Going Topless

by Megan McAndrew

“What was her name again, Fatalescu?” Jiri says.

  “Fatulescu.”

  “I never heard of any poetess called Fatulescu,” Jiri says grouchily.

  “She must be pretty bloody rich, whatever she is,” Marge observes as the manor comes into view atop its bluff, shrouded by a fringe of palm trees.

  “I wonder,” Jane says, “how she managed to get her hands on it. I thought it wasn’t for sale.”

  The manor’s gates have always been padlocked when I’ve driven by, but this evening they’re flung open onto an oleander-lined driveway that winds through a lot of tropical-looking shrubbery before arriving at a bunkerlike structure topped with cement pineapples. We get out and look around curiously. Up close, the place has the vaguely decrepit look of all old houses in hot countries, the stucco dry and brittle and the green paint on the shutters blistered by the sun. Albertine, who must be on loan for the evening from the Marmite, stands guard at the door in a maid’s uniform with a lace cap. Without a word, she leads us through a marble foyer with a burbling fountain and out through a bank of French windows onto the terrace where a table has been set up with drinks and the Marmite’s special-occasion spread of toothpick speared cheese and salami cubes, the lot presided over by a grinning Fabrice in a maroon bartender’s jacket. Admiring the view from the balustrade are the mayor, the retired German couple who bought the old Paoli house last year, and Yolande in a kente-cloth-inspired outfit that makes her look like she’s about to perform a ritual circumcision. She comes rushing over the minute she sees us.

  “Ah, enfin, there you are! I was beginning to worry that you would not come. Where are the others?” She frowns as her eyes fall first upon Jiri, who hasn’t shaved in three days, then upon Jane and Marge, the nature of whose relationship Yolande has never entirely been able to fathom, though what little she does understand she finds alarming in the extreme.

  “Madame Yolande,” Jiri booms, “our Flemish rose!”

  Yolande smiles uncertainly, not sure whether this is meant as a compliment but in the end deciding to take it as one. “Monsieur Orlik, you are a naughty boy….”

  “Yes, Madame Yolande, I am a very naughty boy,” Jiri roguishly agrees. I’m beginning to wonder if he didn’t knock back a few before leaving the house. I’m about to steer him away to safer harbors when Philippe appears with Isabelle on his arm. I find myself staring at his hair. It’s swept back in glossy dark waves that just might, I have to admit, have been sculpted with a touch of gel.

  He kisses my cheek as he whispers to me, “You look enchanting,” which is complete nonsense, even though I am wearing a rather nice silk shift that I spent an arm and a leg on, but pleases me anyway. And who’s to say I’m not enchanting? Even Jim told me before we left that I looked great, though he hastily added to Odette that she looked ravishing in a green dress that I personally find a bit fussy. I’m relieved that she hasn’t tried to say anything to me. It seems we’re just going to let things slide in the French way, as opposed to going on Oprah, which suits me fine. I did feel a little bad for poor Yves—talk about the fifth wheel—but I heard Odette telling him not to be silly, of course he should stay and enjoy his vacation. I guess he was offering to leave, now that he’s been relieved of his stud duties. He and Lucy have embarked on another home-improvement project. He’s going to strip down that old chest she bought and grease the lock. Maybe he’ll grease her lock while he’s at it.

  With Isabelle having gone off to say hello to the mayor, Jiri marches up to Philippe. “I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced,” he says loudly. “I am Jiri Orlik. My wife was just hanging all over you.”

  “Pleased to meet you,” Philippe says imperturbably, shaking his hand.

  Jiri grins, showing his broken tooth. “The pleasure’s all mine. I always enjoy meeting a fellow auteur.”

  “Thank you, I—”

  “Especially one who is such a big hit with the ladies.” Jiri winks. “Ah, but you must excuse me, my wife seems to have slipped away again.” He lets go of Philippe’s hand and darts over to where Isabelle is standing with the mayor and the German lady.

  “This is really rather embarrassing,” Philippe hisses once he’s out of earshot.

  “Maybe you shouldn’t encourage her,” I say lightly.

  He looks surprised. “My dear Constance, your sister requires little encouragement.”

