Jeannie Out of the Bottle - Barbara Eden [90]
“Stay that way!” she instructed.
So I did, teetering to the car in my four-inch heels, my arms, legs, and fox fur all in place.
Once we arrived at the immense palace courtyard, I kept myself covered as best I could and watched enthralled as the king rode a black stallion the whole length of the courtyard and thousands of Berbers in white djellabas bowed down before him and wished him a long life.
Then we were escorted inside the palace, which was furnished with bizarre reproduction Victorian furniture, and into an anteroom, where a group of women, all dressed in long dresses cinched by heavy gold belts, chattered away like a flock of starlings. Although we were all girls together now, as it were, I still kept my arms strategically placed across my body and made sure that my fox fur didn’t slip from its designated position.
Then a ripple of excitement shot through the anteroom.
“The king, the king is coming!” the women cried.
“Remember, you don’t offer to shake hands with the king unless he offers his first,” my escort instructed me.
As I was holding my arms over my chest to cover it, and wished I had some Krazy Glue to fix them there, I was relieved.
Too soon, of course, because the moment the king came into view, the first person he approached was me. And the first thing he did was offer me his hand in greeting. And who was I not to take it?
Fortunately, the king kept his eyes focused firmly on my face, and I breathed a silent sigh of relief.
Afterward, we were led out to a huge garden, bigger than a football field, where the ground was covered by precious Persian carpets, each sprinkled with rose petals.
No alcohol was served, but there were massive tables, many piled high with all manner of sweets, including slivered almonds, hard candy, and petits fours. Groups of wrinkled old men made mint tea for all the guests.
The following day, we had lunch at La Mamounia, Winston Churchill’s favorite hotel, which had beautiful rows of orange trees in the gardens. There we were served cold lobster, chicken galantine, and shrimp-stuffed artichokes. Again, the ground was laid with Oriental carpets sprinkled with rose petals.
The fête was rounded out by folk dancing, visits to the souks, and further exhibitions of horsemanship. All breathtaking, and opulent in the extreme. I was amazed to discover that the king had no fewer than ten thousand retainers to serve his every need!
I was happy living the single life and had no expectations of ever finding love again. Then one morning my friend Marilyn called out of the blue and announced, “Barbara, I met somebody last night. He’s really cute, and I like him. Do you want to date him?”
As usual, all I was doing was working, and the prospect of a date was enticing. The problem was, I simply didn’t have time, so I sighed and regretfully told Marilyn so. But she was having none of it; to her credit, she convinced me to set aside a weekend night on which to meet this new man she was touting so highly.
I was in my fifties and didn’t dream that I would ever fall in love again, but I was willing to meet Marilyn’s cute new acquaintance. So I was pleased when, a few weeks later, I received a call from Jon Eicholtz. I immediately liked the sound of his voice, his Texas accent, and the decisive yet courteous way in which he suggested that it might be more relaxing if we didn’t double-date with Marilyn and her husband but went out to dinner alone at Morton’s so that we could really get to know each other.
The first thing that impressed me about Jon, apart from his perfect manners, was that he had never seen a single episode of I Dream of Jeannie and wasn’t remotely starstruck. Quite a relief, especially after Chuck. Like Chuck, he was born in Chicago, but I decided not to hold that against him.
And I was relieved that he had nothing whatsoever to do with show business. His father had been in the army during World War II, and Jon went to the University of Kansas. Now a builder/developer, he had a five-year degree in architectural engineering. Like me, he had a twenty-six-year-old