Madame Bovary's Haberdashery

by Maurilia Meehan

  Miss Marple leant forward and started whispering. Cicely strained once more to hear, could see her lips moving, repeating the same few shapes over and over …

  But her voice was drowned out by the thudding, deafening, regular rhythm of the train as it picked up speed.

  Uncle Bill was banging in a crescendo on the wall of his room.

  Hadn’t he stopped all that now that Martha had ‘settled him’? Too much chocolate icing perhaps, even for him, had woken him for the first time in ages.

  Why now, at the crucial moment, when she had been so close to hearing what Miss Marple had been trying to tell her? She could still see her lips moving in that repetitive pattern.

  Cicely impatiently threw down her crochet, noting that she had advanced a few lilac rounds, though she had not been aware of it.

  She felt groggy from the tablets, and her own stomach felt as bloated as his probably was. She moved towards her old study, now his room.

  ‘Bah, I feel like hell … I’m having a relapse …’

  The tone of the ‘bah’ had reverted to pre-Martha. Where were the patiently suffering invalids of the world one read about in books? Were they all cantankerous now?

  In a trance, passing him his perfectly reachable indigestion medicine from the bedside table, she feared that she had missed out forever on her chance to decipher those repetitive, mouthed words.

  And by the time she had crawled back into bed, hugging her favourite pillow, trying to get warm again, the mysterious words had become those of a poem recited by Sebastian, with which Miss Marple’s lips were out of sync.

  Into her sleepy mind came the idea that Sebastian was the one Odette had run off with. Or was it Cicely herself who had a crush on him? Could she, in fact, be an objective detective? She squirmed at the thought that she might be just another hopeless fantasist, as bad as the men.

  Was she herself the stalker?

  The set-up

  This was the type of café you should meet in to discuss film deals in loud voices, or that’s what Cicely would think. That’s why Dragan had picked it as a rendezvous.

  Dragan saw it as it really was. A low-rent boho café where pathetic, grubby addicts, dole-bludgers and wannabe writers met in their search for strong coffee.

  Dragan was seated with his second coffee at an outside table, lighting up. He chose to smoke rare Honduran cigars when he particularly wanted to impress.

  He surveyed the street scene, amazed, as usual, that passers-by did not recognise him. But that would soon change. Lovely Lady had been reading him more excerpts from that novel. Raunchy scenes set in Venice and Prague. Big budget. Grand hotels. Plus a younger man as her romantic interest. He would have to choose someone who was gay. Her burlesque show had become exceedingly raunchy these last few nights, leading to a shortage of bananas in the house. Elvis had bestirred himself, a sure sign of literary merit.

  Following print gave Dragan a migraine if it was packed onto the page as a novel was. The average film script was about three thousand words. Lots of white space was what he liked to see. He was, after all, a visual creative. Unlike mystics, madmen and writers of novels, visual creatives were not on that tacky alpha wavelength at all. Tests had proven it. Anyway, the novel was dead, except occasionally, like now, when it was useful for an idea.

  He puffed on his cigar, demanded a bigger ashtray with a wave of his hand. The book-writer was also dead. The relationship of book-writer to film was, say, the same as that of the relationship of a sheep, a grower of wool in spite of itself, to, let’s see, not the farmer, but to the owner of the Superfine Mill. Yes, that was it. Without Dragan and the other mill owners, the sheep would remain just an animal with wool full of burrs, suffering from foot and mouth disease, instead of being reborn as a cosy multi coloured Coogi jumper for sale at international airports.

  He felt the power of being Mr Superfine strongly now, as he saw, trotting plumply towards him, an over-fed sheep wearing a frightful knitted cap festooned with flowers and a furry retro cape that looked like something a Miss Marple might wear in a snowstorm. It almost covered her solid legs, which were clad in patterned tights and ended in those rather delicate feet common to big girls – and which always made him think pleasurably of Chinese women with bound feet.

