by Ros Reines
It was all unfolding again tonight in a massive Spanish Mission waterfront home in Elizabeth Bay. Our host was the well-preserved Shannon Graham, head of advertising agency Network 15, and his flirtatious third wife, Scarlet. The couple were throwing a soiree to celebrate Network 15’s unprecedented success this year, and they had a guest list which included everyone from the city’s social lionesses to the agency’s key clients, with no expense spared. Well, everyone knew that in the eighties the big money was to be had in advertising. The Grahams had certainly not stinted tonight, with a pontoon floated in the harbour right in front of their home as a launching point for a performance of just two songs by INXS, followed by a fireworks display. (This extravagance had not been won without a struggle; the agency’s top contract negotiators had haggled with the authorities and a hefty one-off fee was paid to the council. Another massive amount had been paid under the table, reportedly, but no one was prepared to talk about that, so it remained, for now, in the realm of the urban myth.)
Scarlet, now in her mid-thirties, had been one of the top models at the Ford Agency in New York. Her trademark was her luscious mane of dark curly hair and the sort of body usually seen on billboards showing off lingerie or a bikini. Several years in Australia had not softened her delightful accent, though people gossiped that far from being a Southern belle from Georgia, as she claimed, she hailed from a far less glamorous trailer park in Kansas City.
‘White trash,’ sniffed several women, loyal to Shannon’s sporty ex-wife, Marjorie the hockey champion. But Scarlet never paid them any heed; she just made sure that she accentuated her six-foot languorous frame in her favourite Manolo Blahnik heels and always found a way to show off her taut flesh. Not for her the extreme Dynasty shoulder pads and suits, Scarlet preferred to dress as if she was still at Studio 54 in tight-fitting jeans, spangled vests and those killer heels. She had her revenge by making the other rich wives look positively frumpy.
In many ways, Shannon Graham was a good match for his third wife—physically, at least. He was tall and well built, thanks to his rigorous gym sessions, while his dark brown hair was suspiciously free from the sprinkling of pepper and salt that might be expected of a man who was on the wrong side of fifty. He kept it cut boyishly close to his head, which also served to pull focus towards his soft blue eyes and perma-tanned skin (the word was that he had a sun bed in his inner sanctum at the office, which was also where he did his best thinking).
Shannon and Scarlet had met at one of the world’s most romantic destinations—the Sandy Lane resort in Barbados—but the conditions were less than ideal: he and his very rich wife, Marjorie, were celebrating his fiftieth birthday with a bunch of their friends. Scarlet was at Sandy Lane because she was being shot by legendary photographer Helmut Newton for Tatler magazine. It was a highly erotic fashion shoot, which saw the stunning brunette draped over everything from the hotel’s poolside furniture to the deck of a mega-yacht, always in ridiculously skimpy swimsuits and high heels. The first time Shannon had spotted her was at sunrise, when she was straddling a deckchair with her gleaming bronzed bottom in the air and thousands of dollars of diamonds around her neck, while Helmut Newton kept urging her to go higher, to ‘lift, lift, lift’. Shannon, who was returning from a late-night poker game with the boys, was so astounded by the sight of Scarlet that he fell over backwards into the sea, lit cigar and all, much to the mirth of his mates. Shannon had just found the woman of his dreams, so he had done the only thing that a man could do in that situation—he floated fully clothed on his back while a couple of his friends decided to join him, diving in with their clothes on as well. As a spectacle it left much to be desired, but it did catch Scarlet’s attention. Unfortunately, Helmut Newton was less than impressed with the interruption. The sea was supposed to have been still behind the model and not churned up by a loud bunch of middle-aged larrikins.
