Bruce Wagner - Memorial

The only thing that would ruin the prank was if Maurie had a tantrum, and walked out.

But Chess didn’t think that likely.

THEY went shopping at Saks and Neiman’s.

At 1st, she felt abashed — Marjorie couldn’t remember the last time she bought clothes for herself, and was still in a period of mourning Hamilton. But her new friend did much to raise her spirits. They tried on everything from frocks to 35,000 dollar gowns. Bonita said this would be the party of their lives, and they should just say the hell with it. Marj wound up with an aristocratically festive suit by YSL, but her Sister was more daring: a Céline cherry bouclé jacket, and a, well, interesting ensemble by an unpronounceable Japanese designer.

At the last minute, Bonita said she’d foolishly left her pocketbook at home. Marj offered to put the 85-hundred dollar charge on her Visa — Bonita would have nothing of it. When the old woman finally said she wasn’t going to leave the store without the dresses, the Sister almost tearfully relented. She said she would bring a check to Spago tonight. As they left the Fifth Avenue Club, they sang “High Hopes,” arm in arm, followed by a darling young man who carried their things. It was like out of a movie or a dream.

MARJ was so excited she didn’t know what to do with herself. It was only 3 o’clock and the dinner was at 8. She bounced around the house, singing, “Oops, there goes another rubber tree plant,” and whispering under her breath, “Dinner at 8! Dinner at 8!” She decided to burn off energy and stroll over to Riki’s for a lottery ticket.

Home again, she languorously picked through a bookshelf in the den while running a bath. She hadn’t seen this one in what seemed like a century: a moss-green copy of The Jungle Book with a faded Piranesi-style arch ex Libris: RAYMOND RAUSCH pasted inside. She loved Kipling, as had her father (the writer was born in Bombay, so Marj felt an immediate kinship. She always imagined he looked like Sean Connery, who played one of his characters in that glorious movie The Man Who Would Be King ). She was almost certain Rudyard had stayed at the Taj Mahal Palace — maybe she’d ask Joanie to look it up on her computer.

Marj flipped through the pages as she soaked in the tub, careful to keep elbows above water. She remembered her ex husband reading to Chester at bedtime — especially “Toomai of the Elephants.” Oh, Chess loved that one! It was the story of a little boy who was told about something no man or mahout had ever seen: clearings deep in the forest called elephants’ ballrooms where the ancient creatures went to dance. Could anything be more delightful? She reread it, and the sound of Ray’s voice rushed back to her, as if seizing the words: one stormy night, a noble bull called Kala Nag (“black snake”) broke free of his ropes and galloped with Little Toomai on his back for miles and miles, to the legendary, mysterious bacchanal. There, the elephants partook of doum and marula, mgongo and palmyra, fermented fruits that made them drunk. And dance, they did! When the terrified, delirious boy returned at dawn to tell his tale, the hunters were skeptical until they finally went and found the place he’d described, in the heart of the jungle — a vast “ballroom” of trampled wood, with trails leading to and from and every which way. That night, in a very human celebration, Little Toomai was rechristened Toomai of the Elephants, and the magnificent brawny beasts raised their trunks, trumpeting in joy for the new King of Mahouts.

She read the opening verse aloud:

I will remember what I was. I am sick of rope and chain.

I will remember my old strength and all my forest affairs.

I will not sell my back to man for a bundle of sugarcane…

I will go out until the day, until the morning break — out to

the winds’ untainted kiss, the waters’ clean caress—

I will forget my ankle-ring and snap my picket-stake. I will

revisit my lost loves, and playmates masterless!

SHE put on her “lucky” Schlumberger peas-in-the-

pod and parrot-and-feather Tiffany pins, plus a necklace she hadn’t worn in years made of tourmalines, peridot, and aquamarine stones. (They set off the fire of her wedding ring opal.) It crossed her mind that Cora might look through the window and see her wheeling the suitcase she’d packed for New York; Marj wasn’t up for any explaining. In fact, she rather enjoyed the idea of Cora guessing her whereabouts. The mystery of it. The old woman smiled to herself, feeling like a double agent — a saboteur! It was very Graham Greene! She could always say she’d been to the elephants’ ball…but when she thought of Pahrump and how tough a time her neighbor had been having, Marj felt a little less “cock-of-the-walk” (an expression Hamilton liked to use). She scribbled a note saying she was on her way to La Quinta with her daughter and stuck it in Cora’s mailbox. The suitcase was small but the old woman had trouble lifting it to the trunk. She slid it into the backseat instead. She would get help once she got to the restaurant.

MARJ drove right past Spago. For a moment, she didn’t have a clue where she was. Why hadn’t she hitched a ride with Bonita? Dumb, dumb, dumb. She circled Rite Aid a few times before coming back around Wilshire to Cañon. There was sidewalk construction going on but then she saw the valets.

She felt glamorous making her entrance. The pretty Asian woman looked up “Mr Weyerhauser” then asked if the party might be under a different name. Marj said, as if intoning a password at the Magic Castle (she’d been to that place in the Hollywood Hills years ago, with Ham), “the Blind Sisters.” The hostess seemed puzzled but a confident Marj added, “It should be a large group.” The gal checked again, under “Weyerhauser” and “Herlihy” and “Blind Sisters,” but came up blank. She couldn’t remember Bonita’s last name, not that it made much sense that it would have been used for the reservation. She nearly blurted out “State of New York” and “lottery winners,” but thought that unwise. (It might even be illegal.)

The hostess never stopped smiling. She made the old woman feel comfortable that there had been a mistake, and her party was certain to arrive soon. She led her to an empty table for 2, opposite the bar. She was lovely — and my, there were so many people there, yet she had been so personable! No wonder Lucas had chosen this place.

She ordered Perrier and after a few minutes pulled Mr Weyerhauser’s card from her wallet. Stupidly, she’d left the cellphone Joan gave her at home. (Her daughter would have been mad about that. She told her never to leave the house without it.) Marj asked the server if there was another Spago and was politely told there once was, but no more. She waited almost an hour. She left a kerchief on the chair so that no one would claim it, then went to the bathroom, passing parties of beautifully dressed diners who seemed to stare at her with respect — Marjorie Herlihy knew that tonight she exuded elegance, wealth, sophistication. The old woman splashed her face and the water felt good; she had diarrhea from her nerves and wondered how much longer she should stay. She found a payphone to call Lucas but didn’t have any coins.

She sat down at the bar for another 40 minutes — a gal her age, sitting in a bar! Ham would have laughed — nursing a glass of red wine. She wondered if there had been an invitation, and searched her mind. Did Lucas give her something with an address, something for the party? She told him she was coming — didn’t she? — but there wasn’t anything to RSVP. Usually, for a grand gala, there was a number you could call to RIP…no, they were probably careful about that. This sort of thing, if you had it on paper, was too easy to “leak.” Still, she imagined those federal people had printers they worked with who were bonded. It was probably her own damn fault for being a late enrollee in the Expedited Award Program. There wouldn’t have been time to send something out.