Rhapsody

by Gould, Judith

  "Who wrote it, Manny?" Misha asked.

  "Gertler. Here, have a look?" Manny extended the newspaper across the table to Misha.

  "No," he said, waving the paper away. "Just give me the gist. I don't want to read it."

  "What?" Manny said, eyeing him through his tortoise- shell glasses. "I told you the review's superb, and it is."

  Misha stirred cream and sugar into his coffee. "Look, Manny," he replied. "I don't mean to be arrogant, but I was at my very best last night. You know it, and I know it." He looked Manny in the eye. "So fuck the critics."

  Manny grunted noncommittally. "You're right," he said, "but you never know when they'll send in a hatchet man to chop you into little pieces because somebody happens to be pissed off at you."

  Misha sipped his coffee and didn't reply.

  "Anyway," Manny continued, "Herr Gertler's review is all 'dazzling transcriptions.' 'Old-fashioned virtuoso.' " He thumped the newspaper. " 'Bold' and 'lushly moody.' You get the picture."

  "Yes," Misha said. "I get the picture." His food arrived, and he began eating voraciously.

  "So," Manny asked, "what would you like to do today? There's nothing on the agenda until that party at Prince and Princess von Wallenburg's tonight."

  "I thought maybe Vera would like to see the Hofburg," Misha said between bites of sausage. "You know the Hapsburg jewels. All that." He took a sip of coffee before continuing. "Then, this afternoon, I want to do some shopping. Alone."

  "You?" Manny exclaimed. "Shop?"

  "Yes. Why not?" Misha said, his eyebrows raised questioningly. "I want to pick up some things for Nicky. Maybe a surprise for Vera."

  Manny looked at him with a quizzical expression. This was not like Misha. Misha never shopped unless he had to. "What's up?" he finally asked.

  "Up?" Misha replied. "Nothing's up. I just want to be alone, do some shopping and ...soak up some of the atmosphere."

  "Gimme a break," Manny said. He abruptly dropped his Anglophile pose, his voice and manner reverting to the streets of Brooklyn from which he hailed. "I know you well enough to know you've got something on your mind, Misha. You've been acting weird ever since lunch yesterday. Now, what's cooking? What is it?"

  Misha's eyes strayed out the windows to the Palais Schwarzenburg's lushly planted fifteen-acre gardens. He could see that the sun was beginning to break through the clouds, with the promise of a crystal clear, if chilly, day. His gaze returned to Manny across the table. There was a secretive smile on Misha's lips, but he didn't utter a word.

  "Uh-oh," Manny said, looking at him. "I smell trouble. T-r-o-u-b-l-e, trouble."

  Misha took a sip of coffee, then put down his cup. "Just take care of Vera this afternoon after lunch. Would you?" he said.

  "Jesus!" Manny exclaimed. "It's a fucking woman, isn't it?"

  Misha ignored him, concentrating on his food again.

  "Give!" Manny said in exasperation. "Talk to me, Misha! This is Manny, remember?"

  When Misha remained silent, chewing on a piece of toast, Manny emitted a loud sigh. "Shit," he said. "I'll do it. I'll take care of Vera, but I hope I don't live to regret this."

  Misha continued eating contentedly, knowing that Manny would do exactly what he'd asked him to do.

  "A little more to your left," Serena called out. "Please!" She waved her arm, indicating the direction in which she wanted the men to move.

  There was hesitation, stumbling, laughter, and general chaos, as there had been all morning.

  "Left!" she cried, waving furiously. "Left, gentlemen, left!

  Jason, one of her assistants, jumped to his feet and bounded over to help the men align themselves properly.

  She stifled a growl of exasperation but smiled politely. Heads of state, she thought with frustration. Assholes of state is more like it. Most of them understood and spoke English well, so the language barrier wasn't the problem. No, the problem with this shoot, she decided, was that these political big shots weren't taking her or the shoot very seriously.

  Locker room clowns, she thought with rising disgust. If she could shoot them individually, she didn't think she'd be having this problem. But she couldn't do that— she was stuck with The Group—whether she liked it or not. And like a lot of men in a group, they had to pump up their testosterone levels for one another—and her.

