“I’ll tell you what you can do for me.”
“Sure,” says Marcia. “Hit me.”
“You told me you work at a bank, right? With financial types?”
“Omigod, Fernanda. With more bankers, hedgies and fund managers than you can possibly imagine. I swim in a sea of suits down there.”
“Well, that’s kind of what I was hoping. Because I’d like to find, well, I guess it’s called a … financial advisor?”
“And you’d like it to be a man? There are women who do that, you know.”
Something prickly there?
“I’ll be honest with you, Marcia, I was sort of thinking this could also be a kind of, er … a bachelorette moment for me? There hasn’t been anyone serious since I’ve come to New York, and I’d really like, no, I’d love a relationship.”
“You’re messing with me, aren’t you? You can’t find a man?”
“No, I’m not. I swear I’m not. But here’s the thing. I’ve been so busy since I moved here in March, looking for work, changing jobs, I hope, and now, moving again, that, well, I have this – um – this nest egg. I was thinking I’d better find someone to invest it for me really soon. So if you can help, I might even, well, maybe kill two birds with one business meeting. That’s what I was thinking, anyway.”
“I tell you what, Fernanda. Let me see if I can set something up with a group of the guys I know at the bank. Most of them will be assholes, I say that from sad experience. But I’ll do my best not to include any of the married ones. And at least you’ll get to meet a lot of money men all at once. You’ll be testing the market in every sense of the word.” Marcia snickers. “Fiscal speed dating.”
“Go for it. And the sooner the better, please. How can I thank you?”
“Oh, Fernanda. Don’t even think about it. This is going to be fun.”
On a rainy Wednesday afternoon, Fernanda takes the subway to a muscular granite and glass building in far downtown Manhattan. Sturdy concrete bollards in the front repel potential threats, despite which no less than three security guards approach her as she enters the grand plaza.
Who is she coming to see, they ask, not impolitely.
They are the first group of men she’s met since That Day who don’t react to her appearance. Actually, after each of three has checked her license, the eldest one brusquely nods and directs her to a desk within the bank’s massive doors, where she does that ID thing yet again, while a male receptionist (a receptionist!) makes a phone call – presumably to confirm she has an appointment – and asks that she step to ONE side or ELSE just wait on a nearby bench. There’s probably not even any money in this building, thinks Fernanda as she sits.
One more guard arrives to escort her to the escalator that takes her up to an elevator that takes her up to the thirty-third floor, where she’s buzzed into a huge, high-polish suite. A secretary there shows her into cheerful room with a vast window wall, a monster conference table and, on a shelf to one side, an array of teas, coffees, pastries and tea sandwiches. Fernanda settles herself at the table’s far end and for some minutes has little to do in the empty room but contemplate the spectacular view. Eventually eight or ten men straggle in, softly laughing and joking among themselves. Seeing her, they halt. And gawk. The tallest of the group recovers first.
“Ms. Turner.” He strides forward to shake her hand. “I’m Daniel Palafox, Private Client Services. We’re so glad you’ve taken the time to come in, and we’re glad you’ve given us this opportunity to meet with you.”
His companions, glancing at her covertly, crowd the buffet and balancing their coffee mugs and plates, seat themselves around the table, introducing themselves to her like middle-school boys in dancing class, complete with tie-adjusting, seat-squirming, and the random sweaty hand. Disappointingly, Fernanda has to agree with Marcia’s original assessment: they’re pretty much all losers. Except for Daniel Palafox, perhaps, although there’s something about his practiced self-assurance that’s very off-putting. Should she try to match his poise? If only she had more of that herself.
They wait expectantly.
“Well, thank you all for seeing me so promptly,” she begins. “I’m not a damsel in distress, exactly, but I’m really eager to put myself in what I’ve been assured by Marcia Welliver are your exceptionally capable hands.”
That went nicely, she thinks, until she becomes aware, from the elbow nudge now speeding around the table in a kind of human Newton’s cradle, that she’s awkwardly worded her little speech.
