“About what?” Mike asked, honestly concerned.
“Plenty. Like, if I’m an administrator, why is my first job tomorrow to fetch Ma’am her breakfast?”
“Does that bruise your pride?”
“Well, I tell myself it shouldn’t with the kind of money I’m getting. But there’s more than that. I have the feeling there’s some very edgy interplay among these people when it comes to Ma’am.”
“True,” said Mike.
“And there’s that attack or whatever she had. Nobody even mentioned she’s subject to that kind of thing. I’m not sure anybody even knows about it. But the one thing she demanded was that no notice be taken of it. Absolute confidentiality prevails. So where I probably should at least tell McEye about it I just don’t have the nerve.”
“Understandable.”
“Yes,” said Amy, “but what do you advise? Seriously.”
“Seriously. Well, you know the players now but not the play. Wait it out. Eyes and ears open, mouth shut. If real disaster impends, yell like hell. You can’t be fired for that.”
“Maybe not. But how do I know if it’s real disaster?”
“You’ll know. And remember I’m standing by. As the sage Mrs. Bernius remarked, couples in service have one thing going for them, they have each other to confide in. As a matter of fact—”
“Yes?”
Mike waved a dismissive hand. “No, not yet. Later on when I get my thoughts about it unscrambled.”
“Now you’ve got me curious.”
“I’ve got myself curious. And wheed up. But I don’t want to talk about it just yet.”
Amy apparently recognized the symptoms. “Something to do with your writing?”
“Yes. But not now. Right now what my case calls for is a couple of stiff drinks. The kind Abe and Audie’ll have waiting. Look, there’s no law says we can’t go over there now and finish packing later, is there?”
“No, I suppose not. But early home. I have to be up at seven.”
“No problem. And on the way out I have something to show you. Caverns measureless to man.”
“Xanadu?”
“The basement here. And I’ll bet Sam Coleridge never knew it.”
Seen objectively, as Mike had once explained, his friendship with Abe Silverstone was solidly built on the dislikes they shared. Conversation Boston-style about what you like can be dull. Conversation New York-style about what you detest—politically, economically, socially, or the management of the Yankees—never loses its edge. It was what Damon and Pythias must have shared.
“Sounds bilious,” Amy had objected, “and neither of you is of bilious disposition.”
“Yes we are. In partnership.”
But it was her theory that Abe and Audrey, now married for twenty-eight years and childless, had simply seized on the Lloyds as surrogate offspring. Certainly they were parental in their concern for their downstairs neighbors in the Thompson Street roost. And certainly they were almost embarrassingly generous in gift giving—good givers, awkward receivers—and especially when the Lloyds hit bottom, out of work, out of money, out of expectations, the upstairs neighbors made it plain that they were always ready with the trusty checkbook. Definitely parental, Mike had to admit, although that didn’t make the taking any easier.
When it came to this touchy issue, however, Amy steadfastly argued that for one thing repayment would eventually be made, and for the other thing, well, since Abe and Audrey were backing a writer who would one day make them proud they lent a helping hand when needed, they couldn’t find a better investment for some of the overflow from their already overflowing cup. Consider Sylvia Beach.
“Sylvia Beach?” Mike said.
“You know. That bookstore woman in Paris who practically supported James Joyce. Who’d even remember her now if it wasn’t for him?”
Mike addressed the ceiling: “My poor wife. Driven mad by privation she now dreams she is wed to James Joyce. Not even Hemingway or Norman Mailer, Lord. Joyce, no less.”
“I’m serious, Mike. Abe thinks you are one hell of a writer.”
“On the basis of one published story and one unpublished novel. And various incomplete odds and ends.”
“Well, if you wrote more, he’d have even more basis. But you know he means what he says. He does not conceal his feelings about things that matter to him. Like writing.”
