Embers (77 page)

Emily's mouth was full.  She shook her head.

"I did.  A doozy."  Cara rolled her eyes and tossed off the rest of her sangria.  "I met him at one of daddy's bank things.  From across the room I thought he was the most handsome man I'd ever seen.  From a foot away he was even better.  Snappy dresser; sexy drawl; bluer eyes than mine.  There was only one little hitch ...."

"He was married?"

"He was investigating daddy's bank."  Cara dropped her head into her hands, then looked up with a hopeless, tragic smile and motioned for a refill on her wine.

By the time they left two hours later, Emily and Cara were both convinced that for a tragic situation, Cara's dilemma was pretty darn funny.  Feeling mellow and amused, they wandered aimlessly and contentedly through the lineup of exquisite shops on
Newbury Street
.  They paused to stroke a fine Italian handbag here, an Inuit soapstone carving there.  They stared in the window of a florist for a full ten minutes, choosing the flowers for their wedding bouquets, just in case.  Cara tried on an Australian outback coat and a pair of lizard boots, bought them, and arranged to have them delivered.  The bill came to $3,l37.40.  She wrote a check.

Emily didn't mind.  She figured that in
Boston
she could get along pretty well without either an outback coat or lizard boots.  In general she felt pretty immune to impulse buying.  She tried on a handmade sweater from
Ireland
, for example, but convinced herself that it was too scratchy.  She picked up a stoneware mug from
Scotland
and walked around with it for a while, but then she put it back on its shelf.  It wasn't hard:  in every shop, thoughts of her mortgage hovered sadistically overhead.

Until she ambled up to the window of a shop called, with charming understatement, "Something Old."   The shop specialized in estate jewelry, and the window display was enchanting.  Scattered on a bed of deep maroon velvet were a dozen pieces of antique jewelry, mostly of diamonds and pearls.  Their owners were there too, in sepia photographs whose edges were curled with age--grand ladies in
fin de si
è
cle
ball gowns, their throats ringed in thick chokers of pearls, their tiny waists encircled with diamonds.  There were tools of their trade as well:  a mother-of-pearl hairbrush and a silver comb, and an intricate, hand-painted fan of ebony.  In every fold of velvet a random treasure lay partly hidden:  a ruby hat-pin; a set of pearl tear-drop earrings; a tortoiseshell button-hook.

  Emily was charmed by all of it, from the tiara to the button-hook.  But it was a necklace of pale pink stone that cast a spell over her and held her fast.  It was not a magnificent piece, or even an elegant piece.  It was -- an odd piece.  The big rectangular stone, set in delicate gold filigree but hung on an extremely heavy chain, was like nothing else in the window.  Emily couldn't imagine a woman of either taste or wealth having adorned herself with it, and yet it was undeniably old.  Something about it -- the way the track lighting bounced off its facets, or the gypsy look of it -- made her want to know more.

From over her shoulder she heard Cara say, "What a funky piece.  I like it." 

The words struck dread in Emily's heart.  Until this moment she had not known she wanted the necklace.  "I like it, too," she said, a little fiercely.

"Let's go in and try it on, then," said Cara, oblivious to the fact that there were two of
them
and only one of
it
.  She looped her arm through Emily's and tugged.  "Maybe it's some rare and exotic stone."

"You mean rare and expensive stone," Emily said wryly. 
This is going to be it
, she thought. 
The thing that finally does in this screwy, illogical friendship
.  But she went in with Cara anyway, trying desperately not to resent her money.

The saleswoman, a Coco Chanel lookalike, passed immediately over Emily to focus on the Possible Sale.  "May I help you?" she asked Cara in a cultivated voice.

"Yes, that funny pink-stone necklace in the window," said Cara.  "We'd like to see it."

The saleswoman wasn't quick enough to hide her surprise and -- Emily thought -- disappointment.  "Oh.  That one.  Certainly."

By the time she laid it out carefully on a swatch of black velvet, though, the woman was back in business.  "It's a charming little trinket, don't you think?  It's turned quite a few heads.  Very unusual."

