Riverside Park (27 page)

ALEXANDRA WAS SITTING
on the windowsill of the master bedroom in Cassy's old apartment, watching the storm. Jackson was stuck in Washington, and the only reason Alexandra had been able to get here after the newscast was because the man who plowed West End had given her a lift. She had showered; her hair was in a ponytail and she was naked beneath the terry-cloth robe. “I can't believe Georgiana has no idea it's you.”

Cassy laughed softly into her pillow.

“Why are you laughing?”

Cassy drew herself up to sit, holding the sheet over her breasts. “Because, my darling, you are the only person on the face of the earth who would choose me over her.”

“That's not true,” Alexandra said, turning back to the window.

“I appreciate the sentiment, but it is true,” Cassy said. “No doubt Georgiana thinks it's some lovely young woman who will keep the home fires burning for you.”

“I bet Georgiana didn't say anything to you about how she would leave for a month at a time,” Alexandra said, “and then reappear when she felt like it, expecting me to drop everything.”

“I don't think Georgiana ever expected you to drop anything. It sounded to me as though she had been planning to stay home with the baby, at least for a while.”

“Oh, come on, Cassy,” Alexandra said, sliding off the windowsill, “give me some credit, will you? Don't you think I had a pretty good idea of what raising a child with Georgiana would have been like before I broke it off?” She walked over to stand at the foot of the bed. She had been eager to make love after her shower because of the storm, she said. There was something about storms that did it to her. But as soon as Cassy mentioned that she had seen Georgiana, Alexandra's desire had vanished and agitation had set in.

“Compared to Georgiana's upbringing,” Alexandra said, “dragging a child and a nanny around the world with her would be, in Georgiana's eyes, idyllic. Punctuated by visits to the farm to ride in a pony cart with the child's other famous lesbian mother. Namely me.” She sighed heavily and dropped down on the bed, her back to Cassy. “We had to have major battles before having a child. And I had to win those battles before I would agree to it.”

Cassy felt a twist of something cold in her stomach. Alexandra had wanted a baby. She had wanted to have a baby with Georgiana, and only when they couldn't come to terms had she broken off the relationship.

Alexandra hadn't chosen her over Georgiana. She had broken it off with Georgiana over the child and then had come to Cassy.

She was Alexandra's second choice, not her first.

“I wanted the child's home base to be here, in the East,” Alexandra said. “Not here a month, in California a month and then flitting around the world, Scotland this week, on location the next.” She paused. “But Georgiana would have none of it, there was no way she was giving up California.”

Alexandra headed into the bathroom. A short while later she came back out. She took one look at Cassy and hurried to sit next to her. “What's wrong? You look sick or something.” She felt Cassy's forehead. “What is it?”

Cassy couldn't lie to her. It simply wasn't possible anymore. “I think I misunderstood why you broke up with Georgiana. I thought—Oh, it's stupid, it doesn't make any difference,” she muttered, looking away.

Alexandra gently pulled her chin so Cassy had to look at her. “Tell me.”

“I thought you left Georgiana because you couldn't live without me.” She closed her eyes after tears sprang into them and offered a bitter laugh. “How could I be so stupid,” she said, bringing a hand up to cover her face.

“What are you talking about?” Alexandra said, sounding irritated. When Cassy didn't answer, she pulled her hand away. “But I
did
leave Georgiana because I
don't
want to live without you. I never have.”

“But that was only after you disagreed about—”

“What is the matter with you?” Alexandra interrupted. She gave Cassy's shoulders a little shake. “Look at me. I love you more than anything or anyone on the face of the earth. That is the truth. I tried to run away from it because I was so angry you wouldn't leave Jackson. And looking back, thank God you didn't leave him, because I think that would have been the end of DBS News.”

Cassy's heart was beginning to slow down a little.

“I couldn't make you leave him, and it took me a while to realize that having part of a life with you was better than a wholehearted commitment from Georgiana, or at least what she considered was wholehearted.” She had sadness in her eyes. “I spent twice as many nights with you, like this, than I ever did with Georgiana. And then to drag a child into it—” She held Cassy's face in her hands. “I wanted to be with you. Any way I could be.” She kissed Cassy, but Cassy could tell her mind was elsewhere.

“I think I understand,” Cassy said tentatively.

