THREE

July 1943

Los Angeles

With civilian flights grounded, it took three days to travel across the country by train, first to Chicago on the 20th Century Limited and then on to the West Coast aboard the Los Angeles Challenger. Even with wartime flights closed to us, I was still one of the few civilians on board. Everyone who traveled, traveled with a purpose. Amid all the enlisted men going to bases in Los Angeles or San Diego and all the civilians traveling for war effort work or family emergencies, me, my record player, my suitcase, and my typewriter stuck out like sore thumbs.

Three days was a lot of time to think about what I was doing. I didn’t want to think it, but the idea kept creeping into my brain: The future Adam had promised me—what if I could get it all back?

New York Annie hadn’t been able to compete with an MGM contract and the promise of a shiny new career. But Hollywood Annie, with a shiny new career of her own—maybe she could. Obviously, it would be a much different future than I had previously imagined. Our cozy two-bedroom apartment would be a Beverly Hills mansion, and I would write murder motion pictures for them instead of murder plays, but it was better than nothing—and better than the last four months I’d spent on my own. Anything had to be better than that.

I didn’t want to spend too long indulging the possibility. I couldn’t get my hopes up. I was moving to Los Angeles to start over, and if Adam and Beverly Cook someday saw how well starting over had worked out for me, that would be fine. If not, their loss.

A driver for the studio met me at Union Station and took me a few miles west to my new home. I had been promised furnished lodgings and was expecting a nice hotel, but the squat apartment building to which I was driven was furnished in only the barest sense of the word. The entrance to the building led to a small courtyard, with my front door off to the right. It opened into a living room that was completely bare, lacking even a curtain to cover up the window looking onto the street. To the left was a kitchen with a counter and two stools; around the corner, a bedroom with a bed and an end table. The driver, who had helped me carry in my suitcases, tried to put a positive spin on the place. “Lots of room to make it your own,” he said.

“I don’t know what my own is anymore,” I replied. “I was hoping Pacific Pictures would tell me.”

The Pacific Pictures lot itself was tucked behind a privacy hedge on a block of Melrose Avenue in Hollywood, only a mile or so northwest of my new place. It wasn’t much to see from the outside; it hardly looked like the property was any bigger than maybe a large hotel. Once you were through the front gate and past the wrought-iron sign bearing the studio’s name, however, it unfurled itself at your feet, a maze of soundstages and coffee carts, office buildings and cafeterias, music studios and costume storage. There was even a small schoolhouse building, where child actors were required to spend a few hours of their day. And plastered on the side of every building were posters. Outside, the billboards were all about buying war bonds or starting a liberty garden. Not on the Pacific lot. Some advertised upcoming Pacific movies, some advertised past successes, and some were only pictures of Pacific’s latest stars. Just outside the rectangular L-shaped building that housed the writers’ offices was one of June Lee wearing a red dress so skintight I was shocked it had gotten past the so-called morality clauses Adam and Beverly had warned me about. June Lee had been a serious actress back in her New York theater days—I’d seen her do Ibsen—but now she was barely more than a pinup girl, from the looks of things. “Pacific Stars Are Heating Up Hollywood!” the poster declared in bold orange text.

My first task as an official salaried writer for Pacific Studios was to meet with Mr. Devlin Murray for my assigned screenplay, which I was certain would be an adaptation of Altogether Too Many Murders. Why else would I have been brought here?

The morning of my meeting, I allowed myself to feel—for the first time in four months—something approaching optimism. It would be nice, I thought, to have a task. Something to do and someone counting on me to do it. I bought a new dress for the occasion, a gray one covered in tiny violet flowers. New York Annie had never been one for florals, but Hollywood Annie was going to be brand new.

Mr. Murray’s office was all the way at the back of the lot, an elegant sandstone building surrounded by manicured lawns so green they looked artificial. I was met by Mrs. Irma Feinstein, an imposing woman of about fifty whose hair, pinned up in two severe victory curls, was such a stark shade of brown that it had to be from a salon. She greeted me with a handshake that knocked the feeling from my fingers. “Miss Laurence,” she began. Her smile seemed forced, as if she had never attempted one on her own but was merely copying an expression she’d seen others use in similar situations. “I loved your play.”

“Thank you,” I said, feeling a little flutter in my chest. There was nothing like a compliment from someone in the position to give you money to take the edge off a four-month depression.

“The murder weapon was very interesting,” she went on. “Cherry laurel leaves. How on earth did you come up with it?”

