Final

In the lounge at the Kirby-Jones Events Center in Sydney, Lucille heard someone calling, "Miss Lightfoot – Miss Lightfoot." Her mind jolted to the present and she focused on the reason for being there.

"Yes."

"You're second up when we resume after this break," said one of the coordinators." You haven't far to walk. Are you well – you appear to have been asleep?"

"No young woman. I've allowed l my mind to drift and review some of the things that have brought me to this point. How long have I been allocated to speak?"

"Three minutes."

"I'm sorry, that's not enough; I need at least five minutes."

"I regret Miss Lightfoot but that's not possible. This show is being televised and is running to a tight schedule as dictated by our commercial sponsors. You were hand-delivered the schedule that gave your speaking time."

"Damn commercial sponsors and damn schedules," Lucille snorted. "Its five minutes or I'm not going on."

"I'll be right back," said the pretty coordinator, suddenly turning white.

She returned back the director of the event and her co-presenter.

"Good gracious Lucille," urged the co-presenter, "Please allow us to adhere to our schedule."

"Who follows me Michelle?"

"Philip Gadsby to be awarded for his thirty-five years of excellence in reporting on national politics on television."

"Philip's a jerk and will be drunk. Tell him diplomatically that his three minutes has been cut to one minute."

"You are the only person with three minutes Lucille. Mr Gadsby has two minutes like all other principal recipients."

"Then tell him to say 'Thank you' and walk off holding his golden whatever over his head. He'll be so grateful at not being given the opportunity of disgracing himself in front of family and friends – and the nation."

"Do you think so?"

"I know so Michelle."

The director Alex Dodds intervened.

"That's not fair practice Miss Lightfoot; you are attempting to deny a fellow professional of his rights."

"Well, well Mr Dodds. Then you come up with a better solution. I'm taking a full five minutes and if there's any attempt to shut me down at the end of three minutes I'll create. For god's sake this is television, national television, not a sponsor's plaything. It's time you guys ran your own show."

"Thank you Miss Lightfoot. We will seek a time extension of two minutes from the studio."

"If they refuse suggest they cut out the sponsor's message."

Mr Dodds and Miss Joyce, both looking aghast, hurried off.

Digger re-joined Lucille and asked, "Has anyone ever called you an asshole?"

"Only that grin saved you from head surgery after being hit with this champagne bottle," Lucille said, smiling thinly.

One of the big announcements came immediately after the break.

"Magazine of the Year," Alex Dodds said, stepping in for one of the co-presenters who was too upset to continue.

After another drum roll he said, "Will the principal personnel of

FashionUP

come to the stage, once again winner of this premier award in its illustrious short history of publication."

Sue lead her editorial team on stage and Chrissie led the management and production team to line up behind them.

"It's stunning, isn't it," said Michelle Joyce, as images of front covers and picture-spreads from selected issues of

FashionUP

appeared on the big screen behind her.

Sue accepted the award and handed it to Mo who passed it on to Chrissie.

Sue said, "Thank you the Media Awards organizers and your sponsors. I thank our team and thank you everyone who buys our magazine and renews their subscription regularly and those precious advertisers who support us so well."

"A few of us have been with

FashionUP

since it was founded. In the 28 years that our present publisher, Miss Lucille Lightfoot has owned the magazine it has gone for strength to strength. This is the seventh time in those 28 years we have won this supreme award, a very proud record for us."

"We try to bring Lucille on stage with us but she always refuses, saying the ones who do the work go on stage not the one who only bankrolls the operation and provides a little inspiration. A little inspiration – if only you folk really knew. Congratulations team, and get us back onstage again next year. Thank you."

Digger sniffed.

"To think that woman we almost fired 28 years ago for incompetence when all she needed was a leg up. Every so often along comes someone who can make a significant difference and in our case that person was you Lucille."

"Shut up Digger, you'll be making me nervous," Lucille snapped.

"I saw Bob Monk in the men's room," Digger grinned. "He's now stuck with his New York company chairman's ex-wife who's almost ten years older than him and has him under her thumb. He asked me to say hello and he's looking forward to your presentation as being the highlight of the evening."

