Elementary, My Dear Watkins

by Mindy Starns Clark

  Big news…dream of a lifetime…the only one who would understand…

  She did understand. She was thrilled for him, really she was. In the part of her brain that was concerned with reasoning and commonsense, she knew this was a good thing, that all of his hard work was finally starting to pay off. Yay for him.

  In the other part of her brain, the place where her mind intersected with her heart, all she knew was that she needed Danny and he wasn’t there. Just the way no one had ever been there for her, ever, in her whole life. Born alone, lived alone, would die alone. Right now, all Jo really wanted to do was bury her face in her hands and have a good cry.

  But her father would be here any minute, and the last thing she wanted was to greet him with eyes red and puffy from tears.

  Instead, she pulled herself together, resisting the tears by breathing deeply in and out and in and out until the frog was out of her throat and the tremor was gone from her lips.

  Finally, the urge to cry under control, Jo put away her phone, retouched her makeup, and headed downstairs. Show no weakness. Keep the upper hand always.

  Her grandmother had trained her well.

  9

  Alexa hit the final chord of the piece and then held her hands still, the notes resonating around the room in a beautiful echo. Though she hadn’t really been in the mood for piano lessons, the music had managed to pull her in, as always. She wasn’t ready for Carnegie Hall, but everyone agreed that she had made astonishing progress in a very short time—yet more proof to herself that, these days, she was a true freak.

  “Excellent,” Mrs. Gruber said in a soft German accent. “You have been practicing.”

  “Like, forty-five minutes a day,” Alexa replied proudly. “It’s more fun now that we’re doing harder stuff.”

  “What a perfect segue into science class.”

  Alexa and her piano teacher looked up to see Mr. Preston, Alexa’s tutor, standing in the doorway.

  “Did you feel the vibrations of the music, Alexa? Do you see it in that glass of water over there? That’s resonance.”

  Alexa liked Mr. Preston. He was a dork, but he loved learning so much that she couldn’t help but be swept up by his enthusiasm. That was one of the good things about having private classes. If she wanted to get excited about education, there was no one to make fun of her. Around here, it was cool to learn. Where she came from, learning was the last thing anyone wanted to be caught doing.

  No wonder she’d been so stupid all her life.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt,” he added. He hesitated in the doorway, struggling to hold a big green plastic container. “Go ahead and finish.”

  “No problem. We are done,” Mrs. Gruber said as she began gathering her papers. “By all means, come in and put that heavy thing down.”

  He did as she suggested, lugging the bin over to the counter.

  “Alexa,” her piano teacher continued, “let’s bring your practice time up to an hour a day. The Haydn and the Chopin sound good, but you have to do all the scales on your list, not just the fun ones.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “It was a good lesson. You are doing very well.”

  “Thanks.”

  As Mrs. Gruber prepared to go, Mr. Preston spoke again.

  “Good is right,” he said as he unloaded the items from his container. “I was listening from outside the door. Thought it was a record I was hearing, not a live performance.”

  Alexa glowed under his praise, as did, by extension, her piano teacher. They all knew that Alexa had never even touched a piano until six months ago, so her progress had, indeed, been nothing short of spectacular.

  The two adults chatted for a moment as Alexa tucked the beautiful wooden bench up under the piano, scooped up her sheet music, and placed it in a nearby cabinet.

  The large, sunny studio had different areas for music and art and regular classwork, but lately they had been having science class over in the art section because they were conducting experiments that tended to get a little messy. Alexa loved experiments. Prior to coming here, the only thing she’d done that even came close to conducting an experiment was watching her mom cut cocaine with her little pocket knife, or sitting by while the guys made speedballs for the crackheads at the Grave Cave.

  Once Mrs. Gruber was gone, Alexa and her tutor got right down to business. They were almost to the end of the eighth grade textbook. Alexa was originally so behind in science that they’d had to start with the fourth grade textbook and work their way forward. Between the one-on-one tutoring and putting forth a huge effort after hours on her own, Alexa had managed to learn five years of science in six months. This was one of her last lessons in this book, and then she’d move on to the ninth grade stuff. She couldn’t wait, because then for the first time in her life she’d be ahead of where she ought to be and not behind.