“A friend of mine from primary school had the hedges near her house,” I answered. “We had no idea they were poisonous until one day, her dog ate a bunch of the leaves. He’d never shown any interest in them before, but he got a taste for them, I suppose. And then he died.”

“The dog?” asked Irma. “The dog died?”

“Yes. Bud, his name was. He became terribly ill first, throwing up absolutely everywhere. Our shoes were ruined. But it wasn’t enough to purge the leaves from his system, and he died a few hours later. Of course, for humans it would take a lot more than a few leaves, so I made it into a concentrate. That’s when you boil the leaves in water and catch the condensation. Would kill someone in under half an hour, or so I’d imagine. I wouldn’t know firsthand.”

Mrs. Irma Feinstein frowned at me. “When you tell that story to Mr. Murray, say the dog lived.”

“What? Why?”

“Better story.”

Before I could argue that point, a male voice came booming out from the oak door behind Irma’s desk. “I’ll have your head and the heads of all your little friends on a platter!”

“You don’t tell me what to write. I don’t work for you!” a woman shouted back, seeming unfazed by the threat.

“Work for me? You’ll never work for anyone in this town!” the man continued. “I will personally see to that! Get out of my office! Get out of my sight!”

The office door banged open, and a woman came storming out, moving so fast she was nothing but a blur in a checked skirt suit. The man shouted after her, “I’ll ruin you, you hear me? You write one word of this, and I’ll make your life a living hell!”

I met Irma’s gaze, expecting her expression to match the one of disbelief that was currently on my face. Instead, she was perfectly calm. “Mr. Murray will see you now,” she said.

“I’m not going in there,” I whispered.

“Who’s next?” shouted Devlin from inside.

Seeing as I was practically frozen in my spot, Irma went ahead of me, announcing my presence as she handed Mr. Murray a bound pile of papers. “This is Miss Annie Laurence, one of your new writers. She’s a playwright from New York.”

Devlin Murray did not appear large enough to have made the enormous ruckus I’d just overheard. He was a small balding man with a red-and-gray mustache, wearing an ostentatiously large gold wristwatch that was two sizes too big for his tiny wrist. “Pleasure to meet you, Mr. Murray,” I said.

“I hate New York,” he replied. “That’s all, Irma.”

Although I did my best to beg her to stay with my eyes, Irma shut the door behind her as she left, and Mr. Murray settled in behind his desk without offering me a seat. I stood awkwardly near the door as he kicked his feet up, hummed to himself, and flipped through the document. On one hand, I was relieved he didn’t seem angry anymore; on the other, it was unsettling he’d been able to drop the rage so quickly.

“This your play?” he asked, snapping it shut and squinting at the front page. “Altogether Too Many Murders?”

“Yes,” I said.

He yawned, tossing it aside. “Tell me about it.”

I’d pitched the play probably hundreds of times over the last five years, but my nerves caused everything about it to evaporate from my mind. “Well, when I was a girl—um—my friend had this dog, and it ate leaves from a cherry laurel bush and…lived?”

“Is it funny?” he interrupted.

“Well, no,” I said. “It’s about a murder. Several murders, really. There’s a lot of murdering in it.”

“Where’s it set?” he asked.

I perked up. At least I knew the answer to that one. “At an old society family’s mansion in Newport.”

“Pass,” he said.

I blinked. “Pass? I—are you sure? It got rave reviews on Broadway.”

“It’s not personal,” he explained. “It’s just not what we do. Paramount does the highbrow stuff: drawing rooms and Newport. Warners does the lowbrow stuff: pratfalls and farmers. We do middlebrow—but not preachy like MGM. A thriller, but it’s also sexy. A fun musical, but it kinda makes you think. That’s our niche.”

I’d been rejected before but not simply off the word Newport. “Why did you hire me if my play’s not what you produce?” I asked, trying to sound calm enough to not get screamed out of his office like the last woman.

Mr. Murray laughed. “We’re desperate. Why else? Half my writers have gone to war; the other half will get called up soon enough. You seen a picture lately? Duct tape and shoe polish since December 7, 1941. I tried to convince FDR that ‘movie star’ is a job essential to morale—why are you laughing? I’m serious. But he said no deferment for singing and dancing, so here we are. I’m desperate, you’re desperate. You’re not a fit—well, I’ll make you a fit. You know how many stars I’ve made? I’ve turned cigarette girls into Screenland cover stars. And vice versa. You want a sexy thriller or a smart musical?”