  As he stood up to shake her limp paw she had no idea what a favour he was about to do her novel. He was about to make a gift of himself to her, on the altar of this laminex café table, consummating the sacrament with bruschetta and more very strong coffee.

  She did not drink coffee. She made him order organic Ceylon tea, and then sent it back because it came in a tea bag. Did tea come any other way in this century? Finally, she settled for hot chocolate, playing with her spoon and the rich froth as if she was not going to drink that either. He made a bet with himself that she would eat nothing. Fat chicks were self-conscious about eating in public.

  Dragan believed that he already knew this woman inside out because, after all, Lovely Lady had read him the hot parts of her book. It was a naive search for true love, with many erotic detours along the way, with a happy ending.

  But the novel had a fatal flaw. It was not entirely a hilarious bed-hopping romp. There were other sections that he would have to delete. The last ashram scene could work if the period blood was dropped and if she had a wild orgasm as the handsome guru fingerfucked the acolyte. But all that highbrow Madame Bovary stuff would have to go. In short, he needed to rewrite the whole script.

  He was already homing in on her probable weak points. Well, what to choose? Her hair was covered by that dreadful hand-knitted beanie with spiral whatnots all over it – a bad hair day perhaps. She wore no make-up except for brown lipstick and her face was as round as a pie. She had still not started the hot chocolate by the time the tomato and garlic bruschetta arrived.

  As he picked up his knife and fork, attacking the trumped-up toasted sandwich, he caught her eyes wandering around the café. She didn’t seem to know who he was in the industry. She probably even thought she was the star at this table.

  Comforted by his first mouthful of food, he began to exert his charms on her, not least of which was his skill at conversation.

  ‘So where did your name come from Dragan? Is it Eastern European?’

  ‘A family mystery really.’

  He puffed on his cigar in a decidedly foreign way.

  ‘And do you speak another language?’

  ‘Three. Film, money and the language of love.’

  She actually blushed. Now that was something he hadn’t seen for a long time.

  He was gazing into her eyes, the way they do in movies.

  He seemed to be acting the part of … what? He was nothing like Odette, of course, but Cicely had a similar sensation as she had with Odette, that she was watching a performance. She realised that this was normal, that she too would have to learn to do that if she were ever to impress him, and yet she held back.

  What did he want? She knew that his famous wife was beautiful, so that he could not possibly be flirting. She would talk about his wife, to establish that she knew that he was married, though he wore no ring.

  ‘I saw that episode of Lustbusters where … she’s got nice breasts.’

  ‘Haven’t you heard of a body double? We better hurry up and make this picture before she looks like grandma.’

  He looked at her breasts. Prodigious.

  ‘We’re all ugly without our clothes on,’ he added, to unsettle her further.

  But his previous remark rankled Cicely more. It was really not very loyal of him to say that about his wife.

  ‘I have to get back to my sick uncle soon, so …’

  Kind-hearted, looking after a sick uncle. She was saying she only had a few hours off each day, but seducing her would be a piece of cake. Fat chicks were always desperate. He’d do her a favour.

  He touched the back of her hand. She coughed, and freed her hand to wave away the smoke near her face. He would have to move more slowly. Out of a choic
e between love and money, he was betting she’d take love. They were like that, writers, different from normal people. Dragan wrote only if he was paid for it, right? First draft. Second draft. Money up front, then pen to paper.

  He could not believe it when he had first discovered that book-writers were not paid for their drafts. They sit there in their garrets, doing draft after draft because they love it. It’s kind of endearing in a way. Cuddly sheep, growing that Superfine.

  But it was time for her reality check.

  Bluntly, he told her to shred the script. Pure poetry. But he also told her that if she did a new treatment his way, rewrote it a bit like this movie he liked, but not too much like that one which he didn’t like so much, then he could swing a major grant for the two of them from the Fund.

  Mirror mirror

  After only a few hours at Golden Tower, obediently following Dragan’s instructions for her new treatment of Last Chance, Cicely’s keyboarding fingers led her astray.

