Next to them Helaine turned in her sleep.

  “Beau–”

  “Hold–”

  “Oh, god.”

  Another rock.

  “God.”

  And another.

  “Damn, Lydia.”

  “Hang on.”

  _____

  “You may remove your belt now.”

  “Lydia?”

  “Mmm?”

  “Say something.”

  Lydia blew the hair from her eyes and lay her face against Venus’. “What would you like me to say?”

  Venus whispered it in her ear.

  Bad-ass street slang. Lydia was reticent to repeat it.

  “Say it.”

  “I–I really don’t think I can.”

  “Try.”

  She tried it.

  “Madam, you can remove your belt now.”

  Venus removed her seat belt and stood and stretched in the aisle beside the snoring man who had never woken from his sleep. Asleep through everything, just as Dr. Kristenson had done while her wife rocked on.

  What a great idea, falling in love. Now what?

  From the overhead compartment she withdrew her briefcase and sat down, intent on getting something done in the few hours remaining, or at least on verifying that she had not forgotten anything important.

  She had the key to the apartment on Rue St. Séverin in her briefcase. It was Helaine’s and Lydia’s apartment. “A small affair,” Helaine had described when offering the place, “but it’s the best way to experience the quarter.” And here were the names and addresses of “establishments that cater to women.” Venus shut the briefcase with a sound loud enough to rouse her travel companion across the way. He coughed himself conscious and glanced at her accusingly.

  She put down her case. It was hopeless.

  Chapter 22

  Necessity