The Hinky Velvet Chair

by Jennifer Stevenson

  Griffy swallowed and nodded, her feathers trembling. Virgil! They’ve come for you! Her heart started thumping.

  Mellish turned the frozen corn bag over and pressed it against his face again. “Mind if I have a drink?”

  “I’ll get it,” she whispered. “Sit.”

  He took a stool by the counter and shut his eyes, leaning against the frozen corn.

  She walked behind him, silently took a heavy aluminum saucepan off the overhead rack and, with all her strength, swung it against the back of his head.

  He went down like a rock. Blood ran onto the tile.

  “Oh God. Ohmigod, ohmigod,” she whispered. Voices sounded near the back door. Terror lent her speed. She wrapped a dishtowel around his head, rubberbanded it in place, grabbed his hands, and dragged him around the corner into the pantry.

  “Please, please, I hope I haven’t killed him,” she prayed under her breath. “No! I hope he’s dead and he can’t get Virgil. But please, I hope I haven’t killed him.”

  His long legs stuck out of the pantry. After a struggle, he folded, and she was able to shut the door.

  She went back to the kitchen, cold with panic.

  There was blood all over the floor.

  She snatched up a roll of paper towels, ran the whole thing under the tap, and knelt, wiping furiously, tearing off three wet towels at a time, trying to keep it off her dress and the trailing feathers at the bottom of her mask. When the blood was gone she stuffed the gory evidence into the kitchen garbage can.

  “— Maybe you’ll feel better with a glass of milk in you,” Julia said, coming in from the garden. She still wore her mask, and she was half-carrying Sovay.

  “Maybe I’ll feel better with a Scotch in me,” Sovay mumbled.

  “Hey,” Julia said, propping Sovay against a tall kitchen stool. “You’re talking. But no snakes or toads. Why is that?”

  Sovay sighed. “They come out if I say something bad.” Her makeup had run, her hair was in her face, and her slinky white dress had smudges all over it. She still looked lovely.

  Griffy pulled off her own mask and threw it on the counter. “I’ll get you some Scotch.” She fetched a glass and some ice, too. Sovay might be an awful person, but she looked like she needed a drink. Griffy needed a drink herself. “How do you mean, say something bad?”

  Julia found the Scotch.

  Sovay watched her pour and sighed. “Don’t be stingy. I’m hoping to get really, really, really—” She looked beaten. “Really drunk.”

  Griffy said, “How bad does it have to be?”

  Sovay took a long drink and set the glass down. “I don’t know. I experimented with that for a day or two. If I kept quiet, it was all right. Then that bloody machine did something else to me and I can’t seem to shut up.”

  Julia said, “You used it the first night I did, didn’t you?”

  Sovay nodded, sucking down another long drink. “It’s been hell.” She looked at Griffy with dull eyes. “I hope you’re happy with him. The old bastard.”

  She hiccupped and a small toad jumped out of her mouth and landed on the countertop. Griffy stifled a giggle.

  Sovay said listlessly, “There you are. Something bad. And I should bloody-well like to know who’s the judge of what bad is, and how the hell they can be watching me.”

  “I expect you’re your own judge,” Julia said.

  “I’m the judge?” Sovay said.

  “The power of suggestion made you connect the fairy story with — with whatever you’ve been up to. Nobody else could have done that.”

  Boy, Julia sounded smart. Griffy wondered if she was right.

  “Fuck,” Sovay said. “Figures.”

  “Don’t swear,” Julia said and, when Sovay gave her a puzzled look, she added, “It puts off the marks.”

  Something chirped.

  They all looked at the toad on the counter. It blinked. Its throat throbbed, and a high, musical trilling came out.

  “The fan belt!” Griffy exclaimed. She looked from the toad to Sovay in wonder. Then she remembered Mellish in the pantry. “Um, Julia, can I talk to you for a moment?”

  She led Julia around the corner and opened the pantry door a crack. Mellish lay on his face. He hadn’t moved. Blood soaked the towel rubber-banded around his head.

  Griffy felt terrible. “Ohmigod, he’s dead all right.”

  “What the—” Julia bent over him. “I can’t see anything. This mask is driving me crazy.”