This diatribe had been delivered a mile a minute, and I blinked, not sure I’d taken it all in. “Sorry—what?”

“I’m gonna give you a smart musical; the girl writers are better at those anyway. Say, can you write a part for Henry Hilbert in it? I’m trying to make him a star.”

“Henry Hilbert the songwriter?”

“Yeah—who doesn’t love Henry Hilbert? He was writing tunes for MGM, but he jumped ship fast when we offered to make him a star. He’s almost forty-five and free from the draft. Pretty smart of me, huh? Now let me give you a title. I keep a list of phrases that are bang-up titles—where is it?”

As he shuffled through the papers on his desk, I took the opportunity to speak up. “I don’t want to write a musical for Henry Hilbert,” I said. “I’m a serious writer. I’m interested in the darkness of the human soul. Pain and murder and mystery—”

Devlin sat upright, slamming his feet onto the floor. “Miss Laurence, I’m not sure you understand. You’re under contract with Pacific Pictures, and you’ll write what Pacific Pictures wants you to write. This isn’t a negotiation about your career as an artist. This is your boss, giving you instructions for your job. Is that clear?”

I forced myself to nod.

“Wonderful,” he said, picking up a yellow legal pad. “Now, none of these titles have stories attached to them yet, but that’s your job. How about Don’t Count Your Coconuts?”

“Sure,” I said. “Sounds like a treat.”

“That’s the ticket,” he replied. “And put that hilarious story about the dog eating leaves when you were a kid in there. I liked that.”

I must have looked positively shell-shocked when I exited the office, because Irma smiled at me sympathetically. “Not how you expected it to go?” she said.

“No,” I admitted. “I have no idea how I’m going to write this script.”

“I can help with that,” said Irma. She reached into the inside pocket of her blazer and produced a small notepad. “I always keep this on my person exactly for situations such as these.” She scrawled something on it, tore off the paper, and handed it to me.

This was no ordinary note, I realized. She had written me a prescription. At the top, where a doctor’s name and address would ordinarily be, it read simply Pacific Pictures Medical Offices, and underneath that, in smaller type, Office of Mrs. Irma Feinstein, Assistant to Mr. Devlin Murray.

“Take that to the pharmacy on the lot. It’s just across from the cafeteria. You can’t miss it—there’s always a line out the door.”

“What is it?” I asked.

“A little something to help you focus,” she demurred.

I didn’t press further. “Thanks,” I said, shoving the paper into my purse and wondering how a movie studio’s secretary got a hold of a personalized prescription pad in the first place.

“There’s just one more thing,” Irma went on. “It was sensitive enough that I didn’t want to bring it up over the phone, but now that I’ve got you here in person—I’m certain there’s nothing to this, but we need to know. Have you read this?”

She was handing me a newspaper column, carefully cut out from its original page. Stars Shine, Ending Disappoints in Altogether Too Many Murders by Fiona Farris.

“I don’t read reviews,” I lied, trying to hand it back to her. She wouldn’t take it.

“There’s an insinuation in there that you were having… Well, it’s hardly appropriate to say out loud.”

“I know what it was insinuating,” I replied.

“So you do read reviews,” Irma said, a slight smile coming to her lips. “Is there any truth to it?”

Just a few months ago, I had been certain that if I were ever to be asked this question, I wouldn’t do what Adam and Beverly had done. I would tell the truth, no matter what it cost me, because I loved them more than I loved anything else in the world. But now, with Irma expectantly blinking at me, waiting for an answer—with my entire career on the line—what was I to say?

“No truth to it at all,” I said. “They’re friends, nothing more.”

I went right home after that, stopping only at a liquor store to buy a bottle of vodka. By the time I was climbing the steps to the building, my new violet-patterned dress was soaked in sweat, and the silly pumps with little bows I had chosen to go with them had rubbed my heels raw. I was barely inside the front door before I was throwing them both off, nearly ripping the seams on the dress as I struggled to pull it over my head. Why had I even bought that dress? The sign in the window had said it would “lighten up any day like the gayest melody played on a cheery piano.” I had fallen for that terrible writing? I ought to be ashamed of myself.

