Looker

by Michael Kilian

  “Camilla Delasante. Yes, I know her.”

  Hall seem startled that A.C. knew Camilla’s actual last name, but continued without remarking on that.

  “I need to find her, Mr. James. I hoped you might have some idea where she is.”

  A.C. shook his head. “Sorry. I don’t.”

  “It’s really quite important. I’ve tried to find her everywhere.”

  “Perhaps if you told me what this is about.”

  Hall studied him a moment. “It’s highly confidential,” he said finally.

  If one revealed the confidence of another member—indeed, repeated anything uttered within the sanctuary of the club premises—it was grounds for immediate dismissal.

  “I’m here as a member,” A.C. said. “Not as a newspaper columnist.”

  Hall leaned close. “We represent Miss Delasante’s cousin, Pierre Delasante, who until recently was associated with the White House and is now a consultant in Washington.”

  A.C. nodded.

  “Someone got into our offices this week,” Hall said. “Some file drawers were broken into. One of them contained Mr. Delasante’s papers.”

  “Something was taken?”

  “No. But they were considerably rearranged.”

  “Have you gone to the police?”

  “No, of course not.”

  No indeed. It would not do for the clients of such a prestigious firm to learn that their private affairs could be so readily available to intruders.

  “We questioned the staff exhaustively,” Hall continued. “A receptionist said she’d noticed a new cleaning woman, a blond woman, rather attractive. The cleaning women in our building are all very nice—bonded, don’t you know. But no one has ever called any of them attractive.”

  A.C. was amazed, but perhaps he shouldn’t be. There was something very resolute about Camilla Santee.

  “I haven’t seen Miss Delasante,” he said. “I’m looking for her myself.”

  “Should she contact you, Mr. James, I’d appreciate it very much if you could impart our concern, and our wish to speak to her as soon as possible. As I say, the police are not involved in this matter, and I don’t contemplate that they shall be.”

  “If I hear from her, I’ll tell her,” A.C. said.

  Hall rose. “Thank you.” He stood a moment at the window, looking at pedestrians streaming along the sidewalk. “Such lovely weather today.”

  “Yes,” said A.C., finishing his drink. “In fact, I think I’ll take a walk.”

  He found a phone on the street and called Camilla’s booker. The woman seemed a little disturbed to hear from him.

  “I told her you called, Mr. James,” she said. “But she left no message for you.”

  “Where is she? You said Canada.”

  “She’s no longer in Canada. But I can’t tell you where she’s gone, I’m afraid.”

  “Can’t? Or won’t?”

  “I’m not allowed to give out such information.”

  “Damn it, she told me to call you. She said you’d tell me how to reach her.”

  “Yes, I know. But she’s changed her mind.”

  “I’ve found out what she wants to know, and a lot more. I have to talk to her.”

  “Perhaps if you told me.”

  “No thank you.” He hung up, surprised at his rudeness.

  For the rest of the day, and on into the next, A.C. went searching for Camilla or word of her whereabouts in great earnest, asking after her at every social occasion to which he’d been invited and a few others to which he hadn’t, calling all his friends and acquaintances, calling some he scarcely knew at all, in every case putting out the word: he wanted to find Camilla Santee. Anyone who might help him could consider all past obligations repaid.

  No one could. Late the next night, he dropped in at the Café Carlyle in time to catch Bobby Short’s last set, happy to be offered an empty table off to the side.

  Short and his two sidemen were at their best, bringing forth the old Cole Porter and Noel Coward café society songs from the 1930s as gaily as one might pour tingly vintage champagne.

  A.C. sipped, listening to Short sing “Poor Little Rich Girl,” glancing at the mixed crowd of out-of-towners and Upper East Side locals and feeling at the center of his universe. He knew he wasn’t king of New York, as Vanessa had so hyperbolically put it, but if there was such a thing, this would be the throne room.

  When the set was over, Short worked his way through the room, saying his hellos and goodbyes, then finally coming to A.C.’s little table.

