Desert Spring Read online

  I let the question pass. She was a fine one to hint that ulterior motives were lurking in my wardrobe. As a theatrical costumer, her own interest in clothes bordered on manic—well, everything about Kiki bordered on manic. But clothing was truly a fixation of hers. She changed outfits several times a day, and her style was anything but subtle. Tonight she wore peacock-blue palazzo pants and a gauzy peasant blouse covered with a sleeveless tunic of gold brocade. Nuzzling next to her huge hoop earring, I asked discreetly, “May I have a mint?”

  “Of course, love.” She ferreted through an enormous black vinyl bag, produced a tiny tin, extracted a pea-size mint, and popped it in my mouth. In her flowing robe, she conjured the bizarre image of a priestess in spike heels delivering a microscopic communion pill.

  As my saliva met the mint, it seared my dry tongue.

  A mob of other well-wishers spotted me and drew near. Leading the pack was Glenn Yeats. “Claire, dear,” he said, stepping forward, offering a hug, “remember the first time we met? I flew to New York to tell you about my plans to build Desert Arts College. Then and there, I predicted you would become the crown jewel of my faculty. Tonight, dearest, you’ve proved once again that I have an uncanny knack for fulfilling my ambitions.” He held me tight.

  It escaped no one that his fulsome words were as much a reflection on his own talents as on mine. And while the others didn’t realize it, his warm embrace conveyed more than affection. His hug was clinging and possessive, perhaps even desperate—revealing an insecure underside to the e-titan’s armor of bravura.

  He leaned to whisper in my ear, “We do make a handsome couple, don’t you think?”

  Other than the similarity of our ages—he was fifty-one, a few years younger than me—I’m not sure why he felt we were so well matched, but our pairing was a possibility he had promoted since the week of my arrival in California. “Not now, Glenn,” I whispered through a smile, and he released his grip.

  Spencer Wallace, the movie mogul, moved in. Ignoring Glenn, he grasped my hands and heaved a dramatic sigh, almost swooning. “Brava, Claire. Brava. It was spectacular, but then, I’d expect no less from you, dear lady.” He bobbed his head deferentially, presenting an odd image. At sixty, Spencer was at the height of his career, known and respected by all within the film industry—and feared by many, he was that powerful. Still, this man of aggressive vigor had begun to look old for his years, almost frail. He patted my hand. “Claire, I’m honored beyond measure to call you a friend.”

  “Awww.” I hugged him. “You’ve become more than a friend, Spencer.” And I gave him a light kiss. He beamed. Was it just my imagination, or did the other mogul in our midst, D. Glenn Yeats, bristle at this exchange?

  “I’ve brought a gift for you,” Spencer told me. Then he added, “Not here—at the party.”

  “Oh? You shouldn’t, Spencer.”

  “No,” Glenn agreed with a flat, dull expression, “you shouldn’t, Wallace.”

  Ignoring Glenn, Spencer told me, “It’s nothing, really—a hostess gift, a token of our growing friendship.”

  Arnold Manley, who’d been spotted and surrounded by part of the backstage crowd, managed to break through the throng of starstruck fans and join my own little circle of admirers. “Gosh, Claire,” he said, sweeping me into his arms, “I’d forgotten the excitement of working in your productions. I miss it.”

  I reminded Manny, “No one forced you to abandon the legitimate theater. The choice was yours.” I tried to lighten my stern words with a tone of humor.

  “Hollywood beckoned,” he explained with a shrug. Then, with true concern, he asked, “Do you think less of me for it?”

  “Of course not, dear.” Despite my assurance, my peevishness on this point was a matter of record. I was known to be a tad defensive—in speech and in print—regarding the stature of “real” theater versus the lowest-common-denominator mentality of films, which are generally produced to serve no purpose beyond mass consumption. But we’ll save that lecture. I told Manny, “I couldn’t be prouder of everything you’ve accomplished.”

  Spencer noted, “And now Tanner Griffin is on his way as well—our next rising star. The industry always needs fresh blood.”

  I doubt if the comment was intended as an affront to Manny, but I could understand if he interpreted it that way. Rather than openly question or rebut Spencer, which might have nasty consequences for Manny’s movie career, he simply stepped aside, saying nothing.

