CHAPTER 33

 .33.

Lunch was a masterpiece of avoidance. The lobster was prepared to perfection, and the champagne pleasantly chilled. The conversation stayed strictly in the shallows, steering clear of the “new king” in the Hills and the wedding that was looming over the family like a thunderhead.

Mrs. Karlsen turned her attention to me with a smile that was both dazzling and predatory. “I read your piece in the Advertiser, Ray. Jimmy sent me a clipping. Your descriptions of the islands… they have a certain weight to them. A gravity that is rare in such a young man.”

“Thank you,” I said, feeling the weight of the silver fork in my hand.

“Hollywood is a town built on stories, you know,” she continued, leaning forward. The sunlight caught the diamonds on her fingers, making sparks dance. “The studios are always looking for writers – real ones, not just scenarists who move the furniture around. I have many friends at MGM and Paramount. It would be a tragedy for a talent like yours to be wasted on a beach shack when the right introductions could be made.”

“That’s very kind of you, Mrs. Karlsen,” I said.

It was a beautiful bribe, wrapped in silk and served with lobster. She wasn’t just offering a career; she was offering to make me one of the “right people.” If I took the bait, I’d be in her debt, and I was sure that, in the Karlsen world, debts were never forgotten.

“Trudy,” she reminded me.

“Trudy,” I echoed. Then, glancing at Jimmy, I added: “I’m afraid my little monster and I haven’t quite figured out how to write for the cameras yet.”

“Your little monster?” she puzzled.

“My typewriter,” I explained.

She laughed, a light, melodic sound that didn’t quite make it all the way to her eyes. “Well, give it time. Los Angeles has a way of changing one’s mind.”

She turned back to Jimmy, her expression shifting to something more brittle. “I saw Daisy Poulsen a few days ago. She came to the house. Looking for you. She’s… developed, hasn’t she? Switzerland seems to have given her a certain… confidence.”

Jimmy didn’t look up from his plate. “She’s the same Daisy, Mother.”

“Is she?” Mrs. Karlsen sighed, a long, elegant sound of disappointment. “She has that look in her eyes now. That look of a girl who has spent too much time looking at price tags and not enough time looking at the world. Poulsen is a fine manager, of course, but I worry about the influence a girl like that can have. One must be so careful with people who see a name like Karlsen as a destination rather than a family.”

The irony was so thick it nearly choked me. I looked at the vast, white-pillared palace we were sitting in – a house built by a wealthy man for a woman half his age – and wondered if Mrs. Karlsen, Trudy, even realized she was warning Jimmy away from a “gold-digger” while she was currently preparing to hand the keys to the kingdom over to a man with only a two-percent stake in it and a tailor he probably couldn’t afford.

Jimmy finally looked at her, his eyes cold. “Daisy isn’t the one trying to sell the ovens, Mother.”

His jab made the temperature in the sunroom drop by about ten degrees.

Mrs. Karlsen reached for her glass. “That’s completely different, Jeppe,” she whispered, her voice losing its velvet and turning into wire on his legal first name. “Sometimes, you have to burn a small fire to keep the house from freezing. You’re too young to understand the choices I’ve had to make.”

She turned back to me, the mask of the charming hostess sliding back into place with terrifying speed. “More champagne, Ray? We mustn’t let the afternoon get too serious. Today should be for fun. Tonight is, isn’t it? The Colony party. Yes, I’ve heard of it. It’s exactly what Jimmy needs to get his spirits up.”

I looked at her – this luminous, fragile woman who was busy trying to script everyone’s life – and realized that the Strandhus was a stage. She was the director, desperately trying to keep the lead actors from reading the wrong lines.