Dreams Are Not Enough (15 page)

Maxim jerked to attention. Alyssia was on screen again. He noted that everyone appeared to be paying attention—the popcorn buckets had stopped rattling. She possessed the indefinable magnetism that nobody can put a name to and without which no star is born.

He stayed for the next showing. While the chattering crowd found seats, his mind ferreted after means to convince Alyssia to leave Saint-Simon and defer salary to work on a low-budget film with a novice producer and director. A difficult task at best, made yet more complicated by the obstacle that whenever family members went to France Barry saw them alone while Alicia—now Alyssia—kept aloof.

This has to be played delicately. Maxim thought as the lights dimmed.

I’ll have to go over.

“Barry, Maxim here.”

“Maxim. It’s been eons!”

“Should I put a senile quaver in my voice?”

“Where are you?”

“Home in Los Angeles. But ask the question next week and the answer’ll be Paris.”

“Tell me your flight number. I’ll motor up and act as your cicerone in the City of Light.”

“What’s wrong my dropping by your country place?”

“Well….”

“We have a rotten connection. I can be there next Thursday.”

“The twenty-seventh?”

“Yeah, the twenty-seventh. Will Alyssia be around?”

“No, she’s rehearsing a new film. Magnificent timing. You and I can catch up on auld langsyne

“She come down weekends?”

“Uhhh….”

“This damn connection. Will Alyssia be with you that weekend?”

“Uhh … yes.”

“I’ll be there Saturday, that’s the twenty-ninth, around five. Let’s hear the directions from Tours.”

On that rainy Saturday afternoon in March of 1966 darkness fell long before five. Alyssia had removed both vanity lamps’ old fashioned fringed shades to bare the feeble light bulbs. Leaning toward the round mirror, she held the corner of her left eye, painting a fine blue line just beneath the taut lower lid. The portable electric heater battled ineffectually against the chill.

The conditions definitely weren’t optimum to show the place off to Maxim.

Summer endowed a certain ingratiating charm to this eighty-year- old gray stone country house. The small, bramble-draped park was verdant if unkempt, the white roses that wandered over the pediment arch of the front door bloomed lush and fragrant. Now, with the wind-driven rain dancing the skeletal shrubs and trees, the place had a walpurgisnacht desolation. Interior walls were moist to the touch and drafts prowled the halls.

Two years previously Barry had found this house with twin turrets shaped like witches’ hats. Though the sparse furnishings were battered, numerous windows broken and the front door hanging off its hinges, the Renaissance Revival architecture had sparked fantasies within him. He told Alyssia the derelict chateau, as he inaccurately termed the property, would be an excellent investment. She closed out her savings account at the Credit Lyonnais for the required payment, then borrowed enough from Saint-Simon to make the most vital repairs.

Barry, his sleeves rolled up to show skinny, freckled arms, his brown eyes snapping, his French rotten but decisive, directed the trio of unskilled boys recruited from the nearby hamlet of Bellevillesur-Loire. When there was no cash left to pay his laborers, he lapsed back into morose moodiness. He seldom drove up to Paris, immuring himself within these stone walls.

Alyssia had gone into hock primarily to bring him out of his depression.

The novella started at UCLA had been rejected by twenty-seven publishers in the United States and England. His subsequent opus, all 1407 pages of it, was halfway through the same unhappy round. Barry, always secretive about his writing, now maintained top security.

However, his outbursts of temper, slumped shoulders and the silence of his typewriter told Alyssia that failure had blocked his third endeavor.

Her career, on the other hand, while scarcely classifiable as a blazing rocket, had ascended gratifyingly.

After Bibi, Saint-Simon had said, “Alicia Lopez? Ees thees a name?” So once again she acquired a new identity. Alyssia del Mar, actress.

Saint-Simon recommended an octogenarian marquise to teach her the tongue of Racine and Balzac, and an almost as superannuated acting coach. She took singing lessons, she entered a ballet class, and though she would never be a diva or a prima ballerina, she acquired flexibility of voice and body. She learned how to swim, ski, ride a horse, as enhancements to her craft.

Alyssia del Mar was addicted to an old narcotic—work. Work was the sole anodyne for the loss of love; work kept at bay her sick shame at the manner with which she had left Hap.

