Cooking the Books (29 page)

‘Not a chance,’ I told her, seeing as the Magnolia was a real bakery, not a fictitious one. And wondering what sex had to do with the city. ‘Anything to do with TV is out of the question. Why not think of another name? It’s medieval in theme, isn’t it? Why not Ye Olde Cake Shoppe?’ I said ironically, pronouncing the extra syllables.

‘Brilliant!’ exclaimed Bernie.

This is, as the Professor had remarked, a generation without history . . .

We continued baking. As I let the Mouse Police out to scavenge the alley, Jason came in. He helped himself to a muffin, bit and chewed.

‘Not bad,’ he said. His cool was a trifle studied, but Bernie was so excited about her new cake shop that she told him all about it and supplied him with a door-stopper of yesterday’s rye topped with a slab of cheese big enough to feed a family of mice for a month. Which precluded further comment as I got on with the kneading. He was looking tired, I thought, a bit dishevelled. And he smelt quite strongly of frying oil and chicken. He was working his way through his sandwich with his usual concentration. Jason must have been born hungry. Bernie was concluding her design for her Los Angeles shop as he finally swallowed his last mouthful.

‘Need any help?’ he asked.

I could have hugged him but I always make mistakes in the morning and I just said, ‘Take over the kneading, will you? Bernie needs to do her icing.’

‘Okay,’ he agreed laconically. He washed his hands with special care and started to beat the dough into submission. This is a very soothing occupation. While doing so, however, he was watching Bernie like a hawk as she beat egg whites for her icing. Jason still wanted to learn. This was heartening. Bernie, also, would probably not mind teaching someone. We worked in silence for a while.

Silence is good. It contains no possibilities for putting foot in mouth. Bernie finished her icing and took out her prepared roses. Jason shoved his tins into the oven and came to look.

‘Pretty,’ he commented.

‘They’re easy,’ she told him. ‘I can show you how to make them?’

‘Show me,’ he said.

I did the rest of the baking as Bernie showed Jason how to make icing roses (they are easy enough if you have a steady hand and endless patience, which I do not). Jason made some of his own. They were interesting if a little free-form and he had a heavy hand with the food colouring. Jason’s roses were not delicately tinted pastel ones. They were bright red and bright blue.

‘I can use them tomorrow,’ said Bernie. ‘They have to dry. You’re pretty good,’ she told Jason. ‘Come tomorrow and make some more?’

‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘Gotta go get some sleep. All right, Corinna?’

‘All right,’ I agreed. When he had gone, I just had to hug Bernie. She bore it well.

‘I told you he’d come round,’ she pointed out. We loaded everything and Daniel, who was half asleep, and to the tune of ‘One More Cup of Coffee’ we drove to Harbour Studios.

No tricks this morning, so the kitchen was not so tense. The conversation was mostly about a vampire movie which I had not seen. The lettuce snippers were solidly Team Edward while the meat cooks—perhaps appropriately—were all for Team Jacob and the werewolf way. I have a writer friend who claims that all literature is a metadrama and this is certainly true with fantasy. Anne Rice introduced vampires like Lestat, truly unhuman and chilling. Then other writers took up the idea and spun it as pleased themselves. Though every such novel I read these days seems to have not only werewolves and vampires, but also fairies. I live in hope of another supernatural creature being discovered. I am getting tired of blood suckers and puppy dogs. And tall, exceptionally beautiful men with long hair . . .

I beguiled my pastry making with fantasies of what Daniel would look like with hair to his waist. Ooh! I knocked off only as I realised that my hands were becoming too hot. This is bad for pastry. I stuck it all in the fridge and tried to cool myself down as well. I poured a glass of lemon barley water which Tommy supplied for the staff (in homage to Carême, I believe) and drank it. Lovely. Not fizzy. Breakfast was going out and I joined the servers.

As I handed around my tray of toast I wondered if what the dish pigs had said could be true. Might Ms Atkins’ missing baby boy be here? Was someone on this set concealing the dreadful secret that they had been born Zephaniah? There were a lot of people, but the choice was limited by age. Zephaniah must be about twenty. That left out Ethan and a lot of the crew, who tended to the grey-haired. What about the actors?