Dress puddled on the floor by my front door, I lit a cigarette and poured vodka into one of the two glasses my furnished apartment had generously provided me. Somewhere around the fourth drink, as the sun began to set and cast an orange glow around my blank white living room, I realized I was lonely. For four months I had felt next to nothing, in a depressive haze of smoke and apathy. Now I had finally progressed to feeling again, and the first thing my body could produce was loneliness? What a rotten deal.

The next morning, in my tiny windowless office on the Pacific lot, I fed a piece of paper into the Remington typewriter and began to type.

DON’T COUNT YOUR COCONUTS

By Annie Laurence

Act One

Scene One

My fingers were still poised above the keys as I looked up from the paper and stared into a corner. I wasn’t sure what to do next. It wasn’t a blocked-artist kind of feeling but simply perplexing, like picking up a Sunday crossword only to find the clues are all in hieroglyphics. How exactly did a person…write? Where did you start? I couldn’t remember.

How had I done it in the past? I thought back to all those years ago, scribbling out the first draft for Altogether Too Many Murders in our old apartment, the dark and dismal one in Chelsea. We’d all been so excited to live there, despite the oven never working right and water leaking through the ceiling whenever our upstairs neighbors took a bath. That play had started from a desire to see Adam play a Newport-set mama’s boy and Beverly as the femme fatale who had ensnared his wealthy father. I thought their chemistry would make them compelling onstage rivals, a sensual tension underpinning their struggle. I also thought it would be amusing to see Adam in a sweater vest, and I’d been correct. The play before that, I’d wanted to see quiet, skinny Adam play a gangster and Bev, with her angelic crown of blond curls, a murderous madame. Even the first thing I’d ever written, a one-act play back at Sarah Lawrence for our little theater society, had been for them.

My breaths were growing shallower as I looked back down at the paper in the typewriter. Could I do this on my own?

I remembered clear as day being stuck on the ending of Altogether Too Many Murders, how I complained about it incessantly until one evening Adam shut his book, holding his page with a finger, crossed his legs, and took a drag on his cigarette. “The thing about endings,” he said slowly, exhaling the smoke, “is they are intrinsically linked to beginnings. Whatever your beginning is, Annie, is also your ending.”

I looked to Beverly, who was tickling out some Liszt on the piano, and our eyes met and danced with utter charm at Adam’s ridiculousness. Listen to our man. Isn’t he impossibly silly? Don’t you love him more than life itself?

“I’d like to end it with me saying something cosmopolitan,” said Beverly. “Perhaps ‘I’ll drink to that!’ And then I swallow poison. Hamlet’s mom but with a gimlet and a cocaine habit.”

I’d used both of their suggestions—Adam solving the murder from a clue in the first scene and Beverly drinking poison to save his life. The more I ruminated on it, the more it seemed like I’d never written a single scene without their input. Four months ago I had thought of myself as two things: a writer, and Bev and Adam’s lover. Was I neither?

The phone ringing interrupted this spiral, which scared me half to death. I hadn’t expected anyone to contact me. I tried to answer professionally, but ended up sounding like a fool. “Annie Laurence, Pacific Pictures.”

“Miss Laurence? It’s Irma Feinstein. Are you all right? You sound tired.”

I winced. “Just struggling with the writing, is all.”

“Did you fill that prescription I wrote you?”

“Unless it’s a cyanide pill, I doubt it’ll help me much,” I said. There was no response. I remembered her reaction to my story about the dog and cleared my throat. “Um, no. Not yet.”

“You should,” answered Irma. “It’ll perk you right up. But listen—I’m calling because I thought of an idea for you. You still want to make your play into a movie, don’t you?”

“Yes,” I admitted.

“I want that too,” she said. “Now, look. You’re still going to have to write that other movie Mr. Murray assigned you. I can’t get you out of that. But if you want a chance at your play getting produced as well, you need to go to the Hollywood Canteen tonight.”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“You don’t know what the Hollywood Canteen is?”

“I only moved here a week ago,” I pointed out.

“Yes, but the whole country is talking about the Hollywood Canteen,” Irma replied. “You of course know that Los Angeles is the main port for boys shipping off to the Pacific.”

I hadn’t known that. “Of course,” I said.

“That means servicemen come from all over the country and spend a few days here before they leave to go off to god-knows-where and see god-knows-what,” she said. “So Bette Davis and John Garfield—you know who they are, right?” she asked sarcastically.

“Yes,” I answered, at least being truthful about that.

