A Christmas Fling Read online

  "That’s because its ancestors are Greek, not Mexican." Greg made a mental note to send some Cincinnati chili spice packets to Dr. Lyme. "Our local specialty."

  That started a lively discussion about regional foods while the new arrivals served themselves and sat down. Luckily, Greg managed not to step on the collie-ish dog that was snoozing peacefully under the sideboard. Given the way Jenny fussed over the elderly pooch, he suspected that stepping on its tail would get him exiled permanently from the house.

  Dr. Lyme replenished his coffee. "Is everything in hand for the rehearsal?"

  "So far, so good," Jenny replied. "One of the horn dancers broke his right antler, but we were able to super- glue the end on again."

  Greg grinned, amused at the contrast of old and new. "I’ve been meaning to ask why moose antlers are worn for a dance."

  "Not moose—red deer. The horned god is a pagan deity and tied up with fertility and nature," Patricia explained with schoolteacher precision.

  "We included the horn dance because it’s a specialty of this dance group, and it looks impressive," Jenny added. "Excuse me while I go change into my costume. Patricia, can you help?"

  The two women disappeared, leaving Greg with the doctor and Ken Holmes. Ken, an engineer, was asking technical questions about film editing when the sisters reappeared. Jenny had traded her jeans for a flowing gown of burgundy velvet with gold embroidered borders, topped by a headdress with a diaphanous golden veil. The medieval finery gave her an otherworldly air at odds with the approachable woman who warmed his nights. "You take my breath away," Greg said honestly.

  She dimpled and curtsied gracefully. "‘Tis honored I am to make your acquaintance, Sir Gregory of Ohio."

  Their teasing was interrupted when Alice Lyme appeared. Greg had met her several times at the tithe barn, where she helped as needed. A silver fox version of her beautiful daughters, she usually had an unflappable quality that reminded Greg of his own mother, but this evening she was frowning. "Bad news, I’m afraid."

  "What’s wrong?" Jenny asked.

  "I’ve just learned that the Carthage Corporation has changed its deadline. Originally we had until June thirtieth to meet their price. Now they say we must have the money by January first."

  "They can do that?" Greg asked, startled. "Don’t you have an option contract of some sort?"

  Alice shrugged. "It was a gentlemen’s agreement, which tends to be worthless when dealing with corporations. Last summer Carthage had the barn appraised and told us if we could raise the amount of the appraisal by the time the lease expired, the barn would be ours. But nothing was in writing."

  "Probably they’ve received a higher offer," Patricia said cynically.

  "They know the center can’t raise so much money on such short notice." Jenny looked stricken. "When we fail, they accept the other contract. Come June, we’re out."

  Greg swore under his breath. Jenny had said once that the center had a good chance to raise the money, but it would take the six months they’d been counting on to edit and polish the Revels production and sell it to television.

  Or would it? "Did they say in writing that they would let the village buy the barn if it raised the money by New Year’s?"

  Alice raised a paper she had brought in. "Yes, the cowards faxed me rather than telephoning. But what good does that do us?"

  "The key is television sales," he replied. "Jenny has plenty of London contacts, and I know some people in American TV. If we can produce some good sample material quickly enough, maybe we can get commitments to buy the finished film for next year. With those in hand, you might be able to get a bridge loan from a bank. I doubt the corporation would dare back out since you have their written promise to sell at the appraisal price. It would look nasty in the newspapers if they reneged, and corporations don’t like looking like bad guys."

  "Can that all be done in such a short time?" Alice asked doubtfully.

  Jenny bit her lip, calculating. "It’s possible. Barely. If Greg can pull together some fabulous footage in the next day or two. Can you?"

  "I think so. I rigged the lights to give even illumination, which means I can shoot the full dress rehearsal tonight digitally. Sean has a similar camera and he would love to act as second unit. Does anyone in Upper Bassett have a really good digital editing setup on his computer?"

  "I do." Ken Holmes smiled self-deprecatingly. "We engineers love gadgets."