  “Ah, Miss Gray! There you are.” A man with a notebook, wearing a press badge on his sport coat, edged through the crowd and introduced himself as Kemper Fahlstrom, an entertainment writer for the Los Angeles Tribune.

  His name seemed familiar, and I greeted him cordially, but I didn’t mention that I rarely saw his paper; for arts news, I still looked to New York.

  “I’m wondering if you could spare a few minutes for an interview, Miss Gray. My editor is holding page one of the entertainment section, and I’d like to get something to him tonight. The show was wonderful, by the way.”

  “That’s very flattering”—I hesitated—“but I’m sorry. There’s a party at my home tonight, and I do need to rush along.” I noticed that the backstage crowd was thinning; they would doubtless beat me to my own party.

  “Claire,” said Glenn, raising a finger, “perhaps you should, for the good of the school.” He chortled. “Never turn away an opportunity for some page-one press—especially in LA.”

  I knew from previous discussions that Glenn had no particular enchantment with Los Angeles, but it happened to be the city where one of his two ex-wives, as well as his two grown children, now lived. He would waste no chance to demonstrate to them, preferably in print, that he had met unbridled success in his quest to reinvent his life by building, from the sand up, a world-class arts college in the desert.

  “Glenn, really … ,” I began to protest.

  My friend Grant stepped forward to mediate. “Claire, if you’d like to stay and do the interview, why not? Everything is under control at the house—the catering staff has been there for hours. If you like, I’ll scamper over and make sure everything’s up to snuff.”

  I really wanted to leave. “Well …” At the same time, good publicity would be its own reward, and it was part of my job to promote the school and its theater program. Needing reassurance from Grant, I asked, “You’ll play host till I arrive?”

  “You bet, doll. Do your duty.”

  Glenn Yeats breathed a contented sigh. “There now—excellent—all worked out. We’ll see you at the house, Claire.”

  And with that, my friends departed, as did the few remaining backstage stragglers who filed through a service door and headed out to the parking lot. With a reverberant thud, the big metal door closed, leaving me alone with the reporter.

  I led him onto the set, suggesting we use the sofa at center stage. As we sat, he readied his pen and notebook.

  “Now, then,” I asked, “what would you like to know?”

  2

  Our interview didn’ t take long. I steered the conversation away from me and focused on praising others. I lauded the school and the efforts of its founder, D. Glenn Yeats; I confirmed that the D stood for Dwight, but assured the reporter that Glenn never used it. I complimented the entire cast of Traders and singled out Tanner Griffin for his extraordinary interpretation of the role of Jerome. I wished Tanner well in his fast-approaching Hollywood venture while commending Spencer Wallace for casting Tanner in the starring role of his new film, Photo Flash.

  The reporter commented, “That’ll leave quite a void in your theater program here at the college, won’t it?”

  “We’ll muddle through, Mr. Fahlstrom.” Under my breath, I added, “There ought to be a law against such thievery. Spencer Wallace deserves a public flogging—or worse.” I playfully shook a knotted fist.

  The reporter laughed. “You don’t think much of movies, do you? Your loyalty to live theater is well known.”

  I hedged, �
�Films have their place in our culture. They can be highly entertaining.” I was speaking in code, of course, meaning that most movies lack substance, but my slur was too subtle for the reporter, who slavishly scribed my words. We were finished within a half hour.

  The night was warm as I whisked through the flat, open desert in my silver Beetle, heading toward home. Only the cleaning crew had remained at the theater, so I knew I would be last to arrive at the party I was hosting. When I turned off Country Club Drive, I saw cars lining both sides of the street in the quiet neighborhood where I now lived. Obligingly, the catering staff had cleared its trucks from the driveway, so I was able to slip into my garage and not have to worry about jockeying cars later.

  When I cut the engine, I could hear the thump of music within the house; the party was in full swing without me. I entered through the kitchen, feeling lost in my own home. Total strangers—in jaunty uniforms from Coachella Catering—crowded my kitchen, talking over the music, banging trays, rattling barware.

