Riverside Park Page 23

  “Where they shot all the Jane Austen stuff?” he asked.

  “Good grief, Howard,” she scolded.

  He looked at her.

  “There is no stuff in Jane Austen.”

  They laughed. And then while they sipped tea and nibbled food she talked about friends of hers who had an incredible production facility she would love to use. Howard told her about what Amanda was working on now, about Catherine the Great’s court. His mood was rapidly climbing toward euphoria. Since Hillings & Stewart represented Amanda, perhaps Georgiana Hamilton-Ayres could solve some of the agency’s long-term problems, too!

  “So we are in agreement?” Georgiana said. “You will ring my new agent?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Soon the topic turned to the possibility of her autobiography. “It defies the imagination,” she said, “that a casual comment to Spencer Hawes at a cocktail party in Los Angeles could translate into a three-and-a-half-million-dollar offer from a New York publisher scarcely a month later.”

  “That’s what happens when it’s a great idea.”

  “A great idea until paired with the prospect of working with Spencer,” she said. “I shouldn’t be unkind, I’m sorry, but it’s very difficult for me to believe that anyone who willingly married Verity Rhodes is sane.”

  “No, no—you would work with Kate Weston.” Then he explained Kate’s history. Though recently named publisher, she was a great editor and planned to personally edit a few titles, one of which would be this one.

  “I’ve met Kate. She was Jessica Wright’s editor. Alexandra and I threw the publication party for Jessica’s autobiography, as you may recall.”

  “Oh, that’s right. Rockefeller Center.”

  “Which frankly is why I’m here, Howard, because Jessica told me I should hear what you have to say.”

  He smiled, pleased.

  “I also met your wife at that party,” Georgiana added, pointing to the painting of Amanda, Emily and baby Teddy, which hung over the fireplace, “which is what interested me in reading her book. She’s lovely. I’d love to work with her. She believes she’s Catherine the Great, too, as I recollect.” They laughed and Georgiana sat forward to survey the desserts. “Go on, tell me more about Kate.”

  He listed many of the books and authors Kate had worked with over the years.

  Georgiana muttered something about an extra half hour on the elliptical and finally selected a miniature chocolate layer cake, remembering as she did so, “I would beg Cook to make this for me when I was a child.”

  “Where was that? On your family’s estate?” Howard asked.

  “My father’s home, yes,” she nodded, carefully taking a bite. “The kitchen was always the warmest place at Greycliff Hall. I was always cold there.” She smiled to herself. “In Beverly Hills Mummy had a Filipino kitchen boy who was always giving blow jobs behind the garage.” She looked vaguely alarmed at what she had said. “I apologize. That isn’t a very pleasant childhood memory to share.” She ate the rest of the little cake. “Unless people might like to read about some of those men behind the garage with our kitchen boy, one or two of whom happened to be very famous actors and directors.”

  Howard only smiled slightly, trying not to appear like a ghoul.

  “The situation is this, Howard,” she continued, shaking out her napkin. “I have spent an inordinate amount of time and money trying to forget the times when I felt helpless to do anything about what was happening to me and my parents. I don’t want to talk about my mother’s illnesses or lovers or suicide attempts. I don’t want to talk about what my father did to her, or what she did to him, or why I had to see all the things that I saw. I have no desire to talk about my ex-husband or anyone else in this world who has hurt me. Which means, Howard, unless people want to read about the role that dogs and cats and horses have played in my personal life, I have very little to offer in the way of an autobiography.”

  Howard felt his heart sinking. It wasn’t going to happen. She wasn’t going to do it.

  “So you tell me, Howard, why on earth would I want to write my autobiography at this point in my life?”

  “What exactly did you say to Spencer Hawes?” he asked her. “Because whatever it was made him think you’d do it. And sell him first serial rights to launch his new magazine.”

  “What? Muck about with those two? He must have been drunk.”

  “Do you remember what you said?”