  It was a thought that grew more and more normal by the day. Sometimes when they were sitting there working, she’d look up at the long windows that faced the garden and picture her own self, the self from before, outside looking in. That kid wouldn’t have believed her eyes. She wouldn’t have understood any of it, nor would she have cared.

  Or maybe she would have. Alexa was never quite sure.

  “Do you know what this is?” Mr. Preston asked, pulling out a strange metal object that looked like a long, two-pronged eating utensil.

  “A fork for an alligator?”

  The tutor chuckled.

  “Good guess. It is a fork, of sorts. It’s called a tuning fork, and we use it to measure frequency. Today we’ll be calculating the wavelengths of sound waves. We studied about this the other day, remember? We were dividing the speed of sound by the frequency and then multiplying that number by one hundred?”

  “The speed of sound,” Alexa replied, trying to recall. “Three hundred forty-three millimeters per second at twenty degrees centigrade?”

  “Correct. Put some water into the cylinder, and then I’ll show you a nifty way to measure frequency.”

  Alexa carried the cylinder to the sink and filled it up, smiling to herself as she did. If the old Alexa were outside looking in, right now she’d be holding her sides, laughing at a man who wore a pocket protector and used words like nifty. That thought took the smile from her lips.

  Even though Alexa wasn’t quite sure how she felt about herself these days, sometimes she really hated who she had been before.

  Kent Tulip strode into Eleanor’s home office tall and handsome and crackling with energy. As a teenager, Jo had been the envy of all her friends as the one with the best-looking dad. Age had lined his face a bit, but otherwise Jo thought he was more striking than ever, especially now that there was a hint of gray at his temples. Today he was wearing a black suit with a crisp white shirt and a cerulean tie. Truly, he looked like a million bucks.

  “Eleanor, I don’t understand why you think we need to go over the minutes of the board meeting again,” he said brusquely to his mother-in-law, who was sitting behind her massive antique desk. “What is it that you don’t understand?”

  “Actually, Kent, you’re right. We don’t need to. I only said that to get you over here.”

  Obviously, that gave the man pause. He stood in front of the desk for a moment, hesitating, and then he turned back and closed the door before speaking again, more softly this time.

  “What do you mean? Is something wrong?”

  “Yes, something is wrong. We have a question for you.”

  With that, Mrs. Bosworth gestured toward Jo, who had been sitting quietly in the corner, wondering when she was supposed to jump in. Her grandmother had said to hit her father with the big guns the moment he arrived, with no pussyfooting around, just short, sweet, and to the point. Apparently, that moment was now.

  “Why, Jo!” her father said, confusion mixed with pleasure on his face. He seemed genuinely glad to see her. “You should’ve said something. I didn’t see you over there. How are you?”

  H
e stepped forward as if to give her a hug, but rather than stand and accept his embrace, she merely held up one hand to stop him, as she summoned her nerve.

  “Daddy, why did you pay Bradford to marry me?”

  He stopped short, looking for a brief moment as though he’d been hit by a truck.

  “Why…what?”

  Eleanor surprised Jo by groaning and rolling her eyes.

  “Sit down, Kent. Your daughter asked you a direct question. She expects a direct answer.”

  Jo studied her father’s face, a million emotions flashing across it all at once. Obviously, he wasn’t merely confused. He was also guilty, embarrassed, and stunned. As he took the chair closest to the door, Jo understood immediately that Bradford had, indeed, told her the truth—at least about this.

  “I know all about it,” Jo said. “I know about the Jaguar and the condo and the raise and the promotions. I know you and Mother told him how to make me fall in love with him.” At that, her voice caught. “I just want to know why.”