  “Ah, Miss Gray,” one of the staffers recognized me; his name tag identified him as Thierry. Was he French? “Welcome back. Mr. Knoll told us you’d be late, but I’m sure you’ll find everything is under control. Can I get you a drink?” He didn’t sound French.

  I had no idea who he was—probably the boss—but he’d asked the question I’d longed to hear, so I forwent the niceties of chitchat or introductions and accepted his offer with a grateful “Please.”

  “Uh, Erin!” he hailed a waitress from the living room. “Miss Gray is here. Could you take care of her?”

  She popped through the kitchen doorway. “Happily. This way, Miss Gray.” And she led me into the main room, where a makeshift bar had been set up on a pass-through countertop from the kitchen. She was pretty in a short, frilly maid’s uniform, black with a white apron. Young, no more than twenty or so, she had blond-streaked hair in the modern fashion, looking more artful than natural. With a smile, she asked, “What can I get you?”

  I hesitated. “Can you make a very dry martini, up?” I really did need liquor.

  “Certainly.” She set to it. While shaking my cocktail, she mentioned, “You have a wonderful home.”

  “Thank you, dear. I enjoy it.” Surveying the room, I could tell my guests were enjoying the party’s setting as well.

  The house was still new to me—the second home I’d occupied since moving to the desert the previous fall. Originally, I’d bought a small condominium in a cozy six-unit development in nearby Palm Desert. That’s how I’d come to befriend Grant Knoll; he’d sold me the condo and lived next door to me. But after a few months, I’d begun to feel cramped there. So Grant had found my current home in Rancho Mirage, nearer the DAC campus, declaring the new digs perfect for me.

  At first, I was skeptical. The house was of vintage “desert modern” design, built sometime in the 1960s. These midcentury houses had suddenly become hot-again properties in the Palm Springs area, with a bold, distinctive style that scoffed at tradition and promoted a futuristic aesthetic straight out of The Jetsons.

  On the day when Grant had first shown me the house, my jaw had dropped. For starters, the living room was triangular; in fact, there were virtually no right angles in the house. The living room ceiling, which was also sharply angled, continued outdoors and cantilevered over an expansive pool terrace, providing partial shade. Similarly, the stone floor of the interior continued through a wall of sliding glass to become the paving of the terrace. Though the building wasn’t huge, its blending of indoors and out created a sense of spaciousness and easy living. The house was being sold with its main room furnished—no frumpy sofas or stuffed chairs, but sleek leather-cushioned benches, chrome and molded-plastic chairs, and a zooty coffee table shaped like a boomerang. Grant insisted it was all to-die-for, and I had to admit, I found the retro decorating oddly appealing. It seemed not dated, but fresh, in sympathy with my personal crusade to begin anew. So I bought it.

  My old furniture, the threadbare junk I’d trucked from back East, wouldn’t do at all; I pitched it in toto, as I should have done before packing and moving it cross-country. I trusted Grant’s instincts and moved into my new quarters without changing a thing, with the exception of two minor additions to the living room.

  First, on a stretch of wall above the long, low fireplace, I’d hung a new collection of framed black-and-white art photographs. The pictures, of various sizes and subjects, were partly my own work, representing a hobby I’d recently acquired—yet another aspect of the surprising new life I was building for myself. The photos that were not of my own making were the work of Spencer Wallace. The famed movie producer had long sought refuge in his home darkroom as a means of escaping the stresses of a high-pressure career. What’s more, he’d nurtured a sentimental regard for black-and-white photography, telling me, “The medium harkens back to the golden age of the silver screen.” For a hard-as-nails businessman, he had a poetic edge, mostly hidden, that surfaced in his photographs. My interest in this visual pastime stemmed from Spencer’s; he’d taught me the basics in his own darkroom, and through this shared interest, the two of us had nurtured our unlikely friendship. The fused collection of our photos over the mantel shared not only similar frames, but similar styles.

  On a wall across from the fireplace, near the pass-through to the kitchen, was hung (incongruously, I admit) my other addition to the room’s decor—a small oil painting, a bucolic landscape featuring a crude drawbridge, rendered in a pointillist style. The minor masterpiece, charmingly quaint, had been attributed to Per-Olof Östman, who was said to represent the finest flowering of an obscure school of Swedish neo-impressionist painters. But that’s another story.