True, Mike thought. And like the wedding. Of course, the Silverstones had been invited; Mike had seen them as the backup team he needed in Boston; it had come as a jolt when Abe announced, in no wise apologetically, that he had no intention of spending a day in Boston in the company of middle America. What he recommended in this case was an elopement such as he and Audrey had wisely arranged for themselves way back when. A clerk at City Hall, a couple of strays picked up as witnesses, and a twenty-four-hour celebration party afterward. Which, said Abe, the Silverstones would be glad to provide.
So he and Audrey had not attended the Lloyd wedding, but a week later did provide a celebration party that in the end seemed to involve most of the Village and large segments of Chelsea and SoHo.
Easy to forgive people like that.
And, as Mike reflected after that James Joyce passage, his wife was certainly right in one regard. Abe and Audrey did have the Midas touch. Not only had Abe been doing all right as an NYU economics professor—at least by the Lloyd standards—but he had then produced that economics text for the layman, a book about America’s future so wild-eyed pessimistic that it was calculated to send any reader right up the wall. The End of the Dream. Which had, after a slumbrous period, become a thundering best-seller, six months on the list, fantastic paperback sale, invitations to address panicky audiences from coast to coast at top dollar.
“And the moral of it is, kiddies,” Abe had pronounced, “pessimism pays.”
Amy was troubled. “The way you say that—but don’t you believe what you wrote? That the country is economically living on the slopes of a Vesuvius?”
“Sure.”
“I don’t see—Well, close up you don’t come on terribly worried about it.”
“Look, darling. The sun will probably be extinguished in five million years. If my life expectancy was ten million years, I’d worry about that. Since it isn’t, I don’t.”
“But Mike and I might be around. I mean, for that Vesuvius eruption you’re predicting.”
“Well, I won’t be. So all I can do is wish the best to you dear people.”
That was soon before Vesuvius, in the form of George Oliphant, headmaster of Scoville-Lang, had erupted all over Mike and then caught Amy in the lava flow, after which Abe had done a lot more than just wish them the best.
As for Audrey Custer Silverstone, she had retired from a long-term job as a Macy’s women’s-wear buyer to housewifery, but after a spell of boredom had risked some of Abe’s best-seller bounty on Custer’s First Stand, a boutique on West Eighth where, she announced, she’d stay exactly twenty-four hours ahead of any prevailing fashion. In this she had struck oil, Custer’s First Stand now being the boutique in the West Village and drawing a heavy trade of heavy spenders from uptown who were apparently mesmerized not only by the trendy stock but even more by the most chilling saleswomen in captivity. Sure they are, Audrey had placidly acknowledged. Let the customers feel you’re doing them a favor and they eagerly pay for the favor.
“At least tell me,” Mike pleaded, “that you lose a large number of customers that way.”
“Only a few terribly secure ones,” Audrey answered. “You’d be surprised how few there are.”
Come to think of it, Mike reflected, having found a parking space for the wagon a couple of blocks away from Thompson Street and now following Amy up the three flights to the Midases’ duplex nest, could any of the Durie women be ranked among that terribly secure few? Ma’am? Hard-jawed Jocelyn? Curvy, poisonous Camilla? Slugabed, darkling Dorothy? Moonfaced, meditative Gwen?
Hell, cross any one of them and walk out of
the room with your head tucked underneath your arm.
Poor Amy.
On the fourth-floor landing, before she could knock on the Silverstones’ door, Mike took her in tight embrace and engaged her in a lingering kiss.
“Very nice,” she said at last. “Any special reason?”
“A whole complex set of them. They all add up to one four-letter word.”
“Now? Here?”
“The word happens to be love, not the one you think. As much agape as eros.”
“In exactly that proportion?”
“Don’t nitpick,” said Mike. “Just knock on that door three times. Not twice. We’re not on duty here.”
It was Abe who answered the knock, luxuriantly gray-bearded and with shaven pate gleaming. He drew them into the room, where at the wet bar Audrey, the perfect hostess, was already pouring bourbon into a tall glass. Success had not physically reshaped Abe, who remained wiry lean, but Audrey, who had struggled during her Macy’s years to maintain a size seven, was now plainly heading toward a size fourteen.
