Authors: Dominick Dunne
“Is she still pretty?” asked Rosemary. “Mrs. Somerset used to say she was pretty in a cheap sort of way.”
“I couldn’t tell, really. She was wearing huge dark glasses, like Jackie Kennedy used to wear,” said Gert. “She had one of those big silk scarves from Hermès over her head tied under her chin. She looked glamorous, I’ll say that, like a movie star almost,
like Faye Converse used to look, but I couldn’t really see her face.”
“Did she talk money?” asked Rosemary.
Gert leaned forward and talked directly into Rosemary’s ear. “Double what I make with Missus. Great big kitchen again. My own bedroom and little sitting room, and several trips a year to Ireland on Mr. Renthal’s private plane when he goes to London on business.”
“Dear God, Gert. This is like manna from heaven. What are you going to do?” asked Rosemary.
Gert, bewildered, placed her chip on B8. “Oh, I couldn’t leave Missus. I just couldn’t, not after all these years. I’m the only one she can talk to about Hubie.”
“The one who died of AIDS who had the Puerto Rican boyfriend?” asked Rosemary.
“She still won’t admit it. So I go along with the Epstein-Barr talk.”
“Still, Gert, that’s an awful lot of money and an awful lot of perks The Convict’s Wife is offering you,” said Rosemary. “Chances like that—double the salary, private jet free to Ireland—don’t come around often, probably never again. Think of it that way.”
They stared at each other. “Look, you won the bingo, Gert.”
“She always wins,” said Mae Toomey.
“I
S
P
ARK
A
VENUE
PAYING FOR YOUR CASE?” ASKED
Christine Saunders, who was often referred to in magazine articles as the first lady of television. Photographs of Princess Diana, President and Mrs. Obama, and Adele Harcourt, among others of equal rank, stood in silver frames on a side table. Christine was on intimate terms with world leaders, all the living American presidents, and several of the leading ladies in New York society, who welcomed her with open arms. She entertained frequently at elegant dinner parties with very important people and fascinating conversation in her Park Avenue apartment, which had been done up by Mario Buatta. She and Gus were New York friends. They knew a lot of the same people. They went to a lot of the same parties.
“It’s a moot point,” replied Gus. “Stokes said he had spoken with Hy Vietor in Vienna that morning I met with him at his office and yes they would pay, but it’s never been mentioned again; even when I asked about it I was ignored, and there’s nothing official. There’s no record of what he said to me. If Stokes were to leave
Park Avenue
to become the head of a studio in Hollywood, as has been hinted in Toby Tilden’s column, there’s nothing on paper. I’m beginning to get the hint that the silence I
receive when I inquire about such matters means that the idea has been dropped and they are trying to avoid an awkward situation. I’m afraid I’m on my own now.
“That’s a lot of money for you to be shelling out every month, isn’t it?” She was lighting candles on her round dining room table, which was set for sixteen.
“It’s dizzying. I have money nightmares.”
“Do you at least like your lawyer?”
“Another moot point.”
“You’ve got to like your lawyer, Gus,” said Christine.
“It isn’t that I dislike her. She’s supposed to be brilliant, and I believe that. One of
Park Avenue’
s lawyers assigned me to her. I never even had a meeting with her first. She doesn’t live in New York, which is a pain in the ass. I’ve only seen her face-to-face once.”
“Oh, no, no, no, Gus,” said Christine, turning from the candles to look at him. “You can’t have a lawyer who lives in another city. I don’t care how good she is. You need somebody who’s always there for you. Look at you. You’re a wreck. You have to have ready access to your lawyer.”
“As I was expecting
Park Avenue
to pay for her, I didn’t object sufficiently at the time,” said Gus.
“I may have someone in mind,” Christine continued. “His name is Peter Lombardo, he lives in New York, and he’s a tough one. He’s perfect to go up against Win Burch, who I hear is terrifying. I will get in touch with Peter Lombardo for you.”
Gus, who trusted his friend’s instincts, breathed a small sigh of relief.
