We shared a gentle meal in a self-service place and said so-long. Rose suggested we meet some time. I agreed because it’s my only response with women. I waved her off near Columbus Circle, started walking.
I’d gone a hundred yards when I was taken in custody by a couple of plainclothesmen who flashed badges at me just like on the pictures and bundled me inside a motor the length of a cathedral. I was made to believe that any attempt at discussion would be ill received.
CHAPTER FOUR
« ^ »
IT WASN’T a police car, not like I’d seen. Some special division, arresting me for being an illegal alien? From gaol I’d write to Rose, c/o Fredo’s nosh bar, or her bookshop… We’d driven into an enormous tunnel.
“Excuse me, please. Where are we going?”
Neither answered. My mouth was already dry, but it dehydrated some more. My anxiety gelled into fright. This was no arrest. At times like this I’m even more pathetic than usual, lost, helpless, every neuron on hold.
Emerging, daylight showed me signposts. New Jersey? Wasn’t that vaguely in Los Angeles? Or not? TV late- nighters, hitherto my sources on America, are never precise on geography. Here was New Jersey, stuck right onto New York, as pretty as the rest of the place. Why I should be so astonished by trees, colourful gardens, chalets and imposing dwellings, handsome architecture, I don’t know. I mean, I’ve never been to France or Tibet, yet I’ve read quite a bit about them. But here I was in the United States and ignorant as sin. Maybe it’s that we
The grand house we stopped at was familiar even in daylight. And the frantic girl who came to wring her hands on the steps. She was pale as death, though bonny in her taupe sheath dress. I had the feeling that somehow Jennie wasn’t quite the same status by daylight. She’d been the catering manageress; now she was no more than a gofer. Terror still showed. I hoped mine didn’t.
MR Granger conducted me and Jennie across acres of carpet, modern crud attractive as an oil slick. For the same price they could have had a lovely Edwardian or Mesopotamian. It’s the same with people who buy new dinner services or with household lace, late decorative glassware. Folk never listen.
Nicko was seated between two people. One was his wife. The other was Orly, erstwhile my off-table boss only now much less camp and very solemn. Daylight altered status all round. I prayed it didn’t change mine too much. Mrs. Nicko sat in an apple-green afternoon dress, emeralds picking light from everywhere. Lovely. Nice to see a woman choosing the right colours for once. I honestly do believe they make more mistakes in colours than in hair styles, dress, fashion, textures of materials, food menus…
“What’s with him?” somebody was asking.
“Lovejoy. Tell Mr Aquilina what you said last night.”
I dragged my eyes from Mrs. Nicko, licked my dry lips. My voice came out a croak. “Er, well, Sheraton —”
Nicko gazed obliquely past me, still as a stoat.
“No. The lady, Lovejoy. Mrs. Sophie Brandau.”
“Blue velvet? Yes. I saw her do it.” Suddenly I really honestly didn’t want to be guilty of marking their frigging table. I wanted to prove my innocence to the hilt. “Orly saw her. You served her the glass, Orly.”
I swear my knees were quivering. Sometimes I disgust me.
“He said zircons, Gina,” Nicko told the wall.
Mrs. Nicko did a woman’s meticulous non-smile that speaks volumes. I didn’t want to get on the wrong side of her, either. She said, “Truly, Lovejoy?”
Odd that bosses have first names in America. Was it the custom? Chat and fright are immiscible, the way chat and love are not.
“Well, the setting was a bit too much for the style,” I began helpfully. “The ring stone was about J/K colour, Edwardian cut, put into platinum.” Faces blank in my pause for breath. Was Nicko going to go spare if I said I didn’t like the setting? “Er, I thought the mount crap — sorry, not well designed. There’s a limit to what a slender Edwardian mount can get away with…”
Nicko’s attitude had changed. Jennie jumped in. Fright makes a woman ugly, as if it scars her soul. Odd, because excitement makes them more attractive. I wonder why.
“Zircons, Lovejoy? Not diamonds?”
I eased. Was that all? Had I been brought all this way and scared witless just for society gossip?
“You mean am I sure? Zircon shows a double edge. Diamond doesn’t. You need a handlens to make certain, so I…” I glanced worriedly at Orly “… filled her water glass, handed it to her.” Into their silence I explained that parts of a filled glass can magnify.
“This zircon,” Nicko asked infinity.
“They’re old-fashioned now, really,” I said, cheering by the second. Home ground. “They were the favourite diamond lookalike once. Now there are superb cheaper manmakes.”
“How cheap?”
“Peanuts.” I spoke my Americanism proudly. “Some cubic zirconias and whatnot you can buy for virtually the cost of cutting them. Even amateur jewellers turn them out.”
“So?”
I wished he’d raise his voice, give it some inflection now and then. Maybe it wouldn’t put the mockers on me
