Mistletoe Over Manhattan

Carter, who'd been turning the coiner, cut himself out of the pack and fought his way back in her direction.

'What happened? Whoa. Where are you going?' he said as she whirled.

'Back to Bloomingdale's,' she said.

He contemplated her for a moment. 'You have a thing for Santa Claus, huh?'

The snowflakes that whirled through the air swarmed on her eyelashes, and she blinked hard to clear them. When she saw his gaze riveted on them, she batted them again, more deliberately this time. 'Maybe,' she said.

His jaw tightened. 'I'll see you back at the hotel.'

'You may have gone out with Athena by the time I get back, so-'

'Who? Oh. Athena.'

'So we should decide now on a time to meet in the morning.'

'We're due at Phoebe Angell's office at nine. What about going down to breakfast at seven-thirty.' It wasn't a question.

'I'll be ready. You'll be home by then?' she said, and it was a question.

He gazed at her for a moment before he said, 'Maybe,' and with a slight wave, joined the lemmings swimming east toward the St. Regis on Fifth Avenue.

Jostled by the annoyed shoppers who stepped around her, she watched him go, standing tall in the crowd, the wind rustling his crisp, dark hair, his step sure and purposeful. No wonder she'd just paid $425-plus tax, when she could have saved the tax by having it shipped-for the ugliest sweater in the universe. Proximity to Carter made it difficult to remember anything, even how to spend money wisely.

Everyone should have a budget and stick to it. Financial worries reduce one's efficiency and-

'Shut up, Mother,' Mallory muttered, and charged through the crowd toward Bloomie's.

'My faith in mankind is restored,' said the clerk when she returned the sweater. She watched him pluck it up with two fingers and put it aside, a look of distaste on his face. 'Good decision.' Stepping out of the men's department, her pace slowed. She really didn't want to go back to the suite. Listening through a closed door to Carter getting ready for his date with Athena would be depressing. Pretending to get ready for an imaginary date of her own would be even more depressing.

Slowly she pulled the card Santa had given her out of her pocket. 'M. Ewing,' it said. 'ImageMakers.' Below that, in both quotes and italics, it said, 'A new you in no time flat.'

Mallory drew her brows together. The words were engraved on heavy, expensive card stock. The address was one on the Upper East Side, a high-rent district. 'A new you in no time flat' was a jarring addition to the otherwise elegant presentation of the card. 'Be the person you want to be,' maybe, or 'Realize your personal potential.' Something like that would have sounded more appropriate.

Still, this person claimed to be an imagemaker and came personally recommended by Santa Claus himself. Mallory knew what an imagemaker did. Was that what she needed? Somebody to help her show the world outside she was a woman-a passionate woman?

Forget the world outside. Her sights were fixed on one person in the world. She had her target date and her target victim. Damn straight an overnight imagemaker was what she needed. If M. Ewing turned out to be a charlatan, she'd be out-what? A few hundred dollars? Which she'd just saved by returning the sweater. Without another minute's consideration, she darted into a small nook devoted to a display of Chanel handbags in their leathery, unaffordable splendor. Ignoring the scornful gaze of the woman behind the counter-an armed guard, probably, given the cost of these handbags-she dialed the number listed on the card.

'ImageMakers,' purred a smooth male voice. 'Richard Gifford speaking. May I help you?'

The voice went with the card. The address went with the card. The only thing that didn't go with the card was that 'A new you in no time flat.'

'I'd like an appointment.' Mallory's tone matched this Richard person's in cool professionalism. 'That is, if Mr. or Ms. Ewing sees clients in the evenings, because I'm only available then.'

'Ms. Ewing sees clients at their convenience.' A pause ensued. Richard was obviously consulting a schedule. 'Her next evening appointment is on February 9. Shall I-'

Why had she assumed she could mosey on over to become a new her in no time flat, like, right now? 'I'm sorry,' she said, 'but I'm visiting here and-'

'Who referred you to us?' The man's interest seemed to have picked up.

It burst out of her mouth. 'Santa Claus.'

'Right. Ms. Ewing has had a sudden cancellation. She can see you this evening. As in now. When shall we expect you?'

Mallory felt dazed, and possibly conned. But she felt committed to an image change and she wasn't going to let herself cop out.

'How fortunate,' she said. 'I'll be there-' She glanced at her watch. The afternoon had flown. 'I'll be there at seven.'

It wasn't far. Ten minutes ought to do it.

She was committed. Wondering if she should just commit herself to some kindly healing institution instead, she started out of the store, then screeched to a halt, spun and sped back to the men's department. A few minutes later she had paid $165 for a dark-blue-and-white-striped shirt in a very large size.

She'd also used seven of her ten minutes. Punctuality is key to your success in life. Arrive when you say you'll arrive, and give yourself some leeway for the odd traffic jam, something you can't control-

'Mother,' Mallory muttered to herself as she tossed her credit card into any old corner of her purse it chose to land in, 'I already told you. Bug off. I'm in over your head.'

While she knew that Sixty-seventh Street just off Fifth Avenue would be an area of nice houses, she wasn't prepared for a Beaux Arts mansion. Typical of Manhattan residences, it was small as mansions went.

Mallory clutched her black cashmere coat more tightly around herself and went up to the huge double doors.

There was no box of buttons and buzzers, no list of doctors or dentists or psychiatrists who had made this once-proud single-family residence their professional home. There seemed no alternative but to knock, which one did by grasping a long, pendulous brass thing and banging it against the two brass spheres beneath it. Mallory did a double take, and was having second thoughts about the wisdom of this project when the door opened and a glorious figure of a man said, 'Like the knocker? I picked it out myself.' Without waiting for an answer, he added, 'Come in. Ms. Ewing will see you at once.'

'But I-'

'I'll take your coat.'

'Thank you. I-'

'Follow me, please.'

Giving up, she followed him through a massive foyer, across a marble floor, under a sparkling chandelier and past a sweeping staircase and a few pieces of furniture that looked as if they should be sporting Don't Touch signs. Richard swept open both halves of a tall, curtained French door, said, 'Ms. Trent to see you,' and steered Mallory ahead of him and into the room.

'Hey, hon,' said a voice. 'Come on in and set yourself down.'

One look at the woman behind the desk and Mallory knew she was in the wrong place. She turned to flee, but Richard blocked her path. She turned back. 'You know,' she said in a quavering voice, 'maybe this isn't the right thing for me to do just now at such an extremely busy point in my life.'

'Au contraire,' Ms. Ewing said, drawling the words out to their legal limit. 'Looks to me like y'all got here in the nick of time.'

Dragging her feet, Mallory headed for the chair opposite the desk. It was an ordinary chair, and she felt slightly better sitting down. The desk, on the other hand, was an alarming concoction of branches and horns, or antlers maybe, topped by a slab of stone that looked as if it should have crushed the desk to mulch and bone meal upon installation. But the desk, at least, had the good grace not to speak. If it had spoken, it would probably have mooed. Even that would have been better than listening to Ms. Ewing's exaggerated country-music star accent.

She was a tiny woman with an enormous head of teased, gelled and sprayed blond hair. Half woman, half hair.