  Arms akimbo, she studied the men, lined up as they were in the Zeremoniensaal, one of the Hofburg palace's throne rooms. She liked the juxtaposition of their contemporary, if somewhat dull, appearance with the overwrought Baroque gilt and marble splendor of this, the Hapsburgs' former seat of power.

  "Okay!" she enthused. "That's good. Great! Hold it." She put her eye back down to the Hasselblad's viewer for a moment. "Don't move!" she cried.

  With a flick of a button the camera's motor drive started whirring away. She shot frame after frame of these, the new faces of Mittel and Eastern Europe. Faces she would like to shove her fist in right now. She'd been shooting for over two hours, with limited help. She'd only brought Jason and Bennett, her favorite and most knowledgeable assistants with her from New York. She knew that she had plenty of acceptable shots for the magazine. But she still wasn't satisfied. Despite the setting, she just didn't feel that she'd captured anything beyond the ordinary, the mundane.

  Face it, she told herself. There's simply no magic happening here today. Part of the problem, she realized, was her subjects. They were reacting to her as a woman first and a photographer second. For some reason her usual tactics, including her "disguise," weren't working today.

  Long ago, Serena had developed this disguise, born of ingenuity and necessity. She'd quickly learned the importance of dressing down for photo shoots. There were the practical considerations, of course. Most shoots encompassed long hours of physically grueling labor, and it was sometimes very dirty work—even here in a palace like the Hofburg, where all that marble wasn't necessarily as pristine as it looked.

  Practicality aside, the single most important lesson she'd learned was that whether a shoot was with men or women, or both, she could accomplish a lot more if she minimalized her own, undeniably exotic, presence on the set, drawing as little attention to herself as possible. For her appearance, she'd soon discovered, was distracting to clients and hindered their cooperation. She was a threat to many of the women, and an object to be conquered by most of the men.

  That explained the disguise and her look today: the complete lack of makeup, the loose ponytail low on her neck, and the ratty old baseball cap worn on her head. Plus, the wrinkled work shirt and paint-splotched, torn Levi's. All worn with down-at-the-heel, high-top sneakers. But the clincher, she thought, were the nerdy, black- framed eyeglasses perched on her nose. The ones with the dirty masking tape wrapped around the temples. She didn't need them, of course—they had clear lenses so they didn't distort her vision—but they were essential to her disguise.

  Why was today different? she wondered. Don't I look like somebody's plain-Jane cousin? Perhaps, she thought, they were merely excited by being photographed here in the splendor of the former court of the Holy Roman Empire. Or perhaps it was coming together like this for the first time.

  She didn't know, but she wanted to get this shoot over with. Pronto. Get out of here and get back to the hotel.

  And that, she knew, was the key to the larger part of the problem. Me, she thought. Her usual patience had deserted her today. She was not trying her hardest, not giving it her usual best shot. The reason for this she knew unequivocally: she was nervous, and had been ever since yesterday, after running into him. Misha Levin.

  Before she had spoken to him last evening, she'd promised herself that she would set certain ground rules over the telephone. That she would tell him yes, that she would like to see him, but that they must meet on "neutral" ground—neither's hotel room—and that under no circumstances should he expect anything more than a friendly chat, a catching up with each other.

  The sound of his voice had changed all that. A total
meltdown of defenses, she thought. That's what it was. The deep, resonant baritone, with the merest hint of an accent, had immediately weakened her resolve, made any rules or restrictions seem unimportant—silly even— in the light of the possibilities that were held within its promising timbre.

  Misha had been as excited as she by their encounter, of that she was certain. And it was most definitely not the excitement of two old friends running into each other. No. It was much more than that. It was as if two electrically charged elements had crossed paths, creating a heretofore unknown form of power and magic, that in its potency was an all-consuming force of such depth and dimension that it could not be denied. Their encounter had been one of two former lovers meeting.

  Serena shook her head, as if to clear it of these obsessive thoughts. I've got to get busy, she thought. Forget this shit. She turned her attention back to die task at hand.

  "Bennett," she said, "move that umbrella on the right about a foot toward me."

  "You got it." He jumped up to do as she'd asked.