He was answered with a smile and wink.

"We now present a special major award of this evening in the magazine section," announced Michelle Joyce. "It's being presented to the Magazine Publisher of the Decade. Miss Lucille Lightfoot please come to the stage."

Lucille went to the stage quickly and thanked the media awards organization for honoring her. She thanked the sponsors by name and to the people of Australia who purchased her magazine. She then launched into it.

"Will my dear friend Maria Lombardi please stand."

Maria on a table just in front of the rostrum stood and had a new diamond clip in her white hair.

"Everyone, this woman probably saved me from a life of hell. Maria is 71 now but as a young married and struggling woman in New York, she came across me – a street waif, aged fifteen, recently discharged from an orphanage. She took me into her home and she and husband Enzio treated me as family, allowing me to work in their restaurant and adding to my dignity by calling me the head waitress – I was the only waitress. They paid for my singing lessons and guitar lessons. Thank you – thank you from my heart Maria. Please rejoin Enzio."

"A lady walked into our restaurant in New York one evening, unable to be accommodated in her first choice of restaurant. She saw the dress I was wearing, fingered it and asked who'd made it. I said I did. She asked me where had I copied the design from and I said nowhere, it came from my head. To keep a long story short the late Winslet Graham took me under her wing as her protégé, teaching me everything she knew, taking me with her to the fashion centers of the world and eventually making me general manager of her factories which, at their peak, employed 350 people."

"Maria saved my life, Mrs Graham gave me direction in life and I left her employ, aged 30, and came to Australia for a holiday, fell upon a publishing family who happened to have a failing Fashion magazine called

FashionUp

. I thought I might have the vision and experience to help save it and talked my way into the job. Please stand Debbie Monk."

"Debbie pressed her husband to give me that job. Please stand Andrew Monk. Please stand Mo Davis, my long-time business partner until selling out to me last month. Please stand Digger Morrissey who is Mo's brother. Andrew, Mo and Digger had their backs to the wall but being Australians they decided to give me a go and went to the bank for more money – and it worked. They almost died on that first day with them when I admitted I'd written for magazines but had never worked for one. Shortly after starting I asked them to send me to America and Mo accompanied me. You can imagine what test that put on the hearts of those three directors."

"Please stand Ashleigh Avon. Ashleigh is a household name in Australia. She saw something in me that she liked and agreed to help fund our trip to New York and accompanied us with samples of her beachwear and already famous outback wear. Mo, Ashleigh and I looked great in those days and we put on a fashion show for the staff of my targeted company – a big fashion magazine."

"They American big-wigs thought we were great and agreed to my outlandish request to exchange pages between our two magazines – originally eight pages, today it is consistently twenty-four so readers of our respective magazines get big impact fashion picture spreads from Australia and America for the price of one magazine. Who would be willing to agree to that today? You'd be ass-kicked out the door."

After talking about the magazine market as it was in the late 1970s and comparing it with today, Lucille continued.

"Please stand Mrs Chrissie Morrissey. Chrissie has long managed my group of companies. As a young art student she stuck by me and finally withdrew from my head fashion design concepts that until then I had never been successful in getting on to paper. I'll immodestly say that those designs created by me and produced into sketches by Chrissie for some years until my output dried up made us quite famous in fashion circles. I encouraged Digger Morrissey to marry Chrissie. They occasionally had come into close contact – actually as close as you can get – but after a failed marriage under awful circumstances Digger was too hurt to try again and yet Chrissie had told me she loved him. So I did some pushing. They are still together and are very happy."

"I had a child out of wedlock who died after clinging to life for ten days despite a faulty heart and that birthing left me unable to have another child. But I suppose in recognition of how I'd brought them together Digger and Chrissie have named me godmother of each of their three children."

"And there it is – I came to Australia and found a career and despite my awful start to life I kept falling against some wonderful people who have helped make me what I am. I decided to retain joint American citizenship but spiritually regard myself as substantially Australian as this country has been immensely kind to me. Well, that is my story. Thank you."

