One Dangerous Lady

by Jane Stanton Hitchcock

  “No you’re not,” Betty said.

  “Yes I am!”

  Larry was listening to our conversation, shaking his head in amusement. “You ladies . . . !” he said, chuckling.

  “What?” Betty glared at him.

  “I’m here to tell you that the Carla-Max connection ain’t about romance,” he said.

  “No? So what’s it’s about, then?” Betty inquired.

  Larry put down his fork and lowered his voice. We all leaned in toward him like flowers bending toward the sun.

  “The reason those two are so chummy at the moment is because Carla is putting a roof on Taunton Hall,” he said with great authority.

  We all exchanged bewildered glances.

  “Taunton Hall needs a new roof and Carla is paying for it—to the tune of a cool ten million pounds,” Larry said.

  “Can’t Max afford to put a new roof on his own house?” Trish inquired, echoing my own sentiments exactly.

  “Of course he can,” Larry said. “But why should he when he can get Carla to foot the bill for him?”

  “Larry,” I began rather sternly, “Max doesn’t strike me as the type who either needs or wants to be in anyone’s debt, certainly to that extent.”

  “He doesn’t think of it as being in her debt, Jo. I think Max thinks of it as rather an honor he’s bestowing on her. Taunton Hall is one of the great houses of England. I’m sure there’ll be a plaque somewhere which says the roof was made possible by the generosity of Carla Cole. It’s a charitable contribution. I gather he’s delighted about it,” Larry said.

  “Hey, I’d be delighted if someone wanted to put a new roof on our house,” Betty said.

  “I’d be delighted if someone wanted to come to our house,” Trish said sadly, reflecting, no doubt, on the number of friends who had recently deserted them.

  Max and Charlie finished eating before we did and they both stopped by to say hello. We all exchanged cordial greetings. I practically had to pinch Trish to keep her from standing up in deference to Max. Trish’s pulse just naturally quickened around aristocrats and she became particularly fluttery around Lord Vermilion. Betty, on the other hand, was one of the few people I knew who wasn’t at all impressed by titles. She didn’t care two hoots what Max or anyone else thought of her. She referred to Prince Charles as “Chuck,” and the Queen as “Liz.” And probably would have done so to their faces.

  “Hey, Maxy, honey,” she said, “we hear Carla Cole’s putting a new roof over your head!”

  Max guffawed. “My heavens! That was fast.”

  “Is it true?” she pressed him.

  “In a manner of speaking, yes.”

  “Isn’t that a little tacky-tacky, Maxy-Maxy?” Betty said in her inimitable hand-on-hip way.

  Larry, Trish, and I all glanced at each other in amused disbelief. No one dared talked to Lord Vermilion like that—except Betty. Max laughed. If he was offended, he didn’t show it. In fact, he seemed to enjoy it. Max was the recipient of so much nauseating flattery that I suspected he rather delighted in being kidded from time to time.

  “First of all, it’s not only my house, Betty, dear. It belongs to the National Trust. And despite the millions of pounds I’ve spent on it and continue to spend on it every year, it always needs a vast amount of work. We have a ball every year to raise money for it. You were kind enough to come to one, if you remember. Carla tells me it’s Russell’s favorite house in England. She wants to do it for him.”

  “As what? A memorial?” Betty said.

  Max laughed again. “I don’t think it’s quite that grim, do you? Frankly, I think she’s looking for projects to keep herself occupied until he resurfaces.”

  “ ‘Surfaces’ being the operative word,” Betty said pointedly.

  Enough was enough, however. Max furrowed his wide brow and grew serious. “Mrs. Cole is having a rather difficult time, you know—as anyone in her position would be, of course. She’s a very nice, very generous person who means very well, I think. So wouldn’t it be lovely if all you people here in New York were kind to her—particularly you, Mr. Locket?”

  This zinger out of left field perked Larry right up.

  “Me?” Larry said, pointing to himself with some astonishment.

