Suddenly Ella felt a wave of inadequacy. "I hope I'm dressed enough," she said.
"You look very nice," he said.
"Your wife was not able to join us tonight?"
"Not for many nights," he smiled.
"Sorry, that's another thing I got wrong," she apologised.
"No, you looked up your files perfectly correctly. You just didn't get to the bit where it says "Marriage Dissolved"."
"Was that a long time ago?" Ella tried to be as cool as he "was being.
"Oh, ten years, I'd say, but it's hard to remember because we meet every week at the foundation, you see."
"Does that work? Well, obviously it does because otherwise you wouldn't both be able to do it."
It does work, remarkably well as it happens, and Kimberly is remarried and goes out a lot at night. I don't, so we rarely meet in the evenings. But we met this afternoon. She was most interested in the project, and she will join us tomorrow."
"There will be a tomorrow, then?" Ella was almost tearful in her gratitude.
"Of course there will, Ella. Now look at this menu and tell me. Do your pals in Quentins match up to this place?"
"I wish they could see me now. I wish everyone could see me now." She looked confident and happy for the first time since she had come to New York. Kimberly looked as if she were twenty-two, but Ella knew she must be almost forty. With a perfect, glossy hairstyle that had to be freshly done at a salon every day, a perfect smile with even white teeth, a pale, peach-coloured designer outfit and high black heels, she was dazzling. She was also as smart as anyone Ella had ever met. She was totally on top of the project, and realised what Firefly Films was trying to do. She told them of other movies they had underwritten, one about a young songwriter who had believed so mightily in her own career that she overcame all the rejections and obstacles en route. Another was about a woman who arranged a social club for mentally handicapped children to give their parents a break, but was closed down by the authorities because she did not have the necessary official qualifications. There was another about the stress of being police wives, and another about a woman who had kept a cat for thirteen years in a No Pets Allowed condominium without anyone finding out.
Ella couldn't find any common thread amongst them. Derry and Kimberly seemed pleased. They didn't want to be predictable. Tomorrow they would get down to the nitty-gritty, Kimberly said, and plan out a tour for Derry to make when he got to Ireland. Ella looked up, startled. "But I didn't think you were going to Ireland, Derry?"
"Of course he is. That's only nonsense," Kimberly said.
"No way, Kim, forget it." Derry smiled lazily.
"Would you come instead, Kimberly?" Ella pleaded.
"Yes, Kim, you'd love it." He was teasing her.
"Derry knows I am not going to stir from New York and leave my very young and suggestible husband to all the temptations of this city."
"Oh, Lorenzo wouldn't stray," Derry said. "Not in a million years."
"His name is Larry, Ella, which Derry very well knows, and he is not being left alone to test out any theory."
Ella looked back at Derry. He didn't seem at all annoyed.
"It will all be sorted out eventually. Kim likes to play games. Always her little weakness." He spoke without malice, affectionately in fact.
"Lord, someone has to play games around this place," she laughed, ruffling his hair.
"Now less of this wasting time doing a re-run of an old argument."
"Derry has to go to Ireland sooner or later. He "will leave when he's ready. Why don't you tell us your stories, Ella? Tell us all about these people who will make up the movie."
It was time now, time to convince them that this restaurant was filled with people's lives. She took out her notes and began to tell the stories.
The Short Fuse Martin went back to sleep after he had switched off his alarm. He dreamed a troubled, complicated dream about having the wrong change and being refused service. He woke shaking with irritation about it all and became even more annoyed when he realised it was seven o"clock and that he "would now be twenty minutes late for work. Today of all days. He tried to hurry and naturally that made him slower than ever. He got into a shower that was too hot and had to leap out again, knocking down the contents of a shelf. He lost a button off his best shirt, spilled the orange juice in the fridge. He remembered that he had intended to drop clothes off at the dry cleaners, now there would be no time. This meant that he would not have a freshly cleaned suit for tomorrow. It was the day to put out the rubbish and he had literally no time. He ran out and realised it was raining, went back for an umbrella, and heard the phone ring. Before eight o"clock in the morning, it must be urgent. He answered it and discovered to his great irritation that it was his son.
"Hi, Dad, it's Jody. Just wanted to make sure you hadn't forgotten."
Why did the boy think that he might have forgotten a lunch arrangement made over a month ago?
"It's just that you're always so very busy. It could have slipped your mind."
"No, Joseph, believe me, busy people don't forget things like longstanding arrangements. I'm afraid that the luxury of forgetting is only for those who are not busy, don't have anything important to do. Those who have nothing important in their lives."
Why did he do it? Anger the boy further, widen the gulf between them still more. Delay himself still further. And now Joseph was twittering on about the menu, saying his father must choose whatever he wanted to eat. "Yes, yes, I think that's what one usually does in restaurants," Martin snapped.
But Jody heard no coolness in his father's tone. "I just wanted to make sure you knew you didn't have to keep to the fixed menu or anything," he tried to explain.
"Joseph, I have to go." Martin hung up. Outside in the wet street, everyone else had managed to put out rubbish. Other people had got up in time and gone to their dreary little jobs and yet he, Martin, hadn't managed it. Martin, who ran the biggest advertising agency in the city, a man known all over the country. Today they were making a pitch for the biggest corporate client ever. Something they had been preparing for three months and now that the day was here, he had to have this tedious anxiety dream and go back to sleep. There were other things that had to be done today too. Kit Morris, his secretary, must be smartened up. She was too old for the job, her face didn't fit and she wasn't up to speed on all the new technology. Perhaps he should put off talking to her until much later in the day. The thing about Kit was that she never watched the clock, she worked very hard. She had been with him a long time. Probably had no other life outside.
On any day of the week it wasn't going to be easy telling her that she didn't give the image he wanted by appearing in a shapeless skirt and long cardigan. But today was a tense day and it wasn't going to be an early night, either. They were having a reception for their American partners at 5 p.m. with dinner to follow. The timing could not have been worse. If they didn't get the new corporate account, they would not feel at all like entertaining the Americans. Martin sighed as he hastened along the slippery pavement. This of all days to have to meet Joseph for lunch. But the boy had been adamant. It was the anniversary of Rose's death. His wife had been dead for fifteen years. Martin had thrown himself into work since it happened. But tragedies affect people in different ways. Joseph had dropped out of school only weeks after the funeral. It had been impossible to talk to the boy about anything since then.
Martin arrived wet, out of breath and bad-tempered at his office. "They're waiting for you," Kit said cheerfully.