“I don't have a problem telling Georgiana about us,” she said, brushing Cassy's hair back from her face. “But not yet.” Alexandra lowered her hand, thinking. “Move over a little, will you?”

Alexandra always slept on the right side of the bed, but now she slipped under the sheets on the left and lay on her side to look at Cassy. “If you and I ever do get together, I mean
really
get together, you know there is going to be a lot to deal with.”

Cassy had never truly been able to imagine
living
with Alexandra. And if she did some day, and word got around, it would take a long time before friends and family would come to believe it. Not because Alexandra was a woman, but because they wouldn't believe Cassy could ever fly in the face of her conventional upbringing.

“When and if we ever do make a life together,” Alexandra continued, “I will tell Georgiana before anyone else.”

“I felt like the lowest form of life today,” Cassy said after a moment.

“I can imagine,” Alexandra murmured.

“I almost told her.”

“I'm not surprised.” Cassy dropped her eyes and Alexandra reached for her hand.

“I'm scared,” Cassy whispered.

Alexandra's grip tightened.

“I'm so much older than you are,” Cassy said. “It's hard to believe—”

“Still beating that dead horse, are you?” Alexandra brought Cassy's hand up to her mouth to kiss. “May I make a suggestion?”

“Yes.”

“Might you consider one day truly placing your trust in me? You did it with Michael. You did it with Jackson. Maybe you should try doing it with me.”

Cassy closed her eyes, feeling the anxiety. “The thing is,” she said, opening them, “I didn't trust them, Alexandra, not really. What I did was hand myself over to them and trusted that they would fix my life. Fix me.”

Alexandra bit her lower lip.

“I pray to God I've learned to trust myself. To at least believe that I am the person who knows what's best for me.” They looked at each for a minute and then Cassy smiled. “You are best for me.”

“
YOU
ARE
DIFFERENT
,” Rachel told Celia. Rachel and her boyfriend were sitting at the breakfast bar and the smell of fresh coffee had lured Celia from her bedroom. “We were just talking about it.”

“It's not supposed to kick in for six weeks,” Celia mumbled, getting a mug. “It hasn't even been a month.” She was still feeling very self-conscious about the antidepressant her mother's doctor had persuaded her to try.

“Well, I'm telling you, Ceil, you're different.”

“Okay,” Celia said, pouring her coffee, “like how?” She went to the refrigerator to get some milk.

“Well, for one, you're up and it's nine o'clock in the morning,” her roommate said, nodding in the direction of the kitchen clock.

“Two,” Rachel's boyfriend piped up, “you haven't gotten blasted out of your mind.”

“Three,” Rachel continued, “you're putting your dirty clothes
in the hamper that I've never seen you use before. And your room's not perfect, but it sure is a heck of a lot better than it was.”

“And four,” the boyfriend said, nudging Rachel, “she cooks now.” He looked over at Celia. “I never knew you could cook. And be such a great cook. You've left us dinner like five times now.”

Celia sipped her coffee, leaning back against the counter. She didn't feel different, really. Maybe a little more energetic. And she didn't seem to be so short-tempered. And impatient. And she felt, well, hopeful or something. Did antidepressants give somebody hope?

“And you haven't cried at a commercial for a while,” Rachel added. Her boyfriend gave her a kiss and whispered something in her ear that made Rachel beam. “And we think maybe your junk habit is a career or something. It makes you really happy.”

Celia smiled. She had been selling a few things on eBay. She did as much research as she could about the objects to get an idea of what they should at least sell for, but the world on eBay still held many surprises. One of the glass doorknobs she had listed she figured might go for ten bucks to someone looking to replace one in their old house. But the bidding went crazy in the last five hours of her seven-day listing and the bids rocketed up to $172. When she e-mailed the guy who had won it, asking why he had wanted it, he wrote back to say he believed it was a kind of crystal doorknob that could only have come from one of the old Russian palaces. Someone, perhaps a refugee, he said, must have brought it with them to New York.

But the most exciting thing that had happened was her mother had taken her to an auction house, Nest Egg Auctions, in Meriden, Connecticut. They called it a country-style
auction, which appeared to Celia to be as different from a formal auction as a proper golfing outfit was to a tux. There was no catalog to follow, but each item—and there was tons of stuff—had been meticulously cataloged and put on preview so buyers could note their lot numbers. It was a family owned and operated enterprise, which cheered Celia up for some reason. Probably because all the family members seemed to be having so much fun with each other and with the bidders. There was the head auctioneer, Ryan Brechlin, his mother, Mary Ellen, Ryan's brother, Christopher and sister, Jen, and her husband, Adam.

