The Gilded Life Of Matilda Duplaine

I looked at Rubenstein and saw something vulnerable in him. This was the man who had saved me from Milwaukee, where I probably would have been working beside my father in the lumber department at Menards.

“I’ll call her,” I said.

* * *

I cleaned my desk, filed a pile of old documents, scrubbed my spam folder, made my twice-weekly call to my dad a day early and did almost everything except call Lily.

There were myriad reasons for this procrastination, but top on my list was that the night was still untainted. Once I called Lily and she refused to help me out, I would go back to covering freeway expansion plans and a dull life in a modest apartment.

The only way I knew to reach Lily was through her shop, and once the clock had struck four I knew time was running its course. I had savored the night, and now there was work to do.

Ethan answered the phone on the fourth ring. I imagined him staring at the phone beside him, waiting a moment to pick up because Lily had probably instructed him not to appear too eager. I was told Lily wasn’t available. When Ethan inquired if Lily would know the purpose of the call I answered in the affirmative, and then I hung up quickly, before he had time to ask anything else.

* * *

Three days passed and Lily didn’t call. I couldn’t say I was particularly surprised, but I would be a liar if I didn’t admit the slightest bit of disappointment. Interestingly, the Duplaine story didn’t break—at the Times or elsewhere—and all was quiet from Rubenstein’s office.

As for the evening, it was like anything else in life; the farther one gets away from it the smaller it appears. What had initially seemed like a life-changing event became less consequential as days passed. The first night, I fell asleep hard on my back, and I dreamed of the leopard cat, tame under Carole’s palm and wild in the outdoors. The second day after, which I now remember as a day of waiting for my phone to ring like a schoolgirl waits for a call from a crush, I found myself thirsty for gimlets on ice and I longed to dive into the Blooms’ swampy swimming pool and swim with the minnows. By the third day I realized that the night that meant so much to me meant nothing to them. I was a mere reporter.

The upside of the dinner, however, lingered. Based on my Goldman story and the possibility of the Duplaine scoop, Phil Rubenstein had given me a decent assignment on the weekend box office, and I was typing it up when the phone rang.

“Cleary here.”

“Thomas, love. It’s Lily.”

My heart beat a bit faster, and I found myself straightening my spine.

“Lily, what a surprise.”

“Oh, I know. I do apologize. I meant to phone you back sooner, but work caught up with me. I had to fly to Aspen unexpectedly to pick out some wallpaper for a house and the jet lag has just about killed me.” I was about to remind Lily that Colorado was only one hour ahead of Pacific Standard Time, but then let it pass. “I must say, I absolutely loved your little story on my father. It’s been so long since he got press. He adored reading about himself in the papers.”

“I’m glad you enjoyed it.”

I heard the antique servant bell announce a visitor in the background.

“Oh dear, that’s a customer—and a dreadful one at that. Let me cut to the chase. I spoke with David this morning and he mentioned he’s making some personnel changes at the studio. I convinced David he should give the exclusive to you instead of that absolutely horrible Blaine Wyatt at the Reporter.”

Professor Grandy’s Journalism Rule Number Three: If a story’s handed to you on a silver platter, it’s either not worth eating or will cause food poisoning later on.

“I’ll be right there, Ethan,” Lily called into her store. “David’s assistant’s name is—” She paused. “Oh, I can’t remember now. I’m terrible with assistants. I know you’re busy, but take a minute to call David’s office and get the information. I think you’ll find it worth your while. They’re expecting you.”

“Thank you,” I said, trying to restrain my excitement.

“You’re welcome. Oh, and how rude of me. I haven’t stopped talking, have I? Did you need something the other day? When you phoned?”

I smiled. “I just phoned to say thank-you for the incredible evening and the overly extravagant gifts.”

“Midwestern manners. I should have expected nothing less. You’re more than welcome. It was lovely to have you. Now do call David’s office and let me know how it goes. Au revoir.”

There was a fumbling of the phone, and then the line went dead.

It took a few calls to get to the story, but once I did I was rewarded not just with personnel changes, as Lily had underestimated, but with the untimely firing of the president of the studio, who had been misappropriating corporate funds on private jets, award show after-parties, dresses for his wife and suits for his lover. I got to work, writing well into the night, pausing only to steal a quick cigarette on my balcony.