  In a world of infinite possibilities, Cicely had to limit her pathways, unless she was to be frozen into inaction. She must select five suspects. Or go back to the beginning of the labyrinth. To Zac.

  How many times had Odette met Sebastian? Had he come here to the isolated apartment? Was he a suspect or just Detective Cicely’s own love interest? Glancing towards the rumpled futon bed, she saw the lovers, alone, with no other tenant in the entire building. If things had turned nasty towards the end, there would have been no one around to hear any calls for help.

  Twirling the spiral flower petals on her hat, she stretched her shoulders, leaned back and got out her make-up mirror from her carpet bag. She set about reapplying her creamy brown lipstick, a reassuring gesture. She paused to admire the effect, then hesitated and peered into the mirror more closely. Examined her freshly painted lips again.

  Could it be?

  She moved her lips slightly. Experimentally. Observing closely. Could she replicate the movements of Miss Marple’s own lips, that time that her voice had been drowned out by Uncle Bill’s interruption? Was it so difficult to lip-read? After several attempts …

  But it wasn’t as she had expected, wasn’t the name of a suspect at all. What did it mean? She allowed her voice to follow her lips, and suddenly her mouth was filling with the thin sweet taste of lemon drops … and a voice not her own.

  The mirror fell from her trembling hand. She sank back in her chair, breathing heavily, her whole body shaking. The room swirled sickeningly around her.

  When she came to, she dabbed the perspiration from her brow. Gulped at the cold tea impatiently, washing away that seductive sweetness. Trying to steady herself.

  Retrieving the mirror, she held it in front of her mouth once more. Willed her lips in the same way. Made the words audible at last.

  This time, to her relief, it was her own voice that she heard.

  ‘Listen to the silence.’

  She closed her eyes.

  Listened.

  There was no silence.

  The whirr of the computer, the hum of air conditioning. The rapid pounding of her own heart. And behind that? She strained her ears and thought she could hear a humming sound, like a bumblebee. And a radio playing far away, that flute and harp music that she had heard at home in the kitchen. The voice whispering behind the music, unable to rise above the static of the city. She fought off succumbing once more to dizziness as she saw honeylicks surrounded by jealous lovers. Sebastian and Tiger punching each other, and Zac aiming his jewel-handled dagger.

  Had Zac killed Odette in a jealous rage? His last brooding days in the share house, his self-righteous accusations … the worst are full of passionate intensity.

  Listening to the silence was far too nerve-racking. She must find Odette, yes, but without scaring herself.

  With renewed focus, she determined to rely on logic alone.

  Motivation.

  That was the central question, and in the Christie Method it invariably boiled down to either love or money. An inheritance, blackmail. Or jealousy.

  The logic of the Christie method did not seem to offer enough to sort out a shortlist, but Miss Marple’s alternative was even more unclear.

  With her head aching, she closed the emails.

  The sky was dark outside the window. Martha was cooking fondue tonight, as in a real family.

  Time to go home.

  The thing about coffee

  Cicely was setting up the tiny coffee plunger which Dragan had brought for her as a present. The seductive aroma of coffee began to invade Cicely’s kitchen, overpowering the delicate fragrance of her tea.

  She had timed Dragan’s arrivals to coincide with Uncle Bill’s siestas, so that he would be out of her hair, but still serve as a chaperone, snoring in the next room.

  Dragan waved Mr Mistoffeles away and squeezed himself onto the ridiculously small kitchen chair. Cicely soothed the cat and, nervous about her new treatment, found herself babbling about how the cat liked to smell the basil on the window sill but kept falling off into the sink. On cue, Mr Mistoffeles leapt deftly from the sink onto the sill, making a liar of her by actually balancing, though squashing the plant in the process.

  Smiling indulgently at this prattle, Dragan was under strain as he was not permitted to smoke in the house, even after he had announced that he had managed to get a few thousand in funding.

  Cicely had been pleased, of course, but with the muted pleasure that came from knowing that the money would only pay off her hospital bill.