Celia had not been prepared for how the atmosphere of Nest Egg would affect her. As soon as she came through the door of the vast auction hall she felt a buzz, the kind of buzz she felt around certain kinds of old things and places. It happened in museums and it was happening now. She looked in awe at the endless tables of boxed lots, at the pieces of furniture that circled the auction hall, and the paintings and prints and photographs hanging from, or leaning against, the walls. It was a stunning display.

“Isn't it marvelous?” Celia's mother whispered.

While her mother registered and got them a bidding number, Celia claimed two seats in the back and surveyed the room. There were only fifteen minutes before the auction started. Where should she begin? The buzz in her brain told her there was something very, very special in here. She just needed to find it.

She headed for a couple of paintings in lovely old gold-leaf frames. She guessed they were from the same owner because their theme—landscapes or waterscapes in oil—all resembled southern France. There were prints, some in good shape and others not. There were some framed magazine ads from the
1930s. Nothing spoke to her, though. The furniture lots were interesting. There were plenty of practical modern pieces, but a couple of the older pieces were intriguing. Celia waved to her mother after she looked under a pair of empire end tables. They were mahogany, with a single drawer, dull brass handle and claw-feet. Her mother nearly swooned. “How much do you think they will go for?”

“This far north? I have no idea.” They were ninety miles from New York, twenty from the Fairfield County line and thirty from the Gold Coast. Celia looked around the auction room. There were people who looked well-heeled but for the most part the bidding crowd looked to be the kind of people she ran into at tag sales, flea markets and bazaars, which led her to believe they were here to buy things to resell, whereas people like her mother were looking to buy for themselves.

“Look at that,” her mother had marveled, pointing to a hand-painted glass globe that belonged to aVictorian lamp. (Celia intuitively knew it was original. How did she know? She didn't, not for sure. Still, somehow she just
knew
it was.) “Your great-grandmother had something like this in her front hall. She lived in one of those painted ladies in Bronxville, a great Victorian mansion with all the gingerbread, porches and towers.” (Celia's mother had told her about a hundred times.) “What is that, do you suppose?” She was pointing to a large brown metal box.

“I think they probably used it to measure electricity in the old days.”

Her mother looked at her. “Celia, how on earth do you
know
these things?”

“I don't. Not for sure.” She waved to one of the helpers on the floor. “Could you please tell us what this is?”

“It measured electrical currents so they could regulate the flow,” the young man said.

“My littlest angel,” her mother said after that, putting her arm around Celia, “I think you and I have some talking to do.”

“About what?” She had been assessing a wood-and-string contraption she guessed was some kind of ancient cot. (It turned out to be an old officer's field bed.)

“I think we should come to these auctions and then you should sell things in New York.”

“Old power meters?” Celia said absently, touching the stringing.

Her mother pulled her hair. “No, brat girl. Buy something and take it into that man you told us about in the Bronx. Put it in his auction. I'll stake you, Ceil. Two hundred fifty dollars. Buy something to sell in the city.”

Celia looked around the auction room with new appreciation. What was in here that might sell well in New York? Definitely the end tables she had pointed out to her mother. Maybe the oil seascape, although she was certain it would go for far more than two hundred and fifty dollars. There was also a curved corner cabinet with panes of beveled glass that was very appealing.

Her mother gave Celia a little shove. “There might be a business in here, you never know.”

Celia was almost afraid to speak. This would be too good to be true, too easy. To take her joyful pastime and try to make a little money at it? Wouldn't that wreck it? Jinx it? Take the fun out of it?

“The glass globe,” she said to her mother. “If there's one thing I would like to try in New York it would be that. I can take it in on the train.”

“How much would it go for, do you think?” her mother whispered, turning to look at it again.

“I haven't the slightest idea,” Celia said.

“Oh, Celia, I can just feel it in my bones,” her mother said, squeezing her arm. “We're onto something.”

Celia smiled, uncertain. Still, she could try to sell a few things and see what it was like. No big deal.