  “Anyway,” I say, “I don’t think Jiri is going to make a scene in a public place, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” Philippe says.

  “I guess you’re not finding him so magnificent all of a sudden, huh?”

  “Don’t be silly,” he says crossly.

  The raised voice of the German lady suddenly reaches us. “—and in broad daylight! I ask you, how can you expect to attract tourists when you cannot even guarantee their safety!”

  “Quand même, Madame,“ the mayor smoothly objects, “no one was hurt….”

  Yolande fluffs up like a hen: “And the tens of thousands of francs in damages?”

  The mayor pops an olive in his mouth and assumes a remote expression. He must have thought it was pitted because I see him looking around before discreetly spitting into his napkin. “Well, Madame, not to put too fine a point on it, but I understood the damages are no longer your problem.”

  “And my honor, Monsieur? Am I to sell Madame Townsley a ruin in good conscience?” Catching sight of Madame Townsley now stepping out onto the terrace with Yves and Electra, however, Yolande evidently decides it’s time to change the subject, which the German lady is only too happy to do for her. “I must tell you,” she says, turning to the mayor, “that our friends the Kistenmakers were thinking of buying Madame Albertoni’s house but were discouraged in the end by a number of irregularities in the deed, were they not, Heinrich?”

  “When did the Albertoni house go on the market?” Yolande asks sharply.

  “Allons, Mesdames … ,” the mayor says.

  “I’m sorry, Charles, but this is a perfect example of the lack of transparency that plagues—and I do not think this is too strong a word—the real estate market. Borgolano will never become a proper summer community if people are continually discouraged from buying houses by legal irregularities.”

  “Especially if the houses they do buy are subsequently blown up,” Jiri observes, eliciting a furious look from Isabelle.

  “In Hamburg these hooligans would be arrested, is this not so, Heinrich?” the German lady says. Her husband, who looks like he might have had a stroke recently, nods vigorously. “And I regret to say, Monsieur le Maire,” she continues, “that if this is the most egregious example of the lawlessness that is allowed to prevail in Borgolano, it is not the first. I remain convinced that Monsieur Ystres next door is siphoning our electricity. How else do you explain a bill of six hundred thirty-three francs and fifty-seven centimes for the month of February, when we were in Hamburg?”

  “Is this some kind of local obsession, with the electricity?” Philippe asks me.

  Isabelle chooses this moment to return, Jiri hot on her heels. “There you are, Philippe. I see you’ve met my ex -husband,” she says loudly.

  “Not in the eyes of the law,” Jiri remarks, placing himself between them and smiling broadly.

  Philippe looks irritated as hell but is obviously not going to take the bait. “I wonder,” he says coldly, “where our hostess is.” For, though all the guests seem to have arrived, there is still no sign of Countess Fatulescu.

  “Perhaps,” Jiri says, “she plans to descend in a balloon like the Count of Monte Cristo.”

  Everybody except Jiri looks relieved when Lucy and Yves join us. “We were just having a look at the garden,” Lucy announces. “Very interesting use of local flora: There’s definitely been an attempt to integrate the maquis into the landscaping.”

  “I think this is probably accidental,” Yves says with a smile.

  “Well, perhaps, but it does give one a
n idea of the possibilities. … I was rather hoping we’d get a tour of the house,” Lucy adds in a disappointed tone. “Oh dear, there’s that dreadful old German woman; I wonder why she was invited.”

  “I’m sure you could have a look around if you wanted,” I say.

  “Well,” Lucy says, lowering her voice, “I did get a peek at the parlor off the entrance: It’s all done up in red and gold like a bordello!”

  “Did you see the fountain?”

  “Yes, fabulous, isn’t it? I must say, I’m dying to meet this lady; I didn’t know they had countesses in Romania….” Lucy says, picking up a cheese cube from a tray sullenly proffered by Albertine and then hastily putting it back.

  “I think I have seen this cheese before,” Yves says.

  Yolande’s voice drifts over again. “Take the hameau, for instance. How many such spots are left in the Mediterranean? And yet, it sits undeveloped for years, when all you have to do is declare it abandoned. I know, Charles, you will say these administrative procedures take time, but one has to start somewhere, and now that creature is squatting up there, that criminal—”

  “Criminal?” The German lady gasps.

