Short Straw

Twenty-six

EAGLE WALKED INTO THE INN OF THE ANASAZI TO FIND Susannah Wilde waiting for him, standing in front of a roaring fireplace in the lobby. She was wearing a cream-colored linen dress that set off her tan, a string of pearls, a cashmere sweater over her shoulders and a big smile. She offered her hand.

Eagle took it. "The car is right outside," he said, "not that we need it. The restaurant is just up the street." He put her into the passenger seat, tipped the carhop and drove the two blocks to Santa Cafe.

"I've heard of this place," she said as they were seated.

"I'm glad to be the first to bring you here. We're blessed with good restaurants in Santa Fe, but this is my favorite."

A waiter appeared.

"What would you like to drink?" he asked.

"I'll have a Knob Creek on the rocks, please," Susannah said.

"A woman after my own heart. Make that two. And where did an LA. girl learn to drink hundred-proof bourbon?"

"Oh, I'm not an L.A. girl at all; I'm a Georgia girl, small town called Delano."

"Never heard of it."

"Neither has anybody else, but it got me my first movie role."

"How?"

"A couple of weeks after I first arrived in L.A., I was waiting outside Neiman Marcus for my car to be brought around, and I got into a conversation with an elderly man named Richard Barron."

"I've heard of Rick Barron," he said. "He's the chairman of Centurion Studios."

"I didn't know that, at the time. We had a five-minute wait, and he asked me where I was from. I told him, and, to my astonishment, he told me he had been born in Delano, Georgia, though he left there when he was quite young. You can imagine his surprise when I told him I was from Delano, too. Our cars arrived, he gave me his card and asked me to call him. I did, and he arranged for me to meet the head of production at Centurion, who introduced me to several producers at lunch, and a week later, I had an agent and was working in my first movie."

"Are you always so lucky?"

"Not always. I married one of the producers, and I wouldn't call that lucky."

"Kids?"

"Nope."

"How long have you been divorced?"

"A little over a year. How about you?"

Eagle looked at his watch. "By five o'clock tomorrow afternoon, if I'm lucky."

"How long separated?"

"Less than a week."

"How do you get a divorce so quickly?"

"One: you have a signed financial settlement; two: you have a very good reason; and three: you have a good buddy who's a judge. I have all three."

Their drinks came, and she raised her glass. "Here's to all three," she said.

Eagle raised his glass. "I'll drink to that."

"I take it you're not in a frame of mind to reconsider your marriage."

"You are a perceptive woman."

"It's not hard to see the anger underneath your otherwise charming demeanor."

"That's not anger," he said. "It's relief. The anger came when I found out she'd stolen over a million dollars from me and gone to Mexico."

"Compared to my settlement divorce, that's a cheap divorce," Susannah said.

"That's not counting the other four million she tried to steal but that I was able to hang onto. And it's not costing me very much. I managed to get a lot of it back."

"How did you do that?"

"I hire good people. What about you? Are you still angry at your former husband?"

"The anger pretty much went away when he made good on the settlement."

"Good for you. Anger is self-destructive. It's why I don't do divorce work anymore; I couldn't take the anger my clients were radiating. Let's change the subject. I loved your work in Big Deal and Dare Me."

"Thanks. You Googled me, didn't you?"

"Why do you say that?"

"Because I Googled you, too."

He laughed. "Got me, but I did see both pictures and a couple of others, too."

"Supporting work is sometimes the best," she said, "although, from your resume, I take it you prefer to star."

Eagle laughed. "Nobody ever put it exactly that way before, but yes, I do. I prefer associates to partners. Do you intend to keep on working after your move to Santa Fe?"

"Yes, but I'm not going to look very hard for it. I'll let my agent do that, and I'll only take the good roles. If I don't get those, then I'll produce something myself and shoot it in Santa Fe."

"You're a smart girl," he said. "I hope you don't mind being called that."

"Smart or girl?"

"Girl."

"I'm old enough to take it as a compliment."

They ordered dinner and a bottle of wine.

"What tribe are you?" she asked.

"An eastern tribe."

"Which one?"

"I don't suppose you'd believe I'm the last of the Mohicans?"

"I know the story too well to buy that."

"Ashkenazie."

"That's more like one of the tribes of Israel, isn't it?"

"In a manner of speaking."

"Funny, the Internet thinks you're an Indian."

"I never said so to anybody," Eagle said, "but I never contradicted anybody who thought so."

"You're an interesting man, Ed Eagle."

"And you're an interesting woman, Susannah Wilde."