D AV I D PAT R I C K C O L U M B I A there are always all kinds of people, and lots of talk. That said, there wasn’t a lot of talk around the buffet tables because of the tasty tea sandwiches—except for those who talk with their mouths full. These was nothing little sandwiches—itty-bitty squares on whole wheat or white with their crusts trimmed away— so small, and so light. But each one boasted the thinnest spread of chicken salad or egg salad or ham salad, or watercress or cucumbers. You couldn’t tell what you were getting until you popped one in your mouth. And you didn’t
give a damn anyway, because you never felt like you were eating too much. And all you wanted was to eat another. The most sophisticated had been known to stand by the table with a drink in one hand and the other hand operating like a kind of steam shovel: table-to-mouth, table-to-mouth. There were also Christmas cookies and brownies, but people ate them only to pretend to themselves they were through with the sandwiches. The other good thing about Judy’s parties was the mix: so diverse and so crowded that you were forced to talk to peo-
ple because you were already pressed up against them. And what did they talk about? It was interesting to watch Dominick Dunne. Everyone wanted to talk to him. You could imagine them telling him all kinds of secrets. He’d wend his way around the room, always a glass of Perrier in one hand since he didn’t drink. He operated deftly and quickly, pausing to say hello and then, before you knew it, someone was telling him something. In my notes, I found a list of the guests I remembered seeing at Judy’s Christmas
party on December 19, 2000. I’d written it down when I got home, just to test my memory. Of the more than 200 attending in the course of the evening, I remembered the following: Sidney Zion, Dominick Dunne, Patricia Duff, Karen Moline, Dennis Basso, Michael Cominotto, Tommy Corcoran, Sam Michaels, Ann Rapp, Chris and Grace Meigher, Mollie Wilmot, Sharon Sondes and Geoffrey Thomas, Ian and Ellen Graham, Dolores Smithies, Edgar Battista, Pierre Cossette, Pierre Scapula, Charlie Scheips, Tom Graff, Marina Pignatelli, Pau-
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