L
ATELY
, R
UBY
Renthal had started tipping the three telephone operators at the Rhinelander a hundred dollars a week apiece to monitor all her calls before the caller was put through to her
suite. After the news appeared in the
Wall Street Journal
and the
Financial Times
that Elias was soon to be released from the Las Vegas prison, reporters had started to call. Marietta Elgin from the
Times
was particularly insistent, leaving message after message requesting an interview. Ruby had no intention of speaking to any reporter until she had Simon Cabot on board, which she believed she would eventually accomplish, but she most certainly didn’t want to be caught on the phone when Marietta Elgin called. She had read Marietta Elgin’s piece on Gus Bailey. She had enjoyed the article, “mean though it was,” because her husband so disliked Gus, but she knew that she was as vulnerable as Gus had been when Marietta Elgin had caught him at his house in Connecticut.
Gert waited until Lil Altemus left for her lunch date with Kay Kay Somerset at Swifty’s before she dialed the Rhinelander Hotel and asked to speak to Mrs. Elias Renthal. Candelaria Lopez was the telephone operator on duty. She was a great admirer of Ruby Renthal’s and was very protective of her. “She tips good, she speaks to all the help, and she looks like a movie star,” Candelaria said about her.
“May I have your name please?” she asked.
“Gert.”
“Gert what?”
“Mrs. Renthal will know. Tell her it’s Mrs. Altemus’s cook, Gert.”
“Lil Altemus? Who’s always in Dolores De Longpre’s column?”
“Her.”
“Hold on just a moment.” She dialed Ruby’s suite.
“Yes?” answered Ruby.
“Lil Altemus’s cook, Gert, is on the phone. Do you want to speak to her or shall I take a message?”
“Thank you, Candelaria. I’ll speak to Gert.”
“Mrs. Renthal?”
“Hello, Gert. How lovely to hear from you.”
“Ma’am, I wanted to know if I could make an appointment to come and see you about what we talked about on Third Avenue that day.”
“Of course, Gert.”
“My day off is on Thursday. I could come on Thursday afternoon.”
“Come at three, here at the hotel. Just go to the front desk and ask them to ring me.”
“I just want to check one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“You did say I could go over to Ireland on your husband’s jet, didn’t you?”
W
HEN
G
ERT
carried in Lil Altemus’s breakfast tray, her hands were shaking and the dishes were rattling slightly as she placed the tray in front of Lil and then started arranging the morning newspapers in the order of Mrs. Altemus’s preference. Lil turned immediately to the obituary page of the
New York Times
, which was the first thing she read each morning.
“No one interesting died today,” she said in a disappointed voice, tossing the paper aside. “But people have been dropping like flies in my circle. Poor Sass Buffington. We’ll all miss Sass, I can tell you that. And darling Pat. And Winkie, to say nothing of my dear friend Antonia von Rautbord, after twenty-seven years in a coma. I must send flowers to her children. Oh, good, Gert. You remembered the rose. It makes the breakfast tray so much prettier, and you’ve sometimes been forgetting it of late. And my favorite china coffee cup, the Spode. So cheery in the morning. That came from Mother’s house in Northeast Harbor, as you well remember. Help me fluff up these pillows, will you?”
she said, leaning forward in her bed so that Gert could fluff up the pillows behind her. “That’s perfect. Thank you, Gert. Do you have
all
the papers? Yes, of course you do. Open up to that awful Toby Tilden’s column in the
Post
, which I’ll read next. I saw him at Kenneth’s the other day. I was having my manicure and Mr. Tilden was having his hair highlighted. Don’t you love it? I can’t wait to tell that to Gus Bailey. What’s the matter with you this morning, Gert? You seem a bundle of nerves. Is there bad news from your niece in Ireland?”
Gert paused nervously, took a deep breath, and looked her employer in the eyes. “Missus, you don’t know how hard this is for me to say, after you’ve been kind to me for so many years,” said Gert. “But it’s time for me to say good-bye. I have to move on.”
“What in the world are you talking about at this hour of the morning?” asked Lil. “Look, there’s a chip in this coffee cup. You must have hit the faucet when you were washing it. I can’t believe what you’re saying to me. Are you thinking of going back to Ireland to live? I know Ireland’s doing awfully well these days economically, although that’s about to change, my nephew tells me. But you’d miss New York after all these years you’ve lived here, Gert. You’d miss all your friends in the Sodality of Mary at St. Ignatius Loyola on bingo nights. Hand me the
Post
, will you, Gert?”
“No, ma’am. I’m not planning on moving back to Ireland,” said Gert, still shaking. “I’ve been offered another position. It’s something I just can’t turn down.”