For Mike the bourbon properly watered. For Amy a Perrier. “Horse doves,” Abe explained as Audrey headed for the kitchen. “The cold kind because we didn’t know when you’d show up. But non-Japanese.” He had the same shuddering distaste for Japanese cuisine that Mike did. “Now sit, sit, and wet your whistles. You’ve got some talking to do about life with the highly.”
“First I have to settle something with Audie,” Amy said, and as soon as Audrey reappeared with the tray of hors d’oeuvres Amy said to her, “Clothes.”
“Clothes,” Audrey echoed through a full mouth.
“Yes. I’m all wrong now. It has to be pastel dresses, no patterns. Or white waists, dark skirts. All hemlines at least knee-length. I’m supposed to look subdued.”
“Sounds to me,” Abe commented, “that whoever laid down those rules is more concerned with keeping the gentlemen of the household subdued.”
Mike had a fleeting glimpse of hard-jawed Jocelyn Durie at her writing desk, eyes narrowed in contemplation of the new secretary. “Touché,” he said.
Audrey was now looking Amy over with professional interest. “When are you free tomorrow, doll?”
“Not in the morning. Later on sometime.”
“You phone me at the shop when you are, and I’ll meet you at this wholesale place on Thirty-fifth. Off-the-rack but quality. And they’ll do any fitting while we wait. No problem.”
“Except for the money.”
“A housewarming gift,” said Abe.
“Oh, no. A short-term loan.”
“Now look, darling—”
“Abe,” Audrey said, and Abe took the warning.
“You know,” Amy said, “we do love both of you for your generosity. We’ll love you just as much after we repay everything. Even more. You realize that a debtor always has a shadow over him.”
“What I realize,” said Abe, “is that I love to hear you talk. Say something else in Victorian.”
“Abe,” Audrey said mechanically. She dropped down beside him on the couch and planted her legs on the coffee table. “What I want to hear,” she told her guests, “is the uptown story. What there is of it so far.”
It was Mike who told the uptown story, and it was a long time—two more drinks, two trays of hors d’oeuvres—in the telling. When it was all told Abe said, “Protocol. Confidentiality. Sounds like you’re working for the State Department. Incidentally, aren’t you already violating confidentiality by giving us these domestic details? Harmless as they are?”
“Seriously,” Mike said, “I wouldn’t expect either of you to use them as table talk anywhere.” Charged up as he was by his own narrative, he was a little disappointed in the flat response to it. “Anyhow,” he said, “don’t you think all those details add up to something a touch Byzantine?”
Abe nodded. “A touch. With that housekeeper lady the head Byzant. Quite a woman though. America can put a man into space but can it get anyone in to clean the house properly, including windows? Hardly. But your Mrs. McEye can. How do you two feel about being her genies?”
“Tired and confused,” Amy said.
“Interested,” Mike said.
“In the way she plays her role?” Abe asked.
Mike shrugged. “In everything about the place so far. Actually, I think it’s mostly that family. They’re real people, Abe. Human beings.”
Abe feigned great astonishment. “No!”
“All right. Obviously they are. But today, after the introductions and with all those heavy warnings about confidentiality, it suddenly struck me that I had been plunked down backstage at a marvelous show. Real flesh and blood people insulated by millions of dollars against the world outside and all the more driven to an intense interplay among each other. Very human people when you see them with their hair down. Chekhovian almost.”
This was sneaky in a way, Mike knew, because when you mentioned Chekhov to Abe he melted. He sat forward. “The Duries as literary material?”
“Yep.”
Amy, the day having caught up to her, had been struggling to keep her eyes open. Now she opened them wide and said accusingly, “Is that what you had in mind to tell me sooner or later? About using the Duries in a book?”
“Yep.”
“But you’re already halfway through the book about George Oliphant and the school.” She looked really distressed.
“I know. But I seem to have cooled off on that. Look, baby, I started writing that as our vengeance against George. What I found out lately is that vengeance isn’t the kind of fuel I can operate on. The bile is all thinned out.”
“Two years of work,” Amy said mournfully.
“And,” Abe said, “all of one day on this new job. What novel do you see emerging from the one day?”
