Cooking the Books (7 page)

‘Wonderful,’ she said. ‘Bernie being useful?’

‘She’s excellent,’ I told her. ‘She could get a job in any pizzeria in the land.’

‘Have you finished your list?’ she asked.

‘Yes, that’s the last.’

‘Good, then would you like to watch a rehearsal? They’re just starting. Bernie can mind the oven.’

‘Why not?’ I was curious. I took off my apron and cap and rolled them for washing, told Bernie to watch her cooking times, then joined Tommy as she went into the large studio.

It was transformed. A set had been built. It was a strange construction. Open at the front like the diorama I had made from a shoe box as a child. It had desks and phones and a potted palm which was obviously pining for its tropical home. In front was a wilderness of wires and cameras and people. On the set were Kylie, dressed in a subdued skirt and twin set in which she would ordinarily not be seen dead, and Goss, wearing the same with a much shorter shirt and a tighter top. Ms Atkins, off camera, sat on her plastic chair as if it were a throne. The gorgeous Harrison, in lycras and carrying a bicycle helmet, waited off the set, as did a grey-haired man, a girl dressed like Tank Girl with platforms, I swear, at least ten centimetres high, another young man in a T shirt emblazoned with save the whales and Tash, the director, looking like she was longing for her rural retreat.

A young man snapped a clapper together and announced, ‘Scene three-oh-one.’

I noticed that Ethan and his crew were watching, but I could not detect any cameras operating. I looked at Tommy.

‘Just a rehearsal, no need for cameras yet,’ she told me. ‘We can talk. Grab a chair and let’s sit over here, where we can see.’

I complied. Ethan was lounging beside me, staring very intently at the brightly lit set. Goss cleared her throat. The actors were all watching Tash.

‘Action,’ she said.

Goss asked, ‘Where’s Ms Yronsyde?’

‘She’s not in,’ said Kylie quietly. ‘Not in a good mood, either.’

‘Chloe, she’s never in a good mood,’ said Goss. ‘I don’t think she has “good mood” on her database. What are we arranging today?’

‘Need a new venue,’ replied ‘Chloe’. ‘I can’t get a reply to my emails from that harbourside place. You’d think they didn’t want our business.’

If this was a sample of the dialogue which was supposed to support a whole series I couldn’t see it catching the popular imagination. Tommy nudged me.

‘It’s about the people who arrange weddings,’ she whispered. ‘That’s Chloe, who’s quiet, and Brittanii, who’s kooky. The geek girl is Felicia. Actually, Abby can’t even work a mobile phone, but she’s supposed to understand all the computers and so on. The grey-haired man is the accountant, Darryl, and the blond Elton is Matt the office boy and personal assistant. Harrison plays Adam, the courier. He’s the love interest. One of them, anyway. Pretty standard soap,’ concluded Tommy, as Tash sent us a warning glare.

I had never been seduced by soaps. Not even
Desperate Housewives
. And it did not look as though I was going to be. After a few more lines of this clunky dialogue, however, the door swept open and Ms Atkins as Ms Yronsyde appeared.

And she lit up the set. Really. Her perfect face was enamelled to the point of mask-like immobility. Her scarlet claws slid up the sides of her tight red suit. She had presence. The tension in the room went up like a lift and the actors started to respond to each other. The pace picked up. I sat up straighter.

‘Chloe’ and ‘Brittanii ’ snapped into their lines. The grey-haired accountant, entering, was unable to throw a wet blanket the whole length of the set, though he was obviously meant to be a dreary figure. When Ms Yronsyde went into her office, pausing at the door to deliver a blistering snub to ‘Chloe’, Harrison the beautiful sauntered onto the set and the air went electric with URST.

‘You see why they put up with her,’ said Tommy. I nodded. The woman was a bitch, but she was playing a bitch. She was utterly natural.

‘There’s nothing like it,’ said Tommy dotingly.

‘I expect not,’ I responded weakly. I had never seen anything as sexy as Harrison. The lycras moulded his thighs and buttocks, shaped like those of an Athenian bronze boy I had seen in the National Museum in Athens. He moved with the conscious grace of a ballet dancer. I was finding it difficult to breathe.

‘Gorgeous, isn’t he?’ remarked Ethan. ‘Pity he has a head full of feathers, like all actors. Tell him he’s beautiful and he’ll be happy all day.’