Cara lifted it from it from the velvet and said, "Heavy; is the chain solid gold?"

Emily's hopes sank.

"Oh, no," said the saleswoman, releasing a tiny smile.  "Some sort of plating.  The stone is possibly rose quartz, or maybe pink tourmaline.  It's costume, which is why the price is so reasonable."

Emily's hopes rose.

Cara turned over the tiny white stringed tag.  "Five hundred dollars?"

Emily's hopes sank.

"It really
is
just costume, then," Cara said, disappointed.

Emily's hopes rose.

Why, why, why, you dopey fool!  You don't keep five hundred dollars in your sugar bowl; Cara does
.

Cara held the necklace up around her throat and gazed at herself in a gilded mirror on the wall.  "Pretty," she said musingly.

"Your color sets it off well," said Ms. Chanel, tilting her head and touching one red fingernail to her chin.

Emily thought she might possibly explode.  "May I?" she asked through clenched teeth.  Never had she wanted to possess the way she was wanting now. 

Cara smiled and handed it over with an "I can't decide, I really can't."  Clearly she did not consider that Emily was in the competition for the purchase.

Emily felt the sheer weight of the necklace in her hand, held it up before her, stared at the odd shafts of light in the pinkish crystal.  Her hand was trembling.

"Oh, look, the stone is chipped!" cried Cara.  "On the back.  How really too bad!"

"Well, of course it isn't a
diamond
.  And it's old," said the saleswoman, a little irritated.  "But if you were really interested," she said to Cara, still pitching to her alone, "I suppose I could --"

"I want it," Emily said suddenly.  "I want the necklace."

"You
do
!  Oh, I'm so glad," Cara said, breaking into a surprised and beautiful smile.  "It suits what you're wearing so well."

"Cara, these are not my normal --" Emily began, and then gave it up.  It didn't matter to her whether the necklace suited or not.  It didn't matter whether it was chipped or not.  It almost didn't matter whether it cost five hundred dollars or not.  It only mattered that when she held it in her hand, she felt completely, bizarrely satisfied.

"And how will you be paying for that?" asked the saleswoman politely.  She had dropped all mention of what she could or could not do, seeing as it was chipped and all, but Emily did not dare or even want to re-negotiate the price. 

"VISA," she answered faintly, handing over her card.

"Let's put it on you," said Cara excitedly as the clerk wrote up the sale.

She undid the heavy clasp and lifted the chain over Emily's head.  Emily watched the big pink stone pass in front of her and come to rest on her breastbone.  The necklace felt heavy and icy cold.  She caught her breath -- she couldn't breathe -- and let out a sharp, frightened cry.

"Oh, sorry; did I catch your hair?" asked Cara off-handedly as she struggled to close the lock.  "This clasp is a wicked thing to work."

"No ... no, it surprised me ... with its weight, that's all."

"Okay, turn around and let's see what we've got," said Cara, ready to be amused.  Emily did so, and Cara said in an altogether different voice, "
Emily
.  It's wonderful on you -- strange, and overwrought, and --wonderful.  I can't get over the change it makes in you," she said, sounding puzzled.  "It makes your cheeks glow, your eyes shine --"

"Embarrassment is making my cheeks glow, Cara; stop it," Emily murmured as she eyed the saleswoman approaching with a tissue slip for signing.  "It's just a piece of jewelry.  Nothing more.  Nothing less."

When Emily was finished, they stood outside on the brick sidewalk in the late warm sun, deciding what to do.

"I'm shopped out; how about you?" Cara asked.  "Maybe a cup of coffee before we split up?"

Emily, suddenly exhausted, agreed.  "I think I'm having an attack of buyer's remorse," she admitted.  But even as she said it she brought her hand up to the rose-colored stone and was comforted by its being there.

