“Why are you being so good to me?” she asked as relief began to creep over her.
“Would one reason be enough?” He kissed her again and she nodded in acquiescence. “I love you, I’m in love with you, I love you absolutely and completely. Three reasons, and I could go on and on … but they’d all be variations on the same theme. I love you. I think I forgot to tell you that at La Marée. That was a serious omission, and I’m going to spend a lot of time making up for it.” He wanted desperately to ask her if she loved him, but he didn’t think it was fair. She was too open, too raw, too wounded. She’d feel gratitude and she’d say yes and if she didn’t really love him, she would never tell him. He felt tingles as if from a million injections of love. He was tatooed for life. He could wait.
“It was a bloodbath,” Luke said, dropping wearily into a chair. “And that’s just for openers.” Kiki gave him the martini she had just made, her only domestic sitili, and watched like a mother wolf to make sure he drank up every last medicinal drop. That’s what wives were for.
“I called Daisy,” she said when he’d drained the glass. “She knew already, she’d seen it. I’m having lunch with her tomorrow.”
“Christ! What kind of shape is she in?”
“Weird, didn’t want me to come down to be with her tonight. Kind of strange, far-away, detached, terribly tired.”
“Maybe we should both go down anyway.”
“No, I’m convinced that she wants to be alone. She just didn’t want to go into it anymore.”
“I’ve been talking for the last six hours—I have a faint notion of how she feels. Could you give me another of those splendid martinis, sweetheart? Did you know that a theory exists that it doesn’t hurt if you put a tiny drop of vermouth in it?”
“Oh.” Kiki’s father, as his last piece of paternal advice, had told her that the secret of a dry martini was just to pour straight gin of an excellent quality. That way you couldn’t possibly go wrong.
“Tell me what happened,” Kiki said.
“When I got back from lunch, there was a message to get my body over to Supracorp right away. Hilly Bijur was there, in Shannon’s office, and Candice Bloom and her assistant and a dozen other people from Elstree. Shannon told all of us that Daisy was going to be left absolutely alone from now on, that no one was going to bother her, and then he just simply dropped the bomb—no Princess Daisy line, no launch, no commercials, no nothing. Zip! Finished! Over! like it had never happened. Everything—every fucking thing.”
“But why?” Kiki cried in astonishment. “Can’t they go on without Daisy in person for goodness sakes?”
“He’s right, Kiki The launch wouldn’t get off the ground and the stores wouldn’t promote the stuff the way they’ve planned to and there are a half-dozen other perfumes being launched this month which were going to mean stiff competition for attention, no matter what. Without Daisy, we’ve got only some print ads and commercials which we could keep running for a while, but after that—nothing. Bubkis. See, the whole thing is based on her, on Daisy, her name, her face, and most of all, her personality. If Charlie lost that girl, they could replace her because the perfume isn’t called by her name and most people don’t even know who she is—just another pair of pants. If Lauren Hutton lost all her front teeth, instead of having that famous little space there, Revlon would find another girl or buy her new teeth. With Estée Lauder, it’s not so much Karen Graham as it is Skrebneski’s fantastic photographs that’s the trademark. With Halston and Adolfo, Oscar de la Renta and Calvin Klein you’ve got four big-name designers, already enormously established, famous guys, all of whom are going to do store promotions like crazy, with their new fragrances—with Daisy we only had the romance of Daisy herself to build on. No, honey-bunch, Shannon knows that it’s time to cut his losses. No matter how much Supracorp has spent on the Princess Daisy line now—something like forty million—it’s better to lose that much than to pour in more millions and end up losing them too. We spent all afternoon canceling what could still be canceled. But just money isn’t the biggest part of the loss anyway—not for Shannon.”
“I guess it’s just a lucky thing that Supracorp’s such a big business,” Kiki said, testing the waters.
“No business is so big that they can overlook this sort of disaster. Not when they have stockholders. Shannon’s going to be eyeball-high in serious shit. He could perfectly well have held Daisy to her contract. However, he made the decision not to. Don’t worry about Daisy though—according to her contract, she still gets paid. Worry about Shannon. Oh, baby, worry about them both.”