That night of her conversation with Desmond Cordiner, her alarm had been more for Hap and Barry than herself. Unable to come up with a logical explanation for her abrupt departure that did not incriminate his father, she was afraid to contact Hap. The adolescent panic remained with her for over a year. By the time she recognized that Desmond Cordiner would never harm his son or nephew, it was too late for letters and phone calls. Hap was engaged.

She had learned about the betrothal one May evening in 1961. After a strenuous rehearsal session she returned wearily to the little apartment that she and Barry leased in the 14th Arrondissement of Paris. He was out. On his desk lay Beth’s weekly letter. Though these long, typed letters were addressed to both of them, the references were generally meaningful only to him, so Alyssia seldom did more than scan. This time the opening paragraph jumped at her.

The big family news is that Hop’s engaged! To a truly gorgeous redhead called Sara Cowles. She’s a Kappa at USE, and her father is a senior vice president at Hughes Aircraft. The perfect match. Naturally Uncle Desmond and Aunt Rosalynd are walking on air. There was a big party at the Cowleses, and Sara is terrific. Not that I had a chance to talk to her alone. She and Hap stayed glued together. Alyssia set down the letter. She was crying too hard to read. That summer, though she was rarely ill, she had a bad bout of flu,

then a series of summer colds. She found herself weeping at inappropriate times.

Seven months later, when Beth wrote that the engagement had been broken off, Alyssia loathed herself for her lightness of spirit.

By then, encouraged by Barry, she had signed a five-year contract with Saint-Simon.

The contract was nearly up and she had become, if not a star, at least a known quantity. In December, Elle had done a fashion layout with her, and this month Time had run her picture in the People section—Alyssia del Mar, the exotic American with a Spanish name is France’s favorite sex kitten.

Alyssia yearned to expand her range.

As she licked her mascara brush, there was a tap at the door.

“It’s me, ma’am,” said a woman’s servile voice. The door creaked open to admit a short-legged, heavy-hipped. Latino-looking woman. She wore a neat uniform and her gray-streaked black hair was cut in bangs that reached her glasses.

It was Juanita.

Pushing the door shut, Juanita peered through her bottle-bottom lenses at her half sister.

“I figured you’d be dressed.”

“You know me, traditionally tardy.”

“What’re you wearing tonight?”

“I thought the blue velvet.”

“It’s gorgeous on you, but you’ll catch your death.”

“Avec long Johns, naturellement.”

Juanita laughed. Her laughter was soft, surprisingly melodious.

“You crack me up with that dry little voice.”

Alyssia put her arm around the pudgy shoulders, squeezing.

“Ahh, Nita, how did I ever manage without you?”

It had taken an interfering friend to reunite the sisters. The past August, Alyssia had found in her sheaf of fan mail a letter postmarked USA. Since most of her American correspondence consisted of either obscenely worded propositions or subliterate warnings that even though Jesus loves us all. He does not tolerate immorality, she had slit the envelope gingerly.

Dear Alyssia del Mar,

Yours truly is a friend of Mrs. Juanita Lopez. She being not so grate in the letter-writing dept, asked my help. She seen you in Incroyable, and wants you to know you wasfablous. She says you and her are related, but left me in the dark how close. So here comes the part Im not meant to write.

Things is very bad for her since her kid died last year. Right after the funeral, her husband beat her up so bad she needed the ambulance, then he took off, the burn. Since then she’s been trying to pay the Drs. and hospital. If you could spare some cash, it’d be a blessing.

You could mail it to me, her f rend. ” Lucy Cobin, Box 198, Fresno, Ca.

Alyssia air-mailed a substantial money order and a one-way Air France ticket. At Orly the Hollister girls embraced. Alyssia, radiantly exquisite in a cream Dior suit (she had bought it from Saint-Simon at quarter cost after wearing it in Sabine) and juanita in herj.

C.

Penney green stretch pants with a baggy, mismatched green nylon sweater, Alyssia used every atom of her acting technique to disguise her horror at the changes in her sister. One of juanita front teeth was gone, a raised magenta scar bisected the wrinkles in her forehead, and two deep lines lay between the fine dark eyes, for she needed to squint fiercely to see. It was impossible to believe that juanita was not in her fifties but only thirtyish.