  "He also has first-class recording equipment taking up far too much of the house." Patricia smiled at her husband affectionately. "He records music at our church and we sell the CDs. The sound is professional quality."

  "Then let’s go for it." Greg swallowed a last bite of supper and got to his feet. "We’ll shoot and record the rehearsal, edit tonight, and by tomorrow morning we should have something that will convince the BBC that you deserve a piece of their budget."

  Ken also stood. "I’ll go home for my sound equipment and meet you at the barn."

  After thanking the Lymes for their hospitality, Greg and Jenny collected their coats and left. By the time they reached the tithe barn, the building was teeming with cast members. A flock of cherubs, ridiculously cute in white robes and gilded wings, galloped by as Greg extricated young Sean from a group of dancers and enlisted him for the evening’s shooting.

  As Greg explained to Sean what was needed, Jenny marched up the steps onto the stage. "The tithe barn is on thin ice, my friends," she said in a carrying voice, "so tonight we have to do a cracking good job."

  Swiftly she outlined the situation with a passion that would have inspired soldiers on the eve of battle. By the time she finished speaking, all of the actors, singers, dancers, and musicians were poised for their best work.

  Within half an hour they were set to go, microphones in place and two cameras ready to record the performance. The next hours were a blur of motion and music. When possible, Greg loved to work fast and capture the spontaneity that was hard to maintain in multiple takes. In this case, he also wanted the action to be as uninterrupted as possible so that the performers could get the benefit of their dress rehearsal.

  The show began with the children singing, "Oh, come, oh, come, Emmanuel," as they walked through the darkened theater, each carrying a candle and watched like a hawk by Patricia to see that they didn’t set themselves on fire. The kids, as expected, were adorable, and they sang like crystal bells. With the lights low and the candles illuminating earnest young faces, the procession captured the eternal magic of the season.

  As the story unfolded, the performers outdid themselves. The mixture of professionals and experienced amateurs put on a musical spectacular worthy of London’s famous West End theaters. Sir George, the future saint, was played by an opera tenor, the Turkish physician was a famous Welsh stage actor, and Jenny as Lady Molly proved to be a first-rate singer with a rich voice that filled every corner of the barn.

  Fiercely concentrating, Greg entered the altered state where he was no longer consciously aware of his movements, his whole body responding instinctively to what his eyes saw. A pan across the bright faces of the singing cherubs, yes. Pull back and up to capture the wild energy of the horn dancers. Descend to shoot the ponderous, glittering dragon as the beast slew the knight. A poignant shot of the fallen warrior.

  And always Jenny, first as the saucy narrator who set the stage for the show, later as Lady Molly weeping over the body of her sweetheart. The camera loved her, caressing her expressive face and supple body as she became a woman of another time.

  Enter the Turkish physician in his Eastern robes, and with a stage presence that had knocked London theatergoers dead for decades. The slain knight was revived, the lovers reunited, and the resurrection theme was expanded into a touching Nativity scene.

  At the end, as Greg slowly pulled the camera back and up, the whole cast sang "Go, Tell It on the Mountain," the American spiritual somehow perfectly right. Adults, children, dancers, musicians, and even the dragon were united in peace and harmony. Damn, these people were good.

  As the cast dissolved into post-performance chatter, relief, and analysis, Greg leaned against the wall, almost dizzy now that shooting was over. Having made her comments and compliments to her cast, Jenny slipped away to join him, her face flushed with a performer’s high even though she had removed her makeup. "Was that as good as I thought it was?"

  He nodded. "Better. More takes and angles and a wider range of zoom shots would have been nice, but we have what we need to shop the show."

  Sean appeared, looking awed. "That was bloomin’ marvelous! Better than a year’s worth of course work."

  "You were a great help, Sean. I’m glad you stayed," Greg said. "Maybe we can work together again someday."

  After the young cameraman left, beaming, Jenny stood on her toes and gave Greg a swift kiss. "Thank you so much. There’s still a long way to go, but if not for your wizardry, we wouldn’t have a chance. First thing tomorrow I’ll call my most influential BBC connection. With luck, we can have a meeting tomorrow afternoon."