  “Delighted to see you again so soon,” he said. No one could say “delighted” with the effervescence of Bobby Short.

  The musician accepted a chair and a drink, lighting a cigarette as they talked a bit about the perfect weather and the unusual pleasantness of the New York summer season. A waiter came up.

  “Mr. James, I forgot to tell you,” he said, “there was a lady here earlier tonight who asked for you.”

  A.C. leaned forward. “Not a blond fashion model named Camilla Santee?”

  “Very blond and a lady, but not named Camilla. It was Honey Jerome? She’s staying here at the Carlyle.”

  Honey Jerome, née Tutweiler, was from Pittsburgh, where her father had amassed a large fortune in coal and iron and where she had married into even more, keeping a large share of it in a subsequent divorce.

  Honey since had lived almost everywhere but Pittsburgh—Miami, Paris, Dallas, Los Angeles, and New York, where she took a suite at the Carlyle for her prolonged stays.

  “I’ll give her a call,” A.C. said.

  When they’d finished their drinks and chat, A.C. went to the house phone in the lobby. Honey, as usual, answered at once. She seldom strayed far from a telephone.

  “A.C.!” she said, with the kind of exuberant enthusiasm one might hear from a television game show host. “How super to hear from you!”

  There was still a little Texas in the accent, a lot of Bryn Mawr, where Honey had gone to college, and a lot more of Southern California, which he thought had become her home.

  “Where are you, darling?” she said. “You sound very near.”

  “I’m at home,” he lied. He didn’t want to get tangled up with Honey that night. She was a butterfly, always to be seen fluttering near whatever was the center of attention of the moment, but never settling, always off to whatever was next. Her boyfriends had included one of the handsomer roués in the U.S. Senate, an Arab hotel owner, at least two aging Hollywood leading men, a backup Giants quarterback, and the director of one of New York’s most avant-garde art museums. Her favored causes and interests reflected the changing front pages and social pages of the New York Times—occasionally, even those of the New York Globe.

  She had made a pass at A.C. once, very carefully, as though to test whether this might prove advantageous to her social ambitions.

  A.C. had declined her offer, though not with any disdain. She was attractive, though more chic than beautiful. She was one of the city’s more ambitious social hustlers, but completely open about it. Her modus operandi was friendliness and helpfulness. She did serious favors for people as reflexively as other hostesses offered refreshment. A.C. liked her. Kitty detested her. She’d gone to just one of Honey’s “top this” celebrity dinner parties and declared it enough.

  “I was at the Café Carlyle earlier,” A.C. said. “Bobby mentioned you were asking after me.”

  “Have been simply all day, darling. I called up to Westchester, but I got the most frosty response.”

  “Kitty and I are—are living apart, for the moment.”

  “Absolutely everyone’s hoping it won’t be for long.”

  She paused. He waited.

  “I’ve been trying to reach you ever since I heard at lunch that you’ve been looking for a dear friend of mine,” she said.

  At any given moment, Honey’s “dear friends” might range from the head waiter at Le Cirque to the Sultan of Brunei. A.C. realized suddenly what she was
trying to tell him.

  “I’ve been looking for a fashion model named Camilla Santee.”

  “Yes, I know, and isn’t she simply the most wonderful, marvelous, decent girl in the world? A true lady. I’ve known her for absolute ages. We met just about the time we both came to New York—at a benefit fashion show. I’ve forgotten which, but they weren’t even feeding the poor models. I had Camilla sit right down at my table and we’ve been just the greatest friends ever since.”

  “Where is she, Honey?”

  “Of course, I haven’t seen too terribly much of her lately. Camilla went off to Europe, as I think you know, and I was in California, but wasn’t it just the most marvelous coincidence? We both turn up back at the same airport this week?”

  “Honey …”

  “Of course, Bermuda is so terribly near, isn’t it. I mean, it might as well be in the Hamptons.”

  “Bermuda? You were in Bermuda?”