  “Yes, you. One hears that you are doing an article and that you are only listening to one side of the story,” Max said. “And, as you can see from last night, that side is rather prejudiced, wouldn’t you say? Wouldn’t it be nice to get another point of view?”

  Max may have thought he’d put an end to a conversation with a polite suggestion that had the ring of a royal decree. But Larry, who was no one to trifle with, particularly when it came to his professional integrity, quickly picked up the gauntlet. He straightened himself up in his chair and, pinning Max with a hard gaze, said, “You can tell the present Mrs. Cole for me that I would be delighted to listen to her side of the story if she would be kind enough to tell it to me. I have repeatedly set up interviews which she has repeatedly canceled.”

  “She doesn’t want to talk to the press, Mr. Locket, which I, frankly, find rather refreshing,” Max said. “However, she did tell me that if she were to talk to any of them, it would be to you. And I agreed with her. I do so admire your work—from a safe distance.”

  With that, Max walked off. Charlie shrugged with mortification and followed him out of the restaurant.

  “Brrrr . . .” Betty shuddered as they left. “Well, those two cold fish certainly deserve each other,” she said, referring to Max and Carla.

  “Max isn’t cold,” Larry said. “He’s just very English.” He reflected for a long moment. “And he does make a good point. After last night, anything that Lulu says about Carla is going to be very suspect. If I quote her too much, it’s going to look like I’m biased. Plus I only have her word for some of the things she’s told me.”

  I could see that Larry was troubled.

  “Well, you’ll have to discover the smoking gun,” Betty said, continuing to eat. “And I ain’t referring to Max’s third leg.”

  When I got home that afternoon, there were many flowers and presents and messages waiting for me, all of them thank-yous for the party. Max sent a lengthy handwritten letter on his coroneted stationery, along with a beautiful old book of French furniture designs to add to my collection. He didn’t allude to the incident, but dwelled endlessly on the dessert I’d served, which looked like slices of watermelon, but was, in fact, watermelon sorbet with chocolate pits set in a real watermelon rind so one could easily mistake it for the fruit itself—until one tasted it. It was one of my famous trompe l’oeil desserts, as I called them. Max loved it. He wanted the recipe for his chef.

  Carla sent me a large orchid plant in an antique vase. Her note, written on the back of a postcard, read simply,

  Dear Jo,

  A memorable evening,

  So sorry I couldn’t stay.

  Love,

  Carla.

  What bothered me was that the postcard was a picture of one of the rooms in the Slater Gallery. These cards were only available in the Muni gift shop. Was she sending me a message?

  Someone sent me a cactus plant with no note. I called the florist to find out who it was from. The florist replied, “Lulu Cole.”

  I thought so.

  The most disturbing note came from Justin Howard, however. Justin thanked me for the party, adding a P.S., which said, “And you will be delighted to know that your dear friend Carla Cole is giving the rest of the money to buy the de La Tour Judas, thus making the two of you co-donors.”

  I already knew this from Ethan and it delighted me about as much as watching a fungus grow.

  Betty called bright and early the next morning and spoke the five most feared words in New York, “Have you seen Page Six?”

  “Listen to this,” she said, reading from the pap
er: “ ‘Socialite Jo Slater’s coveted dinner party for the elegant Earl Vermilion turned into a free-for-all when Lulu Cole, once married to missing billionaire Russell Cole, accused her successor, Carla Cole, of being a thief and a murderess in front of the fancy crowd . . .’ ”

  She read on: “ ‘The posh gathering was stunned by the first Mrs. Cole’s slanderous accusations. At one point, she physically menaced Carla Cole. The much younger woman backed off, not wanting to cause her socialite hostess any further embarrassment . . .’ ” Betty paused for a moment, then said, “ ‘The much younger woman’? Carla definitely called Page Six herself.”

  “I wish they’d stop referring to me as a socialite. It sounds so damn dumb.”

  “Jo, better a socialite than a sociopath—which is how Lulu sounds.”

  “Let’s hope she doesn’t see it.”

  “The odds of that are slim and none,” Betty said.