  She reached up to take it off and Griffy stopped her. “Better not,” Griffy whispered. “What if he isn’t dead?” Then he would arrest Virgil.

  “What happened?”

  “He’s FBI. He’s after Virgil. I killed him.”

  “Not good.” Julia stood up and looked down at the remains of Griffy’s butler. “Does he know you hit him?”

  “I was wearing my mask.”

  Julia said, “The one on the counter in there? Groovy. Because it’s my mask.”

  Griffy looked at her with horror. “Then whose mask are you wearing?”

  “Sovay’s. I noticed that outside. So we’re okay there.”

  Mellish groaned. Griffy’s insides did a complicated jump between relief and dread. He got up on one elbow, craning his neck to look up at Julia.

  Julia took a can of silver polish off the shelf and whacked him on the forehead.

  Mellish collapsed.

  Calmly, she yanked the cord off the waffle iron and tied his hands together behind his back. Griffy watched, heart in mouth, while she tied his ankles with the rice-cooker cord.

  They went out and shut the pantry door.

  Julia turned the key in the lock.

  “Is he dead now?” Griffy whispered.

  “Naw. FBI guys have cast-iron heads.”

  Back in the kitchen, Sovay was almost comatose over the Scotch bottle. Julia laid the mask she’d been wearing on the counter next to the mask Griffy had discarded. She looked at the two masks. “Excellent. Let’s go give our news to Virgil.”

  And with that she picked up the mask Griffy had been wearing and carried it out into the garden.

  Griffy hurried after, grateful to have somebody smart in charge. “I wonder who has my mask.”

  “Green, right?” Julia said. “Sovay left it behind the dumpster. Do you want it back?

  “Thank you, no.”

  Outside, the party was over. The garden was a disaster area, cake and ice cream everywhere, potted plants overturned, and articles of intimate clothing soggy underfoot. The alley gate hung open. There was no light in the garage.

  “What happened with those TV people?” Griffy said.

  “You don’t want to know. But don’t expect Kauz at breakfast. If Lord Darner hasn’t got lost again—” She stuck her head out the alley gate and came back, looking displeased. “Now where are they?”

  Griffy went into the garage and turned on the light. She gasped. “The Venus Machine! It’s gone!”

  “Halle-fucking-luia. Maybe it got stolen. Or else the cops took it for evidence against Kauz.” Julia seemed cheerful, in spite of having just bashed an FBI agent in the head with a can of silver polish.

  “No,” Griffy said. “If I know Virgil, I know where it is.”

  o0o

  “I have the tape,” Virgil snarled half-heartedly, standing on the second floor landing.

  Clay was thrilled to be able to say, “No, you don’t. Jewel found it when she got Randy out of the bed. I took it to the basement and burned it.”

  The longer he looked at Virgil, the more he realized he had won. Strange feeling. It was amazing how different Clay’s perspective was after being in bed with Jewel two nights out of three. He took another step up toward the old man.

  “Dad, I never wanted to be in the game.” Virgil looked at him warily, and he added, “I know you feel betrayed because I took this job, but I’m not that good a con man.” For once, Virgil didn’t comment. “I want to do something I’m good at.”

  “S
educing women,” Virgil with a weak sneer. He looked old and shell-shocked.

  “Selectively, yeah.”

  “She won’t have you. She’s all wrapped up in the teabag.”

  “Lord Pontarsais and I,” Clay said, “have an understanding.”

  “Patsy,” Virgil snapped. “She’ll dump you.”

  “Not if she doesn’t know she’s got me.”

  Virgil looked pained. “Boy, did I teach you nothing? You don’t hand me a weapon like that and expect me not to use it.”

  Clay smiled warmly at him. “You won’t use it.”

  “And why not?”

  “Because you love me. Because you want me to be happy.”

  The old man’s face closed up. Then he said, shamefaced, “I suppose I must.”

  Clay flushed. As displays of affection went, that was strong language for Virgil.

  Virgil started up the stairs again, still tottering but with his spine straight.

  Clay caught up with him. “She’ll come after you.”

  “She tell you that?” Virgil said, looking at the floor, but Clay saw the skin on his dome go pink.

  “No, but I know Griffy. She doesn’t give up.”