  “Yes. A little holiday. It’s really not so bad in the summer. And such a lovely place for a fashion shoot. No better place for bathing suits, and Camilla has such a beautiful figure. I mean, I simply seethe when I think of how unfairly I’ve been treated by my genes.”

  “When were you in Bermuda, Honey?”

  “Why, I got back just yesterday, darling. I was just on my way to the airplane gate when, suddenly, there was my lovely friend. And then to hear today that you were looking for her. Have you become friends, darling?”

  “Honey, it’s wonderful talking to you, and I’d love to see you again, but I’m afraid I have to go. It’s something about work.”

  “Call me when you’re free, darling. I’ll be here till the end of next week.”

  A.C. had no idea where he’d be the next week, but he knew where he’d be the next day.

  CHAPTER 11

  When approached from the air, Bermuda appears as a tiny outcropping of land and it never grows much larger, even as the pilot extends the flaps and lowers the landing gear and touchdown is just a moment away. Every landing seems a possible overshoot, the aircraft whooshing down from one side of the narrow island and hitting the runway bent pell-mell for the other.

  When one is finally standing on firm earth, the smallness of the place ceases to matter. A.C. had often gone weeks without straying from an area of Manhattan considerably smaller than this. Here he could abide serenely for much longer.

  The air was hot, yet fresh and breezy, smelling of flowers as much as of the sea. There were palm and banana trees, and pines on a distant hillside dotted with pastel houses. The sky was a soft blue between towering billows of cloud. Rain was doubtless falling somewhere on the island, a gentle shower, quickly come and swiftly gone.

  A.C. had first come to Bermuda on a spring break while in college, and had fallen in love with a girl he never saw again after that week, though they’d both lost their virginity in that sweet, long-ago encounter.

  His next, and last, visit had been the year after his graduation. He’d come over for a holiday with Bailey and her brother, whose parents had taken a house for the entire season. A.C. had stayed with them nearly a month, and he’d felt miserable upon leaving, wondering when he’d ever come back, and if he would ever be that happy again.

  He’d once suggested a Bermuda vacation to Kitty, but she wasn’t interested. She knew he’d been there with the Hazeltines, and that his sojurn had produced one of the more enduring memories of his life, a memory she could not share, or inspire.

  And now she’d told him she’d been having an affair with Bailey’s brother. She hadn’t meant to, but the inclusion of both London and Bedford Village in the itinerary of her adultery had given her away in one chilling instant.

  Bailey’s brother. His friend. The Hazeltines had once been such an important and wonderful part of his life. Now he was paying a bitter price. He’d become quite angry thinking about Bailey’s brother and Kitty, but he had no right to it. All he could allow himself was melancholy, with nothing but thoughts of Camilla Santee as antidote.

  A.C. had only one piece of luggage—a leather Hartmann overnight bag crammed with three days’ clothing. He slung it over his shoulder and hurried to catch the bus to Hamilton, taking a seat in the rear. It was a very large and boxy bus, seeming much too large for the twisting road that was little more than an English country lane.

  As they descended a hill, following the road around a long curve, a wide vista of the sea came into view. In its distance, a great white cruise liner could be seen, on apparent course for the harbor. Bermuda was a place of ships, coming from and going everywhere.

  At the small Hamilton bus terminal, A.C. bought copies of the local newspapers, looking through the one that seemed the most substantial, calling the telephone number below the masthead. He asked for the fashion editor. The switchboard operator laughed, and then connected him with the social news correspondent, an older woman with a slight British accent. She told him there was some sort of fashion shoot going on that involved Trimingham’s department store. The people at Trimingham’s, a charming emporium on Front Street across from the harbor quay, directed him from the Elbow Beach Hotel. A.C. was on the next big pink bus heading out to Paget Township and the South Road.

  Though the Elbow Beach was perhaps the most British hotel on the island, the young woman in a gray blazer behind the front desk was American, and quite friendly. She said the fashion group had been working on the beach in the morning, but had gone out to Dockyard after lunch for a change of scenery.

