Before I went to bed that night I put the music box on the desk beside the picture of Julia. I wound it up and listened again to thin notes of “The Blue Danube.” I closed my eyes and just for a moment pretended I was back in that Paris apartment, a girl with so little care, such high spirits that she could bicycle through Paris on her way to finishing school and cartwheel down the parqueted floor. Where was that girl now?

Chapter Twenty-five

Humming “Silver Bells,” I struggled up the stairs carrying my purse, briefcase, a bag of groceries, and a huge Christmas wreath looped over one arm. Terrence and I planned to go to Baja for Christmas (as we had for the Thanksgiving weekend), but I wanted the old, remembered scents. Julia always loved Christmas, and when I was a kid, the whole house at Summit Drive was festooned for the holiday, including a massive tree in the foyer and specially made wreaths on the doors. Julia shopped for months to get the perfect presents, not just for the family, but for the staff and friends, and there were parties galore. She created such a sense of festivity, especially in planning for the big Empire Christmas party held in the commissary on the winter solstice.

I hung the wreath on the mantelpiece, kicked off my shoes, changed clothes, put my hair in a ponytail, and set to work making dinner (thank you, Thelma and Fannie Farmer). I turned on the radio, KMPC 710, and hummed along with the infectious “Sixteen Tons” while I poked holes in the potatoes, and when the news came on, I listened halfheartedly to whatever the dreaded Soviets were up to. But I stopped chopping green onions and listened intently when the announcer spoke of a bus boycott in Alabama. All the Negroes in Montgomery, Alabama, were staying off the buses to protest an arrest the week before. I heard the Porsche rumble, rinsed my hands, and met Terrence at the door, alarmed to see he carried a battered suitcase as well as his briefcase. “What’s wrong? Has someone died?”

He draped an arm over my shoulders and pulled me close. I could feel his warm breath on my neck. “Let’s go inside.”

He took his coat off, threw it over the desk chair, and retrieved some typed pages from his pocket. I turned off the radio, got us both a drink, and sat on the floor beside him, reading what he’d written. His column for the next day was about the woman in Alabama, a Mrs. Rosa Parks, who had been arrested the week before for refusing to give up her seat on the bus to a white man.

“Is that the actual law there?” I asked. “Legally she had to give up her seat?”