  And indeed, almost immediately after I hung up with Betty, I got a call from Lulu, whose apoplectic rage about the article was directed entirely at me. She hardly drew breath as she ranted at me.

  “Jo Slater, you are a snake! First you lure me to that party, then you feed me to the press! Page Six! That was supposed to be a private party! And after I apologized to you and let my daughter confide in you . . . I think it’s just despicable! I think you’re despicable! And as far as I’m concerned, you and Carla Cole deserve each other!”

  She hung up without even giving me a chance to offer her an explanation—not that I really had one. Aside from the acute embarrassment I felt over the incident and its airing, I was worried that the public perception was that I was Carla’s best friend.

  Then the mail arrived and with it a calligraphed invitation from the Municipal Museum to attend a gala dinner for the opening of an exhibit simply called “The Old Masters,” the show that Ethan Monk had been working on for years. I was thrilled at first, knowing that this exhibition was the culmination of Ethan’s professional career, and that it meant so much to him. I was just about to call and congratulate him when another, much smaller, calligraphed card fell out of the large tissue-lined ecru envelope containing the invitation. It read, “This exhibition has been made possible by the generous gift of Mrs. Russell Cole.”

  Chapter 21

  As is often the case in New York, another scandal got my mind off my own problems. Dick Bromire was found guilty by a jury of his “poorer peers,” as Betty Waterman said. Dick’s lawyers made a brief statement before the television cameras, saying that they would immediately appeal. I spoke to Trish afterward. She was keeping up a brave front.

  “The dogs are barking, Jo, but the caravan will move on,” she said with disconcerting cheer, prompting me to think she had upped her dosage of Prozac.

  The verdict hit our little set like a Scud missile. The ever tasteful tabloids featured huge blowups of Dick’s beefy face, with the word “guilty” perched atop his head like a crown of thorns. All the speculation now was about how much time he would have to spend in jail and how rich he would be when he got out. Would he still keep his plane and helicopter? was the burning question on everyone’s lips. And though the foul odor of his conviction had some hostesses turning up their noses at him, others remained noncommittal or even sympathetic. They were keeping their options open, remembering how generous Dick had been, and also bearing in mind that he might one day again be in a position to provide them with private air transportation.

  The hard facts were that Dick faced a minimum jail term of ten months and a maximum of three years. If he was sentenced to over two years, he might have to go to a real prison, as opposed to one of the regimented country clubs white-collar criminals usually found themselves in—the ones the “jail facilitators” favored. Sentencing was in two months, assuming the appeal did not delay it.

  “Forget synthetic antidepressants,” Betty told Trish. “Jo and I will give you a large dose of that ladies’ homeopathic stress remedy called shopping!”

  In Trish Bromire’s case, shopping meant spending money on variants of clothes and jewels she already owned many times over. Trish adored spending money, but she was so distraught about the verdict that even trying on shoes, clothes, and jewelry couldn’t cheer her up. Then Betty suggested we all drop into Gil’s gallery where we could get Trish to agonize over some really expensive art, and thus forget her problems, if only for one haggling afternoon.

  The Waterman Gallery was an unmarked limestone townhouse in the East Seventies, right across the street from Gil and Betty’s house. It looked just like all the other houses. If you didn’t know about it, you would easily walk by its pretty, classical façade, failing to notice that the wrought-iron bars on the windows were sturdier than average, and that there were at least two security cameras—one above the front door and one perched on a second-story ledge. Gil didn’t want browsers, he wanted buyers, serious ones: i.e., people who were rich enough not to quibble over millions. Betty referred to some of her husband’s best customers as “million wise, billion foolish.” The gallery was one of the hidden treasures of New York—accessible only to those who knew about it.

  Betty rang the doorbell and we were met by Tory Wells, one of Gil’s assistants, a tall, fresh-faced young blonde with a frisky, coltish air about her. Tory was the quintessential all-American girl. Wearing pearls and a sleeveless black dress that showed off her broad shoulders and long, lean legs to advantage, she spoke with the kind of drawl that reflects a privileged East Coast upbringing. She was also, according to Betty, a whiz with a Ph.D. in art history who spoke four languages fluently—including Japanese—and who Gil’s male clients adored.