  Greg gave her a tired smile, the tanned skin crinkling around his dark eyes. "It’s still early enough in the U.S. for me to call there tonight. If the editing goes well, tomorrow I’ll be able to send a rough cut over."

  He looked so huggable that it was an effort for Jenny to keep her hands to herself. Reminding herself that her mother and half her family were in the room, she behaved. Sort of. Linking an arm through Greg’s, she said, "Before we go to Patricia and Ken’s house to edit, let’s stop by my place for a bite to eat and a pot of coffee to keep us awake. You can make your calls while my mother locks up here."

  "Good idea. I’m ravenous. That kind of work really gives me an appetite."

  Arm in arm, they said good-byes and left t
he barn. Jenny was still buzzing with exhilaration from the performance, where the sum of what they had done was so much more than the individual people. Yet underneath was a vein of melancholy, because in two or three days he’d be gone. She wondered if she would be able to kiss him good-bye at Heathrow without crying.

  Even the best actress has her limits.

  Chapter 7

  While Jenny threw together a quick supper, Greg withdrew to his room and called a couple of people he knew in American television, plus a CBC friend in Toronto. All three wanted to see a rough cut of the performance.

  He ended his final call, satisfied that everyone understood the need for a quick decision and money on the table if they were interested. If Jenny did as well in London, there was a fighting chance of raising the money by New Year’s.

  Plato trotted in carrying his buggy whip. After dropping it at the foot of the bed, he leaped onto Greg’s lap. "I’m going to miss you, philosopher," Greg murmured as he scratched the furry neck. Though not as much as he’d miss the cat’s mistress.

  He didn’t want to make a fool of himself by babbling to her what she meant to him—she probably got declarations of love from smitten males every week. But maybe he could find a special gift that would say what he meant without words. Not chocolate or jewelry—Jenny was quite capable of getting her own. What did she want most?

  The dream was to make movies—be an international star, you know. Her flip tone hadn’t concealed her underlying regrets. Despite Jenny’s success at television, her one Hollywood movie had been a fiasco, and now she had the absurd notion that she was over the hill. Did he know anyone who might need a terrific English actress?

  On impulse, he dialed the private number of Raine Marlowe, who had produced, directed, and starred in The Centurion, the movie that had given them both Oscars. Even though she and her family lived mostly on a ranch in northern New Mexico, she was well plugged in to the Hollywood movers and shakers. In fact, she was one herself.

  As the phone rang, he remembered that Jenny was a former girlfriend of Raine’s husband, Kenzie Scott. Maybe she wasn’t the best person to ask. Before he could decide, Raine picked up the phone, in the midst of baking Christmas cookies. After they offered each other best wishes for the season, he explained why he was calling. If something came of it, great. If not—well, no harm done.

  As he hung up, Jenny called, "Supper’s ready!"

  "Coming." Greg stood, boosting Plato over his shoulder. "You’re going to be mad if this works, big guy. Making a movie would take your mom away from you for months." Whistling softly, he went down the stairs. If he couldn’t be with Jenny in person, he could watch her on the silver screen.

  * * *

  "Do all cinematographers know how to edit as well as you do?" Jenny asked as she watched Greg work on her brother-in-law’s huge computer monitor.

  He shrugged. "I like playing with it and I’ve hung out with a lot of first-class film editors. Editing is the critical step that pulls everything together."

  Jenny smothered her yawn as they watched the final scene, a marvelous image that young Sean had shot from the catwalk above the stage. Though an American spiritual was hardly traditional in a mummers’ play, Jenny firmly believed that folk performances were a living tradition, and should evolve and grow and adopt new music.

  The final frame dissolved into darkness. "Finis. It’s a wonderful sample, Greg. Now all we need is for my telly people to bite."

  "They’re nuts if they don’t." Greg saved the final version, then rose, yawning. His skill had made editing a pleasure. She had enjoyed discussing the shots and trying different versions until they had captured the essence of the live performance.

  His competence was very sexy. If she weren’t so tired, she’d jump him. There was privacy enough—Patricia and her family had long since retired.

