Silverbridge Read Online Free PDF Page A

places, or build sets.”
    “It looks like a painting by Watteau,” Jon said.
    A little silence fell as the three of them regarded the loveliness before them. Then Dave said briskly, “All right, we’d better head on down to the garden. Ivan has everything set up, so I hope we can shoot without much delay.”
    The three of them stepped off the terrace and began to walk along the graveled path that led to the pool and thence to the yew-enclosed garden. “We’ve chosen a perfect spot,” Dave said, as they went down the stone steps and through an arched opening in the great yew hedge. Inside was a wide grassy pathway that followed the hedge. Tracy looked first left then right, and saw that all along its perimeter the hedge had niches cut in it, which contained either statues or stone benches.
    “ This way,” Dave sai d, and started along an azalea- bordered path that led toward the center of the garden. Tracy looked up and down a series of smaller paths as they went by, and at the end of each there was a fountain jet shooting water into the air.
    The movie company had set up in the center of the garden, which featured a wide, shallow pool, in the midst of which was a fountain of lead cherubs with a jet sending a magnificent spray of water high into the air. The cameras, the audio equipment, the electrical wires hooked up to a truck, and a crowd of people dressed in jeans indicated that this was where they were going to shoot.
    Ivan Hunt, the cinematographer, called, “All right, Tracy and Jon. If you’ll take your places and walk through the scene, I’ll check the lighting.”
    Like the professionals that they were, the two leads moved to make the first run-through of the scene.
     
     
    T racy was actually back at the Wiltshire Arms in time for dinner. Food was not on her mind, however, as she and Gail stepped out of the elevator and headed toward her door.
    Gail let her go in first. “Get undressed, Tracy, and into bed,” she said. “Do you want anything to eat or drink? A cup of tea, perhaps?”
    “No,” Tracy replied in what she always thought of as her “headache voice.” “I just want to take some Imitrex and get into bed.”
    “Do that then,” Gail replied. “I’ll turn off the ringer on the phone in your bedroom and man the living room phone for the rest of the evening.”
    “Thank you,” Tracy said, and went straight to her bathroom, where she washed down a pill with water. She then changed into silk pajamas and got into bed.
    The headache was pounding in time with her heartbeat, and she curled up in a fetal position, as if trying to escape the pain.
    What on earth happened to me today? She did not doubt that her headache was connected to the strange sense of déjà vu she had experienced at Silverbridge. She had never had such a feeling before. The shock of recognition when first she beheld the house was something entirely new to her; it was also a little frightening.
    I must have seen a picture of it somewhere before, she told herself again. That’s why it looks so familiar.
    It took a full two hours for the Imitrex to work and for the sledgehammer pounding in her head to begin to subside. By ten o’clock she was asleep.
    She awoke once during the night to go to the bathroom, and the dregs of the headache were still there. She took a couple of Excedrin and went back to bed.
    When she awoke the following morning, it seemed to be gone. She sat up and tested it by moving her head. The headache was indeed gone, she decided, but the all- too-familiar hungover feeling she had the day after a migraine was firmly in place. Her mouth tasted like medicine, her stomach was uneasy, and she felt as if she hadn’t slept in twenty-four hours.
    “Water,” she said out loud, and went into the bathroom to fill a glass. She drank it thirstily, then brushed her teeth and washed her face. She came back into the bedroom and was moving to pull the drapes back from the windows when her attention was caught by