Now Harrison must be about the right age and he was an actor right down to his impeccable manicure. On cue—I swear sometimes actors know when you are thinking about them, like cats and children—he sidled up to me and selected a piece of toast. Goddess, he was gorgeous. Dark eyes. Dark hair. Ms Atkins had blue eyes. But then, I didn’t know who the father of this child was. Genetics were not going to be a help. Even if I could remember what recessive meant.

‘How’s it going?’ Harrison asked.

‘Looks good from where I’m standing,’ I told him. He beamed.

‘I thought that entrance was too fast,’ he confided. ‘I’m only in shot for seconds. I tried a slower saunter but Tash hurried me. I hate,’ he said, looking down the length of his classically perfect leg and haunch, ‘being hurried.’

‘I thought it was very effective,’ I assured him.

‘Really? Was it hot?’ He gave me an electric smile, white teeth, red lips.

‘Red hot,’ I said. ‘Sizzling.’ Not even for research would I endure Harrison any longer. Besides, he was hogging the toast. I moved on.

Who else could be the lost Zephaniah? Did anyone show signs of a rigidly Christian upbringing in the Church of Perpetual Suffering? The trouble is that could take people many ways. Look at Aleister Crowley. He was brought up by Plymouth Brethren. And didn’t they regret it . . .

Probably not Ali the sound man. He was so very Muslim. Though he was the right age. Sound men have hard lives: they age early. The world is just so full of noises which are not the right noise. He smiled and declined food.

Just as I approached Ms Atkins I heard her shriek at Emily, ‘You stupid slut!’ She raised that wonderful voice so no one on set could miss a word. ‘I said my red shoes! Are these my red shoes? I think not! Look at them! Go on, look!’

She slapped a strong hand on Emily’s shoulder and forced the girl to her knees, compelling her to inspect the shoes. They looked red to me. I could not watch this. If Tommy wanted to sack me, she could sack me.

I strode up to Ms Atkins and grabbed her arm, releasing Emily, who stayed on her knees, crying like a fountain.

‘That’s enough,’ I said firmly.

Ms Atkins struggled. She might spend two hours a day at the gym, but I spent my life subduing dough and I was stronger than she was. ‘You’re behaving like a child,’ I told her. ‘So I’ll treat you like a child. Now you are going to your room until you can keep your temper and behave like a grown-up. Get up, Emily, you’re not hurt,’ I instructed.

The rest was easy. I escorted Ms Atkins, who had not said another word, back to her dressing room and pushed her inside. She slammed the door on me, which was fine. I gathered up Emily and deposited her in a chair, calling to the kitchen staff for a large brandy. Then I looked around. I had an audi- ence. The cast and crew were standing stock-still and staring at me. There was a long silence. Ethan grinned and made a thumbs-up sign.

‘Corinna,’ said Tash.

‘Can I have your autograph?’ asked Harrison.

‘You go, girlfriend!’ said Kylie and Goss in unison.

Then Ethan began to applaud and the others joined in and I was standing in front of an appreciative audience of actors and crew, blushing.

There was only one thing to do. I bowed, and went back to the kitchen.

There Tommy was waiting for me. I forestalled her.

‘If you want me to quit, Tommy, I’m happy to write my resignation as soon as I can find a bit of paper and a pen.’

But she was smiling. ‘No, no,’ she assured me. ‘Stay! I would love to give you a bonus! That has so wanted doing and no one dared to do it. But you can have some of the good brandy if you are feeling at all faint.’

‘I think I could manage to feel faint if it is the good brandy,’ I replied.

It was. It was Armagnac. I sipped it with a little water. It looked like there was no way that I could get out of Harbour Studios except feet-first. A not-very-nice thought. But I could not loll around here all day. I had pastry to roll out and pies to make.

I had just put the last quiche in the oven and was dusting flour off my sleeves when Emily came into the kitchen. She really was a beautiful girl, even with her hair dishevelled and her blue eyes red.

‘Came to thank you, Corinna,’ she said softly. ‘No one has ever stood up for me before. My Twitter buddies are really impressed.’

‘Oh, good,’ I said. I was vague about Twitter.

