Holiday
Chapter 2
Sweetness and Decency
"Come on, sweetheart," he made a decision and pulled the dozing young woman into an upright position. "We'll see about getting you a room at the motel so you can sleep it off. Get up," he pulled her to her feet and began to drag her along.
"Sooooo haaappy," she muttered as she followed along, leaning heavily into him.
"You got any money?" he asked her.
"Never carry money," she told him.
"Bad habit. How 'bout plastic?"
"Never carry plastic," she told him.
"Very bad habit. Where do you live?"
"The big yellow house," she told him.
"Oh, come on, dearie. You're not that drunk."
"Not drunk at all. Just veerrry haaappy." She giggled.
"Oh, damn it, girl, don't fall asleep again. I don't think I can manage you and my bum knee."
He managed to drag her along the three blocks back to his second-rate motel and got her into the lobby. "Hey, Marco. You got a room for the night?" He addressed the familiar clerk at the night desk.
"Gold! You've got to be kidding. We're totally booked up with this Princess thing going on."
Gold sighed. "All right," he said resignedly. He retrieved the woman who'd nodded off in the chair where he'd left her. "Come along, girlie." She opened her eyes wide for a moment and then managed to get up and follow him. He got back to his room and pulled out the card to open the door. The girl leaned against him, her head on his shoulder.
"Mmmmm," she murmured. "You smell nice." And she buried her nose in between his shoulder blades.
"Right," he answered, shaking his head, unable to disengage. She was snuggling against him. He managed to get the door open and pulled her inside.
His hotel room smelled like air conditioner drip. It was furnished with a complete lack of enthusiasm, containing one full-sized bed, two hard chairs, a short mud-colored sofa, a small table, two low chests of drawers, a mini-fridge and a television set. The girl stood by his bed.
"We need to have an understanding," he began.
"What the world needs now . . . is a return to sweetness and decency. Youth . . . youth must lead the waaaaay . . ." the girl trailed off. "Oh, I'm terribly sorry to mention it, but I'm very dizzy," she told him, wavering on her feet. "May I sleep here?" she waved her hand, motioning toward the bed.
He guided her over to the sofa, "You may sleep on the sofa."
"May I have the green silk nightgown with little rosebuds on it?" she asked him.
Gold snorted and scratched his head. He reached into the closet and pulled down one of his shirts. "'Fraid you'll have to settle for this."
"A man's shirt?!" she seemed delighted.
"Sorry dearie, but I haven't worn a silk nightgown in years."
The girl wobbled on her feet. "Will you help me get undressed?"
"No way in hell," he told her. "Drunk you might be, but you should still be able to handle undressing yourself."
The girl fumbled with her buttons of her little blouse and unfastened her skirt. Gold, seeing that she was about to strip off, turned his back to her. He went over to the fridge and pulled out a bottled water and took a swig. "Let me know when you've finished changing," he told her.
He could hear the girl moving around. "This is very unusual. I've never been alone with a man before, even with my clothing on. With my clothing off, it's most unusual." She giggled, "I don't seem to mind. Do you?"
Gold cleared his throat. "Tell you what. I'm going to go out and get some coffee from the lobby." He gingerly walked by her, keeping his head averted, but even so, he could see that she'd made some progress with changing her clothing. "Remember, you sleep on the sofa," he reminded her.
"Do you know my favorite poem?" she drowsily asked him before he got out the door.
"You recited that one for me already."
The girl spoke up anyway, "'Arethusa rose from her couch of snows in the Acroceraunian Mountains.' That's Keats."
"Shelley," said Gold without hesitating.
"Keats," the girl repeated.
"Shelley," Gold repeated. "I'll be back in about ten minutes." And he headed towards the door.
"Keats. You have my permission to withdraw," the girl told him, speaking slowly, with some apparent effort.
Gold smiled, "Well, thank you very much. And it's Shelley." He went out the door and shut it behind himself.
"Keats," said the girl to the back of the door.
At the Grand Hotel
The Ambassador, the Countess, the Doctor and the General were all in Princess Isabella's room. One of the guards was making a report.
"Well?" the Ambassador quizzed him. The alarm had been raised by Doctor Whale who'd come by the room to check on his patient an hour after he'd administered the lorazepam. He'd found her missing, the door to the balcony opened and had immediately alerted security.
"No trace, Your Excellency," the guard replied.
"Have you searched the area around the hotel? The garage, the streets."
"She was interested in those dancers," the Countess reminded them.
"We've searched the building, the garage, the surrounding streets and the dance festival that is going on across the street. No sign of her."
"Well," the Ambassador began. "I assume I do not have to remind you to speak of this to no one. The Princess is the direct heir to the throne. This is a top-secret crisis."
