The Experimentalist

by Nick Salaman

  ‘I bet it is.’

  ‘Too long for now. I’ll tell you all about it later. I just wanted to ask about Merrymaids. Do you ever get any customers from a company called The Other Judas – TOJI?’

  ‘We sure do. They’re based some way outside town but have an office here. They seem to own everything, They probably own Merrymaids now. They certainly own this coffee we’re drinking and this chain of cafés.’

  Margot pronounced it cafays – she had picked up more than a smattering of Americanisms during her stay.

  ‘Have you met a bloke called Grindlay?’

  Margot’s eyes widened. ‘As a matter of fact, I have. How do you know that name?’

  ‘I heard someone talking about him. He said he’s not as bad as most of them.’

  ‘I want to hear everything,’ Margot said.

  ‘You will.’

  ‘Meanwhile, it seems your ear is close to the ground. What’s the game?’

  ‘I’ll tell you about it later, I promise. But first of all I have to get myself a job.’

  Margot glanced at her watch. ‘And I’ve got to go,’ she said. ‘And you come with me. Wait, you’re not pregnant again…?’

  ‘Good heavens, no!’

  ‘You’d be amazed the records they keep. They’ll have your name down somewhere. Let’s go get ’em.’

  Merrymaids LA was very much modelled on Pilgrim’s Piece, only larger and even more lavishly ‘British’. A butler greeted them, and, when Margot explained Marie’s mission, directed them to a door that said PRIVATE with two chairs and a small sofa outside it. They sat and waited.

  ‘I’ll go in first,’ said Margot, ‘so I can tell her a bit about you. The personal introduction is a good thing at Merrymaids.’

  The PRIVATE door opened ten minutes later, and a secretary dressed in a white blouse and purple skirt beckoned impatiently. Margot got up and went inside. After a short interval, she appeared again, and Marie followed her back into an office remarkable for its austerity considering the lavishness of the entrance and the vestibular largesse. Inside the room was a big wooden desk and two spindly chairs. The hatchet-faced woman at the desk couldn’t smile because her face would have cracked if she had. But it didn’t matter because she wasn’t given to smiling. On the wall hung prints of what looked like Victorian penal establishments.

  ‘Who are you?’ she asked Marie, and then to Margot. ‘I know who you are. Trouble.’

  ‘Why, thank you, Miss Leon. You say the nicest things. And here am I introducing a girl who has already worked for Merrymaids in England – where she would have been Maid of Honour if she hadn’t left,’ said Margot.

  Miss Leon fixed Marie with a basilisk eye. ‘Why did you leave? Don’t tell me. Let me guess. You were pregnant.’

  ‘Yes. How did you know?’

  ‘It’s always the prettiest ones.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘So you want a job again, Miss…?’

  Marie hardly hesitated about the name to give? There was nothing against reverting to Sinclair for Merrymaid purposes. Margot said everyone here went under aliases. The management might want to know for tax purposes and things, but there was time to sort that out with someone Margot said she knew. ‘Marie Sinclair. Yes, I would like to work here, please.’

  ‘What about the child? This is not a job for a mother.’

  ‘I lost it.’

  ‘Tough. So don’t go getting pregnant again. Margot here says you had good ideas for the company. So keep having them. But not too many. You have card, a passport?’

  Marie thought quickly.

  ‘Yes, but not with me.’

  A card? Middleburg would have it, whatever it was. And he wasn’t going to let it go, nor her passport. She had it when she travelled to and from Nice. She would have to sort it out with Margot.

  ‘Drop it in sometime. OK, Margot, you can show her round. Marie, you can start tomorrow.’

  ‘Thank you, Miss Leon.’

  Margot led the way out and gave her a hug in the hallway under the eye of the butler who batted not an eyelid, then she took Marie into the full exorbitance of the Los Angeles Merrymaid experience. There were drawing-rooms for smoking and drinking and even taking tea, there were billiard and snooker rooms, there were bars glitzy and bars pubby, there were great dining-rooms for eating and speaking, there was a cabaret room, an intimate night club, a casino and a ballroom, which sparkled like a Fabergé tiara (if he ever made such a thing). There was a games room, a gym, a bathroom with Turkish amenities, a sauna and, of course, an Olympic-size swimming pool. Then there were the bedrooms with beds so large and inviting that Marie found it quite difficult to refrain from leaping into them on the spot, though she had slept soundly last night at Felipe’s – more from the nervous exhaustion of the last few days than the homely qualities of the apartment. It was hard, as she explained to Margot, to share your sleeping space with a hoover.

  ‘Oh, but you must come and stay with me!’ cried Margot.

  ‘Better we stay friends. I have got a room to myself and a shower. And now we’ve got all this.’

  ‘But it’s not for us. Any more than it is for the goldfish in the morning-room,’ said Margot.

  ‘At least Felipe’s cupboard of a bedroom is mine and it’s private.’

  ‘Meanwhile, you will have this lovely golden cage to disport yourself in.’

  ‘And I will disport,’ said Marie. ‘All this,’ she put her hand to head and shook her hair like a screen goddess. ‘What more could the man about town want?’

