School of Fortune

by Amanda Brown

  “I suppose you’re right,” Dusi sniffled after studying her reflection in a floor-to-ceiling mirror. Her curves looked spectacular in bottle-green Christian Lacroix. “You don’t even come close.”

  “Would you care to have the seamstress repair your pants while you’re here, Madam Damon?” Pippa asked.

  “Thank you, but I’ll have my jet take them back to Paris.” Dusi stepped gingerly over the heap of pillows and shams she had just made. “What is that costume all about, Leigh?”

  “I’m a lark. Remember the classic Studebakers from the sixties?”

  “I’m not familiar with the Studebaker. It sounds very middle class.”

  “From the Pierce-Arrow line,” Pippa informed her. “Surely you’re familiar with that.”

  “I thought a lark was brown. Small and inconspicuous.”

  “The horned lark is brown. The meadow lark is yellow.” Pippa escorted Dusi downstairs. “How did the membership meeting go, Madam Damon?”

  “We still didn’t get to Leigh, if that’s what you mean.” Dusi leaned out the front door. “Horatio!” She impatiently tapped her foot as her majordomo doddered up the steps. “The seam in my pants has given way. Give me yours to wear until we get home.”

  “But then I will have none, madam.”

  “I didn’t ask for editorial comment, I asked for your pants.” Adding insult to injury, Dusi said, “I do hope they’re clean.”

  “Let me get you a pair of Rudi’s,” Pippa told Horatio.

  “Don’t give the man ideas! We have no time.” Dusi nearly stripped Horatio’s pants past his knobby knees. She slipped into them and hustled him back to the Bentley. They drove off.

  Leigh leaned over the banister. “Did Dusi really think I was having it off with that smarmy gigolo?”

  “You handled the situation very well, signora. Brava.”

  Leigh noticed the mess in the foyer. “What happened down here? You must replace that vase before Moss gets home. Go to Antiquites de Napoleon right away. They had two in the window last time I looked.”

  “Do we have a line of credit there?”

  Leigh dropped a wallet over the banister. “Keep going until you find a card that works.” She returned to her fitting.

  Kerry, her face streaked with silver polish, wandered into the foyer. “What was that noise I heard? Sounded like a gun.”

  “You mean ten minutes ago? Thanks for rushing to help.” Pippa thought of something. “Did Harlan drop by today?”

  “Har who?”

  “Dusi’s boyfriend. The greaseball with the bedroom eyes.”

  “Never heard of him.” Kerry noticed the smashed vase. “Uh-oh.”

  “Sweep it up, would you? I have to replace it before Moss gets home. And straighten the upstairs. Madam Damon went on a small scavenger hunt.”

  Pippa took the Duesenberg to Antiquites de Napoleon. By maxing out six of Leigh’s credit cards, she scrounged together fourteen thousand bucks for a French Empire vase with robins. Leaving, she noticed a tiny stuffed bird lying in a bowl. Its red feathers matched the ruby parure Thayne had bought that afternoon. “How much?” she asked, blowing dust off its wings. “One thousand dollars.”

  Pippa counted the cash from her purse and arranged for the bird to be delivered to Castilio Damonia. “The note is to say ‘If I were a bird, I’d fly to you.’“

  If I were a bird? The guy already looked like a barn owl. “Very romantic, sir.”

  By the time Pippa returned to Casa Bowes, the workmen had departed for the day. A white Lexus was the only vehicle in the driveway. As Pippa put the new vase in place, her shoes crunched over many bits of porcelain still embedded in the carpet: typical Kerry cleaning job.

  The doorbell rang. “Where’s Leigh?” mewled a woman one might describe as gorgeous were it not for viscous liquids streaming from eyes, nostrils, and mouth. Her toy terrier barked in sympathetic mo-rosity. “I must see her.”

  Pippa led the woman to the bar, only to find Leigh already there with another hysterical reject from the Las Vegas Country Club. “Vivianne!”

  “Kristel! You, too? Waaaaaa!”

