Chapter 6 March 1995 Lily Jacobsen—Program Manager #2
A trustee? She could probably get me fired. And should get me fired. What had I been thinking? I lifted the photocopies to my chin to shroud my face and prayed she wouldn’t recognize me.
“Did you hear the ‘de’ in her name?” Lorenzo asked. “That denotes French nobility. Her husband’s family owns a vineyard. And she’s a lawyer who comes from a long line of Texas D.A.s. The kind who demand the death penalty.”
The trustee squinted at me as she came closer.
I could practically see her scroll through the Rolodex of her mind: A friend’s niece?
My accountant’s secretary? She barely noticed when Mr. Hayes greeted her.
He followed her gaze to me, puzzled. The director could not envision a scenario in which a trustee would be interested in a lowly program manager.
“I never forget a face,” she said.
“Perhaps you met at a county fair in her native Wyoming?” Mr. Hayes said as he smirked.
Ms. de Narp slapped on a brittle smile. How many times had I worn that same mask when dealing with condescending professors and patronizing boyfriends?
She surely resented the way he dismissed her intuition—after all, she was right.
For my part, I was aware that his crack meant he considered me a country-bumpkin nobody.
He couldn’t even remember where I was from.
“There’s a lot on the agenda,” she told him frostily. “Let’s get to it.”
Mr. Hayes escorted her to his office. After his door clicked shut, I loosened my grip on the photocopies.
“Lily, you’re so pale!” Meg said.
“It’s nothing. I’m fine.” I just wanted to put the unfortunate sidewalk encounter behind me.
Lorenzo raised a brow. “There’s definitely a story here. You know Jennifer de Narp. And she knows you. Spill.”
“Fine!” I said. “I kicked that woman.”
“You kicked a trustee?” For the first time, respect edged out the bitterness in his tone.
“Why would you do such a thing?” Meg asked.
“She threw her cigarette onto the sidewalk and expected some poor street sweeper to pick up after her.”
I waited for them to tell me that I was crazy for attacking a stranger. Instead, Meg chuckled.
“Lots of us want to kick trustees,” Lorenzo admitted.
“But we don’t,” Meg said firmly.
“When Jennifer de Narp figures out how she knows you,” Lorenzo finished, “she’ll fire you faster than you can say ‘au revoir.’ ”
Preparing for Entre Nous events was like throwing a party and not knowing if ten or a hundred people would attend.
Tonight, when David asked how many chairs to put out, I felt optimistic and suggested forty.
Near the door, I stood poised, the toe of my loafer on my favorite ink splotch, which I viewed as a starting block.
I kept my eyes peeled for the speaker, a garden expert who’d been invited by the previous program manager, and I imagined an older woman with a sun-kissed face, like the church ladies back home who tended vegetable plots.
While sizing up attendees and trying to figure out which was the speaker, I reminded them to sign in—I was already nervous about my year-end statistics.
A woman in a pink pantsuit approached. “I’m Vicki Williams. Thank you for the invitation.”
“Welcome! We’re thrilled to have you.” Taking in her ashen complexion and stick arms, I wondered how she could be known as the “Garden Lady.”
“Wait until the end of my presentation before you make such declarations,” she said with a friendly wink.
I escorted her to the director’s office, where Mr. Hayes introduced her to the Select Few, the library’s biggest donors. Three women wore blazes of diamonds; their husbands sported zingy Hermès ties. I lingered in the hope that they’d talk to me. Finally, one did.
“Get the Bordeaux.” Mr. Hayes pointed toward the kitchen.
After serving the elite—in wineglasses this time—I resumed my post near the front door.
A brunette charged past. I asked her to sign in.
“Do you know who I am?” She strode to Mr. Hayes’s office.
David handed me a cup of wine. “That’s Pam de Laney. You’ll live longer and happier if you identify the trustees and stay out of their way. Jennifer de Narp is here as well.”
I committed Pam to memory—bloodred nails, Birkin bag, rude as hell. And Jennifer I already knew too well.
At seven, only fifteen of the chairs had been filled. Before David and I could discreetly remove a few, Mr. Hayes arrived with the speaker and introduced her to the sparse audience, glaring at me the entire time. I felt incompetent.
But sure enough, Ms. Williams worked her magic, and I left my worries behind as she recounted the life of Marguerite Chapin, an American who became Marguerite Gilbert Caetani, Princess of Bassiano, Duchess of Sermoneta, when she married an aristocrat in 1911.
From the last row, I admired the series of slides illustrating Ninfa, Italy’s most lush, romantic garden.
Wanting to leave her mark, the duchess planted two hundred rosebushes on her husband’s estate.
None survived longer than six months. Completely transported, I scribbled in my notebook.
What’s the lesson? That desire is not enough?
More research, and less obsession? Passion is nothing without knowledge?
At the end of the presentation, the trustees Jennifer de Narp and Pam de Laney approached and snapped me out of Ninfa’s spell.
“Did something happen to the bookseller?” Jennifer asked. “Where are Vicki’s books? We all want signed copies.”
“Signed copies?” I repeated weakly. I’d assumed that the previous program manager had contacted the bookseller for events she’d organized, but I should have doubled-checked.
“Of course! There should always be books on hand at Entre Nous literary events.”
“How could you make such a mistake?” Pam de Laney hissed. “You’ve made the library look incompetent.”
“I’m sorry, I—”
“Save it.” The trustees stalked over to the Faithful, who loitered near the circ desk, where the bookseller would have set up shop. Seeing them exit empty-handed, I apologized to Vicki Williams, who replied with a stilted “It’s fine.”
I felt awful. She’d given us such a wonderful gift with her presentation, and I’d ruined her evening.
Meg offered to stay and help close, but I wanted to be alone.
Well, what I really wanted was for Mary Louise to console me, but that wasn’t possible.
Since the move, I hadn’t seen her once. I flicked off the lights.
On my way down the darkened corridor, wine in hand, I thought I heard the raspy sound of someone breathing.
Ghostly moonlight shone through the reading room windows, filling the stacks with shadows.
There were plenty of dark corners for lurkers to hide.
I tried to shake off Meg’s warning about Mike Roth.
At my desk, I entered the statistics:
Date: March 19
Program: Entre Nous
Attendance: 18 (if you include David, Meg, and me)
Books sold: 0
Bottles of wine opened: 8
Glasses drunk by me: 4