“Well, they started the Hollywood Canteen. It’s run entirely by volunteers from the industry. Stars perform, dance with the boys, serve them food. It’s extremely popular, gets thousands of visitors a night. All the studios rotate days, and Wednesday is our night. All the Pacific stars are required to be there. Go make some friends who have more pull around this lot than you do. Henry Hilbert, Don Farris, June Lee—she couldn’t play the lead, of course, but maybe there’s a side character who’s Chinese?”

“Did you say Don Farris will be there?” I said. “Fiona Farris’s husband?”

“If he’s under a Pacific contract, he’ll be there.”

“Will Fiona be with him?”

“I think she comes with him sometimes, yes. Are you worried about her printing more lies about you?”

“Yes,” I lied quickly.

“Don’t worry about her. You have the power of a studio PR department on your side now. She’s nobody. Focus on your future. If you turn in an acceptable draft of Don’t Count Your Coconuts, prove to Mr. Murray that it’s worth it to him to keep you around, and you come into this office with a star wanting to make your other movie? It’ll get made. The studio system is a lot like the solar system: it all revolves around the stars.”

It was likely decent professional advice, but I could hardly focus on that. All I could think about was Fiona, the one sentence she had penned that had ruined my life. How much more did she know, and was there any way I could find out before she struck again?

“I’ll be there,” I told Irma.

“Excellent. It’s on Cahuenga, just south of Sunset, but the entrance for volunteers is in the back around the block. Doors open at seven,” Irma said. “And fill that prescription! You’ll need some energy if you’ll be jitterbugging all night.”

---

The Hollywood Canteen was about a half an hour’s walk from the studio, a faux Western–fronted place with a sign made to look like lasso rope. The light was only just starting to grow long, casting a cinematic purple haze over everything as I walked past the long line of waiting servicemen and headed for the back.

While the main entrance was on a busy thoroughfare, the back entrance was on a street that was little more than an alley. There were two doors, one labeled “Stage Door” and the other labeled “Volunteer Entrance.” I was surprised to see autograph hounds and photographers waiting at each of them. Irma must not have been kidding about all the stars being here tonight.

I made my way through the volunteer entrance and into the small vestibule behind it, where I was met by a woman with a clipboard. She had curly brown hair that was streaked with gray and a presence so tall and commanding that I immediately felt like I was in trouble for something. “I’m here to volunteer,” I told her.

“You work for Pacific?” she asked.

I nodded. “Just started. Irma Feinstein told me I should come.”

She rolled her eyes at the name. “Sorry you had to meet Irma. You won’t have to deal with her here, at least. I’m Terry Levine.”

The name sounded familiar to me, but I couldn’t place it, and something about the straightness of this woman’s spine told me she wouldn’t have taken too kindly to me getting it wrong. I attempted no guess. “Annie Laurence,” I said.

“Welcome, Miss Laurence. You’ll have to fill out some forms, get fingerprinted—standard stuff all the volunteers have to do. Head for the office; they’ll help you out. Across the dance floor to the front lobby, and then it’s the door next to the phone booth.”

The door out of the vestibule led me to a short hallway with two bathrooms. Even though one was marked “Men” and one “Women,” servicemen were queued up for both, loudly swapping stories and craning their necks to check me out as I passed. I guessed that I would just have to hold it.

This short hallway opened up to a large wooden dance floor. I had only begun to take in the giant Western-themed chandeliers, the colorful murals on the wall, and the stage immediately to my right, where a man was absolutely wailing on a trumpet with a full orchestra behind him, when I was pushed out onto the dance floor full of jitterbugging men. One of them grabbed me near instantaneously, launching me into a dance so frantic I felt like I perhaps should have stretched first.

“I can’t dance,” I shouted to him.

“You’re doing great!” he shouted back.

“No, I—”

Before I could explain that wasn’t what I meant and actually I needed to find the office, he interrupted. “What’s your name?”

“Annie,” I shouted. “What’s yours?”

He ignored the question. “You famous? What pictures have you been in?”

“I haven’t been in any pictures,” I said. “I’m a writer.”

He dropped his hands from my waist and walked away.

I barely had time to comprehend what had just happened when another man, this one a sailor, scooped me into his arms. “Hi, I’m Bob,” he said.

“Hi, Bob. I’m Annie.”

“Sorry about that other fellow. He seemed rude.”

“That’s all right,” I replied. “Writers aren’t known for their dance moves.”

“You’re doing just fine in my book.”

