A-Splendid-Ruin(45)

“Yes, of course,” I said heavily, turning back.

Now, Goldie came from her room. She looked beautiful in soft pink. The only thing marring her prettiness was her disgust. “For God’s sake, what is she doing now? What are you doing, Mother? Shin, why isn’t she in bed?”

“She won’t come, miss.”

The layers of Goldie’s silk gown skipped about her ankles as she gave her mother’s arm a little jerk and said, “Let go of Shin now, Mother. That’s right. Back to bed with you. Really, you are making a terrible scene.”

As on that first night, my aunt seemed to lose her will at Goldie’s touch. She let her daughter lead her back to the bedroom.

“I wish I knew what to do,” I murmured to Shin. “She always seems so alone. How often does my uncle look in on her? I’ve never seen them together.” I could not help the snarly thought of the Dennehy woman, my uncle’s mistress, nor my resentment that she was undoubtedly keeping him from my aunt’s side.

Shin said, “It is better if he stays away.” Then she followed Goldie and Aunt Florence.

Only Goldie and laudanum seemed able to soothe my aunt. Goldie had a way of making problems and worries disappear, to distract until one was so wrapped up in her world that one’s own seemed no longer important. We were all so pliable in Goldie’s hands, weren’t we?

It seemed a lucky thing. I did not know how she managed it when her own worries loomed so large. Goldie came from her mother’s bedroom, looking more beautiful to me than ever now that I knew her vulnerability. She smiled. “Are you quite ready, May? We don’t want to be late.”

The Anderson house was only a few blocks away. Italianate, with a ballroom decorated by a colonnade of classical Greek figures that put the indecent, gilded Sullivan bacchante to shame, and festooned with bunches of silk leaves in golds and reds and oranges, basket cornucopias spilling dried corn and pinecones—all very November, celebrating the coming holiday when there was no real evidence of it outside. The weather had turned damp but showed no seasonal change, not like Brooklyn. I did not miss it really, but I did warm to the decorations.

Mrs. Jeffers Anderson was as small as her house was huge, and she was plump and wore her beaded blue-and-gold Parisian Worth gown with easy elegance. It seemed everyone we knew was there, and though I smiled and tried to enjoy myself, I was bored before we arrived, already knowing that I would feel awkward and lonely, and still upset by my aunt’s fit.

Goldie looked for champagne as I went to the French doors, which were opened onto a parterred garden.

The soon-to-be-famous soprano stood near a gushing fountain in the garden, surrounded by adoring fans. She was dark haired, bejeweled, and beautiful, her voluptuousness encased in shot green silk, emeralds encircling her throat and enhancing her double chin. She chattered away to her circle of admirers, and I wondered if her excitement was real, or if she too was simply playing at being engaged.

“Hard to believe she grew up selling sardines on Fisherman’s Wharf, isn’t it?”

The voice in my ear was familiar. I turned to see Dante LaRosa, dressed in a suit—not evening wear—and suddenly the tenor of the night changed; here was something interesting at last.

“Why, if it isn’t Mr. Bandersnitch, in the flesh. What are you doing here?”

“Not so loud.” He winced. “And I was invited. At least, Bandersnitch was.”

“You cannot tell me that no one here suspects who you are. You stand out.”

“Do I? I think it’s only because we’ve met. You’ve never noticed me before. Not at the Cliff House, not anywhere.”

I was flummoxed by the truth of his words. It was the most discombobulating feeling. I couldn’t reconcile his charisma, or frankly, his out-of-placeness, with his apparent invisibility. I wanted to tell myself he’d simply never been to the events I’d attended. But of course he had. He’d written about them. He’d written about me.

He smiled. “People see what they want to see. They’re busy trying to figure out who Bandersnitch is, but what they don’t expect is someone who looks like me, so no one sees me, even when I’m right in front of them. I’m hiding in plain sight. I stay in the background mostly. It’s a damnable thing, but it works. You were surprised at who I was, remember. I wasn’t as you imagined me.”

“No,” I admitted. “I’d thought you shorter.”

“An old woman with cats.”

“Not exactly. A roundish blond man with a liking for cream puffs.”

“You’ve just described Ned Greenway perfectly. I trust you’ll keep my secret.”

“And if I don’t?”

He indicated the soprano laughing just beyond us. “Verina Lombardi’s real name is Anna Russo. Not quite so fancy, is it? She used to slide around in fish blood at the market and pretend she was skating. Once, she threw a calamari in my face. She has a bad temper.”

“What’s a calamari?”

“A squid.”

I made a face. “What did you do to offend her?”

“What makes you think it was my fault?”

“Wasn’t it?”

“I tried to kiss her. It was a festa.”

“I see.”

“She was irresistible. Even back then she had this voice . . . Nothing sounds as good as Verdi sung from the fishmarket. She and Luigi Conti used to duet. He had the stall next door to her father’s.”