Never Too Rich (48 page)

Lydia looked at her. “Vampires, if I remember
correctly, sleep in their crypts during daylight hours. Since it’s
a bright, sunny morning, we’re safe,” she said with false cheer.
“From vampires, at least,” she added ominously.

“
Maybe,” Boo Boo agreed with a
sideways glance. “But we’ll stay out of the cellars, agreed? I am
not
going to set foot anywhere below ground inside that
monstrosity, Lydia. You know how I loathe anything with more than
four legs—and a lot of four-legged things as well.”

“
You forgot these,” Anouk called
out the open back door of the Rolls.

Lydia turned back to the car and leaned down into
it, looking at the keys dangling from Anouk’s hand.

“
What about you? Aren’t you
coming?”

Anouk shook her head.

The car was equipped with a built-in bar, ice chest,
and television set, and she was comfortably ensconced in all that
roomy luxury. She had the latest issue of French
Vogue,
a
cellular telephone, even a few books. Why leave all the comforts of
home?

“
No, darling, you two go on ahead,”
she said. “Empty rooms are your specialties, are they not?” She
jingled the keys.

Lydia snatched them. “Oh, all
right.
Come on,
Boo Boo.” She started wobbling cautiously across the drive in her
white lizard sling backs, and the heels immediately sank deep into
the sand.

“
What on earth could have possessed
us to wear good clothes for
this
outing?” Boo Boo
grumbled.

“
I don’t know, but I sure wish I’d
worn flats. Or sneakers. Or better yet,” Lydia said with violent
distaste, and shuddered, “engineer boots.”

Chapter 49

“
Of course, Ms. Robinson. Ms.
Shawcross said you would be joining her for lunch,” the headwaiter
said with a slight bow. “She is already at her regular table. If
you will follow me, please ...”

“
Thank you.” Edwina followed him
through the marble Grill Room of the Four Seasons, that lunchtime
club of New York’s publishing bigwigs, where clout was measured not
merely by the table one occupied, but by the table one occupied
each and every day.

But this clubby exclusivity held true only in the
Grill Room, not the larger dining room with its pool, and only
during lunchtime. At dinner, the one-hundred-and-ninety-seat
restaurant on East Fifty-second Street, which had been designed by
Philip Johnson and Mies van der Rohe, and which featured originals
by Picasso, Rauschenberg, and Miro in its austere museumlike
setting, became just another expensive restaurant catering to
anyone properly dressed.

Liza Shawcross remained seated as Edwina approached.
Then she smiled and offered an outstretched hand. “So we meet at
last,” she said. “Have a seat and please call me Liza.”

Edwina shook her hand and sat. Liza made it sound as
if she’d been dying to meet her—a result of the
WWD
article,
no doubt. “In that case,” Edwina said, “call me Eds. All my friends
do.”

“
Eds it is. Would you like a
cocktail? I got here early and have already ordered
mine.”

Edwina looked at Liza’s champagne glass. She noticed
that there was no ice bucket beside the table, no bottle of vintage
champagne wrapped in a napkin.

Liza laughed and held the glass up.
“Faux
champagne,” she said, eyeing its sparkly pale golden liquid.
“Enough apple juice to give it color, and the rest is sparkling
water. If I drank anything alcoholic for lunch, I wouldn’t be good
for anything the rest of the day. I’m afraid alcohol goes straight
to my head.”

Edwina looked at her with respect. “I’ll have the
same. I know precisely what you mean.”

Liza smiled. “Bring two more of these,” she
instructed the hovering waiter. “And one menu.”

“
Yes, Ms. Shawcross.”

“
I know this menu like the back of
my hand,” Liza told Edwina. “Thank God they offer a few items of
spa cuisine. If I didn’t constantly diet, I would blow up like a
balloon.”

They made small talk until the drinks and menu came.
Liza lifted her glass in a toast. “To success,” she said to
Edwina.

“
I’ll drink to that,” Edwina
said.

They both sipped. Edwina perused the menu. “I’ll
skip an appetizer,” she told the solicitous waiter, “and just have
the braised fillet of monkfish with papaya and scallions.” She
handed her menu over.