As we danced, I studied the room in an attempt to get my bearings. The first thing I noticed was that it made sense why I’d been grabbed right away: the men outnumbered the women six to one, if not more. The floor was absolutely packed with people, many of whom were dancing with such a flailing intensity that I had to assume there were multiple fatalities a night.

After Bob, I stopped trying to make conversation. I also stopped trying to make my way to the front of the room, letting men scoop me up and going along for the ride. It didn’t take long before I became too overwhelmed to even get a good look at the men’s faces. The uniforms had the effect of making each fellow blend into one another, which I supposed was the point, but it also made it incredibly easy to shut my brain off. Only a few details made it through: Crooked tie. Sweat stain on shirt. Freckles.

This went on for what felt like several hours but what was probably half an hour, if that. I was disgustingly sober. I could have killed someone for a cigarette, and I was starting to get dizzy, both from the whirlwind of faces and the actual whirlwind my body had been on.

“Sailor,” I said to the next man who grabbed me midtune, “Would you mind dancing me over to that corner?” I tipped my head toward the front of the Canteen, where a curtain led to an area that had to be the front lobby. “I’m supposed to be filling out some paperwork in the office.”

“Sure thing, doll,” said the sailor, spinning me around and starting to work his way toward the other side of the dance floor.

That’s when I saw her.

The crowd was so dense it was only a glimpse at first: the stark line of her blunt-cut bangs darting about as she tittered at some joke, no doubt one that had come from her own mouth. I had to crane my neck to confirm it was her sharp, small nose; her dark-brown eyes; her pale skin just starting to crease around the mouth from too many cigarettes. “Oh my god,” I said to my companion. “It’s her.”

“Who’s her? A star?” asked the sailor.

“To some,” I said. “It’s Fiona Farris.”

She was sitting with a small group of other volunteers, whom I came to recognize one by one as I continued to stare through the mass of moving bodies. There was June Lee, whose face had been greeting me outside my office every morning, just as scandalously clad here as she had been in her Pacific promotional shot. The plum sequined number that matched her lipstick perfectly looked as if it had been painted on, yet she either didn’t notice or didn’t care that she was currently being eyed by every fellow in the place. Next to June was Jack Kott, the radio comedian, pulling a series of absurd faces as he recounted for the rest of the group some dramatic story. Leaning back in his seat between Jack and Fiona was a dark-haired man I didn’t recognize, wearing an immaculately cut gray pinstripe suit and a wry smile. And there, at the end of the table, was Fiona Farris herself, in a crisply starched black-and-white-striped button-up and a black skirt. She looked smart, sophisticated, intimidating without even trying to be. I thought of the violet-printed dress on the floor of my apartment and vowed to burn it and never wear florals ever again.

The sailor, not being completely blind, noticed the way I kept spinning my head around to keep her in my field of view. “Want me to dance you over that way?” he offered. I nodded.

We managed to get a little closer before the song ended. The bandleader stopped to take a bow, holding aloft the clarinet he had both played and conducted with. I took the opportunity to bid farewell to the sailor and push my way a little closer to Fiona’s table. The group was near the snack bar, where Rita Hayworth herself was handing out sandwiches and sodas. I maneuvered my way to the counter and asked Miss Hayworth for a water.

Filled water glass in hand, I inched back over toward the tables, closer to Fiona and her friends, hoping I’d overhear even a snippet of their conversation. For a moment of wild vanity, I even thought they might be talking about me, that Fiona might be telling the group about this wonderful play she’d seen in New York, with two actors who were so clearly involved with the playwright…

Obviously, they weren’t talking about me. When I finally managed to get close enough to hear them—which was right over Fiona’s shoulder, given how loud and crowded it was in that room—Jack Kott was still animatedly telling a story. “I didn’t say anything all that terrible. Just that he was boring, thoughtless, slow-witted, dull, and ignorant.”

“So nothing his wife didn’t say on their wedding night,” replied Fiona.

I half snorted, half guffawed, which made all four turn to look at me. All four expressions were identical: Who the hell are you?

Needless to say, this would have been the most mortifying thing I could have experienced, if not for what happened next. Desperate to pretend I was not standing there eavesdropping, only passing by, I took a large step to my right and was immediately slammed into by a jitterbugging couple. My water, which Miss Hayworth had so kindly filled to the very tip-top, went all over myself and Fiona Farris’s white-striped shirt.

“Lovely,” she said, slowly rising from the table. “Now I need to go towel off. Which is another thing Hal said on their wedding night.”