  When Jenny and Greg were outside the house, he slung an arm around her shoulders as they walked to the car. She loved such casual, affectionate gestures.

  Starting the engine as quietly as possible, she headed through the empty village to her cottage. They were almost home when Greg asked, "It’s well known that you and Kenzie Scott were an item at RADA. Were you in love with him?"

  She guessed that he might not have asked such a personal question if he wasn’t so tired, but she didn’t mind answering. "Not really. I do love Kenzie—he’s one of my dearest friends, and he’s as kind as he is good-looking, which is saying a lot. But there was always something unknowable about him—an essence that I could never touch."

  "I thought women liked mysterious men."

  "Some might, but I think it’s tedious to always be wondering what a man thinks. I’m afraid that I’m hopelessly middle class, Greg. I like a chap who’s down to earth and knowable." Someone like Greg. She had dated her share of high-maintenance charmers, and they made her appreciate steadiness and good humor.

  As they entered her cottage, she thought of his question from their first night together: Would she have stayed with him in California if he’d asked all those years earlier? She still didn’t know what her response would have been—but looking back, she was pretty sure that she should have stayed.

  * * *

  Simon Oxnard, Jenny’s honcho friend at the BBC, clicked off the Revels recording. He had watched the first third straight through and skipped rapidly through the rest to get a sense of the whole. Greg sat and gloomily noted all the errors he’d made. Shots held too long, angles that could have been improved, lighting that wasn’t quite right. He was beginning to wish he hadn’t accompanied Jenny for this sales pitch.

  Of course, it was always good to watch Jenny. She’d opted for the businesswoman look today rather than actress glamour or country casual. With hair swept up and a beautifully tailored suit, she looked ready to run the Bank of England.

  "Very nice, Jenny. The script is a delightful blend of traditional and contemporary, and you’ve directed well." Simon glanced at Greg. "You captured a wonderful sense of immediacy, Mr. Marino. I felt I was standing in the middle of the stage, immersed in celebration."

  Greg thanked him, glad his errors weren’t obvious to a non-cameraman.

  Simon continued, "I’ll have to run this by some of our programming people before I can make a commitment. There’s a good chance we’ll want it, but it won’t be anywhere near as much money as you need. Tight budgets, you know."

  Greg sensed Jenny’s disappointment, though she didn’t let it show on her face. "I understand. Many thanks for making time for us today, Simon." She stood and offered her hand. "The Ad Hoc Upper Bassett Players thank you."

  The executive smiled as he shook her hand. "Is that what you call yourselves? You have quite a lot of talent in your village. It’s worth sharing with a wider audience."

  After they were safely out of the bustling television center, Greg asked, "Was he really interested, or was he just giving us the local version of the Hollywood shuffle?"

  "If Hollywood shuffle means what I think, no, Simon isn’t like that. He really did like what he saw, which means he’ll probably make an offer after he runs it by his programmers." She sighed. "Unfortunately, he’s also being straight about the money. When one comes down to it, this is just glorified community theater. We’ll be lucky to sell it at all. We won’t get enough to buy the barn."

  "There’s a good chance of an American sale, and maybe a Canadian one as well."

  "From what you told me, that won’t be huge money either. At best, we’ll have perhaps half the amount we need."

  Much as Greg would have liked to disagree, she was right. Cable stations and public television weren’t rich. "If you have contracts for half the money, you’re in a better position to borrow the rest."

  "Perhaps." Jenny shook off her mood. "We’ve done as much as we can on this front. Now it’s time to start worrying about our performance tonight."

  "You’ll need your strength. Let me buy you lunch," he suggested.

  "What a good idea. I know a lovely pub near the motorway. Beams, a fireplace, and lots of traditional English pub food like chicken curry."

  "Chicken curry is a traditional English dish?"

  "A legacy of empire." Her smile was rueful. "I’ve been working you hard ever since you arrived, and soon you’ll be going home. I want you to see a bit of the real England—the way we actually live here, not England as a giant theme park for tourists."