Angels All Over Town

by Luanne Rice

  “Did they tell you what we have in mind, dear?” he asked me.

  “We usually sign autographs and do a scene or two from the show.”

  “Perfect, absolutely perfect. You just fill the time until two o’clock any way you see fit, but make a lot of noise. We want the shoppers at the south end to know you’re here.”

  “That sounds fair,” I said, staring at Larry Hicks. He had the most unnatural skin tone I had ever seen, and his toupee looked solid instead of a mass of individual hairs. If the wind blew, none of it would move or the entire thing would crash off his head.

  “I see you’ve noticed my tan,” he said, touching one wrinkly brown cheek with his left hand. “Mum’s the word, but Tropical Tanning is giving you and the guys some free gift certificates—a couple hours under the sunlamps. It’ll make the months till summer go by a little faster.”

  “Great.”

  “Tell you, I think you soap stars have it great, all the perks you get. I know it’s not kosher to take free gifts, but quite a few of the stores here have gift certificates with your names typed in.” He winked.

  “How super,” I said. It was the same everywhere; the mall managers offered us free merchandise, gift certificates, promises of fifty percent off retail price at stores in the mall. They always treated it like buried treasure: no one was to know where we had found it. I had stacks of gift certificates that I meant to use one day, but I most often wound up throwing them out.

  A line of autograph seekers had formed behind a red velvet cord. When Stuart, Jason, and I were seated in tall red chairs that resembled thrones, the line started to move.

  How I loved my public! For the first forty minutes or so I smiled and chatted with them. They said such nice things.

  “I love you, Delilah.”

  “I want nothing but happiness for you and Beck.”

  “Oh, I hope your life takes a turn for the better…”

  I signed notepads, business cards, and shopping bags. The women were high school girls, retired schoolteachers, grandmothers, secretaries with TV sets in their lunchrooms, lawyers who watched during their vacations. From years of meeting my viewers, I had begun to know something about them: they were lonely. Whether married, single, young, old, employed, unemployed, they watched Beyond the Bridge and the characters became their family and friends. We appeared before them every day. They knew our greatest fears and joys, our most intimate secrets and lusts. Our lusts were their lusts. Women would take my hand and say, knowingly, “I know what you’re going through with Beck.” They had been through it themselves.

  But after the first forty minutes, the procession of fans started to make me feel unreal. I am not Delilah Grant, I wanted to tell them. I am Una Cavan, I am not in love, I live in Manhattan, not Mooreland. They knew the difference, of course, but they loved Delilah Grant, not Una Cavan.

  A small woman with tight gray curls stepped forward. She wore a black wool coat with a white fur collar and handed me a greeting card. “Will you sign the back, Miss Cavan?” she asked. No one ever called me “Miss Cavan.” I smiled at her.

  “Who shall I—?”

  “Make it out to Mary Finnegan,” she said.

  I looked into her brown eyes and recognized her son. “Are you Joe’s mother?” I asked.

  “Oh, yes. I’m so surprised you made the connection, with all the Finnegans around. I’m a fan of yours—have been ever since you came on the show. I don’t like that stepmother you have.”

  “No, she’s a pip, isn’t she?”

  “I could not believe my ears when Joe said you had moved in to his building. What a small world we live in!”

  “Joe looks like you.”

  She chuckled, passing a thin hand across her eyes. “No, that’s the joke—he looks exactly like his father. But everyone says he looks like me, at first glance only.”

  Although I usually signed my autographs simply “Delilah,” I wrote, “To Mary Finnegan with the fond wishes of Una Cavan.” Mrs. Finnegan read it, then slipped the card into her black vinyl purse. She glanced back at the line behind her, appeared to debate with herself whether or not there was time to have a longer conversation with me, and decided to move on. “Now I’ll have to buy another card,” she said. “I was planning on sending this to my sister-in-law in Hartford. She isn’t well.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” I said. We waved at each other, and she walked away. I gave the next woman a wide smile.

  Stuart was meeting his wife, Margie, at the Showboat for dinner, so I rode back to Manhattan alone with the driver and Jason Mordant. Jason was thirty-eight, gay, and in the process of being dumped by his twenty-one-year-old lover. He rested his cheek against the window and watched the Manhattan skyline come into view.

