Part 4 (1/2)
”I should have guessed it was Victor. I heard Yasmin was looking for a celebrity photographer, no disrespect to you.”
”Olivia,” I said, ”they're my clients.”
She leaned toward me, elbows on her desk, fingers interlaced. ”I wish you the best of luck. Yasmin went after Victor because she wanted his t.i.tle and all the glamour and wealth that come with who his family is. That's all there is to it. She wants to appear on the cover of magazines because she's such a fas.h.i.+on icon or she went skiing in Gstaad or vacationed on Richard Branson's private island or partied with some rock star after his concert.” She sat back in her chair and folded her arms. There were two bright pink spots in her cheeks. ”I wonder how long it will be before she finds a lover.”
Teddy Roosevelt's daughter Alice Roosevelt Longworth, a flamboyant woman who had been known as ”the other Was.h.i.+ngton monument” because of her sharp-tongued political zingers, owned a needlepointed pillow that read, ”If you can't say something good about someone, sit right here by me.”
”I think we ought to change the subject,” I said. ”I'm meeting Yasmin and her mother at the Franciscan Monastery at five o'clock. This is more information than I want to know.”
She looked embarra.s.sed. ”I apologize. I shouldn't have said anything, though all of it is an open secret around here. I met Victor last year at a Smithsonian lecture. He's a doll.” She stood up. ”Be in touch if you have questions about my notes. And let's get together again when you're done. Maybe the end of next week? I need your spring photos and all the interior shots by the last week of May, by the way.”
I nodded. ”I'm still waiting to hear from someone about taking photographs inside the Arts and Industries Building. Though I met a friend of yours who said he could cut the red tape. David Arista.”
Her eyes flashed when I mentioned his name, but she said in a cool voice, ”David? Really? How did you meet him?”
”At the party last night and then I ran into him walking through the Ripley Garden.”
She straightened a pile of already tidy papers. ”Last year right after Museum Press hired me, we worked together on publicity for a book on the history of the National Portrait Gallery.” She fiddled with the pages until the edges were aligned. ”Now he works with Yasmin. They're very close.”
The pink color had returned to her cheeks. ”Tell me,” she said, ”did he invite you for coffee or a drink?”
I smiled. ”He did.”
She didn't smile. ”Want some advice about David Arista?”
”Sure.”
She pointed to the corridor outside her door. ”Walk down that hall. There are a couple of women who could give it to you.”
I thought about what Thea Stavros had said to me last night: Get in line, darling.
”I'm not interested in anything except speeding up my request to get into the Arts and Industries Building.”
She reached around and flipped her hair off her neck again. ”I wouldn't ask him. Then you'd owe him a favor. And David always collects.” Her phone rang and she glanced down at it. ”Sorry, I need to take this. Good luck.”
I left and wondered if she had been talking about the book or David Arista. And if Olivia Upshaw was also one of the women who could give me firsthand advice about the danger of getting involved with him.
I left the Smithsonian by the Mall entrance and stood under the portico. Across from me, the enormous green dome of the Natural History Museum rose behind a line of bare trees. The rain had come and gone during my meeting with Olivia, and the frigate-sized clouds piled overhead now streamed west toward the river, leaving a swath of bright sky behind. But the streets were still wet and slick, and the slant of the rain had made dark-ringed stains on the curves of the sand-colored American Indian Museum at the far end of the Mall.
As predicted, it took half an hour to find a legal parking place on Capitol Hill and then pa.s.s through security in the Russell Senate Office Building. Ursula Gilberti had an office in the Capitol as a member of the Senate leaders.h.i.+p, but her secretary had told me I was expected in her private office on the fourth floor of Russell.
It was the oldest of the three Senate office buildings, and to me the two other buildings-Dirksen and Hart-lacked its character, history, and elegance. They also didn't have the magnificent two-story columned Rotunda or the grand Kennedy Caucus Room, where the sinking of the t.i.tanic had been investigated and the Watergate hearings had unfolded.
I made a point of detouring through the Rotunda, which was silent and empty except for a security guard. Daylight flooding through the oculus in the dome softened the severity of the gray-and-white-hued marble, and I stopped to take photographs of the arches and columns and the carvings in the coffered ceiling while the guard watched me. Then I took an elevator to the fourth floor.