Her ambivalent mood lasted through coffee with Cara, and on the subway ride home to
Charlestown
, and all though supper and an evening of dull summer reruns.  The facts were undeniable:  Five hundred dollars would've paid for a toaster oven, a new muffler for the Corolla, a year of cable T.V.., a whale-watching trip in Provincetown and, say, half a dozen seafood dinners at the No-Name Restaurant. Instead she'd blown it on -- what?  A chipped crystal and a lead-heavy chain. 

So why did it feel so good to have it?  Was it because for once in her life she'd bought with her heart instead of her head?  And got one big treat, instead of a dozen little ones?  Was it because she'd thumbed her nose at Miss Coco Chanel?  Or was it just because -- she desperately hoped not -- it felt so satisfying to behave like a rich girl instead of a working one.

She stared down at the rose crystal that she'd been idly rubbing.  Emily did not care for jewelry very much, but she cared for this.  There was something soothing about the feel of its clean-cut facets, and the filigree work really was quite intricate and very pretty.  In the soft light of her deco lamp the stone gleamed more amber than pink.  She gazed at it in half-dreamy pleasure.  She'd once had a cat with eyes that shade of amber.  She could almost hear him purring in her lap as she rubbed his chin; feel his silky fur as she stroked his back.  Spooky had been gone for fifteen years, but, oh, Spooky was there with her now.

Chapter 3

At eight o'clock the next morning Emily placed a jelly doughnut and a large black coffee from Dunkin' Donuts side by side on Stanley Cooper's desk.  "For you," she said.  "Because life is good."

"Meaning, you actually got somewhere with the senator yesterday."  Stan wasn't surprised.

But Emily was.  "How did you know I met with the  senator yesterday?"

Stan popped the lid on his coffee.  "For one thing, I heard that Lee Alden's mother had some kind of attack.  Alden's brother was away on business in
Czechoslovakia
and couldn't get a flight over.  That left the senator to fly back up.  They thought it was her heart; turned out it was her stomach."

"And for another thing," he said, sipping the hot stuff gingerly, "you took a vacation day:  out of guilt, because you were about to do a nutty thing.  So.  You really nailed down the interview?"

Emily busied herself with unfolding the wrapping from her croissant.  "What d'you do, read tea leaves?"  It was vastly annoying that Stan went to bed last night knowing more about the senator than she did.

Stan shrugged.  "I observe."  He took a monstrous bite out of his jelly doughnut; a blob of bright red filling oozed out and landed in a plop on his knee.

"Ah, hell," he said from under a powdered-sugar mustache.  He dabbed uselessly at his pants leg and said in irritation, "I mean, why else would you have bought that absurd bauble you're wearing around your neck, unless you were feeling mighty pleased with yourself over something?"

Automatically Emily's hand went to the crystal necklace.  She hadn't taken it off since she bought it, nor was she about to.  "Tsk, tsk; you're taking out your jelly on my jewelry, Stan."

Stan was heading with a napkin for the water cooler, still muttering, when the phone on Emily's desk rang.  She picked up the receiver.  It was Jim Whitewood, the senator's aide, wanting to know whether she'd be available for a twelve-thirty call from the senator.  "Of course," Emily answered, and he rang off.

Emily considered whether to brag to Stan about her continuing contact with the senator and then thought better of it.  Maybe Senator Alden was canceling.  In any case, she didn't want Stan sitting with one ear hanging over her desk at lunchtime.

Luckily it was a slow news day; at twelve-thirty the newsroom was pretty empty.  When the phone rang promptly at the half-hour, Emily lunged for it, aware of a kind of first-date giddiness.  If she were, oh, a hall monitor, then Arthur Lee Alden III was the high-school quarterback.

"Miss Bowditch?"

"Yessir."

"Ah.  You're in."  It was his voice all right; but something was wrong.

Canceling, dammit.  She saw her Pulitzer Prize going straight down the tubes.  "Senator?  You sound very ... tentative," she hazarded.  "Are you having second thoughts?"  She closed her eyes and grimaced.  Idiot!  Give him an opening, why don't you?

His laugh was low and rueful.  "I'm having second thoughts, third, maybe even fourth.  Not about the interview, though, but over what I'm about to suggest."