She was right. It was like watching a film in Technicolor for the first time: the world was one way, and then everything changed.
* * *
—
We fell asleep on the carpet, my robe our blanket, my chest her pillow. I stirred with the sounds and smells of the bakery opening downstairs. I went to the bathroom to splash water on my face and brush my hair. The morning light coming through the small window above my shower looked harsh, my image in the mirror jarring. I thought of Irina and Teddy—what their wedding would look like, what she would look like walking down the aisle. And my new Technicolor world returned to black-and-white.
When I emerged, Irina was in the kitchen looking in the refrigerator. She brought out a half carton of eggs and asked how I liked them.
“How does Teddy like his?”
She said nothing. When I asked again, she grabbed my hand and told me we’d think of something. When she said she loved me, instead of telling her the truth—that I loved her too—I pulled away and said I wasn’t hungry, that she probably should just go. And she did.
* * *
Freezing rain the last night of the year. Standing in my kitchen, I unwrapped a foil package resembling a swan and heated up leftover filet mignon. I opened the window to my fire escape and pulled in the bottle of ’49 Dom Pérignon that Frank had given me for a job mostly well done in Milan.
I ate my dinner standing in front of the open oven to warm my back, and the champagne was indeed as delicious as Frank had promised.
Earlier in the day, I’d gone alone to the matinee showing of The Bridge on the River Kwai. But I’d found it difficult to concentrate and left early. The sky was already dark, the rain had started to fall. By the time I got home, our white Christmas had been reduced to brown slush. The snowman some kids had built in the park across the street had turned into solid ice, its carrot nose replaced with a cigarette, its scarf missing. I hated New Year’s.
To make matters worse, my apartment was freezing—my breath visible in the frigid air, the radiator cold to the touch. I cursed my landlord, a man who owned half the buildings on the block but was too cheap to hire a super.
I drew a hot bath and sank in, careful not to wet my hair. When the water turned tepid, I turned the faucet back on with my toes, a process I repeated twice before finally getting out. Assaulted by cold air, I wrapped myself in an oversized terry cloth robe. I wanted to just slip into bed and fall asleep listening to Guy Lombardo ring in 1958 on the radio. But I couldn’t. I had to dress, put on my face, and eat something before the black car arrived to shuttle me to the party in an hour. I had to work.
After Milan, when Frank and I debriefed, he’d looked pleased but distracted, as if he’d already known the details—which he probably had. He didn’t seem to mind that I hadn’t gotten closer to Feltrinelli. At first, I thought he might’ve shared my assessment that maybe I should’ve stayed in retirement, that maybe I didn’t have what it takes anymore; but instead of politely sending me on my way, he said there was something else I could help with.
“I could use another favor.”
“Anything.”
* * *
—
The rain let up just as my black car arrived. I wrapped myself in my white mohair swing coat, leaving my fur in the closet, as I’d done since Irina had told me fur gave her the creeps. “Poor rabbits,” she’d said, running her hand down my sleeve.
The driver, his patent-leather-billed cap in one hand, held the car door open for me with the other. “Gal like you doesn’t have a date on New Year’s?”
I slipped into the backseat.
The District streamed by, a sliver of moon visible in the fleeting spaces between buildings. I wondered if Irina could see the moon from where she was. She was spending the last night of the year with Teddy and his rich family at their chalet in the Green Mountains. Irina couldn’t even ski. I hoped it was cloudy, that the freezing rain had made its way to Vermont.
The New Year’s Eve party was at the Colony, a French restaurant downtown considered among D.C.’s finest, which wasn’t saying much. Hosted by a Panamanian diplomat, the party was basically an office party sans office. This was an inner-circle, invite-only affair. The whole gang would be there: Frank, Maury, Meyer, the Dulles brothers, the Grahams, one Alsop brother, everyone in the Georgetown set. But I wasn’t there to talk with them. I had other work to attend to.
The bas-relief statues of mythological figures lining the dining room wall were outfitted with party hats, the lounge with silver streamers and gold tinsel. A net of white balloons ready for the clock to strike twelve hovered above the crowded dance floor. A large banner hung across the main bar: CANNOT WAIT FOR ’58! A brass band with a satin-dressed singer played in front of a giant clock, its movable hands set at ten. As I handed the coat-check girl my wrap, a waitress dressed like a Rockette with a tiny top hat bobby-pinned to the side of her head presented me with a silver tray of noisemakers and hats. I selected a horn with metallic purple fringe but passed on the hat.
“Where’s your holiday spirit, kid?” Anderson asked from behind me. He was wearing two pointed hats atop his head like devil’s horns, the elastic digging into his double chin. His suit jacket was already off, the back of his tuxedo shirt translucent with sweat.
“Will Baby New Year be making another appearance tonight?” I asked, referring to the time he’d stripped down to a white sheet wrapped around his crotch, stuck a giant pacifier in his mouth, and clutched a bottle of rum at our New Year’s Eve celebration in Kandy.
“The night’s still young!”
“Speaking of holiday spirits, where can a girl get a drink?” My insides were already warm from the three glasses of Dom Pérignon I’d drunk at home, but I wanted to keep the feeling from dissipating; I wanted to keep my thoughts of Irina at bay, at least temporarily.
Anderson handed me his half-full punch glass. “Ladies first.”
I downed it, blew my horn at him, then waved to the waiter with a fresh tray of drinks. Anderson asked if I wanted to dance, and I told him maybe later. I’d already spotted the man Frank wanted me to get to know better across the dance floor.
I watched Anderson go back to a table full of people who cheered his return, then turned my attention back to my man. Henry Rennet stood catercorner to the stage, watching the Eartha Kitt knockoff sing “Santa Baby.” I bypassed Anderson’s table, skirted the dance floor, and found a spot opposite the stage from Henry. Then I waited. The band finished the song and the singer sashayed over to the clock to move its hands to ten thirty. The crowd cheered; Henry snickered, but he raised his glass to the last hour and a half of 1957 anyway. Then he looked my way.