  Serena watched him, then nodded when the reflector was repositioned exactly like she wanted. Then she turned to the men before her. "Just a couple more shots, gentlemen," she said, smiling. "Then I'll let you go."

  Thirty minutes later, she had thanked her subjects profusely and was busy helping Jason and Bennett pack up. There was a lot of equipment, but Serena didn't mind helping out. She hated traveling with an entourage of assistants, so she'd trained Jason and Bennett to do nearly everything. What the three of them couldn't do together, or was simply too time-consuming, she usually hired local freelancers for. Like the hair stylists and makeup artists she'd used today.

  They had left now, and she and "the boys," as everyone referred to them, were just about ready to start taking equipment down to the rented van outside, when the staccato click of Coral's Manolo Blahnik heels on the marble announced her arrival. "How did it go?" she asked.

  "It was not a picnic," Serena said simply, turning to look at Coral. She looks like a modern-day empress, Serena thought. Dressed to guide paying tourists through her throne room.

  "What happened?" Coral asked, a look of alarm on her magnolia white face.

  "Nothing, Coral. Nothing important, anyway," Serena replied. "It's just that they acted like a bunch of guys that just found out what they've got in their pants, if you know what I mean."

  Coral's right eyebrow lifted in an arch, and she nodded. "I see," she said. "But you got all the shots you needed?"

  Serena shot her agent a scornful look. "Of course I got what I needed, Coral," she said. "I always get what I need."

  Coral flinched. "I was just asking, Serena," she said defensively. She brushed at imaginary lint on the sleeve of her black wool, sable-trimmed coat, an Yves Saint Laurent. "I see that you're a little testy. Shall we go back to the hotel so you can change? Then go to lunch?"

  "I'm taking Jason and Bennett to lunch," Serena said, winking at the two of them. "But you're welcome to join us, Coral." She hadn't planned on this, but decided it would be just the diversion she needed to take her mind off Misha Levin. She pulled off her baseball cap and eyeglasses and loosened her long, black hair, shaking it out.

  The boys shot each other amused glances, knowing that Serena was deliberately baiting Coral.

  "Why, yes," Coral said, surprising them all. "I would like that very much, I think." She turned to Jason and Bennett. "It's time we talked, boys," she said. "I've looked at some of your proofs, and I think that you have great promise as photographers in your own right."

  Jason and Bennett exchanged glances again, more a mixture of surprise and awe than amusement this time.

  This news—and it was fantastic for them—came from straight out of the blue.

  "That'd be great, Coral," Jason said.

  "Yeah," Bennett seconded.

  "Good," Coral said, her brows knitted as her eyes ran up and down the two of them, scrutinizing them closely. My God! she thought. She had a feeling that they might as well forget a restaurant with any stars to its name. For that matter, was there any restaurant in Vienna that would even admit them? "I hope you have some clothes at the hotel," she said, smiling sweetly. "Something a little more ...suitable, perhaps?"

  Jason shrugged, and Bennett just stared at her. They were both dressed as always, as if headed for an East Village club. Jason, his nearly waist-length dark brown hair with bold, blond skunk stripes, wore shiny black PVC pants with logger boots and an artfully slashed, asymmetrical Helmut Lang T-shirt, which exposed his numerous tattoos. Black leather pants with futuristic sneakers and a leopard print shirt adorned Bennett's skinny frame. His wildly chopped—that was the only word to describe it, Coral thought—hair was dyed platinum and had black roots, an effect he worked hard to achieve.

  "Their clothes aren't a problem," Serena piped up, ruffling Bennett's hair with her fingers. "In fact, I'm not going to bother to change. We're going to a really hip bar I heard about." She threw her agent a lofty glance. "You're the one who'd better change, Coral," she said. "Unless you want to chance getting that sable spray-painted."

  As they stepped into the sunlit courtyard, Vera's head was still aswirl with the glories of the Schatzkammer, the Hofburg's Imperial Treasury. "It's like going to a really fabulous art exhibition," Vera said, turning to Misha. "My mind will be flashing a kaleidoscope of colors for days. All those beautiful things." She sighed somewhat wistfully. "And to think that the Hapsburgs took nearly all the imperial jewels with them into exile."