“Is it because I said I could only afford the trip every other year? How silly that was of me to say that about every other year. Of course you can go to Ireland to visit your divine niece. Lillian must be quite the colleen by now. It was so sweet when your sister, bless her heart, named her after me, of all people. I only said that about every other year because my nephew has
clipped my wings so, but I know how important that trip to Ireland is to you.”
Gert had planned her resignation speech in front of the mirror in her little room off the kitchen, and she continued talking. “It’s taken me some time to come to this decision, Missus. The only person I confided in was Rosemary, who’s been my best friend all my life, who works for Mrs. Somerset, as you know. I sat with her at the Sodality of Mary bingo night last Wednesday, when you were having dinner at Swifty’s with Mrs. Somerset. I told her I was going to turn the offer down. Rosemary said I should give it some thought because I may never get an offer like this again.”
Lil started to cry. “But, Gert, you’re the only person I can talk to about Hubie. You’re the only one who doesn’t correct me when I say he died of Epstein-Barr.” She was sobbing. “Get me the Kleenex, please. Thank you. Gert, you’re all I have left of my old life.”
Gert, crying, said, “Don’t make it harder on me than it already is. I’ll stay with you until I break in someone new. I’d never leave you in the lurch without training a replacement. There’s a young girl I met at the Sodality of Mary, Moira Shea her name is. She might be perfect. I’ll try her out. I have plenty of time because I don’t actually move in until the new house on East Seventy-eighth Street is finished, and I won’t start cooking for her until her husband gets out of prison.”
“Prison!” screamed Lil. “Her husband’s in prison?”
“It’s not exactly a prison-prison, Missus. They call it a facility,” said Gert.
Lil’s face hardened as it dawned on her who Gert would be working for. She had heard recently about the Elias Renthals’ purchase of the Tavistock mansion.
“Who
are
these people who are stealing you from me?” she asked, though she knew full well.
There was a long pause before Gert answered. “Mrs. Elias Renthal, Missus,” she replied.
“Ruby Renthal? You are leaving me after more than twenty-five years to go to work for Elias and Ruby Renthal? My father
died
at their butterfly ball and Elias Renthal put his body on the pool table and locked the door so it wouldn’t ruin their party. So that’s where you’re going? GET OUT! NOW! Get out of my house. I don’t want you here under my roof one more minute.”
D
URING THE TIME THAT THE
T
AVISTOCK MANSION
on East Seventy-eighth Street was being restored to Belle Époque perfection, both outside and in, with craftsmen and artisans brought from Paris and Rome, Ruby Renthal lived quietly in a suite at the Rhinelander Hotel. She was not hiding, but she was not being seen out either. She had grown very close to Maisie Verdurin, whose idea the house had been. Mostly they talked on the telephone, but on rare occasions they lunched together; however, they stayed away from Swifty’s, where they were likely to see people they knew.
“That was a very good idea you had of turning the old ballroom into a projection room. I told Elias the last time I visited him, and he arranged for Max Luby, who does his investing for him, as he’s been barred for life from trading, to buy a ton of Paramount and Disney stock. Sherry Lansing’s sending me a fantastic man who designs the best projection rooms of anyone going. He designed Spielberg’s. He designed Eisner’s. He designed Tom Hanks’s. It’s going to have an Art Deco theme. We’re going to get all the latest pictures. We’re going to be able to see them a week before they’re released to the theaters, just like all those Hollywood moguls do. I want to start getting
to know some movie stars, to glam up the place when we have our movie nights and buffet dinners. Mix up the crowd a bit.”
“I told you that in no time those same people who cut you dead after your fall are going to be banging on your new bronze doors to come to the movies and a buffet supper afterward,” answered Maisie. “Old Alice Grenville was famous for her Sunday nights in the Waldorf Towers, where she moved after her son’s murder. Everyone wanted to go. Claudette Colbert was a regular, just to give you an idea of the tone of the crowd, and so was Babe Paley.”
“I’m going to do my version of that when Elias gets out,” said Ruby. “Sunday night at the Renthals’. Dinner and a movie. I like the sound of it, don’t you?”
“I can’t talk you into coming to my dinner Thursday night, can I? I could use a beauty like you,” asked Maisie.