‘You’re not bad-looking yourself,’ I told Ethan. He suppressed a smile and looked away from me. Point made, I turned my attention to the action again.

Everyone feels better when you tell them that they’re beautiful. Admittedly, I did not have a lot of experience . . . until Daniel had arrived. He really thinks I am beautiful, God bless him. I still feel that he ought to get his eyes checked.

Reminded of what joys awaited in my bed, I stirred. Tommy grabbed my arm.

‘They’re getting to the good bit,’ she whispered. She was fascinated. I wasn’t, but it seemed rude to rush away. So I sat on the hard plastic chair and watched as Harrison—screen name Adam—cast his spell on the office of Kiss the Bride. He smiled seraphically. I heard Ethan mumble something about a close-up as he witnessed that smile. Then he sashayed out with a large box. I heard someone close to me sigh. Another one who appreciated beauty. When I looked around, the only person close to me was Emily.

The plot concerned finding a new venue for the wedding reception, the old one having burnt down most inconveniently. There were suggestions of arson. The accountant warned that they were running out of money and could not spend a lot more renting the new one. The geek girl rattled her computer keys and advised that they had three point seven hours to make a decision. Ms Yronsyde reproved Matt for looking sad, and it became apparent that she was a bully because the reason for his sadness was the death of his mother the day before. The scene finished with Matt bursting into tears and being comforted by the geek girl and Brittanii. And Ms Yronsyde stalking into her own office and slamming the door.

There was a general sense of relaxation until Tash went to the front with a notebook and began tapping keys.

‘Notes,’ she said firmly, and I made my escape.

Back in the kitchen, Bernie had successfully laid out all of the pizzas. They smelt divine. She was cutting them into neat slices with a pizza roundel. I really wanted to pinch one of them—margherita is my favourite—but I decided to refrain. Unless she offered. They were her works of art, after all.

Fortunately, she offered. Heavenly. The cheese was melted but not toughened, the tomato sauce was first rate and the basil agreeably abundant. Those actors were well served. I said so. Bernie beamed. I took the opportunity for some gossip. Actually, she started it.

‘How did the rehearsal go? They looked pretty wooden to me yesterday.’

‘They were until Ms Atkins marched in,’ I said, wiping crumbs off my lips. ‘She’s amazing.’

‘Great presence. She started off as a model, you know. Even when she was seventeen she could stalk along with that model walk and she found out that she loves an audience.’

‘Is she married?’

‘Was married, now divorced. Didn’t fit in to rich society. They took a dim view of her temper. Not done for members of the tennis club to stamp their feet and scream,’ said Bernie bitterly. I wondered at her tone. It sounded like she took this personally. Was Bernie the product of one of our excellent private schools who had abandoned ‘hit-and-giggle’ afternoons for terribly early mornings and pastry? Was she a disappointment to her wealthy parents, who had a daughter who was clean, neat and sober but not, as it happened, marriageable?

Now why I had I thought that? I shook my head and Bernie mistook the gesture.

‘Sorry, you probably play tennis,’ she said.

‘Certainly don’t. Silly game,’ I assured her. ‘Now, you need to serve lunch and I need to go home. See you tomorrow?’ I asked, gathering up my bag.

They were carrying out lunch as I exited past the rubbish bins and went back to Earthly Delights, which could be considered a tennis-free zone. They had tried to teach me at school, but because of my fine natural clumsiness I had never made it past the hit and had certainly not arrived at the giggle. One advantage of being a grown-up was that no one could make me shuck my clothes, stuff myself into a pair of shorts, and run out onto a freezing paddock to play hockey with an opposition who regularly maimed public-school girls. Life was tough on the young.

Insula, when I reached it, was free of hysterical young women. It was also free of Daniel, regrettably, who had his own apartment and crashed there when he felt like it. Horatio was waiting at the door, anxious for a stroll on the grass and a possible encounter with Mrs Pemberthy’s rotten little doggie, Traddles. Horatio could defeat Traddles with one Look. It was always worth watching. So I found the drinks container and took it and Horatio up in the lift to the roof garden, one of my favourite places, to sit down and contemplate the beauties of nature.

