Missing Reels (47 page)

“That’s not true. It can’t be true. A director doesn’t put his heart into a film so—”

“Shh, I know. I told her to pour herself a drink and call me when she was ready to be reasonable.”

“That was that?”

“No, she told me never to mention your name again and
then
that was that.” Ceinwen sniffled. “She’s been mad before. She’ll climb back down to earth sooner or later. And she won’t kill me, I’m too old. She’s a practical sort, she’ll just wait for the day I drop in my tracks.” She wondered if she’d outlive Miriam, or if Miriam would live on into the next century, waiting for Ceinwen’s smoking to take its toll. “Pull up your garters, girl. You’ve saved part of our legacy as Americans, wasn’t that your goal?” Maybe, she thought. I think my goal has hockey-puck syndrome. “All right then, tell me, when do they unveil this multiple amputee?”

“The Brody says it could take a year, maybe more.”

“That should be just enough time for Miriam to calm down,” said Norman. “Meantime, do watch out in the lobby. Icebergs, dead ahead.”

She told Norman she’d keep him apprised of the Brody’s progress, since clearly Miriam wasn’t going to do it, and hung up. She could still hear Talmadge and Jim out in the living room. George had given Talmadge the air a couple of weeks before, and Talmadge was complaining about Jim’s lack of sympathy. She scanned her bookshelves, not looking for anything in particular, and her eye lit on the paper bag that held the
Mysteries of Udolpho
still, sitting on top of a row of books. She took it down and carried it into the living room.

“How’s Norman?” asked Talmadge.

“He’s good. Would you like to see what he looked like, when he was young?”

She slid the still out of the wrapper and cautioned Talmadge not to get fingerprints on it.

“Wait, so this one is Norman? Well, looks aren’t everything.”

“He looks fine,” sighed Jim.

“This one’s gorgeous, who’s he?”

“Edward Kenny,” she said, “the star. He’s at the Motion Picture Home now. They told me he’s senile.”

“Time and chance happeneth to us all,” said Jim.

“What’s that, Shakespeare?”

“It’s the Bible.”

“Oh,
excuse me
. Which one is the director, the one with his elbow on the camera?” Talmadge held it a little closer. “Not bad. Hm, kind of a small chin. Northern Europeans.”

“I was going to give it to Miriam,” said Ceinwen. “To celebrate finding the film.”

“I’d say it’s yours now,” said Jim drily. “You should frame it.”

She took it back and looked again. Miriam. Edward Kenny. Norman, holding a script. Probably Louis Delgado. And Emil.

“I’ll do that,” she said. “I’ll do it when the film is preserved. And I’ll hang it up.”

They all looked for another minute. “The men’s side at the store just got some picture frames in,” said Talmadge.

“No,” said Jim.

“Art Deco style. Perfect for an old photo.”

“Talmadge, I am telling you,
no
.”

H
ARRY WAS SITTING BEHIND HIS DESK FOR ONCE, INSTEAD OF ON TOP
of it. “I called the Brody today. Talked to the director, Ms. Chung. And I asked her what they had. My
Crowd
, for one thing. I told you Andy would keep that one. But get this.” His brows were straining to reach his cheekbones. “She said that they were very excited, because there was a film in there that had previously been thought lost.”

“A lost film? You’re kidding.” She hoped that sounded surprised.

“I know! Of course I asked her which one and she said they aren’t formally announcing it yet. Cool customer, that one. Fits right in at the Brody, they always were a strange bunch. But, more importantly”—he braced his hands on the desk—“can you believe that lunatic?”

“Which lunatic?”

“Andy! That so-called colleague of mine! Not only was he storing nitrate, piles and piles of nitrate for god’s sake in his own building, but he had a lost film down there and he hadn’t breathed a word to a soul. Mind you, I always knew he was off his rocker, all you have to do is look at his office, although this is a math department, everyone’s a little odd. But a lost film?”

“Maybe he didn’t realize it was lost.”

“Of course he realized. He probably wanted it
because
it was lost. And he was going to let it sit down there until either it crumbled to dust, or the whole complex burned to the rafters, whichever came first. If there were any justice in the world the building would evict him and Courant would toss him out by his hair.”

“Is that what’s going to happen?”