"Of course, sir," the guard told them. "Do you want us to alert the American security contingency?"
"Not just yet," said the General. "Keep me posted as you continue searching."
The officer left and the Ambassador turned to the other two. "We must notify His Majesty that his daughter is missing."
"Of course. Do you need me to make the phone call?" the Countess offered.
Back with the Reporter
Gold carried the worm-flavored coffee he'd gotten from the lobby vending machine and returned to his room. He couldn't help but think that the girl swallowed somebody's Rohypnol and somehow had gotten away from her would-be assailant. She didn't seem drunk, but she sure as hell wasn't coherent. He opened the door and, sure enough, first thing, he noticed the girl had fallen asleep in his bed. He sighed and gulped down his coffee. He went into the small bathroom and grabbed a shower for himself and redressed in sleep pants and a tee-shirt. He debated his next move but opted to lie down next to her on the bed with the covers between them. As he lay on the bed, he heard her, "Soooo haaappy. Thank you."
"The pleasure is mine, lass," he told her and closed his eyes.
The Following Morning
"Goood Mooorning Ammmerricaa!" It was the pretty blonde again. "Your style reporter, Ashley de la Feu, bringing you the latest and greatest news. So, we are all just devastated to hear about the illness of Princess Isabella."
"This is very abrupt, isn't it?" her older co-host asked.
"Yes, Mallie it is. Princess Isabella has been the picture of health and vitality this entire tour. Whether she's just caught an illness or the stress of the tour has finally caught up with her. . . well, we just don't know. Her Embassy spokesman shared this morning that she is bedridden, but they are hopeful that this will be a short illness and the Princess will get back to the tour soon enough. I know all of us will keep her in our thoughts." And Ashley smiled brightly at the camera.
Back with the Reporter
The clock read nine-thirty. Gold struggled to wake up. He opened his eyes against the light streaming in the one window of the room and then he leaned over to look at the time.
"Aw fuck!" he said sitting up. "The goddamn Princess interview!" He must have slept through his alarm – or, more likely, forgotten to set it.
The girl, hearing his outburst, made annoyed noises and buried herself back into her pillows.
He glared at her, "Oh shut up," he told her. He jumped up, grabbed his cane and pulled the window curtain back to look outside.
Yeah, it was bright sun-shiny out in the world.
He went over to the closet to pull out some clean clothes and quickly dressed. He went downstairs to the lobby, got another cup of the vending machine coffee and made his call.
Conversation with The Boss
The main office was in Atlanta. Inside the downtown facility, a sharply-dressed woman sat in her black and chrome office. At the moment, she was running down news copy noting Princess Isabella's illness. Her administrative assistant, a perky red-head, brought her a stack of folders.
"Heard from anybody yet?" the assistant asked.
The sharply-dressed woman shook her head. "Not a word. I'm assuming they all showed up at the hotel and learned about the illness. Surprised we didn't get an earlier call about all this. Hell, I'm surprised we didn't get any calls about her illness."
"Reckon Mr. Gold is up there getting the total skinny on what's wrong – like he's got one of her people in an elevator and bleeding the entire story out of them?" the assistant asked, her eyes lighting up.
The woman shook her head again. "No idea, but I hope that's what's going on. If anyone can get the real scoop on what's happening, it would be our boy Gold." Her phone rang. She glanced at the number. "Ah, speaking of Gold." She put the call on speaker.
"Gold. How are you doing?" she asked her best but, at the moment, most unstable, reporter. She was expecting to hear the whole sordid story – was the princess really sick?
"Fine. And you?"
"Fine," the woman answered. "I thought I'd've heard from you earlier. What's going on up there?" The woman noticed that her assistant was hanging around to hear the ace reporter's scoop.
"Not a whole lot. Just finished up with the Princess interview."
The woman sat back, confused, "Really?" She glanced back over the copy coming over several computers detailing the Princess's illness and indisposition. "And how did that go?"
What was he trying to pull?
"Well, pretty routine."
"She answered all the questions on the list?" the woman asked him.
"Of course, she did. Very obliging."
The woman looked over her desk and picked up her own list of questions. "Let's see. How did Her Highness feel about the future of the European Union?"
On his end, Gold yawned, "She said as long as the different countries can continue to respect the history and cultural identity of the other countries, she thought it would continue."
"Did she now?" the woman answered him. "Say anything else on it?"
"Yeah," Gold continued. "She thought that there'd . . . uh . . . be . . . uh . . . two effects."
"Two?"
"Yes. A direct and an indirect."
"Interesting," the woman commented.
"Of course, she thought that the indirect would not be as . . . direct . . . as the . . . direct. That is, not right away. Later on, of course, well, that would have to be seen."