  “A murderer, actually,” the mayor says.

  “Yes, exactly, and then you wonder why people hesitate to buy property….”

  “Hm,” the mayor says, locking his hands behind his back and rocking on his heels. “Yes, I see your point.”

  Lucy pulls me aside. “Did you hear that? The old fright has her eye on our hameau!”

  “Yes,” I say, “but we have an in with Jojo.”

  She lowers her voice. “Listen, you know the money in the account: Maybe we could … ?”

  “Haven’t you given up yet on Santerran real estate?” I ask.

  She brushes this off. “Don’t be silly; the fishing cabin wasn’t that expensive, to tell you the truth, and I was going to remodel anyway…. The hameau would be a much better investment, and if we all pooled our money together …” she continues excitedly.

  “Count me out.”

  “No, listen, Yves is absolutely brilliant with his hands—”

  “Are you being serious?”

  “Of course I’m serious,” Lucy says indignantly. Just then Albertine reappears with the cheese and salami cubes. “Really, Albertine, can’t you see no one is eating them? You’d think they’d be ashamed,” Lucy adds, turning back to me, “trying to fob off their leftovers like that!”

  Albertine shrugs and moves on, making way for Jim and Odette, who sniffs dubiously at her glass and says, “I think this champagne must be from Romania as well.”

  “Do you know that Odette can tell a wine’s vintage just by its smell?” Jim says, as if this were simply the most amazing thing in the world.

  “Not exactly,” Odette demurs, “though one does learn a thing or two about wine in first class.”

  Lucy and Odette start to argue about who serves better champagne, British Airways or Air France, and Jim volunteers that, when he flew on the Concorde, they served Dom Pérignon, garnering a perplexed look from Lucy, who I guess doesn’t know about the agribusiness empire. It dawns on me that a lot of people would look upon Jim differently, given this information, beginning with my sister Isabelle—who, having tried unsuccessfully to lure Jiri away, perhaps over the cliff, is heading toward us with him still in pursuit. Albertine darts her a lovelorn glance as she goes by, but Isabelle ignores her.

  “Anyone want a drink?” Philippe says, making a beeline for the bar.

  “Can’t you see you’re not wanted here?” Isabelle snaps at Jiri as they bear down on us.

  Jiri bows. “You must forgive my wife: It seems my arrival has foiled her plans to seduce that French hairdresser—I mean writer, sorry—that writer with the pretty hair. Now, where did he go running off to?”

  “He’s completely drunk,” Isabelle announces.

  Jiri looks offended. “Yes, I am drunk—but, in the words of Winston Churchill, tomorrow I will be sober; you, however, will still be a slut.”

  “You’re not making a very good impression, you know.”

  “I don’t need to make a good impression, I am a hero of the opposition!”

  “God,” Isabelle cries, “can’t you see nobody here cares about your stupid opposition?”

  “I find it highly irregular,” the German lady says loudly, “that our hostess has still not appeared.”

  “Perhaps she has been delayed,” her husband says.

  “Has anybody seen the children?” Lucy asks.

  “Who does these childrrrrren belong to!” an angry voice demands from behind us in a thick Balkan accent. We all turn toward the French doors, where a lady in a yellow dress and black beehive hairdo has just emerged on the highest pair of heels I have ever seen, one red-taloned claw fastened around the arm of a furious Sophie, who, at the sight of Jiri, yells, “Daddy! Help!”

  “Ah, dear Countess!” Yolande cries rapturously. Jiri rushes forward, practically knocking the woman over, and yanks Sophie back. Suddenly he bursts out laughing.

  “That’s no countess, you idiots,” he exclaims. “That’s Lupa Romesco!”

  CHAPTER thirty-five

  “S o you’re saying this lady is some kind of gangster?” Jim says, gazing with naked admiration at Jiri across the kitchen table, where we have gathered for breakfast.

  “Well, not exactly a gangster; more like a—how do you call it—ah yes: a con man.”

  “Con woman,” Marge corrects him.