  “There she is,” said someone, snapping me back to the moment. With the realization that their hostess had arrived, my guests clustered around me with a chorus of greetings, making it difficult, though not impossible, for me to enjoy my first sip of Erin’s icy, bone—dry martini. Where there’s a will, there’s a way.

  “Claire! It’s stunning,” said Iesha Birch, director of the college art museum. I presumed she was referring to my new—but old—home, which she had not previously visited. She continued, “It’s a pristine example of the postwar exuberance that immediately preceded the era of Cold War paranoia.” She hugged herself, shaking the big toothlike beads of a primitive, painted necklace. “I adore it. It’s such a statement.”

  “Isn’t it, though,” I agreed through a thin smile.

  She ushered forward a man who was familiar, but I couldn’t quite place him. Iesha asked, “Have you met I.T. Dirkman, the renowned architect?”

  “Of course. Silly me.” Taking care not to spill my drink, I extended my hand to shake his. I. T. Dirkman was currently one of the hottest “name” architects around. He had designed the entire campus of Desert Arts College—nothing but the best for Glenn Yeats. I had met with the designer several times during the early phase of planning my theater. “How nice to see you again, Mr. Dirkman. Welcome to my humble home.” Since I had never heard what I. T. stood for, I felt at a loss when addressing him.

  He glanced about our surroundings. “Not humble at all. It’s splendid, Claire, splendid.” I kept expecting him to add, Call me Ishmael—or perhaps Iggy or Ian—but he never did.

  Glenn stepped up behind the architect, clapping an arm around his shoulder as if he owned the man. “Ah, I. T., it’s like a dream come true. Who’d have thought, a year ago, before DAC opened its doors, that such an esteemed assemblage of talent could be gathered in one place?”

  I noticed Spencer Wallace working his way toward the bar with an empty glass, so I seized the opportunity to introduce the producer to the architect, reinforcing Glenn’s assertion that we were an arty crowd indeed. They greeted each other warmly, praising each other’s work, but I noted that Glenn had backed off some, taking little interest in their conversation.

  Stepping aside, I asked Glenn, “Is something wrong?”

  He shrugged. “Somehow,
I doubt if I. T., a true artist of the highest order, has much in common with Wallace, who’s essentially a promoter.” Sniff.

  I might have reminded Glenn that he himself was essentially a computer nerd who’d hit the jackpot, but that seemed injudicious. Instead, I reminded him, “Spencer is the best in his field, as is Mr. Dirkman. From the look of it, they’re getting along just fine.” They were. I had no doubt that Glenn’s offish behavior stemmed from his competitive nature, which sought to disparage Spencer’s phenomenal success.

  The crowd at the bar had grown thicker, so Erin slipped into the kitchen for a moment to replenish the ice and ask for help. She returned with another server, Carl, and together they took orders for drinks. Another waitress, Mindy, plied the crowd with a tray of appetizers, which were quickly snapped up, requiring a return visit to the kitchen.

  Tapping his empty glass, Spencer excused himself from I.T. Dirkman and stepped to the bar. “Uh, Erin, might I have another Virgin Mary, please?”

  “Of course, Mr. Wallace.” She reached for a pitcher of tomato juice.

  I knew most of the people present—they’d been involved with the show—but there were a good number of faces I didn’t recognize, guests of guests and other hangers-on. There were easily fifty people present, probably far more, and my “spacious” new home was feeling crowded. As the April night was still warm and comfortable, some of my guests had drifted out to the terrace. Plucking a mushroom cap from a waiter’s tray, I decided to join them.

  It was a perfect, clear night in the desert, the sort of weather that prompts visitors to move here. One of the strongest selling points of the house I’d bought was the view from its back terrace. Clusters of palms framed a postcard vista of the ruddy Santa Rosa mountains, but tonight those features were merely black voids against the star-filled sky. A swimming pool—my own, what a rush—stretched along the far end of the terrace, its light casting blue ripples on the underside of the overhang from the house.