  ‘Compliant goddesses.’

  The Merrymaid costumes were a little more sophisticated than the Pilgrims Piece variety, better tailored and sexier, and that included the swimwear. The house rules were more or less identical. You could show as much bosom as you liked but not the whole job. You could go as far with the guests as they wanted, but it was not obligatory. Everyone must be clean, presentable, well-mannered and merry as the night was long.

  ***

  That evening, Marie met up with Margot and, over dinner at a trattoria, they filled in the gaps.

  ‘What’s it like here, I mean compared with Pilgrim’s Piece?’ asked Marie.

  ‘It’s a little more relaxed but it’s rather more dangerous. It’s like the police over here. They carry guns while the British bobby doesn’t. Things can go seriously wrong. One of the girls was killed a year ago. The management keeps quite a close eye on you, for your own good, they say. Everyone’s a bit jumpy after the murders last year and now the trial…

  ‘What murders?’

  ‘You have been out of the scene. Some guy called Manson and his girls. It seems they crept about people’s houses, stabbing them.

  ‘I’m glad I was out of the scene if that’s what the scene’s been about.’

  Marie shivered.

  ‘Air conditioning too cold?’ asked Margot. ‘I asked them to turn it down, but they say the customers like it.’

  A waiter hovered. They ordered insalate tricolore, escalope Milanese with zucchini and a bottle of Californian pinot noir. Marie realised she had not eaten since yesterday breakfast.

  ‘Tell me what’s happened since we last met,’ said Margot. ‘You know, I’ve thought about you a lot. What really happened to the baby?’

  Marie told her as much of the story as she felt was repeatable.

  ‘What? They took your baby and you did nothing?’ exclaimed Margot who wanted one of her own.

  Marie felt defensive. ‘There was nothing I could do. I was drugged and there was Fist who was seriously dangerous. I think of her all the time.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be tactless. They’re bastards. They’ve probably got her somewhere. They know where she is.’

  ‘That at least gives me hope.’

  ‘What about this Middleburg?’

  ‘He saved my life. I thought he was just a kind stranger … someone I met on a plane.’

  ‘But it turns out he was a step in front of you.’
>
  ‘They always have been, at every turn.’

  ‘That’s some organisation. And then this Middleburg turned out to be not such a kind old silver-haired gentleman. He was the chief jerk.’

  ‘He kept me prisoner. The worst of it was, I accepted it. I was so tired. I just couldn’t be bothered.’

  ‘They wanted you to marry him? Why would they want that?’

  ‘I guess it’s money. I’ll be coming up for my twenty-fifth birthday in June. Middleburg says that’s when I can take my share of the business. Or maybe they need my signature for me to resign my interest in the company. To be honest, I’m tired of it all already. I shouldn’t be here. I should be out of the country, thousands of miles away. Let them get on with it. But then I think, how can I harm them? How can I bring them down?’

  ‘This is where they are. This is where you have to hurt them.’

  ‘I know. And I’m scared.’

  ‘They can’t kill you, they need you alive.’

  ‘They need me half-alive. That’s what frightens me.’

  ‘We could go to the police.’ Margot hesitated. ‘But not in LA.’

  ‘Or a judge or someone?’

  ‘Do you have a visa?’

  ‘No. I don’t think so.’

  ‘That’s no good.’

  ‘How do I get one?’

  ‘Do you have a passport?’

  ‘No. But I need one for Merrymaids. And something called a card.’

  ‘A green card. That’s important but it can be arranged. At least, something good enough to satisfy them.’

  ‘I need something really good if I’m to complain officially. I can’t complain about Middleburg to anyone if I’m officially not here.’

  It was an impasse. The girls looked at each other. Margot shared the last of the bottle between them.

  ‘We can put the passport off for a while. Let’s see what Grindlay has to say about Middleburg,’ she suggested. ‘Grindlay’s not a bad sort.’

  ‘He mustn’t know who I am. I don’t want him to connect me with my father.’

  ‘No one uses real names here at Merrymaids. I’m Immie. You can be Katie.’

  ‘I’m pretty sure Middleburg would never come to the club. He’s not the sort. But they’re like that fungus that grows underground. They’re everywhere. They grow on money. You have to keep washing your hands.’

  Margot laughed. ‘They’ve really got to you, haven’t they?’ she said.

  ‘Are you surprised?’

  ‘Not one little bit.’

  ***

  Thursday was the big evening at Merrymaids and tonight a group called The Beach Boys was playing. Bob Merriman usually turned up if he was in town, and all the staff were expected to be there. He liked to run his eyes over the girls before the big money arrived. Margot had told her that the man, Grindlay, was expected – maybe she could engineer it so that Marie sat next to him at dinner.

  Bob Merriman stopped when he came to Marie in the line and his eyes narrowed.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ he said. ‘I never forget a face. Haven’t I seen you somewhere before?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ she said. ‘At Pilgrim’s Piece.’

  ‘Hey, you were the Maid of Honour who left to have a baby, right?’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘And you told me about that song, the “Merry man and his Maid”? That was really cool. I loved that song. Gilbert and Sullivan, right?’