  “I remember quite clearly. Spencer asked me how I was doing. I told him I was fine. He asked me if I was still seeing Alexandra and I told him you never know, he might be reading all about it in a day or two.” She leaned forward. “I meant in the Inquiring Eye, Howard, not writing my autobiography.”

  He nodded, feeling almost numb with disappointment. Well, that was that. Goodbye three-and-a-half-million-dollar book deal. Spencer Hawes must have been drunk.

  All might not be lost, though. At least not for Amanda. “Georgiana, if Catherine the Great did get made…”

  “Yes?”

  “And you were to play her…”

  “Yes?”

  “Might you keep a journal and take pictures over the course of the making of the film? Soup to nuts? And then later, when you had time, work on transforming it into a book? A memoir of filmmaking?”

  “That’s not a three-and-a-half-million-dollar book, Howard.”

  “Who cares if it’s a fifty-thousand-dollar book if you enjoyed writing it and it was good?”

  One exquisite eyebrow arched. “Like The African Queen? Only after thinking about it for thirty minutes instead of thirty years?”

  “And with or without an Oscar.” He smiled. “Well, let me start with the option status on Amanda’s book and then—” He cocked his head and raised a hand to his ear. “I think that might be my wife coming in now.”

  31

  Amanda Sees Her Old Friend

  “SO YOU SEE, dear,” Mrs. Goldblum said, holding Amanda’s hand, “everything is quite all right.”

  Amanda’s lower lip began to quiver and she bowed her head to hide it, looking at the hand-crocheted coverlet Mrs. Goldblum’s mother had made that was spread over the hospital bed. The bed could be cranked up so that Mrs. Goldblum could look out over the park and the river, and it had sides so she could not fall out.

  The Jamaican nurse’s aide, Virginia, was pleasant enough. The room was lovely, with flowers and a lot of pictures. What Amanda still didn’t understand was how all this could have transpired so quickly. She had seen Mrs. Goldblum a week before Christmas. Granted, she had seemed a little under the weather, and they had cut their tea short for Mrs. Goldblum to “have a rest,” but now to see her friend in this bed, to hear her faltering speech, was heartbreaking.

  “You—” Amanda’s voice broke. She swallowed and raised her head, struggling to smile. “You know this is difficult news.”

  “Of course,” the older woman said softly.

  Mrs. Goldblum’s hand felt so light in Amanda’s, scarcely weighing a thing. Her nails were filed though, and carefully painted in a muted pink. That would be Rosanne. And Mrs. Goldblum’s hair was done. It was not the way it used to be (her hairdresser had an unmistakable “do” for her), but it was still attractive. That was sure to cheer Mrs. Goldblum, Amanda knew, to be able to look at herself in the mirror and know however ill she might be she was still “tickety-boo.”

  “I’d like to the bring the children to see you, if that’s all right,” Amanda said.

  She smiled, her head resting back against the pillow. “I would like to see the children.”

  Amanda wondered how much Emily and Teddy would understand. The woman they had played Chutes and Ladders with on Thanksgiving was now preparing to leave this world and wished the people she loved to see her on her way. That much she had understood from Rosanne. Hospice was a process to familiarize everyone with the rites of death and to make the passage a loving one for the patient and their family.

  Daniel, Mrs. Goldblum’s
son, had been here this week, Rosanne had told Amanda. And he’d behaved well. (One would hope that at sixty years old he finally would!)

  “I’m sure Howard will be dropping by very soon,” Amanda said, taking a deep breath in an effort to maintain control. “I find it most fortunate that I was planning to spend much more time in Manhattan anyway.”

  This seemed to catch Mrs. Goldblum’s interest. “Oh?”

  Amanda nodded. “I need to be with Howard more. I want to spend more time with him.”

  Mrs. Goldblum made a sound expressing that she understood.

  Amanda took another breath, looking out at the river, and gave Mrs. Goldblum’s hand a squeeze. “I’m seriously thinking about moving the children back to Manhattan. Putting them in school here.” She looked at the older woman, unsure of what she would think of this plan. After 9/11 Mrs. Goldblum had been all for the exodus of the Stewart children to the relative safety of the suburbs.

