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Fitness.

3
    After class, Charlotte and Adele headed over to the Hall of Springs for lunch. The Hall of Springs was the most imposing of the spa buildings, modeled as it was after the trink halls of the European spas. To Charlotte, its main room, the Pump Room, looked like the nave of a cathedral or perhaps the set of a thirties champagne musical. It was a vast room, a hundred and fifty feet long and three stories high. Huge crystal chandeliers hung from the barrel-vaulted ceiling, which was supported by files of massive Doric columns through which shafts of sunlight poured down through clerestory windows. Encircling the room was a band engraved in roman-style lettering with a quotation from Ecclesiastes: “The Lord hath created medicines out of the earth, and he that is wise will not abhor them,” Above the band was a running frieze depicting episodes from the spa’s history: the Indian maiden at the spring, the arrival of John Williams on a litter, Elisha Burnett’s log cabin surrounded by Indian tepees. The highly polished marble floor was laid out in a geometric pattern. Set at intervals along its length were three circular altars where the mineral waters flowed from brass spigots labeled High Rock, Union, and Sans Souci into fonts of dark green marble. Behind the altars, acolytes in crisp white jackets served up the water to modern-day supplicants, the sophisticated counterparts of the pilgrims to Lourdes. The water was served like the Russians serve tea, in glasses with metal holders. For some, it was heated to the prescribed temperature at heaters behind the counters.
    But despite the architecture, the atmosphere was far from reverential. Guests sat at marble tables amid the potted palms talking, drinking, or eating lunch to the accompaniment of a Strauss waltz played by the string quartet that concertized three times a day on the terrace outside.
    Charlotte and Adele threaded their way among the tables to an empty one in a corner and sat down. A young woman wearing a starched white shirt and a small red bow tie brought them their menus and took their mineral water order. Charlotte played it safe and ordered High Rock water; she had yet to get her mineral water prescription. Adele ordered Union water, heated.
    “Actually, I’d prefer a martini,” she said once the waitress had gone, “but I’ve got to purge my system of the toxins I’ve been pouring into it. Quote, unquote. Excuse me if I bolt halfway through lunch. Union water is guaranteed to produce swift results.”
    Charlotte laughed, the curious husky laugh for which she was famous.
    Adele studied her menu. “I hope you’re not fruits and nuts.”
    Charlotte smiled. “No. Cuisine Minceur.”
    “Good. The fruits and nuts people are bad enough. But the juice people are even worse.”
    She was referring to the spa menu plans. La Cuisine Minceur was the low-calorie continental plan. There was also a low-calorie vegetarian plan—what Adele called fruits and nuts—and a juice plan for the real zealots. La Cuisine Gourmande was for those who didn’t need or didn’t want to diet.
    “Not much to choose from,” said Charlotte, scanning the offerings. There were only three La Cuisine Minceur entrées. Each was marked with a calorie count. A maximum of twelve hundred calories a day for women and fifteen hundred calories a day for men was recommended.
    “I agree. There’s not much of a selection, but I can assure you that it’s all delicious,” said Adele. “What this chef can do with twelve hundred calories is incredible. Michel Bergeron—he’s very famous for cuisine minceur. I recommend the grilled veal chop—it’s out of this world.”
    “That sounds fine to me,” said Charlotte.
    The waitress brought their water and took their order. In addition to the veal chop (two hundred and twenty calories), they ordered crayfish in court bouillon (fifty calories), and a field salad with chives (seventy-five calories). By dessert, they would have used