  “Well, this is one of the few things we can be sure of: that Madame Romesco is a woman. An international woman of mystery, you might say. Some believe she ran off with half the hard currency reserves of Romania, after they did away with that nice couple, the Ceausescus, whom she was friendly with. I think they even made her minister of culture for a while.”

  “It sounds like we should be calling the police, or Interpol, or something … ,” Jim says.

  “Ah, but you see, the problem is that nothing was ever proved. It is all most unclear, beginning with her real identity; maybe she is not even Romanian,” says Jiri, who is obviously relishing being back in his role of chief raconteur, even if he did get us all thrown out of the party, the countess haughtily insisting that he was out of his mind and demanding payment for the Sèvres vase the girls broke while playing hide-and-seek in the bordello room, much to the indignation of Lucy, who declared that if that glorified chamber pot was a Sèvres, then she was a bloody countess. “The only thing that is certain,” Jiri continues, “is that wherever Madame Romesco appears, money disappears, followed in due course by the lady herself.”

  “What an extraordinary story,” Jane says. “But why have none of us ever heard of her?”

  “This is because you live in the civilized West. We had all sorts of crazy characters running around Prague after ’81,” Jiri says, “didn’t we, darling?”

  Isabelle shrugs. I guess she hasn’t entirely come to terms with Jiri’s newfound popularity—especially with Philippe, who, after we’d been shown the door, slapped him on the back and congratulated him on his brilliant performance before pulling him aside and explaining that it was all very much a misunderstanding about his wife, seeing that it’s me he’s dallying with. Or so I gather from the appraising glances Jiri keeps sliding in my direction, as if, now that I’d joined the ranks of the officially desirable, I might be worth a closer look. As for Isabelle, she’s been sending me dagger looks all morning.

  “It was quite a scene,” Jiri continues. “Russian gangsters, Israeli pimps, Sicilian businessmen, and all sorts of fantastical Balkan aristocrats who hadn’t been heard of since the twelfth century…”

  “You’re making it sound a lot more interesting than it was,” Isabelle snaps. “I just remember a bunch of tacky people in track-suits.”

  “Yes, but that is what makes horse races, as my good friend Ross used to say.”

  “What I don’t understand,” Lucy exclaims, “is how that awful woman contrived to buy the
manor. Daddy tried for years and was repeatedly told that it was mired in inheritance disputes.”

  “Maybe,” Jiri says, “she made a more attractive offer.”

  “That I very much doubt. There’s something fishy going on here, if you ask me.”

  “Lucy, just because the lady got the house you wanted doesn’t mean there was skullduggery involved,” Jane says with a smile. She and Marge are snuggled up on the sofa by the window, which was wide open again when we got home, prompting Odette to reflect once again that one of these days we are going to have to replace the latch.

  “Didn’t you hear what Jiri said? She’s an international criminal!” Lucy insists.

  “Borgolano is really turning into a classy place,” Marge observes. “Might be worth investing in some seafront property after all….” She gives Jane’s thigh a possessive squeeze that is duly registered by Odette, who looks pointedly away. With a wicked smile, Marge nibbles Jane’s ear prior to kissing it.

  “Would you two stop it—there are children in the room!” Lucy says. Sure enough, Electra has just appeared in the doorway, where she pauses, staring at us with a calculating expression.

  “Why shouldn’t they witness a bit of wholesome adult sexuality for a change?” Marge says tauntingly, glancing at Odette, who I would swear has just inched away from Jim on the settee.

  “I don’t see why they should have to witness any sexuality,” Lucy says primly, pronouncing it seksuality. “What is it, darling?”

  Silence.

  “Oh, all right: What is it, Agnes?”

  “Can I have a cookie?” Electra says slowly and precisely, as if she were worried she might not get it right.

  “Biscuit, darling. Yes, you may, but just one, please—you don’t want to spoil your appetite before supper.” Electra darts off to the kitchen, where the girls must have been waiting because all of a sudden we hear loud giggles.

  “She’s becoming a regular chatterbox,” Jane remarks.

  “It’s maddening,” Lucy whispers, leaning forward. “She’ll only talk to me if I call her Agnes.”

  “I think Agnes rather suits her,” Jane says.