Daniel Palafox rides to the rescue.
“Marcia’s explained that you haven’t been in the city long. Where were you living before?”
Fernanda sticks to her résumé – the one with Harvard on it.
“I’m from Pittsburgh, Mr. Palafox. Just another Midwesterner come to the big city.”
“Oh, we’re all Midwesterners here, didn’t you know?” He beams at her, and a meaty-looking, ex-quarterback-type cuts in. “It’s actually one of the prerequisites for working at Park Avenue Bank.”
Now, that’s reassuring, in fact, Fernanda thinks. She’s been concerned about those “New York sharpies” that everyone talked about at home.
“Here’s the thing.” She surveys the men at the table, tapping at phones or picking at crumbs on their plates. “I’ve suddenly come into a lot of money. More money than I know how to manage myself. And I haven’t had a lot of experience managing money.” Which has to be the understatement of the year, she thinks, smiling and trying to look helpless without looking helpless.
Around her, the entranced circle of boy bankers grins ever-so-encouragingly (smarmily?) back.
“Can you tell us approximately how much money is involved?” This, from a ruddy-cheeked fellow who appears to be even younger than the rest. Late twenties, she decides, but not her type. His colleagues regard him with silent disapproval. He’s unquestionably jumped their gun.
But Fernanda’s more than happy to get down to the purpose of this meeting. Daniel Palafox (he’s already Dan in her mind) is the only one here who interests her at all, so now she just needs to know what they might have in mind. Investment-wise.
“Investment-wise.” She considers the word. Can that be right?
“It’s somewhere around twenty-seven million dollars,” Fernanda answers.
The seventh grade sits up absolutely straight and pays attention.
“You know, I’m fairly certain we can help you there,” handsome Dan replies.
Courtney has been true to her word. Charles Raff’s secretary has phoned to set up an interview.
“Would you be free next Monday morning?”
But Monday means that Fernanda will have to get time off from Zisk’s to go to Berger’s. Which is a worry, because what if she isn’t hired? It might mean her job, and she’d hate to have to look for work again. Not that she can’t afford being laid off, of course. She needn’t work at all if she doesn’t want to, and she’s incredibly appreciative of her eerie, phenomenal, luck.
But she loves being paid for her work. She loves seeing that paycheck in her hand. In fact, she’s begun to think that housewives – women like herself – are, well … exploited? Because after all, Fernanda thinks, girls grow up in a school system where their A+ work is rewarded with A+ grades. They go to college, most of them, and there they get more grades. But after that, they get married and – for her generation of women – the whole process stopped. No pats on the back anymore. No one who would notice they were doing A+ housekeeping or A+ nurturing or A+ managing of lives. Which is why they’d all settled for the small rewards, because that was all there was: having their hair done, their nails; redecorating the bedroom; trying new hors d’oeuvres; comparing children.
But men. Men still got “grades” at work. Promotions. Bonuses. Raises. Housewives got an allowance.
Is this feminism, she wonders?
In any case, all she knows is that getting a paycheck has altered her sense of herself (as if she needed more mod
ifications!) and she’s legitimized now somehow. So maybe she doesn’t need to work. Truth is, she wants to. She’ll do it for the sport, she’s made up her mind. (She’d read that once.) And the money is how she’ll keep score.
“What time next Monday?” she replies.
At 10:30 Monday morning, Fernanda approaches Berger’s reception desk once again and asks the least fearsome of the blonde harpies to please tell Mr. Raff in the Old Masters department that Fernanda Turner is here for her appointment. She’s recognized now, she sees. She’s “the Poussin woman” now, which suits her just fine. And, settling herself in the chair where she sat that first day – her lucky chair – Fernanda thumbs through an American Paintings catalogue while she waits. She’s at lot twenty-three when Christina Kim appears.
“Hi, Ms. Turner, it’s Christina. Remember me? I saw you at the sale.”
Fernanda stands and offers her hand.