“
And I’ll have the broiled lobster,
as usual,” Liza said, “with arugula on the side. No dressing, no
butter, just lemon for both.”

“
Very well, Ms. Shawcross. I’ll
make certain the lemon’s wrapped in cheesecloth.” The waiter gave a
slight bow and disappeared.

Liza folded her hands on the tablecloth and eyed
Edwina speculatively. “Word around town has it you’re the rising
fashion star.”

Edwina shrugged. “I’m coming up with a line of
clothing, yes,” she said noncommittally. “But as for fashion star .
. .” She laughed. “I wouldn’t go half so far as to say that.”

“
You needn’t sound so humble, you
know. Word has it you’re very good.”

Edwina was silent for a moment. “We’ll see when the
collection is unveiled, won’t we?”

A busboy came with a basket of rolls and bread. “Not
for me,” Liza said. “Too many carbos.” She looked at Edwina
questioningly.

Edwina shook her head. “I’ll pass too.”

Imperiously Liza waved the bread and rolls away.
“The best way to avoid temptation,” she said, “is not to have it
around in the first place.”

Edwina nodded in agreement and took another sip of
her drink.

“
Were you surprised that I moved up
our lunch date?” Liza asked.

“
Yes and no,” Edwina said
truthfully. “What I haven’t been able to figure out is
why.”

“
You’re a comer,” Liza said. “Of
course, on Seventh Avenue there are just as many
goers.”
A
faint smile touched her lips. “Designers appear and disappear all
the time.”

“
Fashion’s a fickle mistress,”
Edwina agreed, nodding. “So is the public’s taste.”

Liza met her gaze directly. “But good marketing
isn’t,” she said shrewdly. “Nor is a commonsense approach to the
business.”

Edwina raised her eyebrows. “You seem to be very
well-informed.”

“
Keeping informed is part of my
job. As you know, there are few real secrets on Seventh Avenue. I
know who’s sleeping with whom, who’s keeping a mistress or two, who
indulges in cocaine. I also pride myself on knowing whose star is
on the rise and whose is on the wane.” She watched Edwina’s face
carefully. “And my gut feeling is that you’re going to make it.”
She reached for her glass, slowly swirled the liquid around in it.
The bubbles danced to the surface and frothed there. “Don’t take
this personally, but I’ve checked you out.”

Edwina wasn’t surprised. “Ditto on my part. I had my
staff call around to find out more about you.”

Liza wasn’t surprised either. “That’s why I think
you’re going to make it. You don’t leave much to chance.”

“
Obviously,” Edwina said dryly,
“neither do you. Word has it you’re already jockeying for Anna
Wintour’s job over at
Vogue.
And you’ve just come to
Chic!
from England a little over a year ago!”

Now it was Liza’s voice that was dry. “Which only
proves what I just got through saying: there don’t seem to be many
secrets in this business.”

“
I’ll say.” Edwina smiled. “So. Why
did you push up our luncheon?”

Liza smiled. “I wanted to meet you face-to-face and
run a proposition by you. You see, I think we can help each
other.”

Edwina looked surprised. “Perhaps you can help me,
but what makes you think I’m in any position to help you?”

“
You certainly don’t beat around
the bush. Good. Neither do I. Let me put all my cards on the table,
and then you can lay yours down, if you choose. It’s no secret that
Chic!
is currently the number two fashion magazine in this
country.” Liza paused, and something hard glinted deep in her eyes.
“I intend to make it number one.”

“
But why do that if you’re after
the
Vogue
job?”

“
Simple.” Liza allowed herself a
modest smile. “Publishing is a lot like television. Mr. X makes
Network A the number-one-rated network. Then Network B comes along
and hires him away from Network A to make
them
number one.
And then, when he succeeds, Network C, in turn, hires him to get
them
into first place too.”

“
And along the way, Mr. X’s power,
along with his salary, skyrockets,” Edwina said slowly, “and then,
when he’s got no place else to go, he’s back at Network A, pulling
down five to ten times the salary he got there to begin
with.”