‘It’s not their fault,’ she went on. ‘All the people I know are in the business, you see, they can’t confront Ms Atkins. They’re sorry for me but there’s nothing they can do.’

‘And what are
you
going to do?’ I asked. ‘Have you thought about another line of work where you won’t be relentlessly bullied?’

‘Oh no,’ she protested. ‘This is all I have ever wanted to do. I’m going to be an actor. No matter what. Ms Atkins or no Ms Atkins. This is my chance. I’ve worked all my life for it. Left everything.’

I asked her to sit down and smuggled her one of Bernie’s rare not-quite-right cupcakes. I poured her a cup of my own special tea from my own special teapot. She started to talk.

It was a common enough story, I suppose, but delivered with the sort of absolute faith and zeal which sent Joan to the stake. Strict parents who did not approve of her aspirations. Drama class at school. Then the scholarship to NIDA, the cutting of all ties with her family, the loss of every friend she had made. New place to live. New skills to learn. Dance classes which ricked the muscles, memorisation which strained the mind. The girl knew nothing but acting. She seemed not to have seen any films—except ones from which she could learn. Read no books—except theatrical memoirs. She ate, drank, breathed and slept the stage.

‘So you see,’ she laid a little hot paw on my arm, ‘I can’t give up, no matter what she does to me.’

‘Yes, I see,’ I told her. And I did see. ‘But I have a suggestion. Stand up to her.’

‘I can’t ! She’d sack me!’

‘No, I don’t think so. She hasn’t hotfooted it in here to demand that Tommy sack me. Yet. I suspect she’s highly strung and overtired and underfed and she just tends to shriek. Try shrieking back. Well, it’s an idea,’ I said, relenting as Emily’s head drooped like a failing flower.

‘Corinna,’ said another voice. I knew that one without turning around.

‘Daniel,’ I said, relieved. I really don’t like emotion.

‘Ms Atkins has emerged,’ he told me. ‘She wishes to speak to everyone. Come along. You too, Emily. She can’t eat you.’

Oh well. It had been fun, in a way. I joined the whole crew as we gathered near the food. Ms Atkins was immaculate, as usual. She raised her head and looked each of us in the eye, one after the other, as she delivered herself of—my God!—an apology.

‘I’m so sorry,’ she said in her thrilling undertone, perfectly audible even to Ali, who was muttering something about infidels. ‘I have behaved appallingly. I am an unadulterated bitch and I apologise to each and every one of you and hope you might forgive me. Especially Emily.’ She held out a hand to the girl and Emily faltered towards the star to be hugged gently to the upholstered bosom. ‘You have all been working so hard and so well. I am sure that this is going to be a great success. We’ve got Tash, we’ve got Ethan and the crew, we’ve got fine young actors and excellent writers.’ The writers grinned, astonished. ‘We have to work together,’ she said, and I was amazed, because the whole seething mass of resentment was coalescing, in front of my eyes, into a warm pot of something like bouillabaisse. Complex, flavourful and, ultimately, fishy.

But that seemed to be it. Ms Atkins gave us all a beaming smile, kissed Emily lightly on the cheek, kissed Tash, even kissed Ethan, and they all fled back onto the set in a glow of collective endeavour. Actors.

I went back to the kitchen to tear off my apron and get out of Harbour Studios before I self-combusted. Daniel met me at the door.

‘Docklands,’ he suggested, and I said, ‘Wait.’

I paused at the lunch table and packed a box full of goodies which I had personally cooked. Bernie added some of her baked cheesecake. Then I grabbed the bottle of Armagnac and we left. If Lena’s father, Mr White, wasn’t home, then Daniel and I had a picnic. I was in the mood for spoiling the Egyptians. And if there were no Egyptians available, then Tommy would be an adequate substitute. I lifted the box and we stumbled out into the sunlight.

‘Phew,’ commented Daniel.

‘Did you see that? How they all forgave each other like little lambkins?’

‘I saw it,’ said my beloved. ‘I don’t altogether believe it, however. Come along. I think it’s that building.’

I shelved consideration of the scene I had just observed and followed Daniel through the canyons between the high- rise towers. This was a very expensive apartment building. Not as high as some of the others but well placed to get good views. The glass door was firmly shut and there was a doorman inside. Security.