  “What’s on for tonight?” I asked.

  “Evisceration,” Jason said. “Mine or his, I haven’t decided.”

  “When’s he moving out?”

  “Moving out? He moved out last month. His body’s still there, but his mind’s long gone.” Jason had a receding hairline. He was a very handsome man, with a warm smile and expressive blue eyes, but he blamed everything on his receding hairline. I had seen him regarding Larry Hicks’s head with undue interest. At various times he had told me he would be playing Warren Beatty–type characters, finding more satisfying and longer-lasting love matches, and not feeling suicidal so often if only he had more hair.

  “I’m having dinner with my sister,” I said.

  “Oh, you’ll like that,” Jason said, smiling at me. “I know how you love your sisters.”

  It was true; the prospect of seeing Lily was part of the reason my spirits were so high. Generally autograph sessions could depress me for days. But crossing the Triborough Bridge, I felt elated, ready for anything. I thought of Mrs. Finnegan; she was hardly a familiar face, but I knew her son, and the connection seemed comforting. Mrs. Finnegan, Lily: two connections in the same day. Presence is everything.

  I was admitted to the twelfth-floor apartment of Dr. and Mrs. Henk Voorhees by a statuesque woman of sixty dressed in a black uniform at least one size too small. “Willkommen,” she said coldly, engaging my eyes, standing aside and allowing me to enter the black-and-white marble foyer. Gilded pedestals bearing chipped antiquities stood around the oval room. An enormous, unmistakable van Gogh filled one wall; the painting was familiar, a swirly green-and-yellow landscape. Transfixed, I stood there, turning around and around, stunned by the grandeur of my surroundings. Lily rushed in wearing a silvery chiffon caftan.

  “Dahhhhling,” she said.

  “All you need is an ebony cigarette holder.” I kissed her and handed her the bouquet of roses I had been presented by Brierley’s Florist in the mall.

  She gestured at the painting. “Henk loves van Gogh. He is an ancestor.” She smiled at the elderly maid. “Thank you, Ilsa. That will be all.”

  The maid nodded sharply and took my coat and the roses away. “What is with her?” I asked.

  “Let’s just say she hasn’t taken to me yet. Henk says she thinks I’m too young for him. She thinks I’m after his money.”

  “Henk talks to his maid about his wife?” I asked, regretting my question instantly.

  “Ilsa has been with him for a long time,” Lily said. “She is very devoted. I have to understand that.”

  “Oh, I know.” I rubbed my palms together, trying to bring the conversation’s tone back to what it was when I entered. “So, what’s cooking? I’m starved. Am I going to get one of your gourmet meals?”

  “Unfortunately not.” Lily’s tone was cold. “I was busy all day, so I had it catered.”

  “‘It’? Is this a party?”

  “No, it’s dinner for three. Relax—you’re in the lap of luxury.” Lily relaxed as she showed me around the apartment. It faced south and east, with views of the East River, the Sound and the Atlantic, the bridges, the Chrysler Building, Citicorp, and the Empire State Building. The apartment had seven bedrooms, five bathrooms, two kitchens, two li
ving rooms (each with two fireplaces), a library, a formal dining room, an informal dining room, a breakfast nook the size of my bedroom, and Lily’s morning room.

  I liked the morning room best. It faced east and would get the morning sun. It contained a Queen Anne writing table, two chintz-covered armchairs flanking a small tile fireplace, and a chaise longue. Watercolors of Paris hung around the room, and the walls were covered with pale-gold-and-white-striped fabric. The Tomassi madonna hung above the writing desk. Lily had filled the bookshelves with her art books, and she had erected an easel in the corner.

  “This is where I spend my days,” she said. She pointed at the chaise longue. “That is where I lie when I have the vapors.”

  With the toe of one maribou-trimmed mule she stepped on a tiny button. Ilsa appeared immediately, as if she had been lurking in the hallway. “We’ll have drinks in the library,” Lily said. Turning to me, she added, “It’s so much more intimate than the big living rooms.”