That speech had dragged on, leaving the director and his co-presenters looking like nervous wrecks, drew a prolonged standing ovation which sucked up more time.

Lucille returned to the microphone, hushing the crowd.

"I've selfishly gobbled up more than my fair share of time. So you guys coming up here please accept my apologies and make it short and snappy. Let's have a little bit of professionalism and help our fine presenters run to time huh!"

The nationally televised awards presentation ended exactly on schedule. At Lucille's request Chrissie purchased two bottles of champagne for each of the five recipients who'd followed Lucille and two for each of the presenters including the young coordinator who Lucille had roughed up.

"Tell them I'm not always hard-nosed," Lucille called to Chrissie.

She then bought champagne for their table and asked Digger to fetch the Lombardi's up to her table and squeeze them in beside her.

* * *

After Maria and the now arthritic Enzio, soon to turn eighty, were in bed in the loft apartment, Lucille looked at her company's award as magazine publisher of the decade – in this instance she really meant her rather than the company.

Although the string of magazines are produced by a team – at the latest count being eighty-one people – she continued as the driving force with

FashionUP

which still easily shone as the flagship of output from MagWorld.

Lucille examined the bronze replica of an open book held on a thin brass column attached to a weighted brass stand. A piece of junk really – except to her. For the last thirty years publishing had been her life, the rewards had been numerous, the disappointments few.

Amid the milestones had been the death of her infant daughter. That was so tragic but at least as Atlanta grew within her it made Lucille feel whole, complete.

The heart defect – more or less an under-development – had been detected before birth and the consensus was Atlanta would either die before or at birth but those medical persons hadn't counted on the underweight little darling having the fighting spirit of her mother.

Each day, each night had been a nightmare for Lucille, expecting Atlanta to go at any minute and finally, just after midnight on the tenth day of life Atlanta gave a little cry and stiffened. A night nurse finding the two locked together during her hourly check recorded details on the chart and called her supervisor for conformation.

The two nurses made no attempt to take Atlanta until at 5.45, shortly before ending their shift, when they arrived with a porter wheeling a trolley. They stood silently, waiting. Lucille kissed Atlanta for the final time and then gave her up.

Lucille felt terrible, absolutely exhausted. She knew she'd lost weight, her skin looked yellow and her eyes were sunken. This was the huge low in her life – far bigger even when learning the loss of her parents because at that young age she really wasn't aware of what that meant and bigger than the grief she felt upon learning that Mrs Winslet Graham had passed away.

That nondescript nurse with mousy hair who'd found Atlanta had passed on returned when she finished duty to find Lucille staring at the ceiling. That young woman had a heart of gold, Lucille recalled.

The nurse sat on the bed – a real no-no for nursing staff – and took Lucille's upper body into her arms began stroking Lucille's hair and cheek. Lucille remembers that moment as if it occurred only a few days ago. She'd been lying stiffly, barely blinking, her eyes dry, her mouth parched and her heart heavy.

"Cry for me Lucille."

The request registered, dully.

There was a long pause then the nurse – Lucille remembers as Elizabeth Harper – said something else and that brought the tears: "Lucille, cry for Atlanta."

She began to weep and for a moment that turned to wailing and that was it.

She slept all day and awoke during the night, dressed and against the protests of hospital night management, signed out. The irate facility manager called a taxi and Lucille returned to her loft, climbing the stairs and resolving to get that planned elevator installed.

After the morning funeral Lucille returned to work and thereafter thought little more of her poor darling.

Grief still remained foreign to her. Mo and particularly Ashleigh Avon knew this and one or the other remained close to Lucille for the next two days and nights. Then Lucille left with Ashleigh for a few days in Honolulu.

On the second day in their hotel at breakfast, overlooking the beach at Waikiki, Ashleigh asked: "Would you rather stay here or come with me to the other side of the island to look at a property."

"A property?"

"Yes, I'm thinking about it as an investment. Things are only ticking along between me and Martin so once the children leave home I rather think I'll be leaving the nest as well."

"But you two..."

"Lucille he's found someone else."

As they traveled across the island to the coast Lucille began pointing out landmarks.