  “A very wise decision, my dear,” Mrs. Goldblum said.

  Amanda blinked. She had not expected this answer. “You sound very sure.”

  There was a hint of a smile, but Mrs. Goldblum’s eyes were growing weary. “I am sure.”

  A few minutes later she drifted off to sleep and after watching her awhile, Amanda went to the kitchen. “She’s asleep,” she reported to Rosanne.

  “You okay?”

  Amanda crossed her arms over her chest and nodded, but then felt herself starting to give way. Rosanne pulled out a kitchen chair and guided her down into it, and Amanda lowered her head to the table and wept. The pending loss of Mrs. Goldblum felt unbearable. Why had she wasted all that time in Connecticut?

  She wasn’t sure how long she cried, but after a while she sat up, reached for a paper napkin, and then wept a little into that. She started to get under control when she felt a hand on her shoulder and she looked up to see Cassy Cochran. “I’m so very glad you’re here,” Cassy said softly. “And that you know. I don’t have to tell you how much you mean to Emma.”

  32

  A Walk in the Park

  CASSY AND AMANDA went for a walk in Riverside Park. “Look at the snow!” Cassy cried when they got outside. It was coming down thick and furious, blowing on the diagonal. It wasn’t a cold wind, though, but eerily springlike. Cassy pulled up the hood up on her winter coat and Amanda put on a knit hat. They walked north at first, against the wind, not down into the park proper but along the perimeter brownstone wall. Way down, on the river level, they could see the West Side Highway was jammed with cars trying to make it out of the city before the roads got bad. Amanda said they were too late, the roads were already bad in the suburbs.

  Amanda asked a great many questions about Emma’s condition and Cassy answered them as best she could. She explained that there was a tumor near her lung, that it might possibly be surgically removed and followed by chemotherapy, but Mrs. Goldblum had chosen to forego that route.

  “I don’t blame her,” Amanda said.

  “In truth,” Cassy said, slinging her arm through Amanda’s, “nor do I.”

  “She looks so tiny in that bed,” Amanda said. “She doesn’t seem to be in pain, though.”

  “She’s started on morphine,” Cassy explained. “The nurse will increase the dose as the pain increases.”

  “What does the doctor say?”

  “He’s signed off the case.”

  Amanda looked at her, blinking rapidly. “Is that because—?”

  “It’s the hospice process. If she doesn’t want to go back to the hospital, doesn’t want to be treated any longer, the charge of care transfers away from her doctor. He came by, I think Rosanne said. Or he’s going to. I’m afraid after a while I start to lose track. That’s why Virginia keeps that log. So we can all see exactly what has happened every single day.”

  Amanda looked at her. “You’ve done a great deal, Cassy.”

  She shrugged. “I wish I could do more.” She stopped. “This storm’s getting worse, Amanda, maybe we should turn around.”

  They did, walking back down the Drive. Amanda suddenly stopped. “Five weeks, Cassy. Only five weeks ago she was sitting at our dining room table trying to decide between pumpkin pie or pecan pie and she ended up eating a little of both!”

  Cassy didn’t know what to say.

  “Now she can barely—” Amanda held out her hand and then dropped it. “It’s not fair,” she said, starting to walk again. “Intellectually I understand she’s eighty-nine years old, Cassy, but I don’t care. Does that make any sense?”

  “I know. Why does she have to go when there are so many—?”

  “Vermin stalking the earth,” Amanda finished for her. “Evil violent creatures from hell, yet Emma Goldblum has to die.”

  “We all have to die,” Cassy said after a moment.

  “I guess this is what it takes for us to remember that,” Amanda said.

  Sleet was mixing in with the snow now and it stung Cassy’s face. The storm was turning into a nor’easter. They reached the Stewarts’ building and Amanda asked Cassy up for a cup of tea. Cassy wanted to say no—she had work piled to the ceiling to do—but the sadness in Amanda’s eyes prompted her to say yes, she would like that.