For Shannon Graham, though, the moment had been life-changing. Despite his total lack of sleep, and much to Marjorie’s chagrin, he spent most of that day trying to track down Scarlet at Sandy Lane so that he could invite both her and Newton to his birthday dinner that night. Eventually, thanks to a generous tip made to one of the hotel staff, Shannon managed to get a message to Scarlet in her suite. Helmut Newton declined the invite—possibly because he could really think of nothing worse—but, at the eleventh hour, Scarlet had accepted, although she did give herself a get-out clause by cautioning that she had a shoot the following day so she would only pop in for a couple of hours at the most. Meanwhile, Shannon had devised a plan to tell Marjorie, who couldn’t have been more of a contrast to Scarlet with her pixie haircut and sturdy athletic body, that it was one of his single friends who was interested in the model. Of course, he fooled no one—least of all Marjorie—when he gave Scarlet his undivided attention at the dinner. He then arranged to rendezvous with her later that night. Eighteen months later he had not only divorced Marjorie (luckily they had no children between them) but married Scarlet, after persuading the model to relocate from New York to Sydney. (It’s amazing what a wedding gift of several million dollars will do, payable after the blushing bride’s signature on the wedding certificate.)
Shannon had also promised Scarlet he would set her up with a film career after paying for a Hollywood acting coach to fly to Sydney to tutor her. She was not a particularly gifted thespian and, aside from a few cameo roles in various soapies, which had been given to her more as a favour to Shannon than an endorsement of her talent, she was still waiting for her big break.
I had only met Scarlet Graham once before, and it had been a memorable experience—not just because she was wearing a tiny, glittering sheath over her taut body at Blake’s restaurant for the Channel 8 season TV launch, but because of her plus-size personality.
‘Hi, Savannah!’ she had whooped as I had tentatively walked into Blake’s, hot on the heels of famous sports commentator Simon (the Adonis) Ward and his entourage. Unfortunately I had just featured Simon as the lead item in my No Names column, which was quite a scoop because everyone thought that he was one hell of a pants man who always flirted outrageously with women. I hadn’t counted on seeing him anytime soon, and here he was at Blake’s—a restaurant fitted out to look like a gentlemen’s club—how apt. Under such potentially incendiary circumstances, if Scarlet seemed thrilled to have me around, it suited me, as Simon probably wouldn’t want to make a scene in front of her. Still, I hadn’t been prepared for Scarlet to seize my hand and pull me in close to give me a big kiss on each cheek.
‘I’ve heard so much about you, Savannah,’ she had drawled in her seductive American accent. But before she could elaborate, Scarlet had been distracted by Leeza French—the straitlaced network newsreader who had arrived shortly after me.
‘Leeza! You go, girl!’ she had hollered at the prim and coiffed Leeza, who smiled weakly at Scarlet as she was pulled into an enthusiastic embrace. Despite having also greeted me as if I as a long lost friend, Scarlet and I never spoke to each other again that long night, much of which I’d spent trying to keep moving so that Simon wouldn’t catch up with me.
Whether you loved or loathed Scarlet, all of Sydney’s social set did agree on one thing: she knew how to throw a good party, which was why nearly every guest who had been invited to this evening’s celebration had accepted with alacrity.
And now here I was on the way to the long-awaited soiree. My mood was buoyant as I made my way to Elizabeth Bay. I was definitely up for it—even if the party was seething with tedious socialites—because there had been a message from Daniel on my answering machine.
‘Hi, Savannah, I just got back to town today. I guess you’ll be living it up at some party this evening, but I’ll try to call you later on tonight. I hope we can get together soon.’
I’d replayed it five times, just to hear his voice, smooth and sexy. It had given me such a lift that I now felt confident about inserting myself into tonight’s extreme party scene, which would no doubt also be filled with beaut
iful women going all out to prove that they were really the queens of glitz and glamour, and men who were obsessed with their own importance. Yes, just another average night out on the town cavorting with the A-list.
I felt a momentary twinge of nerves when the cab dropped me off outside the massive pile on millionaire’s row. Behind those heavy wrought-iron gates, I knew, was one of Sydney’s most stately houses.
To my surprise, Scarlet opened the door to me herself. Equally surprising was her outfit. She was wearing sequined turquoise shorts, a silk tank top and very high turquoise and cream Manolo Blahnik heels.
‘Savannah!’ she cried, as if she hadn’t seen me in decades, grabbing me by the hand and hauling me inside. ‘I’ve had the most terrible night,’ she gasped, leading me into a small sitting room before I’d even had a chance to snatch a glass of champagne from the battalion of waiters lined up along the imposing entrance hall.