  It was Gil’s contention that, great art notwithstanding, it was always helpful to have smart, attractive women around to help sell the product. The fact that Betty was never threatened by any of these bright, attractive staffers was a testament either to the strength of her marriage or to her own self-confidence, or both. Ever since my late husband had betrayed me so completely, however, I was more suspicious of men and their secret lives.

  “So nice to see you, Mrs. Waterman,” Tory Wells said, aiming her charm-braceleted hand at Betty like it was a gun.

  “Hello, dear,” Betty said curtly. “Where’s my husband?”

  “He’s in the basement with a client,” the young woman said. “The Tiepolo.”

  “The Tiepolo . . . well, well, well,” Betty said knowingly. “Let’s go see him, shall we?”

  The basement was where Gil Waterman kept old stock, as well as paintings that were too big to display in the gallery. The four of us crammed into the small, old-fashioned elevator. On the way down Betty explained that Gil had acquired a massive Tiepolo painting, but that it was so big and so expensive that he had not yet found a buyer.

  The brass-gate door of the elevator opened onto a huge, windowless space, aglow with cold, gray fluorescent lighting, lined with vertical wooden racks into which framed paintings of all shapes and sizes had been slotted.

  “They’re in the viewing area,” Tory said, leading the way across the rough cement floor to a gray metal door at the end of the vast room.

  Tory opened the door, and believe me when I say that if I’d seen Gil Waterman on the floor screwing one of his assistants, I couldn’t have been more stunned by the sight that greeted me. There were Gil, Ethan Monk, and Carla Cole standing in front of an unframed canvas, so enormous that only half of it was visible. The other half was rolled up on the floor.

  “Betty, Jo, Trish,” Gil said, stepping forward to greet us. “What a nice surprise. This must be old home week.”

  I hadn’t seen Carla since my party. She immediately walked over and gave me an air-kiss, moving right along to Betty, then Trish.

  “Trish, darling,” she said, taking both of Trish’s hands in hers, “I was simply devastated to hear about poor Dick. But darling, you will get through it, I promise you. Look at me.”


  Ethan sidled over to me. “So what do you think of it?”

  “I take it you’re referring to the painting,” I said sourly.

  “Huh? What else?” Ethan said, uncomprehending. There were times when Ethan’s choir boy naïveté infuriated me.

  We all paused to study the Tiepolo painting: a mythological scene of Poseidon surrounded by nymphs and sea creatures. Gil crossed his arms in front of him and stared at the majestic canvas with the look of a proud father.

  “I bought it straight off the wall of a Venetian palazzo. It’s unquestionably the finest Tiepolo in private hands, right, Ethan?”

  “It’s just remarkable,” Ethan said.

  Carla said, “What do you think, ladies? Do you like it?”

  “Don’t ask me, I’m prejudiced,” Betty said.

  Trish, whose eclectic taste ran more toward modern and contemporary art, said, “I think it’s nice. It’s big. And there certainly are a lot of fish.”

  Carla turned to me. “Jo . . . what do you think? You have such impeccable taste.”

  “I’ve always trusted Ethan’s judgment,” I said.

  “But would you buy it?” she asked.

  Gil shot me an anxious glance. So did Ethan.

  “Probably. If I lived in a warehouse. It’s enormous.”

  “Fortunately, I think it will be just perfect for my new apartment . . .” Carla paused to reflect. “I’ll take it!” she said decisively.

  The tension in the air diffused slightly as both Ethan and Gil let out little sighs of relief.

  Betty clapped her hands in mock joy. “Oh, goody, goody, goody. Now I can go shopping, too!”

  Later on that afternoon, I called Ethan and asked him point-blank how much the painting cost. He knew better than to try and stonewall me.

  “Gil was asking twenty-two,” he said. “But I think she bargained him down to nineteen.”

  Nineteen million dollars. Some bargain, I thought.

  Chapter 22