The Charmers: A Novel(30)

At this point she had put on her spectacles and eyed him keenly for a long moment. He’d shifted under her glare, not knowing what to say, how to accept such a responsibility.

“Don’t worry,” she’d said. “All I want is for Mirabella to be safe. I don’t want her to go Jerusha’s way.”

“Jerusha?”

“Jerusha was her great aunt. And a murderer, you know.”

He stared back at her, stunned.

“Oh, don’t worry, it was a long time ago. Back in the thirties. Killed her lover, shot him, or so they said. I don’t believe it was ever proved. Still, it ruined Jerusha, ruined her career. She was a star, y’know, musicals, a singer, dancer, a great beauty. So they say.”

Aunt Jolly took a photo in a silver frame from the side table. “This is Jerusha.”

The picture was of a tall, rounded woman, her long red braid tumbling over shoulders bared in a low-cut evening dress, one foot in a silvery slipper peeping from the ruffled hem, a slender arm resting along the back of a silk chair, a cluster of lily of the valley in her hand. Her eyes looked into the camera confidently, Chad thought almost challengingly, as though she had to meet life and cameras dead-on.

Aunt Jolly said, “Jerusha was a woman who fought to get where she was, Dr. Prescott, and she was enjoying the fruits of her labors. Until she met the man who caused her downfall.” She took his empty cup. “More tea?”

“Thank you. And it’s Chad, please.”

“Well, with women, it’s usually one of two things that get them in the end. The first is money, lack of it, or working out how to get it. The second is a man. Personally I’ve always thought the man should be placed first. My cousin, Mirabella’s mother, had other ideas, which is why she got herself into trouble, and hence, years later, the reason for Mirabella. Who, it seems from all I hear, and the little I know of her, is a very smart cookie.” She smiled. “I do so like that expression, ‘smart cookie.’ Do have another Garibaldi, Dr. Chad.”

“Just Chad.” He took the cookie though he did not want it.

She put the plate back on the tray and got to her feet. “It has been nice seeing you, Dr. Chad. I have a feeling in my bones we shall not meet again.”

*

Now, standing on the steps of the Villa Romantica, gazing into the hallway, Chad remembered the old lady who had met her end so violently here. He wanted to know why.





22

Mirabella

I’m looking at myself in the long mirror, dressed for the Boss’s party, all snazzy in long aqua chiffon, cut low on the bosom and narrow on the hip, flaring out just sufficiently at the hem to make walking possible, though not probable. This dress, and the heels I’m wearing to accompany it, strappy gold five-inch sandals in fact, are definitely not meant for walking. In an outfit like this I might make it from a limo into a New York restaurant, but it’s doubtful I’ll make it into the front seat of that low-slung Jag. That is after squashing Verity into the back, though of course Verity is less disabled by her outfit, which consists, as far as I can make out, of a swathe of white silk hitched high on her right thigh, low to the knee on the left, with a strapless silvery bustier that clutches her small breasts in a lover’s grip, sending them spilling nicely over the top.

I smoothed my silver gloves, put on the sapphire ring. Verity was standing next to me. “Is that really what you’re going to wear?”

“That’s it.” I took the aggressor role before she could get onto me, as I knew she was going to, about being a bit more daring.

“At your age you should be flaunting it a bit. Shorter is almost always better. Wait, though, I have an idea.”

She dashed out of my room and returned moments later, brandishing a pair of scissors.

I held out a hand to ward her off. “What are you, girl, mad? This is an expensive dress, bought specially for the occasion, and I am a woman in my forties who knows her style and is sticking to it.”

“But you have great legs.” She stopped in front of me, twirling the scissors around three fingers. “We women must always understand what our assets are and make the most of them. That way men won’t notice our shortcomings. Like for instance your hair,” she added, eyeing her scissors once again.

“Jesus, girl, you are mad.” I retreated farther, hands up to my newly styled hair. I had taken a couple of hours out of my busy schedule and submitted myself to the ministrations of the hairdresser in the town square, a young man who did everybody of note in the area. Nobody went to the posh salons when they were on vacation in the South of France and dipping in and out of the sea or the pool all day. Waste of money. Even for that upmarket event the Boss’s party promised to be.

“Put those scissors down,” I ordered. Thankfully, Verity obeyed.

“But it’s so stiff,” she complained. “Your lovely red hair, sprayed to within an inch of its beautiful life. Wait, I’ll take care of it, I’ll set it free.” She grabbed a brush, shoved me into the chair in front of the mirror, and attacked my mane vigorously.

“Tilt your head forward,” she commanded. I obeyed.

“Up now, toss your hair back, shake your head.”

I did so.

“There, take a look at that,” she said proudly.

I looked, and looked again. I twisted my head to the left, to the right, shook my hair out again. It shone, a burnished red-gold cloud of waves in a way it never had before.