On the drive to the 14th Arrondissement apartment, they caught up with each other’s lives. Juanita laughed about Alice’s christening herself Alicia Lopez to get domestic work, and sighed deeply when she heard that Alicia had been in love with an unnamed guy but had stayed with her husband. When Alyssia learned the specifics of the death of her little nephew, Petey—from spinal meningitis and medical ineptitude—she wept.

Over supper, Alyssia said firmly, “Of course you’ll live with us.”

“Where is your hubby?”

“He doesn’t come into Paris much—it interrupts his writing.”

“The last thing you need is a pachuco sister.”

“Nita, don’t talk like that. Please? You can’t leave me, not now. I’ve been so lonely.”

“Who said I was taking off? I never had anything but you and Petey.

But you don’t need a long-lost slob sister, and you sure could use a maid. “

“Be my servant?” Duck terrine from the nearby charcuterie dropped from Alyssia’s fork.

“That’s the craziest thing I ever heard! You raised me!”

“And now you’re a movie star.”

“I’m a bit player.”

“You never did know what you got, Alice,” Juanita said.

“Okay, a feature player. And you’re my sister.”

“In private we’ll be the same as ever. In public I’m working for you.”

“No!”

“Does your hubby know what sort of life you had? Before that Alicia Lopez business?”

“No….”

“If you introduce me as your sister, he’ll sure as heck find out.”

Alyssia sighed but refused to surrender.

“And don’t you think he’ll be suspicious we both have the same last name, Lopez?”

“There must be a million Lopezes—five million.” Juanita spread brie on a hunk of baguette, using her finger as a knife. She said thoughtfully, “We’ll kill two birds with one stone. I’ll tell him I heard your real name was Lopez, which made me write you a fan letter and ask for help in finding a job.” She licked the cheese from her finger.

“Alice, quit arguing. It’s the only way I’ll stay. This place is a mess, and I’m proud of being good at housework and cooking.”

“Are you positive that Mexican food’s okay for this rich cousin?”

Juanita was asking.

Just then Barry opened the door.

His hair was receding from his forehead in an uneven W, and that adolescent boniness was gone forever—his thick Irish tweed jacket hid a slight paunch.

“Hon, you’re nowhere near dressed, and you promised you’d be ready before five,” he said, taking a long drink from his nearly full glass.

Barry had been nipping vin ordinaire since before lunch. His nerves were tangled into a cats cradle. His sharp-tongued, rich cousin would see the chateau at its worst and be thrown in with Alyssia. The infrequent times that Barry had played tour guide to visiting Cordiners, he omitted his wife from his elaborate plans. Despite his inverted, unexpressed pride in her status, and despite what he considered their stable marriage, he had never outgrown that early sense of shame about her.

Alyssia, who had been nursing her own anxieties (How’ll it be, seeing Hop’s brother? ), found her husband’s nervous state unbearable.

“What’s the rush? Maxim isn’t here yet.”

Juanita edged out.

“At least we don’t have to worry about the dinner,” Barry said.

“That woman’s a gem.” He had accepted Juanita’s story without a question.

“Listen! Isn’t that a car?” He yanked aside the faded red plush drapes. Headlights glared through the rain.

“I’ll go down and let him in—hey, there’s two of them.”

Alyssia’s throat tightened. She ran to Barry’s side. A man was darting up the rain-obscured steps ahead of Maxim. Or was it a woman wearing slacks and a trench coat? What difference did it make? The figure was far too short and slight to be Hap.

“I’ll tell Juanita to set another place,” Barry said.

“And, hon, let’s not take the remainder of the twentieth century, okay?” He barged from the room.

Alyssia back-combed her hair fashionably. Pulling on thermal underwear, she slipped into the hostess robe with the deep decolletage that she had bought after Cowcous avec Creme, clasping on her gold and sapphire necklace—the gold was plate, the stones fake, but the piece was an antique, and she liked its soft, worn look. Her instincts told her she looked smashing. She tilted her head. But. wasn’t she overdressed for the country?

She changed to a red flowered evening skirt with a fluffy angora sweater, then to a black pantsuit, then she returned to the blue velvet with the awe sapphires.

Maxim and his companion had been in the house nearly an hour before she descended the unlit stone staircase, guiding a hand along the cold balustrade in order to avoid the broken step.

Barry and his guests were in the drawing room, their chairs drawn close to the blazing logs in the baronially carved fireplace. As Alyssia entered, they rose.