“I am!” Kiki breathed.
“Yeah. Listen, should I console you or should you console me, since Daisy won’t let us console her?”
Kiki sat in his lap, tickling her nose on the tip of his beard. “That sounds like six of one and half a dozen of another.”
“Let’s try it and find out. Those old sayings usually have some truth to them.”
26
The following morning, shortly after People appeared on the newsstands, Joseph Willowby and Reginald Stein, two major stockholders in Supracorp and both members of the nine-man board of directors, telephoned Patrick Shannon’s executive secretary and demanded an immediate meeting. They arrived within ten minutes, flushed with a combination of anger and triumph. Shannon had finally given them the ammunition they’d been waiting for.
“What do you intend to do about this mess?” boomed Willowby, brandishing a copy of People.
“I warned you a year ago that the best thing to do with Elstree was to sell it, but no, as usual, Patrick Shannon had one of his off-the-wall strokes of genius and he had to have it his way,” Reginald Stein said in tones of vindictive satisfaction.
“Sit down, fellas. I’ll tell you what I’m going to do,” Shannon said cheerfully.
They sat down and he told them. When he’d finished, Willowby said in fury, “In other words, Elstree is a total loss for the third year in a row? And you call that a way to run a business? We’ll have lost almost a hundred million on that one pet division of yours—Shannon’s baby. Of course, you realize what this has done to our over-all profit picture?”
Shannon nodded calmly. There was no point in interrupting Willowby. And he also happened to be correct.
“To say nothing of our stock,” Stein chimed in bitterly. “It went up in anticipation of this new move and all the excitement you spent so much money to create, but by the time the exchange closes today I don’t even want to think about how far down it’ll be. And when the news gets out that we’re closing down the whole Princess Daisy operation—shit, Shannon, would you like to bet on how many points Supracorp will drop? Would you? How many points, Shannon?” he roared.
“I don’t know, Reg, but this move isn’t something I’m prepared to negotiate with you. I’ve told you what I intend to do. I made the decision and I’m standing by it.”
“You cocky bastard, don’t count on that!” shouted Willowby. “I’m going to call a special meeting of the board, Shannon, and throw your ass out of Supracorp if it’s the last thing I do. I’ve had it with your so-called independence and high-rolling and flying by the seat of your pants. We’ll get someone in here who doesn’t throw away millions of dollars on a lousy whim. If you hadn’t let the Valensky girl off the hook we could probably salvage this fuck-up—in part, anyway. It’s your own fault and I’m going to nail you on it You’ve made one high-handed decision too many, Shannon!”
“Call a meeting by all means,” Shannon said. “I’m perfectly prepared to sit down with the board at any time. But now, gentlemen, if you’ll excuse me? We do have seven other divisions and I’ve a number of matters to attend to.”
After the two fuming men had left his office, Patrick Shannon sat and thought for a few minutes. Several other members of the board had leanings toward caution and conservatism quite as strong as those of Joe and Reg. He’d had constant trouble with their group in the few, short, exhilarating years during whi
ch he’d been head of Supracorp. They didn’t know him well enough yet to be entirely convinced of his basic soundness, but as long as he’d been making money for them they’d been prepared to put up with him, little as they liked it Supracorp was perfectly strong enough to withstand the Elstree problem in the long run, and they knew it as well as he did, but this was the best, opportunity Joe and Reg and their gang had yet had, or probably would ever have in the future, to get rid of him. Yesterday, when he’d made the decision to protect Daisy from all the exposure necessary to ensure the success of the launch, it hadn’t been a business decision. As a business decision it stank, Shannon admitted to himself. He’d taken losses before, but never for reasons he could control. He’d risked failure before, but never, never for anyone else. But he wasn’t going to win at the expense of Daisy, not while he had a choice left And without a choice he wouldn’t want his job anyway. A good thing too, since it was entirely possible that he would be voted out of Supracorp.