“Not a chance.” Harry made a little grunt of disgust. “Tenure. They wrote him a stern rebuke. I’m sure he was crushed. But”—he held up his finger—“I’ve fixed him. I’ve fixed his little red wagon. There was a faculty meeting today, and of course Andy wasn’t there. Can’t be bothered with meetings, they’re boring. God forbid Andy should be bored. And do you know what I did?”

“You voted to censure him,” she guessed. Harry shook his head. “You docked his pay?”

“No! I moved to make him department chair for next year! And it passed on a voice vote. No nays, no abstentions.” Harry threw back his head and let out a great, booming laugh.

“But, isn’t that an honor? Department chair?”

“An honor, she says. It’s the biggest pain in the tokus you can
possibly
imagine. And it’s a four-year appointment. Four years of memos and letters and budgets and meetings and you better believe, I mean you should bet your life that I will be breathing down his neck every step of the way.”

“That’s great,” she told him. Wasn’t this supposed to be a final interview? “Um, Harry … my test. Weren’t we going to …”

“Oh, that. You’re hired.”

She blinked. “I am?”

He waved his hand like the pope blessing the crowd. “Sure you are. Congratulations.”

“Tania is fine with that?”

“Tania left it up to me.”

She had to ask. Harry was too good a person to have a lousy secretary. “Harry, you saw my typing test, right?”

“Sixty words a minute! You’re a speed demon. You start training a week from Monday.”

“I, uh, made seven errors.”

“Errors, schmerrors. It’s all on computers nowadays. You go back and fix them before you print it out. Problem solved.” He peered at her. “Believe me, that’s plenty good enough. Angie used to make twice that many mistakes on one page.”

“I’m sure I’ll get better the more I do it,” she said.

“Of course, of course. Besides,” said Harry, “it would be a novelty to have a face around here a man can look at without shuddering.” He looked at her, waiting.

“
His Girl Friday
,” she said.

His eyebrows were working. “Director?”

“Oh come on. Howard Hawks.”

“Who played Diamond Louie?”

“Abner Biberman.”

“And that,” he shouted, smacking his hand on the desk, “is why you’re hired. Get out of here. Go get that limey a drink.”

The light was on in Matthew’s office and the door was open. She peeked in; he was at the blackboard, chalk in hand, writing out something at the bottom of an equation. She grabbed the door jamb and swung herself into the room, a real MGM musical move. “Hel-lo theah,” she chirped in her best British.

“Hello,” he said quietly, and put down the chalk. “All done with Harry?”

“Mm-hm.” She perched herself on the desk, crossed her legs and twitched up her skirt. “I start training a week from Monday.”

“That’s wonderful.”

“And the remission kicks in for the fall semester.” She swung one leg over the other. “But that’s not why I’m here. There’s a Michael Powell series at MoMA starting next week.”

“I don’t know about that.” He was walking to the door.

“Don’t be a bore, this is your native country we’re talking about. All I’ve seen is
The Red Shoes
.”

He shut the door. “I can’t make it.”

“You can’t work all the time, not even Harry expects you to. The first one’s
I Know Where I’m Going!
”

He leaned against the door. “Anna will be here in about three weeks.”

She uncrossed her legs. “So?” He was looking at the floor. “Did that not sound right? How about, so
what
?”

He put a hand through his hair.

“You’re going back to her?” No response. “Even after you came back to me?”

“Nothing’s changed.”

“That’s ridiculous. How can you say that?”

He looked at the ceiling. “It’s the same story it’s always been, do we need to go back over it?”

“Yes. You don’t love this woman.”

“I do.”

“Then why are you telling the fucking light fixture and not me?”

He bent over the back of the desk chair and looked at his hands, fingers laced. “My postdoc ends after next year. After that I go wherever I can get a job. You’ll be working for Harry and going to film school. Anna and I planned what we’d do after postdocs for a long time. We’re the same age, we have the same way of looking at things, we have years together.”

“What do you want, a medal?”

He flinched. “I know you don’t like her.”

“I don’t know her. What I saw was snobbish, cold, and boring, but I don’t know her.”

“She’s moving here. We’re getting married.” She put her arms across her stomach. “I’m sorry. I truly am.”

She rocked forward. “You don’t,” she gasped, “have to use words to lie, you know.”