“It’ll be a lot more than that, Abe, before I start the actual writing. First comes a close study of these people until they become understandable. Three dimensional. A great big fat daily journal on them.”
“Meanwhile, sonny, keep that journal locked up tight. One hint to them that they might wind up as characters in their chauffeur’s novel—say, they don’t know you’re an aspiring author, do they? You didn’t put that into any resumé?”
“Nope. Glum I sometimes am. Suicidal never.”
“At least,” said Abe, “until publication time. After which, if your text is closely drawn from identifiable sources, you could wind up facing a big fat libel suit.”
“I doubt it,” Mike said. “Murder maybe, suits for libel never. Not the way the Duries see it. They’re acutely publicity shy.”
“Indeed?” said Abe. “Then listen closely, because I did a mite of research on them yesterday and came up with something pertinent. In 1920, a James Hamilton Durie—he’d be papa of the present brood—put aside fears of publicity to defend the family honor. Seems his wife was deeply involved in some churchly good works. And the lady she had ousted from the good works committee—its previous chairperson—proclaimed loudly and recklessly that if the dominie of the church wasn’t so young and attractive, Mrs. Durie wouldn’t be so committed to Christian charity. James Hamilton then sued for slander, risking all that nasty publicity, and won hands down. Fifty thousand old-fashioned American bucks. Quite a pile then. Mrs. Durie, the family’s honor restored, then contributed the money to the good work. Interesting?”
“In the light of the book Mike plans,” said Amy, “oh, yes.”
“Baby,” Mike protested, “by the time there is publication we’ll be independently wealthy. If there is publication. Remember that nest egg we’ll be hatching? But if you want me to give up all ideas of doing this book—”
“No,” said Amy. “And don’t use that tactic on me.”
“Talking about wealthy,” said Audrey, the peacemaker, “I wonder what that Mrs. McEye must have accumulated by now.”
“Awesome thought,” said Abe, “but she’ll never catch up to the family. You know, Michael, you’ve been referring to their m
illions. But from what I picked up in my research yesterday, you’ll have to think bigger. Try billions.”
“Billions?” Mike said. “Fact, not fancy? Nine zeros?”
“Nine. Now keep them in mind while we turn time backward. We focus on the Duries, prosperous colonials. They buy land, then lease out what they buy. Got it?”
“Got it,” said Mike.
“Stay with it. Before the Revolution they owned big chunks of lower Manhattan. After the war, when land held by the Tories was confiscated and put up for auction, the Duries were usually right there with the winning bids. Cash flow required in those early days was provided by a family they united with in marriage. The Cheathams. Rum distillers. Their distillery was on ground leased from the Duries. Marriage was inevitable.”
“How romantic,” said Audrey.
Abe gave her a look. “Anyhow,” he said, “that accumulating disposition—it seems to have been in the blood—went on generation after generation. Last year when Forbes magazine published a study of America’s wealthiest, there in the top percentile was the Durie family. Estimated net worth? Three billion. Source of wealth? As with the inevitable Getty and Rockefeller, inherited. Certainly your new bosses are the good stewards.”
“Nine zeros,” Mike said.
“But why do they keep piling it up?” Amy asked. “I think that when you’ve got more wealth than you could ever dream of spending—”
“Because,” Mike said, “it’s not the spending that’s fun, it’s the getting. And highly moral. Calvinist morality.”
Amy looked doubtful. “I didn’t hear of any of them going to church this morning.”
“Because the Lord has already given them the nod.” Mike turned to Abe. “Anything about their Northeast Colonial company in those records?”
Abe raised his brows. “Without going into any records I can answer that one. A very conservative brokerage house, more investment slanted than speculative. In the shadows behind it is a network of agencies devoted to land development. No soil as fertile as what they till, is there?”
“Probably not,” said Mike. “Now, aside from the name Durie there’s that other name I dropped along the way. Langfeld. Gwendolyn’s faraway husband. Somehow it seems familiar. Does it ring any bell for you? Daniel Langfeld?”
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