The Charmers: A Novel(64)

But the waiter was not talking. His eyes peered blankly out of those bandages. He did not even bother so much as to shake his head, to indicate he did not know. He simply sealed his lips and shut up.

The Colonel did not blame him; the reward for implicating the Boss would have been severe, and anonymous. This waiter, like the other one, would simply have disappeared.

Of course that possibility still existed but, with a shrug, the Colonel knew it did not matter anymore. What mattered was what Mirabella had to say. And Verity. Once he got her out of that bunker.





53

Verity

It was strange, mystical, almost, being held aloft over a stage on an ornately carved golden throne, as though I were the princess I had so often as a child imagined myself to be. Children have those kinds of daydreams, those fairy-tale fantasies they know in their hearts are not true, but in that moment they live them as though they were. Fond parents might call it a fertile imagination. They might say, “Oh, she’s always playing games in her head, inventing things, you know.” They called me a very “creative” child.

But now my head buzzed unceasingly, crammed with odd thoughts, memories, wishes … and how I wished I might be somewhere else, other than playing princess for the Boss. And, oh my God, could that be Mirabella with him?

The stage lights were blindingly bright but I knew it was she, I could tell by her fiery red hair, though I could not make out the details of her face. Yet I could see she held a glass of wine in her hand. Surely that meant this was a social occasion, that everything was alright and what was happening to me was a prank, some kind of joke. Yet I heard no laughter.

The lights were suddenly lowered, except for a spotlight aimed at me, on my throne, and at the objects on either side that I could not see because I could not move my head, which seemed imprisoned in a kind of collar. I tried turning my neck but it was impossible.

I called out, “Mirabella, help me.” At least I thought I had spoken but no words seemed to come out. All I could do was look at her. She had saved me once, on the train, and again when the car went over the canyon. I had the sinking feeling that this time my luck had run out, because sitting next to her was the Boss.

“Well then,” the Boss was saying jovially, rubbing his hands together in anticipation. “A little more of the Montrachet, I think, Mirabella, while you admire my show.”

Mirabella

I am looking at Verity and I am living a nightmare. A horror story, some kind of theatrical event staged with real-live participants, and which I know with a cold feeling in my gut can only end in tragedy. I feel the Boss’s eyes on me as I stare at his montage, his little “show,” at Verity’s blank face, and the golden halo that outlines her head. Her blond hair is pulled back so severely I feel sure it must hurt, but then so must the metal halo, and the wide matching collar, half hoops that I know must also be gold. The Boss would not have stinted on his show. The gold would be real gold, as would the large emeralds in her ears, and in the rings on her thin fingers. In fact Verity seemed so emaciated I didn’t know how those rings stayed on. Her fingernails were enameled a deep red, as were her toes.

Then the golden curtain that had parted to expose Verity slid farther to the side, and there, mounted to the black wall beside her were the taxidermied heads of two donkeys. Each donkey wore a golden halo.

“So, you see, how lifelike it all is?” the Boss said. He was remembering the two donkeys he’d liked so much when he was a child, and how he’d ultimately had them executed, then sold them as fake “venison.” He sat back in his large chair, rubbing his hands together again, in anticipation of more to come.

I was already on my feet. The fragile crystal glass smashed on the floor, wine went everywhere, rich as blood. He grabbed me and I shook him off with a strength I did not know I had. Verity’s eyes were fixed on me. Her mouth moved but she was not saying anything, but I saw her bare toes curl and her thin fingers were gripping the arms of the throne as she tried to lift herself up.

I lunged at that small stage, took the two steps up in a single leap. Fear gave me a weird strength, an energy I did not know I still possessed. The horror of Verity up there, with the embalmed donkey heads on either side of her hit me, and I knew it was what the Boss intended for her too. He wanted to make his collection complete with the young blonde. He would place her in the center, all three wearing their halos, maybe even the emeralds. It was the way some very rich men paid to have rare paintings, Leonardos or Raphaels, stolen from the walls of museums so they might place them in their own secret “museum,” a special place nobody had access to but themselves. And where they went to gloat alone over their stolen beauty.

I knew that place would be the Boss’s bunker, and that Verity was destined to be displayed there, his ultimate trophy, on that wall and I did not know if I could save her. Nor did I know what was going to happen to me. I heard the Boss laughing as I ran toward her.

“Mirabella,” she said, her voice a whisper. I saw that her eyes were dry as though she could shed no tears. I also saw fear in them. I gripped her hand in my gloved one. The sapphire sparkled in the strong light. Between the two of us we were at that moment worth a small fortune in jewels. And we would have given it up, everything, just to be free.

Quite suddenly all the adrenaline that had given me my fake strength drained from me. My knees gave way and I sank to the floor, resting my head on Verity’s bare feet. They were so cold I feared the worst, yet I could feel a pulse beating, slowly, steadily.