He was still looking down at his chair. This was a new expression he had, she didn’t know it, but she must have seen something like it some time, after all these years and all those movies. In her mind she projected close-ups, flipping through them like stills in one of Andy’s folders, trying to name it. Not pity. Not anger. Not sadness.

The frame paused. Longing.

She had nothing to say. She stood up and walked out.

Go ahead and long.

When she unlocked the street door on Avenue C, she had no idea what stores or doorways she’d passed, what men had whistled or ignored her, who’d tried to sell her anything or whether she’d jaywalked or waited at the corner. She mounted the stairs, looking at cracks under the doorways and listening for TVs. There was a light underneath Miriam’s door. She kept walking.

Talmadge called to her from the living room. “Ceinwen, is that you? Come and look at this. I moved the couch. I think it looks so much better over here between the windows.” She stood in the entrance; he was facing the couch and holding his hands up as though to frame it. “Check out how …” He turned to her and trailed off. “Oh sweetie.”

She started to talk and couldn’t. He put his arms around her. A first. After a while she raised her head and checked the mascara she’d smudged on his T-shirt.

“Jim was right after all,” she said.

“Ha. Let me tell you, Jim’s not as smart as he thinks he is. Last night he told me maybe he was wrong.” Talmadge brushed at his T-shirt, then dropped his hand. “Let me make you some tea. I have linden. It’s like, a tree or something.”

“I’m okay,” she said. And remembered she needed to take off her jacket.

“No, you’re not.”

“I’ll be okay.” She started walking toward the bedroom. “I’m going to be in the bathroom for a while, do you need it?”

“Not at all.”

She undressed and wrapped her robe around her. She grabbed an old towel out of the stack in the kitchen cabinets and went into the bathroom. The box of hair dye was still in the medicine cabinet. She mixed it up and started applying with the pointy tip of the applicator, like the instructions said. But she got tired of making parts in her hair, so she unscrewed the top and slopped it on. Then she sat on the toilet seat and waited. She didn’t have a watch and she didn’t put on a timer. She let the fumes sting her eyes and watched the light go down in the bathroom until she had to switch on the overhead. When the dye started to itch she stepped into the shower and rinsed it out. She got out, dried off, wrapped the towel around her head, and slipped back into her robe. Talmadge hadn’t had to see her naked since Christmas.

Jim had come home while she was in the bathroom. When she came into the living room he just said, “Let me see.” She took down the towel. “That’s going to be gorgeous, honey.” He pushed his cigarettes at her and she took one.

“I moved the couch back,” said Talmadge. “Jim told me it would be too hard to see the TV.”

“I know exactly what we need,” said Jim. “Sit right there.” She sat on the couch and Talmadge lit her cigarette. Jim came out of her room with a tape in his hand.

“In honor of your new hair,” he said. He put the tape in and pushed play. He sat down and they watched.

“You need a hat like that,” said Talmadge.

Ceinwen concentrated on the glasses on the bar. “How many drinks have you had?” Myrna Loy was asking, and William Powell was saying, “This will make six martinis.” And Myrna was asking the bartender, “Will you bring me five more martinis, Leo? Line them right up here.”

“Do you have any of the sequels?” asked Jim.

“I have them all,” said Ceinwen.

“Good,” said Jim. “Line ’em up, right here.” She put her head on his shoulder and settled in for the night.

“T
HIS ISN
’
T MY FAULT
.”

“Then precisely whose fault is it, Ceinwen?” Matthew held up a page and jabbed it so hard he left a crease down the middle.

“It’s not my fault you have bad handwriting.”

“There’s nothing wrong with the way I wrote this. Look.” He flicked the page across her desk, picked up his handwritten copy, and slapped it down beside her keyboard. “That is a delta. It is very clearly a lower-case delta.”

“If it looks like an alpha to me then what the heck am I supposed to type?”

His voice was rising. “You could start by looking here, where I wrote out the word on first reference. Delta. D, E, L, T, A.”

“After that, for the rest of the paper you put little tails on them, like an alpha.”

Louder. “You’re from Mississippi. I shouldn’t have to explain a delta to you.”

She picked up her LaTex manual and began flipping to the index with savage concentration. “Okay, okay, don’t have a cow. I’ll look up the command for a universal change—”