  Virgil took the last four stairs two-at-a-time. With his hand on the collection room door, he met Clay’s eyes. “I may be in jail this time tomorrow.”

  He might have been saying, Fuck you, son, or I wonder if it’ll rain.

  Clay blurted, “Anything you want, you got it. I know a good lawyer.”

  The claw on the collection room doorknob relaxed. “It isn’t that bad yet.”

  Clay nodded. “Keep me posted.”

  o0o

  In the collection room, the Venus Machine was in pieces. Clay and Virgil got to work, reassembling it. Randy stood by, handing them tools and parts.

  “I don’t see what’s so urgent,” Virgil grumbled. “I can put this together any time.”

  “We have to fix, uh, Julia,” Clay said and, for a miracle, his father didn’t argue.

  Then Jewel and Griffy marched out of the service elevator.

  Clay flinched at the sight of all that determined womanhood.

  “Virgil, we have a problem,” Griffy said crisply.

  His father looked taken aback. “Griffy, this may not be a good time—” Clay savored the moment.

  “The butler is with the FBI,” she stated. “I hit him over the head and so did Julia and then Julia tied him up. He’s in the pantry.”

  Virgil seemed to be struggling to change gears.

  Clay said, “Did he see you?”

  “I was wearing a mask,” Griffy said, “but I think he thought I was Julia.”

  “We could try to pin it on Sovay,” Clay suggested.

  “Already done,” Jewel said, and exchanged a look with Clay that warmed him down to his toes.

  Virgil’s head was shaking but he didn’t seem to realize it. “This is it, then,” he muttered. “They must have something, or they wouldn’t be here.”

  Clay shot him an incredulous glance.

  The old man took a deep breath. Then he approached Griffy and took both her hands. “Sweetheart, give us a chance. Please. I’ve been — I’ve made mistakes, but I can—”

  “I’ve decided that I want you, Virgil, but I don’t need you. I have to tell you that.”

  He turned her so that his back was to everyone else. Clay heard him say in a low voice, “I’m saying that I love you. I want you to stay with me.”

  Her voice wobbled. “I always wanted that. But I want to be me, too.”

  “Who else would you be?” Virgil said, sounding puzzled.

  She lifted her chin. “You get to be whoever you want to be with everyone else. But you’re always you to me. I can only be me. I’m not your sister. I’m me. If that’s not enough—”

  Clay’s father’s voice cracked. “Griffy — oh Griffy, you are enough. I’m a bad hand at showing my feelings. I’m sorry. I love you.”

  The glorious hesitations and apologies and begging tumbled out of him, and Clay grinned with silent glee.

  At this moment, Randy took Jewel by the arm, led her outside, and shut the door. Clay hid behind the Venus Machine and held his breath.

  Virgil didn’t seem to notice. “My love?” His voice trembled.

  She squared up to him, her forty-two-year-old lip quivering. “What about Sovay? Why did you bring her here? Why did you make me pretend to be your sister? I know I’m not smart like her—”

  “It was just money. I wanted it.” Virgil waved that aside. “Sovay is nothing.”

  “Nobody is nothing,” Griffy said in a firm voice. “I love it when you talk nice to me. But you need to learn to listen to me. And I’m not talking about Sovay.” She took a deep breath. “Would you still love me if I did go to college?” Her chin trembled, but she smiled with chorus-girl tenderness.

  Virgil turned and exchanged glances with Clay. His look said, See what happens when you fall in love with a dumbbell?

  Clay sent him a look that said, You conned her. Now you have to fix it.

  Virgil shrugged and turned back to Griffy. “Go to college if you want to,” he said helplessly.

  No, not the truth! Clay rolled his eyes.

  “When Julia got her second time on the machine?” Griffy swallowed. “All I could think was, I want my Virgil back. I want him to love me. And then I did it, and then you loved me. But it was all the Venus Machine! Maybe I’ll get you away from Sovay, but what if that’s j-just the m-machine, not m-m-m-meee?”

  Her face crumpled, and Virgil wrapped himself around her.

  “It’s not real, honey, it’s not real. It’s just a con,” he kept saying.