"You've been here before?" asked the astonished Ashleigh, or have you been studying the map?"

"Oh I came here many times. The Grahams always escaped the winter in New York and after Mr Graham's death Mrs Graham brought me here with her – exactly for ten weeks, always flying out on the same date each year, always returning to New York on the same date. Mrs Graham operated like a clock. I'm also familiar with some of the other islands."

"Then you choose what we do and where we go; you be our guide."

"Okay if that's what you wish. But should we not get this property inspection over. It's got you so uptight."

"I'm a little nervous because the asking price is huge. It will mean taking out a big loan and I'm rather stretched financially at the moment in relocating to my new factory and design complex."

"I'm prepared to loan you money; you won't have to go to the bank and it will be interest free."

"Darling, not the amount of money I'm talking about."

As they drove through the opened iron gates rusting on their hinges, the excited Ashleigh turned to say something and stopped: Lucille's face had turned white.

"What, what is it?"

Lucille, without changing expression, intoned: "This is Atlanta Estates spreading over four acres with three houses and a derelict shack right on the private beach. Income from the two rentable houses provides sufficient profit to cover all outgoings on the property. Asking price will be US$4 million."

Smiling at the stupid look on her friend's face, Lucille said: "This was Mrs Graham's winter retreat. You have brought me almost full circle."

"I can't believe this," Ashleigh gasped. "As a coincidence, the chances of this happening are incredibly huge."

"Changes happen against all odds; you know that."

"Well...anyway you're wrong about the asking price – it's $5.8 million."

"That's pie in the sky thinking. How long has it been on the market?"

"Just over a year."

"There you go. Buyers in this price bracket want to go to where other rich folk go, on the popular stretches where they can be seen and impress when being asked where they live. People who want the opposite to that buy a retreat like this and there're no so many people like that. Offer the sellers $3.7 and accept their second counter offer of $4.2 million."

Ashleigh stopped the rental sports car. "How can you know that? Oh yeah, you know Hawaii. But darling even four mil madness for me at the moment and besides, they'll just laugh at me offering $3.7."

"Ashleigh, your expertise is fashion as is mine but I've also added a sound business brain to my personal arsenal. And as you know I 'see' things. This estate is run down; the three houses will all require expensive maintenance – those gates at the entrance tell the story."

"That's what you saw, you mean."

"Dampness is the problem in all three houses. All require replacement roofing."

"Oh come on, let's get this over. We should be back on the beach in our bikinis looking at the sexy men strutting their stuff."

"Oh really, I thought your preference was women."

Ashleigh laughed and called Lucille a cheeky bitch.

Lucille asked, "Did Angus McKeon ever bed you?"

"No but he made several determined efforts. He was too old for me and lacked the features I desired. Without his money he would have been nothing. Some stupid bitch gave him my private line number."

"I apologize for doing that. I thought a rumble in bed might produce some new business opportunities for you – he invests in things other than the media. He could easily set you up in a joint venture, ensuring you remain close when he feels it's your turn to be screwed."

"What, in business or the flesh," Ashleigh laughed then looked at Lucille thoughtfully.

"What? I'm not having sex with you, at least not in this toy car and in the open."

"Buy this property with me as a joint venture."

"Okay."

"What? Don't you have questions...require assurances as big money is involved?"

"No I was just waiting for the invitation I knew would come. Let's get on with it and get back to looking at those sexy men and women on the beach. All that I ask is that you allow me to conduct the negotiations, alone, to allow me to bring that sale and purchase agreement to sign at $4.2 million which is the figure the sellers will cave in at."

"How do you know that?"

"I just know. Let's go."

The inspection took almost two hours.

"God, the potential is great. It's a pity about the dampness," Ashleigh said. "But as you said, new roofing and reinstatement and we'll be on cloud nine. The funny thing is I wasn't aware it rained in Hawaii but of course you can't have this tropical greenness without plenty of rain."

Lucille took her friend by the arm as they strolled to the beach.

"It's the power and influence of advertising huh? Have you ever seen an ad of Hawaii pictured during a rain downpour?"