It was 1:00 a.m. I took a long drag of my cigarette and craned my head toward the hills. That sliver of a view of the mountains was the only reason I had gotten this crappy apartment in Silver Lake in the first place. I couldn’t even remember how I’d gotten here anymore, except for the vague fact that around three years ago I headed out to Los Angeles from Manhattan. It was supposed to be a temporary apartment—a stop on the way to greatness, someplace I would eventually point to and say, “Can you believe it? I started out there.” It didn’t happen that way. I would have left but for the fact I had no place to go.

I looked around me. It wasn’t close to being Christmas, but icicle lights hung on my neighbor’s balcony, and pot smoke wafted from his apartment day and night. Tall date palms stood high and mighty in the distance, but the foliage in our complex was the indigenous sort that required little water or sun. The U-shaped building was centered on a dilapidated courtyard. There was a sadness to it, because in the 1950s when the building was built someone had tried to make something pretty, but now the courtyard was neglected. Chairs with webbing too thin to sit on were sprinkled haphazardly around a swimming pool. The pool needed a new heater, and the hot tub was drained. Peeling plaster gave the water a cloudy and gray appearance.

I surveyed the surroundings one last time before crushing the remnants of my cigarette into the stone balcony. I had a deadline to meet.

Five (#ulink_2093b39e-6793-535c-8695-5af4f85e3724)

The story, in various incarnations, stayed on the front page for the next four days and then got mileage in Calendar and Business. We had scooped the Reporter, ditto for the online sites that were breathing down Rubenstein’s back. The story was covered by nearly every national publication—the New York Times to the San Francisco Chronicle—and I gathered them up and savored the words “The Los Angeles Times reported...” because the Los Angeles Times meant me. I knew the story and the scoop had nothing to do with me. Any community college journalism student who happened to have landed at the right place at the right time could have written the same article, but I was proud nevertheless.

I grew up in Milwaukee, the land of gratitude and manners. So I knew a token thank-you to Lily was in order. Choosing a present that I thought Lily would like was difficult on a reporter’s salary, so I did the best I could. I went to the most expensive department store in the city and chose the least expensive item there: a candle.

As I made my way over to the shop I thought of how quickly my prospects had changed. It had been just over a week since I had first met Lily.

The bell announced my arrival. The store was as cluttered as on my first visit, and it took a moment for Lily to emerge from behind the large Asian screen.

“Thomas! How are you, love?”

“Fine. I hope I’m not interrupting.”

“You could never be an interruption. What’s this?”

I looked around and became conscious of the candle I was carrying. Suddenly it seemed like a totally inappropriate gift. In my weeklong sabbatical I had forgotten how exotic and remote the world of Lily Goldman was.

“Nothing—”

“A candle,” Lily said, unwrapping it lustfully. “I absolutely love candles. It’s the most exquisite color of vanilla, isn’t it, Carole?”

It was only now that I noticed Carole lounging on a sofa, surrounded by pillows in various textiles and prints. She lay on her back, barefoot and beautiful as she had been the night of our first meeting. She looked as if she belonged in Marrakech or Casablanca, not in an antiques shop in Los Angeles.

“Truly a one of a kind” was her response. Her delivery was as polite as the sentiment was sarcastic.

“Carole’s here looking for pillows for her aviary,” Lily said. “This candle is absolutely spectacular, Thomas. You are so sweet. Isn’t he sweet, Carole?”

“Did you find anything?” I addressed both of them. I had no idea why one would need pillows for an aviary, or why one would have an aviary in their home in the first place, but I needed to quickly steer the subject away from the embarrassingly cheap gift.

“My first indication was to use this peacock fabric—” Lily pointed to an ornate fabric with stenciled peacocks, seemingly a perfect fit “—but now I feel it’s too predictable. I deplore predictable.”

Carole glanced at the peacock fabric with indifference, as if there was nothing about it that compelled her either way, and then she focused on her lap, at a script that lay open to a page somewhere around sixty.

“Your article on the terrible man who worked for David was brilliant,” Lily said, addressing me. “You are a fantastic writer, Thomas. Isn’t he, Carole?”

“He handled a tricky situation with aplomb,” Carole replied, flipping the screenplay’s page.

It was true. I hadn’t lambasted David as some of our competitors had. Instead I was deliberately gentle, exonerating David of blame while still maintaining my journalistic integrity. It was a strategic move on my part of course. I had to protect my position in their world, and it still felt very precarious.