In the few minutes left before the auction began Celia moved quickly through the goods going up for sale. There were boxes of old tools; toys and dolls and people's figurine collections, boxes of letters, postcard albums, photos from WWII, car manuals from the nineteen-sixties (those should fly, she thought, not as something she wanted but as the kind of thing people searched on eBay to find, a manual to the old car they were fixing up), odd lots of china for daily use, bone china teacups and saucers, candlesticks (brass, glass, silver plate), fireplace utensils, old cameras, a box of
Playboys
, a box of nineteen-thirties business records for a defunct department store. It went on and on, table after table. Celia felt almost shaky now, overwhelmed with the idea of exploring her mother's suggestion but also wondering what it was in this room that was setting her off? There was some
thing
here on her radar but she had yet to see it with her eyes.

Ryan Brechlin was up at the podium microphone warning the auction would be starting shortly. Something under one of the tables caught Celia's eye and she made her way over, excusing herself in the crush of people, and squatted. In a cut-down Arizona Iced Tea box there was a pile of magazines, the size of the old
Life
, the top one of which was blue with a black-and-white photograph of a mounted equestrian lady holding a trophy.
Saddle & Bridle
it was called. Celia looked for a date.
1932
. She took a sharp intake of breath through her nose and gently picked up the magazine to look under it.
August, 1932. September, 1932
. She straightened up, rising to her feet. This box was coming home with her.

A glossy equestrian magazine of high society after the great crash of 1929? How big could that audience have been? The magazines were heavily illustrated in black and white, on acid-free paper and had obviously been tucked away in someone's attic. She moved on. (And looked back at them over her shoulder, as if to signal to the magazines they were not to worry.)

People were sitting down now and the aisles were clearing so Celia moved fast. Then something lying across the table to the side caught her eye.

Shotguns. Four of them.

She edged closer, aware that Ryan was above her on the dais ready to start. But she couldn't help herself, she had to reach out to one of the guns and touch the fine wood of its gunstock. She knew nothing about guns but the wood was such a gorgeous nutty-brown and the signs of wear only seemed to enhance it. The barrels were sleek, smooth and cold to the touch. The shotgun was broken open and the precision cut of the shell chamber fittings was fine. The whole piece was exquisitely made and Celia's mouth had gone dry, which told her this was it. The shotgun was the star of the room.

“Do you like guns?” Ryan asked her, smiling down from the podium.

She shook her head. “But I know I love this one. It's one of the most beautifully made things I've ever seen in my life.”

He smiled. “Then maybe you know more about guns than you thought.”

Celia sat down next to her mother. “Mom, you've got to buy the shotgun that's up there and put it in your auction for the historical society.”

“A shotgun?” she said, astonished.

“It's gorgeous.”

“Does it work?”

“Who cares, it's the most gorgeous thing I've ever seen.”

Her mother frowned a little. “I don't know, Celia.”

The auction began with the sale of an oil painting for seven hundred dollars. The next item was a simple cherry chair from the nineteen-fifties that no one seemed to be the least bit interested in. “All right, who will start me with five dollars, five dollars for the nice cherry chair, five dollars, come on, people, five dollars, that's less than what delivery would be from a furniture store—for five dollars you can break it up and use it for firewood, I don't care—” Finally someone raised their hand. When the chair went for five dollars, the entire auction room cried, “Five dollars!” Celia and her mother looked at each other and burst out laughing.

No, this was not like any auction Celia had ever been to before.

It fascinated Celia what moved and what did not in this part of Connecticut. The mahogany end tables came up and her mother joined the bidding, which ended with her mother's winning bid of eighty dollars. “I can scarcely believe it,” she gasped to Celia. “I feel as though I'm stealing.”

It was amazing. The hoosier went for three hundred and twenty dollars but a modern dining room table and chairs for only two hundred(!). The electric meter went for five dollars (“Five dollars!” everybody, including the Cavanaughs, cried), but a box of postcards went for one hundred and ninety dollars! When the first of the shotguns came up Celia felt her stomach tighten. “Not that one,” she whispered, which went for one hundred and ten dollars. “No,” she whispered on the next three (one-fifty, eighty-five and two hundred and ten dollars in succession). When
her
shotgun came up Celia elbowed her mother. Ryan explained that it had been made in Connecti
cut around nineteen-ten. “Don't bid until the very last second,” she told her mother.