  She swallowed hard, forcing herself to remain calm and cool and not cry. Her father might be sweating, but she wasn’t going to show one speck of emotion other than a very controlled anger.

  “How did you find out?” he asked finally.

  Somehow, just hearing the question gave Jo a great sense of relief. At least he wasn’t going to try and deny it.

  “We’ll get to that in a minute. Tell me why.”

  Kent ran a hand over his face and looked directly at his mother-in-law.

  “You know why, Eleanor,” he said. “Do you really want to have this discussion in front of her?”

  Last night, Jo had felt sure that her grandmother knew more than she was saying. Now, the woman didn’t even squirm. She simply reached for a drawer, opened it, and pulled out a file.

  “Obviously, you’ve given me no choice,” she said. “And do not for one moment take that self-righteous tone with me, Kent Tulip. In my wildest dreams I couldn’t have imagined that you and Helen would pull a stunt like this.”

  “Eleanor,” Jo’s father said defensively, “you had a stroke. Your doctors were telling us at the time that you’d be lucky to survive through the end of the year. We felt that we had no choice. Fortunately for all of us, you rallied.”

  Before Eleanor could reply, the telephone rang and she answered it.

  “Send him in,” she said after a pause.

  Jo wasn’t sure who else was going to join them, but a moment later the door opened and a man entered the room. A distinguished-looking fellow in his sixties, Eleanor introduced him as her lawyer, Sidney Shaw.

  “Sid, we have a problem that needs your immediate attention. And I do mean immediate. Have a seat, please.”

  Sidney shook hands with Jo and Kent and then took the middle chair between them.

  “Just to bring you up to speed, Jo,” Eleanor said, “I do believe that all of this insane behavior—both what your parents did to you with the wedding and what happened last night—was probably brought about because of certain stipulations in your grandfather’s trust.”

  “His trust?”

  The woman sighed heavily, looking every bit of her 86 years.

  “As you know, Bosworth Industries is a private company established by your great-great-grandfather. In his lifetime, he was judicious about the company’s stock, following a plan for its distribution that would echo down through many generations—and hopefully keep the company always under family ownership and control.”

  “Okay…” Jo said, this information not unfamiliar to her. All of the family members owned shares of Bosworth Industries in varying degrees. Jo had been given two shares herself when she was born, though she hadn’t been allowed to touch the profits from those shares until she came of age, nor could she ever sell them to anyone outside of the family.

  “Controlling interest in the company was passed down to your great grandfather and then to your grandfather, my husband. At the time of his death, my husband owned sixty percent of the company’s shares. But rather than divide them evenly between our two daughters, he chose to distribute his shares a bit differently.”

  Jo glanced at her father, who looked as though he might burst a blood vessel any moment. Was he embarrassed? Angry? Whatever it was, the vein on his temple was bulging up the way it always did when he became upset.

  “Upon my husband’s death,” Eleanor continued, reaching for a piece of paper from the file on her desk, “his will decreed that his shares would go into trust, for my benefit, but that upon my death they would be split.”

  “Split?” Jo asked.

  “Yes. Half would be divided among our children and half among our grandchildren. Of course, neither your grandfather nor I realized that we would end up having only two grandchildren. His original intention, of course, was to see the shares divided out among a much larger base of descendants. You were quite young when he died, Jo, so you wouldn’t know this, but your grandfather expected Helen and Winnie both to procreate much more prolifically than they did.”

  Jo forced herself not to roll her eyes. As though it was any of his business to dictate how many children his daughters had.

  “Which brings us to the marriage clause,” Eleanor said, “the part of this whole thing that has a bearing on the situation we now find ourselves in.”

  “The marriage clause?” Jo asked, glancing at her father. He was staring straight ahead, his chin set like stone.

  “To wit,” her grandmother said, looking down at the paper and skimming it. “‘Upon my wife’s death’…so on and so forth…here we go, ‘shares to be distributed thusly: one-half to be divided equally among my children and one-half to be divided equally among my grandchildren, not including unmarried females.’”