  “Poor Virgil. Stuck in a world with no magic.” She touched his face. “I don’t think it’s a beauty machine at all. I think it’s a wishing machine.”

  “There’s no such—” Virgil started to say, and stopped.

  Clay frowned at him. You have to fix a con with an other con. The mark will never believe that you fooled her. Lied to her, yes, as long as you say, ‘But this is the truth, this time.’ Her pride won’t accept being fooled. So you fix a con with another con.

  A look of despair crossed his father’s face, as if he’d read Clay’s thought. He took her by the shoulders. His hands trembled. “Honey, it’s a fake.”

  Clay could have strangled him.

  She seemed to pull herself together. “No, really. Should I get the reverse treatment on the Venus Machine?” She looked at him with big, dumb, serious, blue eyes.

  I could have told you she wouldn’t buy that answer!

  Virgil looked hunted. “What can I say?” His hands rubbed together as if he couldn’t stop them. “If I tell you the machine’s a fake, how can I explain how beautiful you look to me? If I say, go ahead, reverse it, would that be fair to you, when you seem to get so much confidence from it? You need the truth from me, don’t you?”

  She sniffed, nodding.

  He pulled her hand to his chest and his mouth twisted. “You’re better at honesty than I am. What do you want?”

  o0o

  He held her hand, looking scared. Virgil, scared! Griffy was entranced.

  “You first,” she said. “Tell me what you want.”

  “I want to set things right with you. With us. It’s been a lot of years.” He touched her hair so sweetly she had to bite her tongue to keep I love you in. “The other night, when you stepped out of that contraption, you looked like the girl I brought home eighteen years ago. I realized you’ve been in there all the time.” He smiled. “My big-hearted stripper girl, inside the clothes I chose and the jewelry I bought and the elocution lessons I forced you through. I didn’t know how much I took away from you. The you I want is the you I couldn’t change.”

  Her heart swelled, but she sniffled and tossed her head. “Does that mean I can say dese, dem, and dose now?”

  He looked horribly uncertain.

  She decided to put him out of his misery. “I’ll tell
you what I think. That machine didn’t do anything. It was you. I saw what you did for Julia. She used to be like I used to be. Young and beautiful and wild. Giving it away wherever she wanted. Somehow she lost all that — that free glory — but you gave it back to her, Virgil. I saw that and I wanted you to give that to me, too.”

  He swallowed. “Honey, if you need to be free—”

  “I need you to be free.” She put out both her palms. “You have so much power and wisdom. You could use them for good, if you wanted. You made a stripper into somebody worthy of you.”

  “Oh, Christ!” He covered his face. “I’m not worthy of you, and you know it.”

  Clay caught her eye and slid down behind the half-assembled machine.

  She touched Virgil’s hand until he looked at her. “I fell in love with a good guy. Being good to people is harder than taking them.” She smiled through tears. “That should interest a workaholic like you. A new challenge.”

  He drew a deep breath. “What should I do? I can do about anything, but I don’t know if I can be a do-gooder.”

  “Sure you can. You can help Clay convince Sovay and Julia that the Venus Machine is fixed so it will cure them.”

  Virgil sent a sideways glance in Clay’s direction. “He might not thank me for that.”

  Clay stuck his head out from behind the Venus Machine. “I could use your help. Julia is the toughest mark I’ve ever met, and the most honest, so it’s hard to fake her out. It’ll take both of us.” He told Griffy, “It’s not real, you know. It was never real. I’m sorry if — if that ruins something for you.”

  “My boys. Always doing things the hard way.” She kissed Virgil’s cheek. “There’s always one person who can make the magic happen for you.”

  “Now, that I can do,” Virgil said gallantly, putting his arms around her.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Out in the stairwell, Jewel faced her sex demon.

  “Virgil sets an improving example,” Randy said. “Let us make peace. I want to live on good terms with you.”

  She blinked. “Well, I want that, too. This situation drives us both crazy. I think we can make it more bearable.” He nodded. She said, “I guess I should be more patient. I know you used to have, like, this big estate, and all these servants my-lording at you, like Mellish does. It’s gotta kill you to be so dependent on me. I — I guess I can try to be less bossy. I mean, who am I, I’m not a lord.” She gave a lame laugh.