‘Oh, I’m sorry to hear that,’ I said clumsily, imploring the waiters with my eyes in the hope that one would follow us into the room and give me a drink. (My powers of mental telepathy apparently needed a bit of work.) ‘Are you okay?’
Scarlet shook her head. ‘I spent last night in hospital, first in emergency and then in the gynaecological ward,’ she confided, and then paused, smiling faintly. ‘The doctors at St Vincent’s Private are so sexy by the way. Have you seen them? They are straight out of General Hospital—but it was still a horrible night.’
‘You poor thing,’ I said. Had she miscarried? I wondered. Obviously something major must have happened—but how did she still look so beautiful? And why was she telling me all this private information, when we had hardly exchanged a sentence before—and I was a gossip columnist? Maybe Scarlet had mistaken me for someone else? This was becoming just plain awkward.
‘What was the issue?’ I asked quietly, aware that I shouldn’t really be probing into what was clearly a personal matter.
‘Issue? Oh, nothing,’ she said, shrieking with laughter. ‘It just turned out to be a heavy period.
‘What?’ Who goes to emergency because they’re menstruating?
‘I would simply not stop bleeding. I thought that I might need some kind of transfusion.’
‘Oh my goodness, that’s awful.’ Was she setting me up with some kind of crazy story as a joke to see whether I would dare print it in the paper? Surely not.
There was a small silence. I watched as the exquisitely dressed guests arrived in the vestibule and looked towards us uncertainly. I could tell they didn’t know whether to make a detour to greet their hostess because Scarlet seemed to be holding forth in quite an animated exchange with me. Little did they know that I was actually willing them to interrupt—anything to escape this bizarre conversation, which I couldn’t even use in my column unless I started a new section called ‘Too Much Information’. Why was she telling me this?
I looked longingly at the glowing marble hallway outside, which was lit with chandeliers and decorated with massive vases of roses on enormous plinths. In that setting, the waiters looked more like models accessorised by glittering trays of champagne. If only one would come close enough to hand me a glass. And where was Shannon Graham, by the way? I needed him to save me from his mad wife, so that I could escape and join the party.
Finally, someone did interrupt us. It was none other than my work buddy, Erica Hopewell, a vision in black lace with a slash of red lipstick and masses of baroque pearls—more Sydney Harbour than South Sea, but still . . . I had known that she would be there because she had boasted several times in the office about the invite sent by her ‘very dear friend, Scarlet Graham’. Apparently they had known each other ever since Erica had worked in the fashion department of Chic during the peak of Scarlet’s modelling days. I didn’t have to glance at Erica’s face to know that she would be most put out to see me having a private tete-a-tete with the party’s hostess. Personally, I had never been so thrilled to see Erica before (and probably would never be this happy to see her again).
‘Hello, Scarlet,’ Erica said warmly, leaning in for a kiss. ‘I love those shorts, very witty of you. Are they YSL?’
But her great buddy from New York, while automatically exchanging an air kiss, didn’t even bother looking up at the overdone fashion editor. Scarlet was still so engrossed in our conversation. ‘Really, you know there was so much blood I thought that I was haemorrhaging. That’s why I made Shannon stay with me in the hospital—I thought I might bleed to death.’
‘Scarlet!’ said Erica, sounding shocked. ‘What’s happened? Are you all right?’
But Scarlet still ignored her. She seemed unable to respond to two people at once. Starting to feel embarrassed on Erica’s behalf at the snub, I thought I’d better fill her in on Scarlet’s calamity.
‘Scarlet was just telling me about the awful experience she had last night. She was rushed to hospital—but, um, luckily it was only a heavy period.’
‘What?’ For a moment, Erica gave me her famous Sphinx-like stare, as if she wasn’t sure whether or not I was mocking her. And if I was having her on, her narrowing eyes implied, then I had a bloody nerve.
At last our hostess looked up, seeming genuinely surprised to find Erica there. ‘Oh, hello, Erica,’ she said. ‘I didn’t see you there. How are you?’