“So … fuck that noise!” Shannon said out loud, grinning, and went back to work.
In North’s studio the copy of People had been passed from one person to another all morning. A Planter’s Peanut spot was being shot on a closed set while a football star did fifty-four consecutive takes which involved actually eating two nuts and delivering four lines on the virtue of “freshly roasted flavor,” while simultaneously opening a fresh can and holding it up to the camera. This feat of hand-to-eye-to-mouth coordination had prevented anyone from exchanging their reactions until the lunch break. Wingo, Arnie Greene, Nick-the-Greek and North finally had a chance to meet over sandwiches in North’s office with the door closed behind them.
“I should never have gotten her into this shitpot,” Nick said, with an air of great gloom. “It’s all my fault.”
“Typical,” Wingo said waspishly. “You’d take credit for everything, including pogroms, floods and stuffing ballot boxes.”
Nick mournfully fingered his switchblade. “Be fair, Wingo, it all started with her hair, and that was my fault Say, remember how cute and mad she was the day we tried to get her to join us in the new production company?”
“Nick,” Wingo hissed, “could we be spared your reminiscences?”
“What are you talking about, Nick?” North asked, suddenly interested.
“Ah, balls, I couldn’t care less if you know,” Nick said. “Wingo and I were thinking of going out on our own if we could get Daisy as our producer, but she straightened us out good; loyalty, what we owed you and all that bullcrap, horse turds and eighteen other kinds of buffalo droppings. Wish you’d heard her.”
“I don’t want to be just a cameraman forever, North,” Wingo said defensively. “I can direct—even if Daisy didn’t think so.”
“How long ago did this happen?” North demanded.
“Maybe a year, maybe more, and there was nothing cute about her that day,” Wingo answered. “She was as angry as I’ve ever seen her, even worse than the time the Cinemobile people got lost in Arizona and we wasted the whole day sitting broiling under a tent like a bunch of fucking Bedouins.”
“Nah,” said Nick, “I think she was angrier the time that chimp she located down in Mexico took a piece of luggage into his cave and just played with it for six hours, instead of trying to tear it apart so we could show how tough it was. Remember the things she said to try and make it come out?”
“None of you ever heard Daisy really upset,” said Arnie miserably. “Because you weren’t there the day she found out that the caterer had charged us for ten pounds of smoked salmon on a shoot for Oscar Mayer where we only served the sponsor’s products. Now that was angry! We’ll never find another producer like her again.”
“Listen, why don’t you guys get out of my office?” North bit out the words. “If I want to go to a wake, I know a couple of Irish funeral parlors—at least the ethnic quality would be pure.”
“Shove it, North,” Wingo said. “You’re more upset than any of us. You think you can kid us?” North looked at him and fell silent.
“I never realized why she worked so hard,” Arnie said, compulsively turning to the pages of the People story again. “No wonder she didn’t seem to have much of a private life. That poor kid.”
“Listen,” North said, “I want this whole subject dropped, permanently and forever. None of us really knew Daisy and none of us really understands her now, even with that magazine piece, so will you all just shut the fuck up about it and go back to work? And that’s not a suggestion.”
He watched the three men file out of his office and locked his door behind them. Systematically, methodically and quietly, he then proceeded to demolish a new Cooke zoom lens, a twenty-five-thousand-dollar piece of equipment that had just arrived from England. He didn’t know any other way to mourn, he didn’t even know he was mourning, and he certainly didn’t admit for whom he was mourning, but never again in his life did Frederick Gordon North visit Venice.
Vanessa Valarian called Robin at his showroom the minute she read People.
“Send someone downstairs to buy you a copy and I’ll meet you in a half-hour for lunch. I can’t possibly wait till tonight to talk about it. Oh, Robin, darling, it’s so thrilling!”
As soon as they were settled on their banquette at La Côte Basque, without preamble, Vanessa fixed Robin with her eyes. “Now, listen, sweetheart, the main thing to remember is that we knew her when. We were her very first friends, her first sponsors, the first people who held out a hand to her without knowing a single thing about how or why she had to struggle, that brave, wonderful little darling.”