  Pippa made several quarts of martinis as, over the next hour, the number swelled to eight, not including dogs. Dusi’s membership meeting had barely adjourned, yet letters of rejection had been dispatched with such speed that one might suspect they had been typed before the meeting began. Dusi had signed them all with her fountain pen formerly owned by Gloria Swanson. Each note ended with a handwritten “PS. I’m so sorry, dear!” in garnet ink. Each woman had immediately phoned Dusi, who had taken thirty or so seconds to explain that an anonymous letter of protest had arrived, squelching further consideration. The points of protest? Kristel had a son whose boutique Napa vineyard just won a blue ribbon (possible alcoholism in family). Vivianne had sold her Matisse to an Egyptian (unpatriotic, possible terrorist). Gina, a Ph.D. in astrophysics, had sent away for home-schooling materials in lieu of brochures from Choate (dangerous fundamentalist). Jocelaine possessed only thirty pairs of shoes (automatic expulsion). No one could figure out how Peggy Stoutmeyer had made the cut. She walked, talked, and dressed like Roseanne Barr. She wasn’t even that rich.

  “If it makes you feel any better, I’m probably next to get the axe,” Leigh told everyone after the fourth round of martinis. “My application is on top of the pile now.”

  “But Dusi adores you, honey!”

  “She adores Cosmo. I’m just the chum.”

  “What are you going to do if you don’t get in, Leigh?”

  “Rejoin the Rockettes.” Leigh unsteadily placed her martini glass on a side table. “Let me take you to dinner, girls. We can cry on each others’ shoulders.”

  “I’ll get the car, signora.”

  Pippa ran into Moss and Cole in the foyer. She hadn’t even heard them come in over the keening in the bar. As Moss was inspecting the new French Empire porcelain vase, Cole knelt on the carpet, picking up the larger pieces of porcelain Kerry had failed to vacuum. “Another hen party, Cosmo?” Moss asked.

  “Eight more ladies didn’t make the cut at the country club. They’ll be leaving in a moment.”

  “I preferred the vase with orioles,” Moss mentioned, his voice flat. “These are robins.”

  “Then take it up with the chick who thought she was shooting skeet,” Pippa snapped. “Maybe you know her. Mole on her right cheek, red vinyl coat, black vinyl boots, wears too much Shalimar.” He got the picture. “I believe she carried a Smith and Wesson thirty-eight. The bullet’s still in the wall. There.”

  Moss’s face went white as his new vase. “She came here?”

  “Oh—she left a message—the next bullet’s for you.”

  Moss grabbed Pippa’s sleeve as she walked past him. “Does Leigh know?”

  “I didn’t see any point in informing her, signor.”

  “Good boy.” Moss and Cole took off like a pair of elk. They didn’t return until well after Pippa had tucked Leigh, inebriated and despairing, into bed.

  Pippa was expecting the knock on her door. “Come in.”

  Cole wasn’t surprised to see her up and fully dressed: that last look she had shot him in the foyer was a definite “See me in my office, sonny.” He sat on the chair rather than on her bed. She remained standing, arms crossed. “I owe you an explanation,” he began. Pippa said nothing. “It’s not what you think. That woman controls the biggest feather syndicate in Asia. Moss needs to keep her happy.” “How happy?”

  “Very.” Cole didn’t have to elaborate.

  “Then I’d say he was doing a lousy job.” Pippa tossed back some scotch from a glass on her dresser. “I saw her with Moss at Trump Tower yesterday. While we were shopping.”

  She took her liquor neat, he noted with admiration. “Her name’s Bing Bing.”

  “Thank you for that heartwarming detail.”

  “How did you know what sort of gun she was carrying?”

  “My mother owns one similar to it.”

&nb
sp; “Tell me what happened.”

  “The doorbell rang. Bing Bing stood there demanding to see Moss. I told her he wasn’t home and invited her to wait inside.”

  “Obviously you didn’t know she had a gun.”

  “Of course I knew. She was waving it in the air. She probably rang the doorbell with it.”

  “And you invited her in?” He almost choked.

  Pippa gave him a withering glare. “What was I supposed to do, slam the door in her face and call the police?”

  Well, yes. If you were a normal person. “Why didn’t you?”

  “Bing Bing wasn’t interested in anything but putting a few holes in Moss.” Pippa almost added, You’d have to he a woman to understand that. “When she realized he wasn’t home, she vented on the vase and left. It was all over in fifteen seconds.”

  Cole sat staring at his hands. “You’ve got balls, Cosmo,” he said finally. “It could have ended very differently.”

  “You could say that for a lot of things.”

  What did that mean? And she was still mad at him, damn it. “For the record, I don’t approve of what Moss is doing. But I’m in no position to tell him off.”