  ‘Right.’

  He started singing in a surprisingly good baritone.

  ‘It’s the song that is sung by a lovelorn loon,

  Who sang to the light of the moon-o,

  It’s the song of a Merry man nobly born…’

  He stopped singing as suddenly as he had started. There was a round of applause from the girls. And then he started again.

  ‘Heydee lady,

  Misery me,

  Lackaday dee,

  He sipped no sup and he craved no crumb,

  But he sighed for the love of a lady!’

  ‘Go on, Mr Merriman,’ they giggled. ‘Bet you’ve never had to sigh for the love of a laydee.’

  But he shook his head. There were shallows in Mr Merriman’s life too secret to mention.

  ‘What happened to the baby? Do you have her at home?’

  Marie thought it prudent to lie. ‘She’s back in England with her father. We are separated.’

  ‘Too bad,’ he said, without condolence.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘The chapter is closed.’

  He clapped his hands. ‘To business,’ he said. ‘We have a full house tonight. And you,’ to Marie, ‘no more babies or you’ll be out on the street again. Nothing personal but Merrymaids is for maids not mothers. Hear that, girls. You’re to be maids not mothers.’

  ‘Yes, Mr Merriman.’

  ‘He’s in a good mood,’ whispered Margot.

  And so the evening began.

  Jack Grindlay turned out to be a tall, fair, good-looking man in his forties. Athletic once, he was just developing a little bit of a spread around his middle. He was one of those men who genuinely enjoy the company of women. Margot and Marie sidled up to him in the drawing room as the guests stood drinking champagne before dinner. Just at that moment, Merriman clapped his hands again and the conversation stopped.

  ‘Just wanted to welcome you all to our Thursday Special, our favourite night of the week. Other nights are great but Thursday is Special. Champagne’s on the house and the night’s all before us. Dinner first and then a cabaret. We have a very special guest, raconteur and singer Jack Fieldfinger from Princeton where he lectures on something so clever I can’t even pronounce it.’

  Pause for dutiful laughter.

  ‘And then, well, a little dancing, a little gambling, some more wine and conversation and happiness ahead. Do what thou wilt, that is our motto, but don’t frighten the horses.

  ‘Welcome once again to Merrymaids – oh and a special welcome tonight to our newest Merrymaid, Ma…’

  Here he paused for a dreadful second while Marie thought he was going to say her name, which would have meant an immediate retreat from the place as far as she was concerned, but he corrected himself so fluently she decided people would have thought they hadn’t heard him properly.

  ‘…my special favourite, Katie from England.’

  There was a polite burst of applause and Marie curtseyed prettily. Curtseying was much favoured in the Merrymaid ménage.

  ‘Dinner will be served in ten minutes. So if you want to adjust your dress, or your expressions, now is the moment to do it. Thank you.’

  There was more polite applause before the sound of a typical British country house gong resonated in the hall. People started to move, most of them towards the dining room. Margot gave Marie a look and they tagged along with Grindlay who chatted easily about some motor race he had attended and the winery he had invested in and the film star who had bought a house next door to his home in Beverly Hills. He was evidently, as employees go, a close follower of the company ethos: good at his job, whatever it was, a likeable man, but not a driver; the sort of successful man that very successful men get to do their bidding. As Hospitality and Entertainment Vice President, his job took him up to the company castle to supervise the cellars and the wine and cigar merchant’s more important deliveries.

  ‘Whereabouts in Beverly Hills?’ Margot asked with a glance at Marie.

  ‘Oh, just beyond the Boulevard.’

  Not far from where she had enjoyed the hospitality of Middleburg and the Holdsworths.

  ‘Do you know Beverly Hills at all?’ he asked Marie.

  ‘Oh no. I’ve only recently arrived. I used to work with Merrymaids in Pilgrim’s Piece.’

  ‘I just love that place.’

  They found themselves places at the long table, which sat a hundred guests. It was customary at Merrymaids for all guests on formal occasions to sit together. You spoke to your neighbour and he or she spoke to you. It was a quirk of the place. Very St James
’s, as Merriman liked to say, though the London clubmen’s eyes would pop to see what went on under the table.

  ‘What is it you do, Mr Grindlay?’ asked Marie, with innocent curiosity (or what looked like it) as a waiter poured them all a glass of something good. ‘My friend Immie said you worked in a castle. Is that right? It must be wonderful to work in a castle.’

  Better to work in a castle than to be brought up in one with two maiden great-aunts.

  ‘Call me Jack,’ said Grindlay, ‘and you are Katie, right? And you are going to tell me what Katie didn’t do?’

  ‘Really, Jack. Immie told me you were a nice man for a businessman and that you were intelligent and full of wit. That is why I asked to sit next to you. I don’t know what you were saying to her last time, but you are really going to have to work harder than what Katie didn’t do.’ She smiled very sweetly at him to show she was hoping he would fall in love with her.

  ‘I didn’t know we were going to be smartasses tonight, Immie,’ said Grindlay, smiling. ‘Your friend here says she expected me to be little short of Einstein.’