  "What was your favorite?" Misha asked her, putting an arm around her waist. "Oh, wait. I think I can guess."

  Vera laughed. "You know me too well, Misha," she said.

  "Emeralds and rubies and sapphires and diamonds," Manny sang. "These are a few of my favorite things." He turned to Vera and grinned. "Am I right?"

  "You know me almost as well," Vera said.

  "If I were a betting man," Misha said, "I would guess that your very favorite objet was perhaps green? As in emerald?"

  "Certainly not the 1,680-carat Colombian Emerald," Manny joked.

  "I don't think I've ever seen a precious stone that big," Vera said. "And the old imperial crown! It's enormous, with all those diamonds and rubies and sapphires!"

  "Hitler liked it so much he took it to Nurnberg in '38," Manny said.

  "All the gold and precious stones were dazzling," Vera said seriously, "but you know what?"

  "What?" Misha asked, looking at her.

  "My very favorite things," Vera said thoughtfully, "were actually the christening robes that Maria Theresa embroidered for her grandchildren."

  "They were magnificent," Misha said.

  "Yes," Vera nodded, "but they were also sweet. I mean, the work that went into them, the thought. It's not something that an empress has to do for the grand …

  Vera suddenly slowed her pace and peered off to her left.

  Wasn't that.. . ?

  She was certain that she recognized the tall, thin raven-haired beauty loaded down with photographic equipment who was striding across the In der Burg courtyard, two wildly clothed young men alongside her, and …

  My God! It has to be! she thought.

  ...Coral Randolph, jet black helmet of hair and white-white face, in a sable-trimmed coat, leading the way.

  Unmistakably. Unmistakably Coral, therefore almost certainly ...

  Vera quickly resumed her pace.

  ...Serena Gibbons.

  "What is it, darling?" Misha asked. "You look as if you've seen a ghost."

  "Nothing," Vera said lightly. "Nothing at all. I thought I had something in my shoe for a minute, but I don't." She smiled up at him, searching for any indication that he had seen what she had. If he had seen her, she thought, I would be able to tell it from his face. But apparently he hadn't, for she saw nothing in his expression or manner that was a tip-off.

  "You two still game for the crypt?" Manny said quickly. Oh, God! he thought. I've got to get them out of here. And fast! He
couldn't believe what he'd just seen, but knew his eyes hadn't fooled him—especially considering Misha's peculiar behavior since lunch yesterday.

  Serena Gibbons. She explained everything.

  Chapter Six

  Serena eyed herself critically in the bathroom mirror, then made hollows of her cheeks by sucking them in. She picked up her sable-tipped makeup brush, dipped it in the tinted powder, and whisked another touch of Mata Hari blusher onto her cheekbones. She looked again. "Purrr-fect," she told her reflection. Then on second thought, she puckered her Cabaret-coated lips just so. "No more," she decided. "Enough's enough." She bent over double and began brushing her hair furiously, from the base of her neck over her head, back to front, back to front, then stood back up, swung her head from side to side, shaking her hair, and gave it a few strokes from under the ears down. "There," she said. "All done."

  With that, she twirled out of the bathroom and into the suite's bedroom, where she quickly slipped on a black wool boat-neck sweater and quilted black leather micro-miniskirt. Both by Iceberg, but anything but cold. She eyed herself in the bedroom mirror for a moment, then heaved a sigh. "Shit!" she said. She turned and slumped down onto the bed, arms on her knees, chin in her hands.

  Another promise broken, she thought. And to the most important person around: me.

  She sighed again, then got up and poured herself a glass of mineral water and brought it over to the bed. She put the glass on the nightstand and spread out. She'd promised herself that she wouldn't make any special efforts for her meeting with Misha today, that she would take their seeing each other in stride. She would not let nervousness and excitement rule the day.

  Famous last words.

  During lunch with Coral and the boys, she had been anything but helpful in the discussion of the boys' careers. She simply couldn't concentrate and had gotten increasingly anxious, finally becoming so overwrought that she'd jumped up from the table, told them she didn't feel well, and deserted them there in the restaurant. Same reason, of course. She'd fallen prey to her thoughts of Misha.