The woman smiled. "Remarkable. These royal brats. Sometimes they have a lot more on the ball than we might suspect." The woman looked back down at her paper. "How did she feel about the future friendship of nations?"
"Youth," Gold responded.
"Go on," the woman encouraged him.
"Yes. She felt that . . . eh . . . the youth of the world . . . they must . . . uhm . . . lead the way to a return to sweetness and decency to become a better . . . world."
The woman sat back in her chair. "Nice." She turned away from her list for a moment. "Oh, by the way, what was she wearing?"
"You mean like, what did she have on?" Gold asked her, wincing on the other end of the line.
"That's what that usually means," the woman told him. "What did she have on?"
"It was . . . "
"She usually wears blue," the woman shared.
"Yeah, it was a kinda blue," Gold agreed immediately, grasping at the straw his boss had thrown in his path.
"Oh, I wonder if it was the dress she wore in Colorado. Did it have a little gold collar?"
"I think so. I'm not very good at describing women's clothing. But . . . yeah . . . that sounds right."
"Well, Gold. I think you described it very well." The woman picked up the receiver and took the phone off speaker. She glared at her assistant who had been hanging on, listening to every word. The woman behind the desk motioned for her assistant to return to her own desk. She continued talking with Gold, "Especially considering that Her Highness was taken violently ill at three this morning, was put to bed with a high fever and has had all her appointments for today canceled!"
There was a long pause before Gold responded. "All of them?" he asked, not wanting to hear the answer.
"All of them," the woman repeated herself. "Gold, I'm surprised at you. You trained me. The first thing you bitch-slapped into me as a tyro was that sources are sacred. This isn't like you - making up crap."
"Well shit, Gina! You knew I didn't want this POS fluff assignment when you crammed it down my throat!" Gold protested the situation he felt he'd been forced into by his boss, Regina Mills, the head of news for ATNN. He'd mentored her many years ago and had always viewed his relationship with her more like a father/daughter one. She often acted the loyal daughter, going to bat for him, unafraid to berate him when he acted stupidly, and often letting him know how much she appreciated him. But sometimes, like recently – since The Incident – she'd been a bitch, as far as he was concerned – another person determined to protect him and coddle him.
"But you aren't well enough for me to put you back on the front lines. The doctors at the Center were quite clear. Gold," the woman shifted in her chair. "You are the best reporter on staff, one of the best anywhere. Two Pulitzers, three Murrow Awards, I could go on. You don't need me to tell you that you're great. But right now . . ."
"Yeah, I'm fragile and delicate. That's bullshit, Regina. I'm clean. I'm sober. I'm healed up, body and soul. I'm ready to go back into the trenches."
"Gold, I'm just following your doctors' recommendations. They want you back at work but only doing light assignments. I thought reporting on Princess Isabella would be just the ticket. Since Zoso got sick, ATNN hasn't had anyone on the job there."
"Come on, Gina," Gold protested, calling her by the pet name he'd given her when she'd first started on the job working under his mentorship. "What the hell do I know about interviewing some pampered bint princess? Give me somebody's freedom fighter, terrorist, accused serial killer, crooked politician, rogue government leader, smuggler, pirate - fuck yeah, hold my beer, I got this! The meaner, the better. Shit, I don't even know what she looks like."
"Here," Regina turned her attention to her computer and forwarded several pictures to his secure account.
Gold accessed them and looked them over. "Wait a minute," he was looking at the same woman, sans regal gown, necklace, and tiara, without the long hair, who was sleeping in his bed at the moment. "Wait a minute. That's the princess?" he asked.
"Yes. It's not some movie celebrity, reality star or pop princess. She's a real princess. She looks like this. Take a good look, Gold. Maybe, if, when, she recovers, you might be interviewing her for real some day."
"Listen, Gina." He was rapidly thinking this over and asked slowly. "How much would a real, one-on-one interview with this little chit be worth?"
"By 'little chit' are you referring to Her Royal Highness?" Regina asked him.
"I'm not referring to some movie celebrity, reality star or pop princess," he used her words.
"Why would you even ask? Her people don't let anyone get close to her. She's better protected than the Pope."
"Hey, remember me? I've interviewed the Pope. Nothing to it. But back to this princess. If I could get this kind of interview, would you let me back on the circuit again? Iraq, Afghanistan, North Korea, D.C. wherever it's hottest?"
"If you could get a for real and for true, person to person, deepest feelings, unrealized dreams, hopes, and desires, of this young woman. . . . Yeah, you could write your ticket."
"The Private and Secret Longings of a Princess. Her innermost thoughts as revealed to your own correspondent in a private, personal, exclusive interview."
"With pictures?" Regina asked.
"With pictures," he confirmed.
"Video?"