  “Of course. You’re just the innocent chauffeur.”

  Cole realized that she had seen him with the redhead. There was nothing he could do about that right now. “I try to do my job. Good night.”

  Twenty-One

  Leigh did not remember much about her evening with the girls except that Cosmo had tucked her into bed and the bill for dinner was two thousand bucks. When she finally opened her eyes around ten in the morning, she was surprised to see a large bouquet of roses on the bed table. “Tonight’s our ball. Let’s dance. Moss.”

  Moss hated to dance. Our ball?

  Hungover, Leigh dragged herself downstairs in an aqua peignoir. Dozens of people buzzed hither and yon with napery, bottles, and floral arrangements. Cosmo stood in the middle of traffic with a clipboard and policeman’s whistle. “Good morning, signora. Ready for your big day?”

  Leigh rubbed her throbbing cranium. “Whatever.”

  “I put a Thermos of coffee in your office. You’d best stay out of the kitchen.”

  Beside the Thermos was a bottle of aspirin. Leigh swallowed eight as she leafed through the invoices on the blotter. To date Masqueradia Dusiana was running slightly over two hundred thousand dollars. That was peanuts, Leigh thought as bits of last night’s party floated back to her. Kristel had spent nearly four hundred grand on two bridge parties with Omar Sharif. Beverli had blown six hundred reserving Dusi a nonrefundable seat on a future shuttle mission. Jocelaine had donated an enormous Hadzi sculpture to the club to plant behind the eighteenth hole.

  No one’s husband had been enthusiastic about the huge gambling expense. Vivianne had silenced her spouse by procuring an online credit report proving they had nothing to worry about. An excellent strategy, Leigh thought, turning on her computer. She went for the fifty-buck superspecial report and was waiting for results when Pippa walked in with a small, ornately wrapped package.

  “For you. From Kuriakin.” Pippa watched as Leigh unwrapped a diamond choker. “Fantastic, signora!”

  “I told you all this bellyaching was just hot air.” Leigh opened the little envelope. Her smile faded. “‘To my adorable Bing Bing. Love forever, Moss.’“ She looked oddly at Pippa. “Bing Bing? He’s never called me that.”

  “Let him call you anything he wants. It’s a stunning necklace.” Heart pounding, Pippa slipped the offending card into her pocket. “We’ll leave for the Ritz in thirty minutes. I’ve booked you for the full-day treatment at Vita di Lago,” That would get Leigh out of the house. “Are you listening, signora?”

  Leigh was way more interested in the credit report that had just come onscreen. She had no idea she had that many credit cards, each about twenty grand in the red. Moss still owed forty on the Duesenberg. The mortgage on Casa Bowes remained four million, signed by Leigh and Moss Bowes. The mortgage on his condo at Trump Tower was two million, signed by Moss Bowes and Bing Bing Kao.

  Pippa stood paralyzed as Leigh connected the dots, or rather, the Bing Bings. “He got himself a little pied-affaire,” Leigh whispered after an eternity. She ran to the kitchen, dropped the necklace down the garbage disposal, and flipped the switch before anyone could stop her. “That’s what I think of Bing Bing,” she shrieked over the terrible metallic gnashing.

  Rudi emitted a howl. He couldn’t care less about adultery. He was now without a functioning garbage disposal for the biggest party of his life. “Leaf my kitchen!” he cried, brandishing a carving knife. “Or I chop your head off!”

  Leigh got a heavy ladle from her silver chest and proceeded to smash the new French Empire vase as well as Moss’s rococo harpsichord to pieces. She heaved his soapstone owl through the library window again and was about to start tearing his bird books apart when Pippa shouted, “Enough, signora! You’ve made your point!”

  “I haven’t begun to make my point!” Before Pippa could stop her, Leigh rampaged through Casa Bowes, laying waste to Lladro figurines and antique grandfather clocks, throwing anything she could out the nearest window. She beat the Bolivian rosewood doors until the silver ladle looked like a Giacometti sculpture. Finally exhausted, she crumpled to the floor. “How could he do this to me, Cosmo?”

  “Get back to work,” Pippa snapped at the half-dozen guest workers gathered around them. Murmuring, they scattered. “You must pull yourself together,” Pippa whispered.

  “What for? First my dog, then Bing Bing! My life is over!”