“Hi, Christina. I saw you there too. I remembered you from the day I brought my painting in. I was so intimidated.”
They start down the hall, their heels clicking on marble.
“You were?” Christina leans on the elevator button. “Actually, I was intimidated by you! So gorgeous and so tall. I didn’t know what to say to you, you seemed so, um, so self-possessed.”
“Did I?” Fernanda considers that. “Well, there you are. So much for appearances.”
Christina smiles up at her sweetly. Fernanda imagines them sharing an office. Or something like that.
The elevator opens and they cross a sunlit space to a glassed-in mahogany suite. The secretary there is already on her feet.
“Mr. Raff will be with you in just a few minutes. Won’t you have a seat?”
Christina turns. “Well, I’ll just leave you here.” But she motions to Fernanda to lean down and whispers. “Try to remember what you just said about appearances.” She lifts one swallowtail eyebrow and leaves Fernanda puzzled, and alone, urgently trying to put together Christina’s comment with Courtney’s odd hint about the interview. Is it going to require a BJ or something? Actual sex? If it is, Fernanda decides, she’ll be up and out of here so fast he’ll never know what hit him.
And she’s just settling calmly in her chair, when Charles Raff steps through an inner door and crosses the anteroom, one hand outstretched.
“Ms. Turner. How very nice to meet you.”
He’s wearing a different bow-tie today, yellow, and he seems slighter in person than he did on the auction podium. Close up, she notices he has purplish lips and what remains of his curly hair is blow-dried. His expression is shrewd.
“How do you do, Mr. Raff.”
He’s been staring at her, and he starts when she speaks.
“Oh, Charles. Charles will be fine.”
That cut-crystal English accent. James Mason in North by Northwest. Laurence Olivier in anything at all.
“Thanks for seeing me, um, Charles. I saw you at the Old Masters auction.”
“Oh, were you there? Good sale. I’m the tiniest bit chuffed about that one. We were lucky to have some very fine consignments, though. Yours among them, I might mention.”
One hand firmly on her waist, he’s steering her through to the office door.
“Don’t disturb us, Susan,” he calls back. “I expect to be a while.”
A while?
The lock on the rich mahogany door ticks behind her as Charles casually indicates a plump chair, very much like, but considerably larger than, any of those in the lobby downstairs. Softer, too, Fernanda discovers, lowering herself into it and surreptitiously looking around. Art books in piles on the shelves and on the floor, a small painting of a flock of wooly lambs on one wall, his desktop very neat. His tall leather chair is back by an impressively tall window that looks into the windows of the neighboring office building.
“This is probably just a formality, so don’t be nervous, Fernanda. You don’t mind if I call you Fernanda?”
He doesn’t wait for an answer, and Fernanda braces for his pounce.
“So here’s what I know about you.’
He clears his throat.
‘You have no experience and no formal training in this field whatsoever. You’re new to New York, which means you don’t know many people here – let alone the kind of people who have major art collections: the people who might call on you to help them sell their things. No family ties, either, I think, so no old-money connections. Basically, Ms. Turner, you bring nothing to us.’
‘What you do have is the recent one-off purchase of a major work of art. Albeit a fairly important work of art. Yet it does make one wonder, doesn’t it? Because what is it you think you can do here for an encore? For Berger’s? For us? More specifically, for me?”
Fernanda is nailed to her chair. She hadn’t anticipated such a negative reaction. Is this an attack? She opens her mouth to respond, but brusquely, coolly, he cuts her off.
“On the other hand, you’re quite splendid-looking. And I do mean on the other hand.” He grins wolfishly. “Are you wearing gloves today, by any chance?”
His sly manner and Oxbridge accent make the question sound even more surreal than it is. Why on earth would I have gloves with me in June, Fernanda wonders? Still, she begins rooting around in her bag, hoping to stall whatever this is.
“I can’t be sure. Just let me see.”
And curiously, right there, scrunched together at the bottom of her old tote bag are her leftover black winter gloves. How long have they been in there? She pulls them out gingerly, their leather all wrinkly and stiff, and shakes a dusting of tissue lint and crumbs back into the bag.