  “The big ones, yes,” I said. Then, suddenly noticing Henk’s absence, I asked where he was.

  “Oh, at the hospital. He works incredibly long hours. He’s never home before ten o’clock. I hope you don’t mind eating late.”

  “What will Madame have?” Ilsa interrupted rudely.

  “Are you talking to me?” I asked.

  “Yes, madame.”

  “I’m not married. You’d better call me ‘mademoiselle.’”

  “Very good, mademoiselle.”

  “I’ll have a malt Scotch on the rocks,” I said.

  “Oh, give her the Laphroaig, Ilsa,” Lily said. “I’ll have my usual.”

  “Very good, madame,” Ilsa said, walking out of the morning room.

  “That one has got to go,” I said.

  Lily giggled weakly. “You shouldn’t push her, Una. I have this feeling she was a Nazi.”

  “Is a Nazi. She’s here all day?”

  Lily nodded, smirking. “Watching my every move. She’s afraid I’m going to steal the silver.”

  “Why don’t you get Henk to fire her?”

  “Like I said, she’s the loyal family retainer.” Lily led me down the long corridor to the library, where everything was made of mahogany and red leather. A fire crackled in the marble fireplace. Lily and I sat at opposite ends of the red leather sofa. We sipped our drinks and stared at the fire. For the first time in my life, I did not know how to start a conversation with her. Was it the austerity of our surroundings? The unfamiliarity of the terrain? A blazing birch log snapped and crashed between the brass andirons. Like a Noël Coward heroine, Lily walked to the fire and stirred it with an exceptionally long poker.

  To her back, I said, “I’ve missed you. Thank you for inviting me here.”

  Lily turned and smiled skittishly. “You know I’ve missed you too. But being married—” She shrugged.

  “Being married what?”

  “It’s time-consuming.” Defiant, chin tilted ceilingward. “I have new loyalties.”

  “But they don’t replace old ones, do they? Look at Henk—loyal to you, loyal to Ilsa.”

  “That’s not it at all,” Lily said, her voice growing high and strained. “You don’t understand. Henk warned me that you and Margo would be jealous of him at first. He sees families in crisis all the time—when a man is dying, his wife and sisters and children always fight over who has the most rights. You know, over who gets to stay in the room, who should talk to the doctors, who gets to determine what extreme measures can be taken. There are bound to be conflicts like that between members of a family. The old family and the new one.”

  That speech left Lily breathless. I sat absolutely still, my lips pressed to the rim of my Scotch glass; I found it extraordinary that Henk should compare families and marriage to families and crisis. Lily sat down on the couch. We drank without speaking; we were sipping our drinks when Henk walked in ten minutes later. He kissed the tops of our heads and settled himself in a red leather wingback chair beside the fireplace.

  “Liebchen,” he said, patting his knee. Lily flew across the room onto his lap. Ilsa, tight-lipped, walked into the room with a glass of Genever gin on a silver tray.

  “This is a lovely apartment, Henk,” I said, thinking how handsome, how blond they looked together; what a stunning couple they made.

  “I want to make a good home for your sister,” he said. Stroking her pink cheek with the back of one hand, he murmured, “Beauty.”

  “Well, you’re succeeding,” Lily said. She kissed his lips, then gently eased off his lap and returned to the sofa.

  “Tell me about your day,” she said.

  Henk took a large swallow of gin, then smoothed back his blond hair with both hands. His fingers were long and slender, and he wielded them with arrogance. The hands of a surgeon, I thought.

  “Oh, it was a monster. You don’t really want to hear about it.”

  “Of course I do!”

  “Well, Mrs. Lavoise went into crisis late this morning. I spent six hours with her on the table.”

  “You must be exhausted!”

  Henk waved one hand. “No, it’s over and done with. She’s fine, the procedure was fine, we’re all fine. Now I’m home and all I want to do is kiss my pretty wife. Come back here.” He patted his knee again and Lily, dimpling, charged to his side. I watched this with pure incredulity. Could it be possible, Lily simpering? Was this what marriage was all about? Maribou mules and a hostile maid? The good little wife on the husband-daddy’s knee? Was I privy to a secret scene of marital life, enacted only in private or in front of sisters? I finished the Scotch in my glass and looked away. No wonder Ilsa was sick at heart.