  Jo’s head jerked up.

  “Excuse me?”

  “‘One-half to be divided equally among my grandchildren, not including unmarried females,’” Eleanor repeated.

  She set down the paper, folded her hands, and looked directly at Jo.

  “It was nothing personal, dear. This was written when your grandfather was just a young man back in the forties, and long before women were respected in the workforce. At that time, it was simply a given that unmarried females would have neither the desire nor the capability to be involved with the company. He was acting to protect both Bosworth Industries and his female descendants.”

  Jo tried not to be hurt or look shocked by the fact that her own grandfather had inadvertently cut her out of his will because she wasn’t married. She thought about the implications of such a stupid clause, but she didn’t know enough about who in the family already owned how many shares to calculate where such a bizarre division would place the controlling interest. Judging by the look on her father’s face, though, it couldn’t be good.

  “Help me out here,” Jo said slowly to her grandmother. “If you dropped dead tomorrow, once the dust settled, exactly who would have controlling interest of Bosworth Industries?”

  By all rights, that should be Jo’s mother, Helen Tulip, since not only was Helen one of the Bosworths’ two daughters, but Helen’s husband, Kent, was the chief executive officer of the company.

  The second-best option would be an even division of control between Helen and her sister, Winnie. Winnie’s husband, Neil, was the chief operating officer which made him second in command to Kent. Neil was also one of the few members of the family that Jo actually liked and respected.

  “Unfortunately,” Eleanor said, “if I died tomorrow, once the dust settled, controlling interest would end up in the hands of your cousin, Ian.”

  Ian?

  Even Sidney, who had known all of this already, looked mortified at the thought.

  The only offspring of Winnie and Neil, Ian was a few years older than Jo. As a child, she had adored him. Riotously funny in a subversive way, Ian had made long family dinners and boring get-togethers feel wild and exciting. As a teen, Jo didn’t find his dangerous antics quite so funny, and as an adult her
feelings for him vacillated between concern and disgust. Quite simply, Ian had never really grown up, choosing instead to live the lifestyle of a rich, self-indulgent playboy. Now Jo realized that once her grandmother died, Ian would be a millionaire many times over—not to mention the deciding voice for Bosworth Industries.

  Given the circumstances, in a way Jo could almost understand why her parents had tried to buy her a husband.

  10

  Mr. Bashiri was looking tired.

  It was only 3:30 in the afternoon, but already he seemed weary and in pain. Danny was concerned because their itinerary called for a full day’s shoot with only a two-hour break to grab dinner and check into the hotel, and then they had a night shoot at a benefit gala in Zurich’s Old Town district. They would be up quite late, something Danny suddenly realized might not happen if Mr. Bashiri was already fading fast this early in the game.

  Danny didn’t want to insult or embarrass the man, but after a while he discreetly pulled him aside and asked if he needed to take a break.

  “You’re holding your back very stiffly, sir,” Danny said out of the earshot of the others. “You don’t want to push yourself too hard or you might end up completely incapacitated.”

  Mr. Bashiri thought for a moment and finally agreed.

  “I will pull up a chair and rest my feet right over here,” he said. “Why don’t you switch to the digital and finish this series for me? I’m using the 82B cooling filter. Make sure you turn the fire on under the meat for some of the photos, but keep the flames as low as possible. I’m looking specifically for that low, blue glow of gas, not the higher oranges or yellows of the flames.”

  “Okay.”

  Danny got Mr. Bashiri settled on a full-length lawn chair and then went to work, switching out the cameras and filters to photograph the doctor on the patio near the pool, pretending to cook giant hamburgers on his grill. At first, Danny took the shots exactly as Mr. Bashiri had said, but once he was finished with those, he decided to experiment a little. First, he told the doctor to turn up the flames and try flipping a burger. After about ten tries, Danny managed to capture the shot perfectly, with the burger high in the air, the doctor grinning widely, and the spatula glinting in his hand.