Ira Levin (9 page)

    Judy shook her head, smiling. "No," she said, "no. Thank you, Rosemary! Thank you!" She dabbed at her eyes, sighed, shook her head. "Look at me," she said. "I was an intelligent, capable woman with a meaningful job to do-and he has me completely derailed, a blubbering ninny who puts an X by a pink."

    Patting her hand, getting up from the sofa, Rosemary said, "Come on, we'll start over."

    "No!" Judy said, getting up, going after her. "It wouldn't be fair, you had a hundred! It's easy to put back: you were 'jittery," I was "jinxed," you were "foxy." his

    Rosemary, sitting at the table, shook her head. "No, dear, a new game. I insist on it."

    "Okay, but you go first."?

    As they gathered tiles, Judy asked, "Are you good at anagrams too?"

    Rosemary recalled the time, weeks before giving birth, when she had shifted tiles back and forth between steven marcato and roman CASTEVET, realizing that the neighbor who had befriended them was the son of Adrian Marcato, the nineteenth-century Satanist who had lived at the Bramford. "Pretty good," she said.

    "Thanksgiving night," Judy said, "while I was waiting for Andy's call, I finally solved the all-time killer anagram, after more than a year of working at it in trains and buses and waiting rooms." She sighed, smoothing her hair down. "Quite minuscule compensation, in truth."

    "It sounds like a killer," Rosemary said, drawing tiles from the bag.

    "That was an observation," Judy said. "The anagram is "roast mules." his

    "Roast mules"?"

    "R, O, A, S, T," Judy said, turning the timer over, "M, U, L, E, S. They can be made into one common ten- letter English word, so common that even children of five and six use it."

    Switching tiles around on the rack, Rosemary said, "I'll get on it later."

    "Don't come begging for the answer," Judy said, drawing tiles from the bag. "You'll be wasting your breath; I'm unyielding. And no fair using a computer."

    "I don't know how to," Rosemary said, "but I've really got to learn. What a great tool! Who ever thought they'd be so small and cheap? They filled whole rooms! Double on the y, double word." Starting at the central pink space, she laid out the letters of dandy.

 He brought her an angel-a curly-headed lad with a lyre and a book and a fine pair of wings, reclining in terra-cotta relief on a plaque about four inches square, white on della Robbia blue.

    "Andrea della Robbia made it," he said. "Circa fourteen seventy."

    "Oh my God, Andy!" she said, cradling it in both hands, adoring it. "It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen!"

    "It's named "Andyst was he said. "For him, I guess."

    Smiling, she tiptoed to kiss his cheek. "Oh thank you, darling, thank you!" She kissed Andy della Robbia- lightly, very lightly. "My handsome angel Andy!" she said to it. "I adore you! I could eat you up!" She gave it another feather-kiss.

    Sunday brunch was the first chance they had to be together. At the airport, he had come out of the VIP pass door with two elderly men. They seemed to be in an ongoing discussion, so after a hug and two handshakes outside the limo-one with a Chinese, one with a Frenchman-and a little eye language with Andy, she had ridden back to the city the way she had ridden out, up front with Joe. They listened to tapes of fifties big- band music, chatted about the musicians, and admired the billboards that had begun going up December first- Andy beaming at them over the lines of copy: Here in New York we're lighting our candles at 7 p.m. on Friday, December 31/. Love ya! When they got out of the limo on the building's lower garage level-at two in the morning Rome time-Andy was jet-lagged. They made their morning date.

    Rosemary and the waiter had shifted the Scrabble table aside a few feet to make room by the window for the brunch table and chairs. She walked there slowly, hands cupped, and leaned the plaque carefully, very carefully, against the side of the jam caddy-so Andy della Robbia could see and be seen.

    Andy Castevet-Woodhouse, seated, smearing cream cheese on bagel, said, "You look great. That's just the kind of negligee I was picturing."

    "I'm meeting Joe at the spa at eleven-thirty," Rosemary said in her pink sweatsuit and sneakers, sitting down.