"Sure," he answered.
"Maybe a love angle?" Regina asked him.
"If there is one . . . yeah, I'll do a love angle."
"You get that and you get your own weekly half-hour slot on the network," Regina told him.
"Lovely, my dear," Gold seemed very satisfied.
"But wait," Regina told him and he froze. "If you don't get this intense, personal interview, then for the next six months, your ass is mine."
"Flattered. I never thought you had those feelings about me, dearie," he began.
"Not like that. Eeuu." Regina took a moment to gag before responding, "You will go where I tell you to, report on who and what I tell you to and you will do your best damn job of it. I don't care if it's the god damned Westminster Dog Show. Agreed?"
Gold hesitated half a moment. "Agreed." He hung up the phone.
And, smiling, Gold stepped back into his hotel room. He entered softly and saw that the Princess was still asleep. He made a couple of passes on his phone, calling up a picture of her and comparing the two. No question. He then picked up a corner of the sheet and tickled the back of her hand with it. He leaned in close to her.
"Your Highness?" he said very softly.
"Mmmmm mmmmmm," was all she said.
"Your Royal Highness?" he repeated.
"Yes. . . yes, what is it?" she sighed.
Gold smiled. "You, my dear, will be my ticket back to The Big Show." He stroked her hair back.
"Dr. Whale?" she said sleepily.
Gold quickly decided to play along – no telling what he might learn, "Yes dearie. You're fine now. Much better. Is there anything you want?"
The Princess sighed, "Oh yes, so many things."
Gold leaned in, "Yes dearie. Well, tell the good doctor everything."
Without opening her eyes, Belle began, "I dreamt and I dreamt. . . "
He waited a moment. "And what did you dream?"
"I dreamt I was asleep on a bench and a man came along and picked me up."
"Is that right?"
"But he was so mean to me."
"He was?" Gold pulled away.
Belle stirred and turned onto her back putting her arm over her eyes. "But he smelled good and took care of me." She lowered her arm and blinked her eyes. She looked at the ceiling. It looked different from what she remembered. Not her hotel room. She looked around the room and saw the man sitting next to her.
"Good morning," Gold greeted her.
"Where's Doctor Whale?" The young woman was most alarmed and pulled the sheet up around her neck.
Gold shrugged, "I'm afraid I don't know anybody by that name."
"Wasn't I just talking to him?"
Gold looked around the room, "Don't see how that's possible."
Belle was suddenly alarmed, touching her short hair, "Have I been in an accident?"
"Not that I know," Gold reassured her.
"Then it's safe for me to sit up?"
"I believe so."
Belle gingerly raised herself. She kept an eye on Gold, clearly not trusting him.
"Thank you," she said in her clipped tones. She looked down at the shirt she was wearing, "Is this yours?"
"Yes. You seemed quite happy to change into it last night."
Belle's eyes widened.
Gold decided to reassure her. "I found you on a city bench. You were acting drunk . . . or drugged. I didn't want to leave you outside for the night. I was afraid you'd be arrested. I tried to get you a hotel room, but they were all full up because there's some Princess visiting the town. So. . . I brought you here to my hotel room. You were pretty out of it."
"Have I been here all night?" she asked him.
"Yes."
"With you?"
"Yes."
Belle blinked. "So, I spent the night here . . . with you?"
Gold hurried to reassure her, "I don't know if I'd use those exact words, but . . . er. . . from a certain angle . . . yes."
Belle thought about it but seemed reassured that he was her rescuer, not a predator and she gave him a brilliant smile. She held out her hand to him, "How do you do?"
Gold took her hand and shook it. "Fine. And how do you do?"
"Fine. And you are?"
"Gold. My friends just call me Gold."
"Mr. Gold. Delighted."
"I'm quite delighted to meet you."
Belle gestured to a chair nearby. "You may sit down."
Gold sat down on the bottom of the bed instead. "Well, thank you, very much. And what is your name?" He was most curious as to how she would answer this.
Belle considered. She decided to use her family name. "Belle. I'm Belle."
"Well, thank you, Belle. Would you like a cup of truly heinous coffee?"
"Coffee? What time is it?"
Gold looked at his watch. "Almost ten o'clock."
Belle panicked. "Ten o'clock?!" She jumped out of the bed and headed towards the door. "I must get dressed and go!" She then remembered that all she was wearing was one of his shirts, leaving her legs bare. She grabbed the sheet to wrap it around herself.
"Why? What's your hurry? There's lots of time." He had caught the quickest glimpse of toned legs, short, but well proportioned. Nice.
"Oh no, there isn't. And I've . . . I've been quite enough trouble to you as it is."
Gold graced her with his most charming smile, "Trouble? No, you're not what I'd call trouble."