  He remembered Dockyard from his earlier visits—an old naval base that was now mostly old fort and museum, though the Royal Navy still maintained a repair and supply facility there. It was on the far southwestern end of the island, as it was erroneously called. Bermuda was actually a chain of interconnected coral reefs and smaller islands.

  “They’re all staying here,” she said. “They’ll be back for dinner.”

  “Is there a Camilla Santee with them?”

  She consulted her registration book. “Not staying with us.”

  “How about a Camilla Delasante?”

  “No. Sorry.”

  “She’s a model. A blonde. Very beautiful.”

  “They all look very beautiful, sir. But there’s no one registered under that name.”

  He looked at his watch. He had hours to wait.

  “Do you have a room?”

  “Do you have a reservation?”

  “No.”

  “Well, I have one available. Not very nice, though. And not with an ocean view.”

  “I’ll take whatever you have.”

  “You can only have it until Monday. After that, we’re completely booked.”

  “That’ll do.”

  He snapped out an American Express card. The bill would eventually go to their house in Westchester, but that was a million light years distant from his present concerns. He began filling out the registration form.

  “Is there a bus to Dockyard?” he asked, as she handed him his key.

  “Just went by. There’ll be another in an hour or so.”

  “Is there another way to get there?”

  “Do you have a driver’s license?”

  “Yes.”

  “You can rent one of our bikes.” He looked blank.

  “A moped. They’re fast enough for these roads. Get you to Dockyard long before the next bus.”

  He had always thought of these conveyances as little more than toys, something for adolescents to putt around on until they were old enough to drive automobiles. But, once out on the South Road heading west, he felt quite nervous on the motor bike he’d rented, unused to riding on the left and finding himself regularly passed by the vehicles that came huffing up behind him. On a high stretch that overlooked both the wide, island-dotted Great Sound on the right and the rocky ocean shore to the left, a large Mercedes-Benz garbage truck almost ran him off the road, compelling him to pull over and stop in someone’s driveway. He didn’t even know if Camilla was here. He was depending on th
e word of one of New York’s most notorious gossips.

  He kept on, gaining mastery over the little machine and at length feeling confident enough to remove the helmet he’d been told to wear and drop it in the bike’s wicker basket. He had paused in his tiny room long enough to change clothes, retaining the white dress shirt he’d worn on the plane but switching to khaki Bermuda shorts, tan knee socks and a pair of Top-Sider boating shoes. He’d bought sunglasses at the airport. He imagined he looked like an ordinary islander—or at least an ordinary tourist.

  It took much longer than he’d expected to reach Dockyard, even though Bermuda was just twenty-eight miles long. Putt-putting past a couple of British frigates tied up along the main dock, he went on to the old fort built around Bermuda’s furthermost hill, parking the minibike under a tree and locking it.

  There was an admission fee, which he paid, but instead of waiting for the scheduled tour with the others gathered at the entrance, he slipped off by himself and climbed up to the top of the old battlements.

  He could see the fashion people down at the end—so many bright colors against the gray stone and turquoise sea. Walking slowly toward them, he recognized Camilla easily by her long blond hair. As he drew nearer still, he saw she was wearing a relatively conservative bikini under a large print beach jacket that the wind kept billowing open.

  She was posing—moving quickly and professionally from one stance to another—and did not notice him. He stood off to the side, waiting patiently until the cameraman and the director of the project signaled a break. She went over to the side of the battlement and leaned against it, tilting back her head as though to enjoy the sunshine.

  A.C. jumped down beside her, startling her, but only for a moment. To his delight, and surprise, she smiled at him, though a little sadly.

  “So you’ve found me,” she said.

  “I called your booker, as you told me to do. She wouldn’t tell me where you were.”

  “I’m sorry.” She touched his arm gently. “I was going to call you today.”

  He couldn’t decide if she was lying.

  “I found out what you wanted to know,” he said. She showed no pleasure at the news.