    He said, "Uh, you and Joe…?"

    "Enjoy each other's company," she said, unfolding her napkin. "I would tell you to mind your own business, but I played Scrabble with Judy the other night so I'm not in a position to talk. Indian women sure do, at least the heartbroken, maltreated ones."

    He groaned, filling her cup with steaming coffee.

    "You really ought to be ashamed of yourself," she said, shaking a packet of sweetener at him. "She's such a nice girl. And what a champ! She beat me twice, and I'm good. I'm not used to a two-minute limit, not that that's an excuse. We're having a rematch tomorrow or Tuesday." She tore a corner from the packet.

    "She no longer appeals to me," he said, lifting a slice of salmon on the tines of a silvery fork. "What do you want me to do, fake something I don't feel?"

    "You could at least have spoken to her face-to-face about it."

    "Oh sure," he said. "You haven't seen her in her District Attorney mode." He laid the salmon over the cream cheese.

    "I have a feeling you'd stand up under crossexamination," she said, stirring her coffee.

    He bit and chewed, looking out the window.

    She sipped, looking at the plaque. "It's just so beautiful, darling," she said. "Thank you so much." She sighed, drew the basket of rolls and bagels nearer, poked among them.

    Andy sighed. "You're right," he said. "It's not my finest hour. I'll call her later. She sleeps late Sundays anyway."

    Rosemary chose a thin slice of bagel. "We're invited to a fund-raiser for cerebral palsy," she said. "Against it.

    You know. In the ballroom, Wednesday, black tie. I'm going with Joe. He says he's a great dancer; is he?"

    Andy shrugged. "Pretty good," He said. Took a bite.

    "I thought maybe you and Judy…"

    "Mom," he said, chewing, "she doesn't appeal to me anymore. I can't help it. Okay? I wish I could."

    She spread a thin layer of cheese onto her bagel slice, squinting at it. "Bring someone else," she said. "Does Vanessa have a steady?"

    "I don't know," he said.

    She took a small bite and chewed. "I did a little trading in the Bergdorf boutique," she said. "Six old-lady outfits for a satin sheath right off Ginger Rogers" back. I figure if Joe thinks he's Astaire, I'll humor him. I hope I didn't go overboard." She took a larger bite and chewed, peering out the window at something of interest.

    Watching her, Andy smiled. "Aren't you the foxy one," he said. "You win, we're a foursome. But after New Year's we're going on a little vacation alone, just the two of us. We're going to need it; we're going to be really busy all month." He wound the fork's tines around a sliver of salmon on his plate, frowning. "There's a real danger of the timing getting screwed up," he said. "We just got polls showing eleven percent of seniors worldwide still think the Lighting's at midnight everywhere. Can you believe it? We're going to have to do something more. And there's the PA commercial. I'd like to meet on it tomorrow at three; is that all right with you? Craig, Diane, and Hank. Maybe Sandy too; she comes up with good ideas." "You know everybody, I don't."

    He raised the forked curl of salmon and put it into his mouth, ate it facing her as she sipped.

    She lowered the cup. "Don't do that," she said.

    "Do what?"

    "Just stick with the hazel, Mr. Wise Guy," she said. "I** mean it, Andy. And don't tell me it was my imagination either." tJs caret rather caret com*8*8caret com*

    Specific information on representative PA groups might be useful at the meeting, Rosemary realized, so she eased past Monday morning's Film Society meeting with a whispered "Hi, everybody"-to Craig, Kevin, Vanessa, Polly, and Lon Chaney Jr., sprouting face hair- and went right on into what she had begun to think of as her office. Craig's assistant Suzanne would be reclaiming it the Monday after New Year's but maybe they could share it, as long as there were two desks.

    She searched among the news and documentary tapes, and was about to recruit a computer-literate research assistant when she found a tape of a year-old PBS production called Anti-Andy. Watching it, she had some doubts about its overall objectivity-the narrator, a charming if loquacious Southerner, was wearing a large i V andy button- but the footage he eventually got around to showing spoke concisely for itself, ranging from the foolish to the frightening.