“Pass them over here,” says Charles Raff, leaning across the desk.
Fernanda hands over the gloves and he takes them tenderly, like precious black kittens. Making a neat circle with the fingers of one hand, he pulls them slowly, one at a time, through the opening, then holds both gloves above his nose like a bunch of black grapes. He appears to be breathing them in. Turning them inside out now, he inhales deeply, which is when Fernanda notices his other arm beginning to move rhythmically beneath the desk.
He passes the gloves back to her.
“Put them on,” he commands.
Flustered and a little afraid, Fernanda inserts her hand into the rumpled kid, one finger at a time. What does he want her to do? Well, nothing, probably. And it doesn’t seem to require her body or mouth, after all. In fact, she thinks she’s beginning to understand what might be about to happen here, and to her surprise, she’s – well – kind of amused. Hasn’t she just had a lifetime full of male chauvinist pigs? (Wasn’t that the term?) and yet she’s grateful, too. Grateful, especially, to Ben, who’s introduced her to so much she didn’t know. Grateful to Marcia, who’s been teaching her the ropes. And grateful that her first sexual adventure as Fernanda wasn’t this, right here: this glove-y thing with Charles Raff. Besides, she thinks. If this is all it takes to work at Berger’s, she’s just signed on. Not only that, but – her body’s telling her – a fetish might be … fun.
Her right hand is fully encased in her glove now, and with her left she tugs at its bottom edge once or twice until the leather softens a bit and feels taut. She takes the mate in her black-gloved hand and, watching his face all the while, she slowly – very slowly – slips her left hand into the supple leather: little finger, middle finger, thumb. The man across the desk is riveted. His purplish lips part slightly and his tongue slides left to right, wetting his mustache. Charles Raff’s head drops back and lolls against the tall back of his chair, and his eyes close. For a few moments, Fernanda watches his right arm working furiously, then she turns to the window behind him and hums faintly to herself as she smoothes the back of one leather hand with the palm of the other, and then inverts them both to flex her tight, shiny palms. She extends her very long arms – now tipped in form-fitting, polished black sheaths – toward the man behind the desk, and beckons.
He is her Charles Raff now.
“I have to tell you
, Ms. Turner – Fernanda,” the man says hoarsely, opening his moist blue eyes, blinking, and regarding her almost tenderly. “I have to tell you that never has anyone indulged me as fully as you have just now.”
Flushing pinkly, he sits up to the desk, all business.
“So. You’d like to work for Berger’s?”
“I would,” she answers decisively.
“Fine. You’re hired. And next time, bring elbow-length.”
CHAPTER 11
While Marcia’s banker friends have spent several weeks writing a proposal for investing Fernanda’s money, the attractive Daniel Palafox has wasted no time in becoming considerably more personal.
“I know this cool bar in Chelsea,” he says in his text. “It’s even downstairs from an art gallery, so you’ll feel right at home. And if you want, I can probably find an opening for us to go to first.”
Mmm, nice, Fernanda thinks. He seems to have been paying attention, although an art gallery in Chelsea definitely won’t be exhibiting her kind of art.
“Sounds amazing,” she replies, feeling comfortable with the word at last (lately, however, she’s been aware of an increase in “awesomes”). But even if it didn’t sound amazing, she’d go out with him, and probably sleep with him anyway, because she needs to start making a baby. Right away. Right now. Because nice-but-callow Ben hasn’t made her pregnant. But then, Ben hasn’t worked out in so many ways, his maturity and his penis being the least of them. She’d never dreamed it would take her so long just to get pregnant. She’s actually begun to feel a little panicky. Should she sleep with the cute handyman in her building? But does she want his baby? Or a child by anyone she doesn’t feel something for?
Happily, here’s this nice Daniel: quite good-looking, obviously interested, and immediately available.
“I’m kind of free tonight.”
Girls today are actually fine about admitting that, she’s heard.
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