  The doorman let them in and they shook themselves off in the lobby. They went up to the eleventh floor and Amanda unlocked the apartment door. Howard was having a client meeting here this afternoon—Amanda explained to Cassy, taking her coat and hanging it up—so if Cassy didn’t mind they’d have tea in the kitchen. It was a large, bright, warm kitchen and Cassy helped herself to a seat at the round table in the bay window while Amanda put the kettle on. A moment later Howard came in through the swinging doors.

  “Hi, Cassy,” Howard said, seeing her first. He then went to Amanda and kissed her hello. Holding Amanda by the elbows he asked after Mrs. Goldblum.

  Amanda nodded. “She’s very ill.”

  “I’m so sorry,” he said sympathetically.

  “Cassy says it could be a matter of weeks.” And then Amanda burst into tears on her husband’s shoulder. Howard held her tight, stroking her hair and murmuring something. There was an exchange Cassy couldn’t hear and then Howard looked at Cassy over Amanda’s shoulder.

  “Could you tell my client I need a minute?” he whispered.

  “Howard, I’m fine—” Amanda started to protest.

  Howard kept his hold on her and nodded to Cassy to please do as he asked.

  Cassy touched at her hair for a moment before going through the swinging door into the dining room. She crossed the deep Persian rug and dark wood floors to reach the living room.

  Once there she didn’t know who was more surprised, she or Georgiana Hamilton-Ayres.

  33

  Cassy is Made to Feel Like the Lowest Form of Life

  “CASSY! IT’S BEEN too long!” Georgiana said, jumping up from the settee to give her a kiss and a hug. She held Cassy’s hands in her own for a minute, looking at her with genuine fondness. Then a hint of pain appeared in her eyes. Cassy knew she had to be thinking of all the dinner parties, cocktail parties, fund-raisers and birthday parties they had shared because of Alexandra.

  “I’m so surprised to see you,” Cassy said honestly.

  “Howard and I are talking about some possible book projects,” she said, releasing Cassy. She dropped her voice. “Bennett, Fitzallen & Coe wanted him to approach me about writing an autobiography. I told him a party or two might not be wild about me writing a kiss and tell—” She half grimaced. “And told him, no, I wouldn’t do it.”

  Cassy nodded. What else could she do? Then she remembered why she had been sent out here. “Howard asked me to tell you he needed a minute with Amanda. A close mutual friend of ours is dying. Amanda just saw her.”

  “Oh, I’m so sorry. What does your friend have?”

  “Cancer. But she’s older—”

  “That doesn’t make it any easier when you love someone.” She turned to look out the window. “That snow doesn’t look too
promising for my flight out tonight, does it?”

  “I think the airports are probably closed,” Cassy said. “It’s only supposed to get worse.”

  Howard came in and Georgiana said she really needed to get going. When they moved to the front hall to retrieve Georgiana’s coat, Amanda appeared, apologizing for barging in. Georgiana took one look at her and threw her arms around her in a hug, murmuring, “I know, I know, it’s very difficult,” while Howard and Cassy awkwardly looked on. Then Georgiana gave Amanda another brief hug, kissed Cassy goodbye, saying they should get together soon, and Howard saw her to the elevator while Amanda and Cassy returned to the kitchen.

  Amanda made a pot of tea and Howard brought the tea cart in from the living room. Cassy drank a cup of tea but passed on the food, watching the clock. As soon as it was polite to do so she made her apologies to leave and promised Amanda they would keep in touch.

  In the elevator, Cassy leaned back against the wall, holding the bridge of her nose a minute. She had the worst headache, either from the weather or the stress, she didn’t know. She did know she was on overload.

  As she crossed the lobby her heart sank when she saw the limousine waiting out front in the snowstorm. She knew who it was. She took a breath, pulled her shoulders back, and, as if she didn’t know who it was waiting for her, stepped out under the awning and pulled up her hood. Almost immediately the mirrored rear window of the limo went down.