  Pippa helped Leigh to her feet and up the grand staircase. “You’re going to spend the day at Vita di Lago. Tonight you’ll be belle of the grandest ball Las Vegas has seen in years. By Monday you’ll be the newest member of the country club.” By Tuesday my diploma and I will be out of here. “I’m sure this is all a misunderstanding. You only have one side of the story.”

  “A diamond choker, ‘my love forever,’ and a pied-affaire? How many sides do I need?”

  “Believe me, I know how you feel. I had a similar episode in Prague a few years ago.”

  “Did you kill her?”

  “I simply left. Within four weeks I was reengaged.” Pippa walked into Leigh’s middle closet. All of the clothing Dusi had torn off the racks yesterday was still lying on the floor. She found a beige knit ensemble. “Put this on.”

  “Those nights away. Those months working late. How could I have been so blind?”

  “Stop torturing yourself, signora! Get dressed now. Quickly.”

  Leaning over the banister, Pippa screamed a few orders to the people scurrying about downstairs. How the hell had that mix-up happened? If Bing Bing got the jewelry intended for Leigh, she might return to Casa Bowes with a missile launcher this time. Pippa speed-dialed Painless

  Panes and told them to get over immediately, with one of everything. She called Cole’s cell. “Leigh received a diamond necklace this morning. The card was for Bing Bing.” “Oh, shit.”

  “Half the downstairs is smashed to pieces. I’m missing eight windows. Signora found out about the condo at the Trump Tower.” “I’ll be right over.”

  “Leave Moss behind, if you don’t mind. Unless he’s really good at vacuuming glass.” Pippa made one final call, to Dr. Zeppelin. “Signora Bowes just learned her husband is having an affair. Go to Vita di Lago and hold her hand.”

  “Will you throw in a deep-tissue massage?”

  “You can do the whole-day treatment together.”

  Leigh exited her bedroom looking like a wraith, thanks to the sedatives she had just swallowed. “Why am I going to the spa, Cosmo?” she asked in a childlike voice.

  “Because Dr. Zeppelin will be there waiting for you.” Pippa guided her downstairs. “Watch the glass,” she shouted over her shoulder, keeping a firm grip on Leigh’s arm as she opened the front door. “I’ll be right back.”

  Who should be standing on the stoop but Dusi, dressed in a vintage
shirtwaist. Her Bakelite necklace and bracelets gleamed in the sunlight. Her face looked tight and rodentlike beneath a plaid hair-band. “Good morning! May I come in?”

  “Can’t you see we’re just leaving, Madam Damon?”

  “My lord, Leigh, you look as if you’ve been through the wringer.”

  “Signora Bowes has just had a ballet lesson with Mikhail Barysh-nikov,” Pippa replied. “She will be spending the rest of the day at Vita di Lago.” Dusi didn’t budge. “Is there anything we can get for you? Several tons of caviar, perhaps?”

  “Actually, I brought something for you” Dusi unearthed a large silver ladle from the depths of her Prada handbag. “It is from King Edward the Seventh’s court. I’ll need it back, of course.”

  “I believe we have plenty of ladles.”

  “Really?” Dusi smiled triumphantly. “That’s not what I hear.” Pippa swore she felt Leigh’s body temperature drop ten degrees.

  “Signora, could you please see yourself to Vita di Lago? I will be detained here and I don’t want you to be late.”

  “Of course.” Leigh sleepwalked to the garage.

  “Disgraceful,” Dusi huffed. “That woman is unfit to join Alcoholics Anonymous, let alone the Las Vegas Country Club.”

  “I congratulate you, Madam Damon. And your informant.” The house was crawling with people: could have been anyone. “You wasted no time getting over here.”

  “I had to know if that rampage rumor was true. I have an obligation to the membership committee.” Her voice turned sly and wheedling. “May I come in?”

  “No. Go home and play with your stuffed horses.”

  Dusi sighed. “Then I must presume the worst. I will be morally obligated to write a letter objecting to Leigh’s membership in the club.”

  “In that case, the party’s off.”

  “How dare you blackmail me, Cosmo!”

  “I’m simply playing your game. The score is tied at zero.” Pippa turned to go inside.

  “Wait. I can make this a win-win situation.” Dusi clutched Pippa’s sleeve. “I can guarantee that Leigh and Moss will succeed in their membership.”