Liza smiled. “And gets more and more powerful with
every hop, skip, and jump.” She paused. “Now, I know for a fact
that you know where the big money in fashion is and that you’re out
to grab a chunk of that mass-market pie.”

“
You
have
been doing your
homework.”

“
Knowledge is power.” Liza fell
silent as the waiter approached with the food. When he was assured
that everything was to their satisfaction and left, Edwina cut a
paper-thin slice of papaya. She looked across the table at Liza.
“You still haven’t answered my question. Why am I so important to
you and
Chic!
?”

“
You’ll be doing heavy-duty
advertising,” Liza said, squeezing lemon juice onto her lobster.
“Firms like Esprit, Liz Claiborne, and Georges Marciano spend
hundreds of thousands of dollars a month on advertising. You’ll
have to too, and quite a bit of that is going to filter down to
Chic!.
”

“
Since when does an editor-in-chief
concern herself with mundane matters such as advertising? You have
a whole department to take care of that.”

“
We do.” Liza took a minuscule bite
of lobster. “But ads alone do not clothes sell.” She gave Edwina a
significant look. “It’s all about exposure and press coverage. Of
course, it helps if the clothes sell themselves.”

Edwina cut a morsel of monkfish, slipped a bit of
papaya onto the fork, and chewed it slowly. The tender, meaty fish
and the tropical fruit melted exquisitely in her mouth.
Ambrosia.

Liza dropped the bombshell casually. “How would you
like an outfit from your very first collection on the cover of
Chic!
?” She smiled and cut another piece of lobster. “Say .
. . with Billie Dawn modeling it?”

Edwina tried not to gape. “I’m sorry,” she said
weakly, certain she would need the Heimlich maneuver. “I don’t
think I heard you right.”

“
You heard me right.” Liza gestured
with her fork. “You just find it hard to believe.”

“
Damn right I do. While you’re at
it, why don’t you ask me if I want to be twenty-one
again?”

Liza smiled. “Because I only deal in the possible.
Anyway, there’s more.”

“
More?” Edwina stared at
her.

“
More.” Liza nodded definitely.
“What do you say to an eight-page color spread featuring your
outfits inside that very same issue? Also with Billie Dawn
modeling? She
is
the hottest thing in town these
days.”

Edwina put down her knife and fork. There was no
way, absolutely no way on earth that she could eat another
morsel—not after having been offered the sun, the moon,
and
the stars. Hell, the whole solar system was more like it! Maybe she
should pinch herself.

“
Eds?” Liza asked with good humor.
“Are you still here?”

“
Is it Christmas?” Edwina ventured.
“Russian Easter? Hanukkah?” She took a swallow of her drink and her
voice was hushed. “An offer like this does not come without
strings.” She searched Liza’s face for confirmation.

Liza looked at her blandly. “Sometimes it does, and
sometimes it doesn’t.”

“
Then let’s talk turkey. What,
exactly, do you want in return for playing fairy
godmother?”

Liza stared intently at her. “Exclusivity.”

Edwina frowned. “You mean you want
Chic!
alone to show my clothes?” She shook her head. “That’s impossible,
and you know it.”

“
No, Eds, exclusivity for
Chic!
to be the
first
magazine to unveil the
first
Edwina G. collection.” Liza half-smiled. “You’re free
to advertise in any and all other magazines at any time the month
after Chic!
does its spread. But I want to get a month’s
jump—one month is all I’m asking—on covering the
collection.”

Edwina took a deep breath. “Eight pages, did you
say? Plus the cover?” She fanned herself with her hand.
Unbelievable as it seemed, Liza Shawcross and
Chic!
magazine
would virtually put Edwina G. firmly on the fashion map—and in one
fell swoop.

“
Will I have the final say on which
clothes you’ll feature?”

“
As long as they cover a broad
spectrum and are complete outfits, yes.” Liza nodded. “However, the
accessories we use are up to the art director and the
stylist.”

“
And can you also,” Edwina asked
very, very slowly, “guarantee me the photographer of my
choice?”

“
I do believe,” Liza said dryly,
“that you think it really
is
Christmas.”

“
I only want the feature to be a
winner.”