She leaped up with her heart pounding, hand to the phone and no weight in her stomach; a core with no weight and her telephone ringing.
She answered. The assistant director.
'In makeup at six, honey.'
'Right.'
'How ya feelin'?'
'If I go to the bathroom and it doesn't burn, then I figure I'm ahead.'
He chuckled. 'I'll see yon.'
'Right. And thanks.'
She hung up. And for moments sat motionless, thinking of the dream. A dream? More like thought in the half life of waking. That terrible clarity. Gleam of the skull. Non-being. Irreversible. She could not imagine it. God, it can't be!
She considered. And at last bowed her head. But it is.
She went to the bathroom, put on a robe, and padded quickly down to the kitchen, down to life in sputtering bacon.
'Ah, good morning, Mrs. MacNeil.'
Gray, drooping Willie, squeezing oranges, blue sacs beneath her eyes. A trace of accent. Swiss, like Karl's. She wiped her hands on a paper towel and started moving toward the stove.
'I'll get it, Willie.' Chris, ever sensitive, had seen her weary look, and as Willie now grunted and turned back to the sink, the actress poured coffee, then moved to the breakfast nook. Sat down. And warmly smiled as she looked at her plate. A blush-red rose. Regan. That angel. Many a morning, when Chris was working, Regan would quietly slip out of bed, come down to the kitchen and place a flower, then grope her way crusty-eyed back to her sleep. Chris shook her head; rueful; recalling: she had almost named her Goneril. Sure. Right on. Get ready for the worst. Chris chuckled at the memory. Sipped at her coffee. As her gaze caught the rose again, her expression turned briefly sad, large green eyes grieving in a waiflike face. She'd recalled another flower. A son. Jamie. He had died long ago at the age of three, when Chris was very young and an unknown chorus girl on Broadway. She had sworn she would not give herself ever again as she had to Jamie; as she had to his father, Howard MacNeil. She glanced quickly from the rose, and as her dream of death misted upward from the coffee, she quickly lit a cigarette. Willie brought juice and Chris remembered the rats.. 'Where's Karl?' she asked the servant.
'I am here, madam!'
Catting in lithe through a door off the pantry. Commanding. Deferential. Dynamic. Crouching. A fragment of Kleenex pressed tight to his chin where he'd nicked himself shaving. 'Yes?' Thickly muscled, he breathed by the table. Glittering eyes. Hawk nose. Bald head.
'Hey, Karl, we've got rats in the attic. Better get us some traps.'
'Where are rats?'
'I just said that.'
'But the attic is clean.'
'Well, okay, we've got tidy rats!'
'No rats.'
'Karl, I heard them last night,' Chris said patiently, controlling.
'Maybe plumbing,' Karl probed; 'maybe boards.'
'Maybe rats! Will you buy the damn traps and quit arguing?'
'Yes, madam!' Bustling away. 'I go now!'
'No not now, Karl! The stores are all closed!'
'They are closed!' chided Willie.
'I will see.'
He was gone.
Chris and Willie traded glances, and then Willie shook her head, turning back to the bacon. Chris sipped at her coffee. Strange. Strange man. Like Willie, hard-working; very loyal; discreet. And yet something -about him made her vaguely uneasy. What was it? His subtle air of arrogance? Defiance? No. Something else. Something hard to pin down. The couple had been with her for almost six years, and yet Karl was a mask---a talking, breathing, untranslated hieroglyph running her errands on stilted legs. Behind the mask, though, something moved; she could hear his mechanism ticking like a conscience. She stubbed out her cigarette; heard the front door creaking open, then shut.
'They are closed,' muttered Willie.
Chris nibbled at bacon, then returned to her room, where she dressed in her costume sweater and skirt. She glanced in a mirror and solemnly stared at her short red hair, which looked perpetually tousled; at the burst of freckles on the small, scrubbed face; then crossed her eyes and grinned idiotically. Hi, little wonderful girl next door! Can I speak to your husband? Your lover? Your pimp? Oh, your pimp's in the poorhouse? Avon calling! She stuck out her tongue at herself. Then sagged. Ah, Christ, what a life! She picked up her wig box, slouched downstairs, and walked out to the piquant tree-lined street.
For a moment she paused outside the house and gulped at the morning. She looked to the right. Beside the house, a precipitous plunge of old stone steps fell away to M Street far below. A little beyond was the upper entry to the Car Barn, formerly used for the housing of streetcars: Mediterranean, tiled roof; rococo turrets; antique brick. She regarded it wistfully. Fun. Fun street. Dammit, why don't I stay? But the house? Start to live? From