‘I’m fine, thank you,’ the fashion editor responded a little stiffly. ‘But, more importantly, how are you?’
I took this as my cue to leave but, unfortunately, Scarlet wasn’t having it.
‘Savannah, wait,’ she said, reaching out to grasp my arm. ‘I promised I’d show you around upstairs, remember?’
What? She’d never said a word about showing me around.
‘No, really, that’s okay,’ I protested. ‘Another time, perhaps. Right now you have a home full of guests to look after. I’ve monopolised you for long enough. I really have.’
‘We’ll do it right now, Savannah,’ Scarlet insisted. ‘I promised you a tour, and I always like to keep my word. Come on, this way—you are going to absolutely love my dressing room.’
‘Maybe we should take some champagne with us?’ I said hopefully. I felt as if I really needed one. No one had warned me that Scarlet was a total nutter; I had just been under the impression that she was a bit over the top.
‘Oh, we can drink champagne later,’ said Scarlet airily. ‘You’re not thirsty, are you?’
‘No, not at all,’ I lied.
Leaving a still shell-shocked Erica behind us, we headed upstairs, Scarlet’s arm linked through mine.
Scarlet’s dressing room turned out to be a total fantasy, dominated by a huge antique mirror with a gilt frame and marble floors covered with Persian rugs and oodles of clothes racks. It felt as though I had stepped into a palace—in fact, Scarlet’s dressing room was probably bigger than my entire terrace house. It was also crammed with designer labels—some carry bags hadn’t even been opened yet—and there were probably two hundred pairs of shoes in every conceivable shade, most with extremely high heels.
‘Here,’ said Scarlet, shoving an unopened bottle of Miss Dior perfume into my hands. ‘You can have this and you can take this too.’ She flung a large, flowery silk scarf around my shoulders. ‘It’s Hermès, but I hate wearing scarves.’
‘No, really, that’s very kind of you, Scarlet, but I absolutely can’t accept these.’
But Scarlet wasn’t listening to me; she was emptying the contents from a Louis Vuitton carry store onto a bench. She then put the scarf, the perfume and a cream blouse so new that it hadn’t yet been unfolded into the empty bag.
‘There you are,’ she said brightly, handing it over to me. ‘Now let’s go down and have a drink.’
As I followed her back down the stairs, clutching the bag, I was frantically trying to work out how to handle the situation. I could hardly walk back into the party carrying a Louis Vuitton bag full of Scarlet’s possessions. What would Shannon think if he saw me? Not to mention Erica, whom I had no doubt would be burn
ing with rage at Scarlet’s snubbing of her in favour of me . . .
Scarlet must have read my mind. ‘We’ll cloak the bag,’ she said, taking it from me and giving it to a butler who was looking after people’s belongings. He handed her a little numbered disc, which she gave to me to put in my bag. ‘Make sure you pick it up before you leave,’ she reminded me. But I made a mental note to somehow lose the disc in the course of the evening.
‘Scarlet, where have you been?’ Shannon Graham, in tailored jeans and a designer shirt unbuttoned just far enough to show off his perfect tan and impressive physique, emerged from a throng of people to steal his wife from me. Thank heavens. ‘I’ve been looking all over for you. There are some people I want you to meet.’
Scarlet playfully pushed him away. ‘Wait a minute. Have you met my friend . . . ?’ She paused, looking at me to fill in the gap for her.
‘Savannah,’ I said with a smile, thinking, What the hell? She’d seemed to know exactly who I was when I arrived.
‘Savannah! Of course. I’ve just been telling Savannah about our adventure last night at the hospital and how dreamy those doctors were.’
Shannon Graham shot me a very eloquent look which I had no trouble reading: If you write just one word of this in your column you are mincemeat.
‘Really, darling,’ he said through gritted teeth, ‘I’m sure Savannah wasn’t interested in hearing all the boring details.’ He put his arm firmly around his crazy wife’s waist and steered her towards the epicentre of the action. ‘Now, if you will just excuse us . . .’