  ‘We’ve got a Krupps in our kitchen. Only five hundred dollars at House.’

  His campaign to explain the enormous costs of living in the real world continued as Cicely served him coffee, and prepared tea for herself. As he spoke, her mind drifted away to the cruel metal and glass steaming robots from which coffee drinkers took their medicinal shots. Tea, especially her Lady Grey with its beautiful petals of cornflower, was more … human. You could let a teaspoon of dried leaves brew in a glass, then drink it all the same. Try that with coffee beans.

  She placed the pot and cup on the table and sat down. When she tuned in again, he was talking about hierarchies in ‘the industry’. She recognised that this chatter about his own success was his way of flirting with her. And although this was the third meeting, he still had not asked to see her treatment.

  ‘My fourth for the day,’ he said finishing off his coffee and Tim Tam, and popping a few pills. This pause seemed to Cicely to be a suitable moment to mention the treatment.

  He sat back in his chair. Raised his eyebrows, as if puzzled. She thought for a moment he was going to pat her on the head.

  ‘You mean, you want me to look at what we’ve done so far?’

  ‘I mean,’ she continued bravely, ‘it wouldn’t look very professional if it’s late for the Fund, would it?’

  His face flushed.

  ‘You know what the difference between an amateur and a professional is?’

  He took another Tim Tam, placing it all in his mouth, spraying chocolate crumbs as he continued. ‘A professional knows what he does is pointless, but does it anyway.’

  What on earth did he mean, she vaguely wondered, but she was more concerned that one of his crumbs had landed in her lovely red tea. He expanded his theory while she fished the crumb out with her teaspoon. Suddenly, it clattered to the table as he captured her hand, massaging it in his.

  ‘You don’t realise what a very influential person I am. We could be working on it for ten years. Fully funded.’

  ‘A hilarious sexy romp, as instructed,’ she said.

  He let go of her hand, picked up the treatment and, skimming it, threw it down again with a groan.

  ‘All you’ve done is condense your script into eight pages,’ he frowned.

  ‘That’s what you told me to do.’

  ‘It’s exactly what I told you not to do.’

  His voice was over-patient, the way she sometimes wanted to address Uncle Bill.

  He was trying t
o be kind, but she had not changed it to be a bit like that film he had mentioned as a model. Trouble was, she was hanging on to her original characters and plot. Lovely Lady needed a bigger part, the overseas scenes had to be expanded, and all that Madame Bovary stuff, whatever that meant, had to go. Or Rodolphe had to be made into a more dashing figure, a film producer, possibly, who smoked cigars and had a thing about lighting. Wasn’t Rodolphe a reindeer’s name? What was this, Disney’s Christmas special?

  In fact the only good thing about the treatment, wilting already on the table under his gaze, was that Lovely Lady wanted that Emma Ball part. At least, the sexy overseas adventures part.

  He had hoped that Cicely would have fallen in love with him by now. He knew that he had charisma. He was a producer, after all. He was sitting on the treasure chest.

  It was clear that the small problem of getting Cicely’s name off the project must now be dealt with by other means.

  Losing Madame Bovary

  Cicely had a new understanding of Jane Austen.

  A heroine was asked when, exactly, she had fallen in love with a particularly well-heeled gentleman. She replied that it had been on first seeing his grand property.

  Cicely’s bank account was actually in the black, for the first time in years.

  Dragan couldn’t help his physical appearance, after all, and as he had said, we are all ugly without our clothes on. Not that it had got that far yet. Thankfully, they were still only at the hugging-on-arrival-and-departure stage, though he was pressing home his advantage more and more, and she had to be the one to break away from him, as his tobacco aroma made her cough.

  But it was great to be with a man who, so often, said he loved working with women. And she could learn a lot from him about living in the real world, as he put it. When had she ever got money from a funding body, for example? As they sat down once more at her kitchen table his hand lingered on hers more ungently, telling her that they had started on a filmic journey together.