    The likeliest winner in the foolish division was the Ayn Rand Brigade, whose half-dozen sallow, crewcut members wore large dollar signs painted on their T-shirts and small ones tattooed below their sweatbands. They opposed tax exemptions for religious institutions and supported "In Reason We Trust" on paper money-everybody's, not just the United States'. They had hijacked a freight train in Pittsburgh, tied banners to both sides of the engine reading pay your taxes, andy and all witch doctors!, and driven it cross-country with their one female member at the throttle, a piece of symbolism based on one of Rand's novels but by and large meaningless to the general public. The train had been abandoned in Montana, where the Brigade was believed to have found refuge in an enclave of laissez- faire capitalists.

    The middle ground of anti-Andy protesters was best represented by the ACLU, still around and still fighting the good fight. Their spokesman made it plain that he loved Andy and admired everything he had done to improve race relations, ease the abortion conflict, settle the Irish troubles, and get the Arabs and Israelis back yet again to the negotiating table. Good grief, wasn't he wearing two i V andy buttons? He just felt that as long as Andy was addressing groups like the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the governors of all the states, then GC should be renamed WE, for World's Children, and if that was a problem in Europe, then EC for Earth's Children. And did Andy really have to lean quite so heavily on his resemblance to Jesus Christ?

    Sheer rudeness. She was surprised at

    the ACLU.

    The frightening anti-Andy group, the Smith Brothers, were frightening only to her. They had been joke fodder for late-night comedians,- the Southerner showed samples.

    Four mountain men more wildly bearded than their cough-drop namesakes, the Smith Brothers had holed up in a Tennessee cabin with the latest in military hardware, bullhorning to the world that Andy was the son of Satan, the Antichrist, and they weren't giving up without a fight.

    The FBI had waited them out and they were now in a federal hospital, shaven, medicated, and undergoing psychiatric evaluation. caret caret so caret rf caret caret go caret just

    Mrftie meeting was hugely productive and over almost 1. before it began. Seven took part-Andy, Judy (with memo gizmo), Diane, Craig, Sandy, Hank, and Rosemary-in Andy's office looking out at the buildings of Central Park South and midtown. The coffee table was stocked with veggies and nuts,- they sat around it on a black leather sofa and chairs, Hank in his motorized wheelchair. "You were right, Rosemary!" Judy had whispered on the way in, radiant in a buttercup sari, i caret

    ANDY'-ED.

    "A joyous reunion last night!" Rosemary was joyous for her.

    H

    And for Andy too, the lying weasel. Mom, she doesn't appeal to me anymore, I can't help it, I wish I could. She smiled at him, taking a carrot stick from the bowl he offered, smiling at her.

    Everyone agreed about simple being better than elaborate, for both effectiveness and fast production, and from there it was a hop, skip, and jump to a unanimous decision to use the same technique that had produced four of Andy's top ten commercials-which meant that he and Diane would sit in a couple of easy chairs on the stage of the amphitheater down on the floor below, the ninth floor, and schmooze about the PA'S and their rights for a couple of hours while Muhammed and Kevin worked the hand-held cameras. Diane would then be edited out and the footage pared down. And pared, and pared, and pared.

    Except that this time, Diane suggested, Rosemary should do the schmoozing, her feelings on the subject obviously being stronger than Diane's. The PA'S could all be shipped to the South Pole as far as she was concerned. Rosemary would also draw richer emotional responses from Andy. "And leave some of her in," Diane said. "She radiates honesty and openness."

    Craig said, "What do you say, Rosemary, do you want to give it a shot? The most we can lose is a few hours tomorrow morning. Andy, I assume it's okay with you?"

    From then on it was a party. Andy opened a bottle of wine, and William and Vanessa came in with another bottle. William, our ambassador to Finland under three presidents, was handsome and white-haired-red tie, y white shirt, blue suit. A fun guy though, judging from his hand on Vanessa's miniskirted rump.