“We helped her first, before anybody cared,” Robin repeated.
“Because,” Vanessa went on, paying no attention to him, “we sensed a rare spirit in her, a beauty of spirit that others had overlooked. And we always knew that there was something marvelously worthwhile about her—her sensitivity, Robin, her enchantingly modest reluctance to accept gifts or invitations because she couldn’t reciprocate—as if we cared!—but, thank God, we were able to help her with commissions and clothes—I don’t know if she would have managed without us.”
“It wouldn’t have been possible, darling,” Robin assured her. “I’m sure everyone who knows us will realize that.”
“I can hardly wait for the Winter Palace party—she’ll be so happy to see a few familiar faces in the mob—I feel so protective of her, Robin. Almost maternal. And now I’ll be able to tell everyone about what really happened on the yacht—all those people who’ve been hounding me with their nasty questions—and vicious insinuations. At last I’ll be free to reveal the truth without betraying Daisy.”
“What did really happen, Vanessa?”
“Never mind about the details, dearest. I’ll think of something.”
It was a dreary, wet morning at Woodhill Manor, ugly weather for early September, which usually was fine in England. Ram, sitting down to breakfast, could think of nothing but the fact that, allowing for the difference in time zones, the issue of People with Daisy on the cover would be appearing on American newsstands by the time he ate lunch that same day. He contemplated, with a lack of interest, those choice brown eggs, boiled for exactly three and a half minutes, that faced him on the table. He rang for the manservant who attended his breakfast.
“Why are there no gooseberry preserves, Thompson?”
“I’ll inquire, Sir.” He returned within seconds. “The grocer had promised them for yesterday but he didn’t deliver because his van broke down. The cook regrets the problem, Sir.”
“All right, Thompson. It’s not important” As Ram sat motionless in the dining room of his gracious dwelling, one of the most peaceful in all of plenteous, gentle Devon, he wondered how many people in the neighboring market town would eventually read that issue of the magazine. It was easily available in London, of course, with scarcely a day’s difference in time. And in Paris, Rome, Madrid … within a week it would be everywhere. Leaving his breakfast untouched, Ram rose from the table a
nd rang again. “I’m going out, Thompson. Tell the cook to make sure the grocer delivers today. If he can’t, go into town and pick up the order yourself.”
As Ram walked, carrying his shotgun, across his ancestral acres, as he opened the gates of fences and wandered across the meadows, he thought about the pictures and the interview he had given the correspondent for People. It would be an enormous story. It would destroy her. She would never recover from it. He had made sure of that.
And so her picture was going to be used on the cover? Was it indeed? Ram stared out across the wet fields, imagining her face, imagining it smashed, crushed, broken, punctured, blood running from her nostrils, from her ears, from her eyes. From moment to moment he was able to sustain himself with these images but then he would see her again and again as she had been on the night of the Quatorze Juillet, see her as she danced in her white lace dress, flying mirthfully from arm to arm, ardent and innocent, eyes alight with discovery and jubilation, hair flying, tangled … laughing, laughing, dancing—dancing with everyone but him … the night on which he had finally acknowledged that she must be his or he would die.
He didn’t come back for lunch on that rainy day, nor did he return for tea. Mrs. Gibbons, the housekeeper, began to fret about her employer, who was always so gratifyingly precise in his habits.
“It’s ever so windy out,” she complained to Sally, the housemaid, “and not a day to go out shooting, not at all. There won’t be any birds about. I thought so when I saw him leave the house, but of course it wasn’t up to me to say anything.”
“Gentlemen have to have their sport,” the housemaid replied, philosophically.
“It’s pneumonia weather, that’s what it is, and cook had such a lovely bit of steak for his lunch,” Mrs. Gibbons grumbled.
“Someone’s knocking at the pantry door,” Sally announced to the housekeeper, who had become increasingly deaf during her long years of service to the Woodhill family. “I’ll go.”
Princess Daisy Page 57