The temple of Ceres had been constructed by the same lunatic builder who had designed Insula to be entirely Roman. It had a life-sized statue of the goddess, her arms full of corn. Under her feet was a very comfy stone bench, on which I deposited myself and my cat, poured my drink (with a small libation to the Mother) and found a women’s magazine. It had presumably been left by that same Mrs Pemberthy, who was also in sight, urging Traddles to pee on a daphne bush. Horatio stalked off into the undergrowth on his own occasions and I leafed through the brightly coloured pages. Thin women in silly clothes. Celebrity gossip about celebrities unknown to me. I was getting bored—I didn’t recognise any of the names—when I sighted a familiar face. Molly Atkins sneered out of the paper. Well, well.

I settled down to read the article. It said, in a breathless rush of superlatives, that Ms Atkins had a part in a new, hush-hush project being made at Harbour Studios. That her clothes were more amazing than ever and her tragic past seemed not to be cramping her creative style. Tragic past? Molly Atkins struck me as someone who caused tragedies, not suffered them. The author did not explain, assuming that I knew all about it. Just then Mrs Pemberthy arrived, accompanied by her small, smelly, scruffy terrier, to reclaim her magazine. I held it out.

‘There’s an article about Molly Atkins,’ I explained. ‘I saw her today and I was curious.’

Mrs P’s face lit up. ‘You saw her? What’s she like?’ she exclaimed.

‘Looks just like her picture,’ I answered carefully.

‘No, really, Corinna.’ She sat down next to me. ‘You’re the lucky one!’

‘I’m just in the kitchen,’ I told her. Mrs Pemberthy was a poisonous old bitch and was not to be crossed lightly. She made tenants’ meetings hell and was always trying to get rid of my cats on the grounds that they were unhygienic. I did not want to needlessly offend her. Now she was settling in for a nice long gossip. Damn. I always knew women’s magazines were a bad idea, just as Grandma Chapman had said. Though that did not affect her affection for the
Women’s Weekly
.

‘She’s a bit temperamental,’ I offered.

Mrs P bridled with pleasure. ‘They say she’s an absolute monster,’ she replied. ‘I’m sure she’s an immoral woman,’ she added, sucking her false teeth.

‘Well, she’s playing a superbitch,’ I said. ‘Perhaps she feels she has to get into the part. Beautiful clothes, though.’

‘Too short and too tight,’ said Mrs Pemberthy.

‘Yes, well, they were rather short and tight,’ I agreed. Dis- agreeing with Mrs P always required preparation. And earplugs. ‘I really didn’t see much of her. I was baking.’

‘I’m not surprised that she’s got a temper, considering what she’s been through,’ opined Mrs Pemberthy cosily. This was shaping to be the friendliest conversation I had ever had with her. A gust of lavender water and mothballs engulfed me and I tried not to sneeze. ‘Does she look older and fatter in the flesh?’

‘I suppose,’ I said feebly. ‘What tragedy?’

‘Oh, her husband left her and then, just as she was preparing the party for her only son’s eighth birthday, he was struck by one of those wicked cars and died. Poor little boy. You wouldn’t think a mother could get over something like that.’

I couldn’t imagine what use Molly Atkins would have for a small child, except maybe as an entree, but I did not say so. I haven’t had children, what would I know? Come to think of it, Mrs Pemberthy had borne no children, either. But she was wiping away a sentimental tear. Traddles, assuming that I had caused his mistress to weep, bit me on the ankle. Horatio, appearing from the bushes, scratched him. He yelped. Trudi emerged from the arbour and yelled.

Then it all got a bit mixed but eventually Mrs P departed with Traddles and her magazine, mouthing curses. Leaving me to soothe Horatio, who was licking dog blood out of his claws with every sign of enjoyment, and Trudi to break out the first-aid box and hand me Betadine and bandaids. Her kitten, Lucifer, observed from her shoulder. He did not object to blood but Betadine made him sneeze.

After all that excitement Trudi sat down on the bench with me to share a companionable gin while Lucifer played ‘King of the mountain’ on her shoulder and Horatio ignored him. Trudi prefers her gin unadulterated by such abominations as tonic water, despite the risk of malaria. I chatted about gardening, about which I know very little, and wondered how, indeed, a mother could get over the loss of a son at such a young age. Was this secret sorrow the reason why Molly Atkins was such a bitch?