Jane S. Fancher - Upstart

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UPSTART

Jane S. Fancher

The room was growing a bit tawdry around the edges---curtains fraying, cracks

in the stained-glass windows, a stain on the couch the maids could not get

out---still, Diana called it home.

Far more dismaying was her own physical state. It had been such a long winter.

"Getting downright anorexic, darling." Mammon came up behind her, examined his

own face for wrinkles or (worse) spots, winced at her reflection, and

retreated from the mirror.

"For gods' sakes, man, remember the year. That term won't be in vogue for

another---" Oh dear, what year was it? '68 . . . '78 . . . '88. "---at least

fifteen years. I'm---twiggish. Quite fashionably thin."

"You look like a rail.

"Difficult to argue with the truth. And speaking of Truth . . .

Sweeping her voluminous robes into an elegant swirl around her feet, she

turned full about on the vanity stool to smile sweetly across the posh Hilton

suite. "And you, my dear, look like a fat---you should pardon the

expression---toad." With the grace only eons of battles (verbal and otherwise)

lost and won could achieve, she rose to her feet. "I'm starving. Shall we

go?"

And as they strolled arm in comfy arm through the suite to the door: "What are

we doing today? ---American tourists? ---Oh, good."

Mammon opened the door and the cool draft from the excessively airconditioned

hallway brushed her bare knees.

***

The daily squeeze in the Hotel Diana lobby was well underway by the time they

arrived.

"I don't know why you always insist on eating here," Mammon grumbled, turning

sideways to avoid a tourist armed with 50 pounds of camera equipment. "The

food is mediocre at best."

"Only because you've developed a taste for American grease-burgers, darling."

Diana paused, admiring the tall statue holding court at the far end of the

lobby, an admirably accurate recreation of one of the ancient statues

excavated from the nearby ruins of Ephesus. "Do you honestly wonder, my dear?

How many of us have been so honored in this century?" She cocked her head,

trying a different angle on the many-breasted statue. "Goodness, that would be

painful at that time of the month. My male worshippers always did get a

bit---carried away. Seems to me four would be sufficient to make the---"

Across the jammed lobby, at one of the coffee shop tables: "Oh, look. He's

here. Somehow I knew he'd be."

She pulled Mammon through the crush as smoothly as his girth would allow.

"Just a minute," he growled, and dug in his heels beside the news stand.

"Isn't he sweet!" she murmured, tapping her foot impatiently, while Mammon

negotiated the price of the Wall Street Journal. "I think, perhaps, it's time

I approached him. What do you think?"

He ignored her, involved in arguing over the cover price. Why, just this once,

he couldn't simply pay the man . . .

"Find us a table, will you, darling?" she said, and drifted away, slowly

fading as she approached the crowded table.

More crowded than usual. The new one was tall, blond, definitely middle-aged

and decidedly out of place in the abundance of dark native elegance. Swiss,

unless she missed her guess, and not to her taste---today.

Today, her taste ran more toward eighteen ---ma-a-aybe nineteen---slim build,

golden skin, and bl-l-lack cur-r-rly hair.

And equally out of place among his co-conspirators, though his differences

were more subtle than yellow-hair's. His dark sweater and form-fitting slacks,

of good quality and excellent taste, were a bit frayed about the edges.

Nothing overt, but the least his excessively well-heeled 'friends' could have

done was lend him a cast-off or two for their frequent meetings in this

exclusive hotel.

Sweet. Terribly sweet, the way he gazed wonderingly upon her monument. Of

course, he wasn't the only one to do that---a half-naked woman with about a

million and one breasts tended to have that effect on male mortals---but this

mortal was different.

His name was Kemal. She'd first seen him a year ago, and with increasing

frequency as time passed. At first he'd been alone, standing just inside the

door while the tour groups he guided took their lunches at the feet of the

spotlighted statue, waiting for them to rejoin him at the bus, as though he

would not be welcome in the posh, European-style hotel. Then, barely a month

ago, here he'd been. At this same table. Always with this same group. Always

slightly out of place.

She came up behind him and brushed an invisible finger along his rounded

cheek. He started and glanced over his shoulder, his smooth brow wrinkling

with puzzlement. She chuckled silently and waited until his companions called

his attention back to the conversation. Then she . . . let her fingers do a

little walking . . . until the poor boy was flushed and quite thoroughly

confused. With a final brush of her lips across his, she whispered in his ear

. . .

"It was wonderful, darling."

. . . and drifted back to Mammon's table, fading into Reality until, when she

sat, she was quite as visible as a mortal woman.

"Have fun?" The question rose from behind the paper.

She pressed the paper down, smiled sweetly into his irritated face.

"Wonderful, darling."

He flipped the paper free, disappeared again.

She smiled as the waitress delivered her usual: steak (Diane, of course), with

fruit macedonia, a dozen croissants, aubergine parmesan, haricots abeurre,

pilafi, and squid etouffe aux pelits champignons . . .

. . . plus a six-pack of Coors. One at a time, of course, and specially

imported for her. Terrible habits one picked up in one's travels.

"You're wrong, you know," Mammon said.

"Wrong?"

Kemal's eyes, making a surreptitious scan of the lobby, met hers. She smiled.

"About what?"

"The statue," Mammon said. "It's not to honor you. The sign on the front door

might read the Hotel Diana, but the whole establishment is a monument to moi."

"Never!"

"Oh, but it is, darling. The people come here to gawk at the statue, but they

spend money. Lots of money. And that's why the finance company loaned the

money to build your statue." His Cheshire Cat grin appeared over the top of

the Journal. "Mine, darling. All mine."

She wrinkled her nose, and carefully trimmed the fat off her steak.

***

Asker, Deniz, Cahil, Mart and Kabil. No family names; likely not their real

given names, either, but Kemal Duman hadn't known that when they'd introduced

themselves, had naively exchanged his own truth for their prevarications. Now

they used his true name casually---and frequently---in the presence of this .

. . foreigner . . . ensuring that he, and anyone (or anything) listening,

would remember it.

He ran a finger around the rim of his glass, sipped the ten-year-old Glen

Kinchie within, resisting the temptation to gulp. He couldn't really afford

this one. Another would mean going hungry two nights running. But he wasn't

about to sit in this elite company swilling rakhi.

Six weeks ago, Kabil had been a stranger, one of many thousands he'd herded

through the ruins of Ephesus. But then Kabil had casually invited him to join

him and his university-educated cronies for drinks here in the shadow of her

statue, where the scent of flowers filled the air regardless of the season,

and the fountain's gentle spray drowned out the racket of the traffic outside.

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Jane S. Fancher - Upstart

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