Ursula's state flag, the flag of West Virginia, hung from a stand in an alcove in the corridor outside her suite of offices; bright colors against more gray-and-white marble. One of the young female receptionists in the visitors' room took me back outside and walked me to a door that led to the secretary's office, where she handed me over to a white-haired no-nonsense woman. She, in turn, led me into Ursula's office.
The large room was furnished with a quirky mix of modern and antique furniture, the walls painted a b.u.t.tery yellow and covered with art, mostly avant-garde modern, which surprised me, along with numerous awards and rows of photographs of Ursula with the good and the great, which did not. On the mantel of her carved marble fireplace next to a modern sculpture of what looked like a bronze elephant was my framed engagement photograph of Yasmin and Victor.
She got up from a paper-strewn desk and shook my hand.
”Can I get you and Ms. Medina a cup of coffee, Senator? Tea?” the secretary asked.
Ursula gave me a quizzical look and I shook my head. ”Not just now, thanks. Can you buzz me when my two o'clock arrives?”
I glanced at my watch. One fifty. Whatever Ursula had to say wasn't going to take long.
”Sophie, please have a seat.” She gestured to a pair of leather mission-style armchairs across from her desk and I slid into one of them. ”Thank you for coming by.”
Last night, the golden light of the candelabras that graced the dining room table and the glittering chandeliers in the formal rooms of the Austrian amba.s.sador's residence had somewhat softened Ursula Gilberti's hard-sh.e.l.l demeanor. She had been a proud mother at a family celebration, not the tough get-the-deal-done woman she was known as on the Hill. Today she wore a severe black suit with a white blouse and a pearl choker, and any softness I'd seen at that party was gone.
”I have a proposal for you.” She smiled, but it lacked warmth, and already I knew I didn't like where this was going.
She put on a pair of thick-framed reading gla.s.ses and picked up a piece of paper from her desk. Though I couldn't see through it, I thought it looked a lot like my contract. ”It concerns the fee you're charging.”
It was the fee we'd agreed on after a round of horse trading. I gave her a tight-lipped smile and waited for her to go on. She wanted more sessions for the same price or something like that.
”I'd like you to do this job pro bono.”
”Pardon me?”
”Pro bono. It means you wouldn't charge me for it.”
”I know what pro bono means, Senator.”
”In return, I will recommend you to everyone I know, and believe me, I know a lot of people.”
She had somehow managed to make it sound like she was doing me a favor.
”Thank you for the offer, but I'd prefer to stick to the agreement we have.”
Ursula took off her gla.s.ses and rubbed the bridge of her nose with her thumb and forefinger. ”I'm not sure you understand. Do you realize how much publicity you're going to get just from being chosen as the photographer for this wedding? A royal wedding in Was.h.i.+ngton? You couldn't pay for that kind of exposure. Already the guest list includes royalty from just about every European country, senators, cabinet secretaries, a Supreme Court justice . . . not to mention that we're juggling publicists from a couple of rather big names in Hollywood whom I've met over the years and would like to be here.” She folded her hands. ”The president and the first lady are on the guest list.”
”It sounds like it's going to be quite an event. But with all respect, I didn't volunteer for this or compete with anyone else. Victor asked me because he likes my work and I said yes.”
Ursula blew out a short-fused breath and looked up at the ceiling. ”Oh, for G.o.d's sake,” she said, focusing on me again. ”Do you have any idea how much this wedding has cost me so far? I'm also in the middle of a primary where I'm being outspent by an opponent who's got deep pockets all the way to China, and then there's the election in the fall. When all is said and done, I'm a working single mother, not a millionaire. The expenses for all of this are absolutely crus.h.i.+ng. Can you possibly understand what I'm saying?”
Sure I could. I had bills, too. That's why I worked for a living and expected to get paid for it.
”I'm sorry to hear that-”
She cut me off. ”I need you to do this, Sophie. I'm not really asking you. I'm telling you. I can't afford to pay you anything beyond what I've already given you. You were well compensated for last night's party, and I trust you'll be sending a link to those photos soon because I'm fending off press queries with a stick until I get them. I'm not asking for charity, you understand, because I a.s.sure you what I'm offering will be very much in your financial and professional interest. And I always keep my word.”
Except for the contracts she signed. And it certainly felt like she was asking for charity. Before I could open my mouth, her phone buzzed and she reached for it.