  Henk noticed. He laughed uproariously. “Una, dear. Are we embarrassing you?”

  “No, not at all,” I lied.

  Lily rested her head on Henk’s chest and regarded me through sleepy eyes. I could see her enjoying my discomfort. She was getting me back for years gone by when I, the oldest daughter, had gotten riding lessons, new party shoes, first pick of the doughnuts on Sunday morning. For years I had appeared daily on national TV. But now Lily had something I did not have: an adoring blond husband. I felt like sticking my tongue out at her and screeching, “Nah, nah, I would hate to be fawned over.” Instead I smiled politely. I tipped my empty Steuben glass. Henk, the vigilant host, touched a button on the mahogany side table. Ilsa appeared immediately.

  “Another drink for Miss Cavan, please.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  “Oh, am I the only one having more?” I asked.

  Lily gave me an exaggerated roll of the eyes. “One drink before dinner, that’s our limit. Right, darling?”

  “Absolutely. ‘One makes the blood behave, more are tickets to the grave.’ A little cardiovascular humor,” Henk said, grinning. He, too, had something I didn’t have—Lily.

  “We never eat red meat either,” Lily said. “Henk’s taught me so much about diet. Did you know that increased fiber lowers the risk of cancer as well as heart disease?”

  “Yes, I’ve read that.”

  “And forget salt!” Lily eased herself off Henk’s lap and came across the room. She displayed her left hand. I held it, feeling the faceted surface of the enormous pear-shaped diamond with my thumb. “Not that,” Lily said. “Notice my fingers.”

  Her nails were long and opalescent. “You had a manicure?”

  “Yes, but the fingers themselves. See how much thinner they are? That’s since I quit using salt. You wouldn’t believe how much water it makes you retain.”

  I stared at her fingers, but I couldn’t see any difference. Lily had always been thin. “I’ll have to cut down on the stuff,” I said.

  “Give it up entirely,” Henk commanded. “That’s the thing to do. It’s poison to the system. Give up eggs too.”

  “Okay, I will.”

  For dinner we had curried chicken, hearts of romaine in tarragon vinaigrette, and fresh peach chutney. Lily assured me that it did not contain one pinch of salt.
It was delicious. I drank one glass of Gewürtztraminer, and the Voorheeses drank Ramlösa water. We ate in the baronial dining room, with Voorhees coats of arms on one wall and a moose head over the blazing hearth. I sat in the center of one side of the long table; Lily and Henk faced each other at the ends. Ilsa stood against one wall, watching us eat. My sister and her husband were totally absorbed in each other; it was almost as if Ilsa and I were not there.

  Suddenly Henk smiled broadly at me. “Forgive us, Una. Are we ignoring you?”

  “Well—”

  “A little, I can see that,” he interrupted. “You are too polite to say. Like your sister, so polite, so well-bred. You were an example to her? Growing up?”

  I glanced at Lily, who smiled encouragingly at this exchange. “I suppose I was. We were very close. By that I mean emotionally, as well as in age.”

  “Ah, how I envy that. A close family. My brothers and I have no respect for each other. They are mechanics, if you can believe that, with no love for art or culture or any of the things that make me happy. They think I am a doctor only for the money. Thus, sometimes it is difficult for me to understand the bond between siblings. The sibling relationship. I marvel at it. When I see it, say, between a patient and his healthy brother? It is a wonderful phenomenon,” Henk said.

  “I hope that we can become closer, Henk,” I said. “Now that you’re married to Lily. My brother-in-law!” I began to relax, to enjoy the conversation.

  “I’d love that! It’s exactly what I’m hoping for!” Lily said, excited. “I’ve been planning—”

  But Henk interrupted her with a seemingly urgent question about a telephone call he was expecting from a patient in Japan. Lily stared at him, her mouth dumbly open, her cheeks pink.

  “There has been no call from Japan,” Ilsa said.

  “Oh, good. I’m sorry, go on, darling,” Henk said to Lily. He resumed eating.