Weep No More, My Lady

been water and air to Leila.

Quickly she went into the file room. With Min's passion for beautiful surroundings, even this small storage area was extravagantly designed. The cus-tom-made files were a sunny yellow, the ceramic-tile floor was in shades of gold and umber, a Jacobean sideboard had been converted into a supply cupboard.

There were still two full sacks of letters to Leila. They ranged from lined paper torn from a child'* notebook to expensive, perfumed stationery. Dora scooped a batch of them into her arms and brought them to her desk.

It was a slow process. She could not assume that another anonymous letter would necessarily come addressed with snipped and pasted words and numbers like the one she had found. She began with the letters already opened, the ones Leila had seen. But after forty minutes she'd gotten nowhere. Most of the mail was the usual. You're my favorite actress… I named my daughter after you… I saw you on Johnny Carson. You looked beautiful, and you were so funny… But there were also several surprisingly harsh critical notes. That's the last time I spend five dollars to see you. What a lousy movie… Do you read your scripts, Leila, or just take what roles you can get?

Her rapt concentration caused her to be unaware of Min and Helmut's four-o'clock arrival. One minute she was alone; the next they were approaching her desk. She looked up, tried to summon a natural smile and with a casual movement of her hand slid the anonymous letter into the pile.

It was clear that Min was upset. She did not seem to notice that Dora was early. 'Sammy, get me the file on the bathhouse.'

Min waited while she went for it. When she returned, Helmut reached out his hand to take the manila folder, but Min literally grabbed it first. Min was ghastly pale. Helmut patted her arm. 'Minna, please, you are hyperventilating.'

Min ignored him. 'Come inside,' she ordered Dora.

'I'll just tidy up first.' Dora indicated her desk.

'Forget it. It's not going to make any difference.'

There was nothing she could do. If she made any attempt to put the anonymous letter into her drawer, Min would demand to see it. Dora patted her hair and followed Min and Helmut into their private office. Something was dreadfully wrong, and it had to do with that blasted Roman bath.

Min went to her own desk, opened the file and began to race through the papers in it. Most of the correspondence was in the form of bills from the contractor. 'Five hundred thousand down, three hundred thousand, twenty-five thousand…' She kept reading, her voice going higher and higher. 'And now another four hundred thousand dollars before he can continue working on the interior rooms.' She slapped the papers down and slammed her fist on them.

Dora hurried to get a glass of ice water from the office refrigerator. Helmut rushed around the desk, put his hands on Min's temples and made soft, shushing sounds. 'Minna, Minna, you must relax.

Think about something pleasant. You'll bring on high blood pressure.'

Dora handed the glass to Min and looked contemptuously at Helmut. That spendthrift, she thought, would put Min in her grave with his crazy projects! Min had been absolutely right when she'd suggested that they add a self- contained budget-price spa on the back half of the property. That would have worked. Secretaries as well as socialites were going to spas these days. Instead, this pompous fool had persuaded Min to build the bathhouse. 'It will make a statement about us to the world' was his favorite phrase when he talked Min into plunging into debt. Dora knew the finances of this place as well as they did. It couldn't go on. She cut through Helmut's soothing 'Minna, Minna-'

'Stop work on the bathhouse immediately,' she suggested crisply. 'The outside is finished, so the place looks all right. Say the special marble you ordered for the interior has been held up. No one will know the difference. The contractor's pretty much paid to date, isn't he?'

'Very nearly,' Helmut agreed. He smiled brightly at Dora as though she had just solved an intricate puzzle. 'Dora is right, Minna. We'll put off finishing the bathhouse.'

Min ignored him. 'I want to go over those figures again.' For the next half-hour they had their heads together comparing the contracts, the estimates and the actual figures. At one point Min and then Helmut left the room. Don't let them go to my desk,

Dora prayed. She knew the minute Min calmed down, she would be annoyed to see clutter in the reception area.

Finally Min tossed the original sketches across her desk. 'I want to talk to that damn lawyer. It looks to me as if the contractor is entitled to price over-runs on every phase of the job.'

'This contractor has soul,' Helmut said. 'He understands the concept of what we are doing. Minna, we stop building for the moment. Dora is right. We turn the problem into a virtue. We are awaiting shipment of Carrara marble. We still settle for nothing less, yes? So. We shall be admired as purists. Liebchen, don't you know that to create a desire for something is every bit as important as fulfilling it?'

Dora was suddenly aware of another presence in the room. She looked up quickly. Cheryl was standing there, her shapely body curved against the doorframe, her eyes amused. 'Have I come at a bad time?' she asked brightly. Without waiting for an answer, she strolled over and leaned past Dora. 'Oh, I see you're going over the sketches of the Roman bath.' She bent over to examine them.

'Four pools, steam rooms, saunas, more massage rooms, sleeping rooms? I love the idea of nap time after a strenuous romp through the mineral baths! Incidentally, won't it cost a fortune to provide real mineral water for the baths? Do you intend to fake it or pipe it in from Baden-Baden?' She straightened up gracefully. 'It looks as though you two could use a little investment capital. Ted respects my opinion, you know. In fact, he used to listen to me quite a bit before Leila got her fangs into him. See you people at dinner.'

At the door she turned back and looked over her shoulder. 'Oh, by the way, Min, dear, I left my bill on Dora's desk. I'm sure it was just an oversight that one was left in my bungalow. I know you planned to have me as your guest, dear.'

Cheryl had left the bill on her desk. Dora knew that meant she had gone through the mail. Cheryl was what she was. She had probably seen the letter to Leila.

Min looked at Helmut. Frustrated tears welled in her eyes. 'She knows we're in a bad financial bind, and it would be just like her to tip the columnists off! Now we have another freebie-and don't think she won't use this place as a second home!' Despairingly, Min jammed the scattered bills and sketches back into the file.

Dora took it from her and replaced it in the file room. Her heart fluttering rapidly, she went back to the reception room. The letters to Leila were scattered on her desk; the poison-pen one was missing.

Dismayed, Dora tried to assess what harm that letter might do. Could it be used to blackmail Ted? Or was whoever sent it anxious to have it back, just in case someone tried to trace it?

If only she hadn't been reading it when Min and Helmut came in! Dora sat down at her desk; only then did she notice that propped against her calendar was Cheryl's bill for her week at the Spa.

Scrawled across it Cheryl had written Paid in full.

Seven

At six thirty the phone in Elizabeth 's bungalow rang. It was Min. ' Elizabeth, I want you to have dinner with Helmut and me tonight. Ted, his lawyer, Craig, Cheryl, Syd-they're all going out.' For a moment she sounded like the familiar Min, imperious, brooking no refusal. Then, before Elizabeth could answer, her tone softened. 'Please, Elizabeth. You're going home in the morning. We have missed you.'

'Is this another one of your games, Min?'

'I was absolutely wrong to have forced that meeting last night. I can only ask you to forgive me.'

Min sounded weary, and Elizabeth felt reluctant sympathy. If Min chose to believe in Ted's innocence, so be it. Her scheme to throw them together had been outrageous, but that was Min's way.