13
Tuesday
morning I was at my desk, thinking about the deadly airplane crash in Indonesia
about which I had read in the paper. I had been flirting with the idea of a
vacation in Indonesia later in the year; Kaycee had suggested Bali, but I
thought that I would find Java more interesting. The crash happened on Sumatra,
but still
A call came from the
office of Clerk of the Court, informing me that the petition on behalf of
Elizabeth Perino Schlemmer to be recognized as Peter Harts heir and the
administrator of his estate had already been assigned to a judge, and that a
hearing on the matter would be scheduled in due time. I was to come by the
Courthouse at my convenience to take care of some formalities.
The
next call was from Rose.
Hi,
she said. Last things first. About Peter Hart: his parents are deceased. His
mother died just last year. Hes got two brothers and a sister. The brothers
are both married, with children and grandchildren, living in the Cleveland
area. Theyre both on the Forbes list, by the way. The sister is childless,
twice divorced, living in North Carolina. Im e-mailing you the details as we
speak.
Great.
Youre a genius.
Now,
did you know that in Canada they have Labor Day the same day we do?
Yes,
and they put U in it.
What?
Rose,
cant you ever be polite and laugh at my jokes? The letter U. They spell it
L-A-B-O-U-R. The thought crossed my mind that Chris would certainly have
laughed.
Im
sorry. I guess Im a genius for some things and dumb for others. Anyway, Thomas
called me last night to wish me happy Labor Day. Hes got tomorrow off. I could
go tonight and be back tomorrow evening. Of course the flight will cost more on
such short notice. Around nine hundred, with hotel, cabs and everything. On top
of my usual day rate.
Dont
worry, I said, just put it on your bill.
All
right, just let me click OK on the confirm button. There. Its a two-hour
flight, she continued. Ill have my laptop with me, so Ill be able to get a
start on the report en route. She paused. I know. I dont waste time. Its
the Catalan in me, my mother used to say. Eres una catalana, Rosita. Did
you know that Catalans are supposed to be stingy with time and money? Go ahead,
answer with a joke. I promise Ill laugh.
No,
I didnt know. I only thought that they fought with the Doggalans. Please dont
laugh. That was pretty lame. But she laughed anyway.
No,
that really was funny. Now you know my level of humor. Third grade. She
laughed again.
What
time is your flight?
Seven-twenty-five,
on Alaska. Staying at the Airport Travelodge. Back at SFO at five-thirty-four.
I can go to my office and work on the report some more, and I can have a rough
version printed out for you later in the evening.
Fantastic,
I said. Enjoy your trip!
I
will. I like Vancouver.
After
I hung up I found that an incoming call had gone to voicemail while I was
talking with Rose. It was from Jeff, at work. Jeffs office, and probably
Chriss as well, is not in the main Wells Fargo building downtown but near the
Civic Center.
I
returned Jeffs call immediately.
Hi,
Gary. Ann told me that you wanted to talk to me about Chris.
Yes,
Id like that, I said. Do you mind?
No,
of course not.
I
have to be at the Courthouse some time today, so Ill be near you. Shall we
have lunch?
Sure.
It
was now well past my cappuccino time. I did an hour of paperwork and drove to
the Civic Center.
So, what do you want to know about Chris? Jeff asked
after we exchanged pleasantries and ordered lunch.
Im
not really sure. She told me a lot of details about herself. Its her behavior,
or her attitude, thats got me puzzled.
Hmm.
I know her pretty well, and I think of her as pretty straightforward.
Tell
me about you and her. Our beers were served.
We
had a little thing going when she first came to Wells Fargo, maybe eight years
ago. We were both on the rebound me from Claire, her from whoever. Claire
was Jeffs second wife. We both knew it wasnt going to go anyplace special.
Workplace romances are okay, provided they dont get serious. When she met
someone else we stopped, and when that ended we would get together again. And
the pattern didnt change after I met Ann, Ann being who she is. Jeff smiled.
Ann must have told him about the night before.
So
with you and Chris its been just sex.
Not
just sex. That wouldnt be Chris. Were friends.
I
beg your pardon. Just sex is exactly how Chris put it to me. It would be
either that or a relationship, and she wont go to bed with me until she knows
which one it is.
That
seems new for her, Jeff said just as our lunch plates were brought. Her
tendency has been to lose herself to a guy, and then get hurt when things
didnt work out. Shes been hurt a lot. Maybe shes learning. Shes about to
turn forty, and there may be a little panic setting in.
She
said something of that nature, about going on forty and not wanting to make the
same mistakes over and over. It just feels weird that Im the one that she
wants to practice her newfound discernment on.
Dont
get sarcastic. Chris doesnt deserve it. Shes a good girl who hasnt had an
easy life. You might take it as a compliment that shes picked you to try to
practice some self-control with.
Thanks,
I said as I put a big forkful of chow fun into my mouth.
There
you go again. I think she really likes you. She really went after you at the
party, and you let her down. So you picked her up, I said inwardly.
Give her a chance. Hell, give yourself a chance.
A
chance for what?
Have
you had a real relationship with a woman since Margo?
No.
Believe
me, my friend, its worth the pains and annoyances and inconveniences. After a
moment of chewing he went on. It was Anns idea, by the way, that you and
Chris might be good for each other.
Maybe
we are, I said with a shrug. But she wont give me a chance to find out.
You
mean, because she wont fuck you?
Yes.
As
I said, thats something new for her. Probably for you too. Think of it as an
opportunity to get to know each other from different perspectives than the
sexual.
It
felt clear that I could not explain my dilemma to Jeff unless I told him about
Libby. What he advised would have made sense without that bewitching presence
looming over me. But the conflict in my mind between Libby and Chris was a
metaphysical one, almost in the literal sense of being beyond the physical
realm. There was no credible chance of realizing my feelings about Libby in a
physical way, except as I had done with Kaycee. I was in the throes of a
schoolboy crush, and this was not something I felt ready to share, as one
fifty-year-old man to another.
Okay,
I said, Ill try to think of it that way. Thanks, and I mean it. Jeff
acknowledged my thanks with a smile while chewing, and we went on to other
subjects.
In the Clerks office at the Civic Center Courthouse I
found out, after filling out the appropriate form with the names and addresses
of Peters siblings, that Libbys petition had been assigned not to a judge but
to a probate commissioner named George Mandros whom I knew quite well from his
days in private practice and with whom I had dealt several times since he had
become commissioner. I knew George to handle the matters before him
expeditiously. He would probably want to have an accountants appraisal of the
estate, with its tax liability, as soon as possible. And who better than Paul
Stevens (originally Stavropoulos)? Paul, Georges cousin, was currently helping
me with the software tycoons divorce settlement. Like George, he is a fast
worker.
I
called Paul as soon as I got back to the office, and my estimation of his
speedy work was confirmed immediately. I was just about to call you, he said.
Im done with the calcs.
Good,
I said. Ive got another job for you. A big estate to be appraised.
Peter
Hart?
Good
guess.
Not
exactly. I heard from George.
News
travels fast.
You
know us Greeks. We communicate instantly. We even have a word for it: tilepáthia.
Telepathy, for you barbarians.
Watch
who you call a barbarian.
Its
a compliment, my friend. We Greeks invented civilization, and look where its
gotten us. Anyway, lets meet and exchange data. You give me raw, I give you
cooked.
We
arranged that I would stop at Pauls office on my way home; it would be only
slightly out of the way. I made a photocopy of the notes I had taken at the
bank and packed it into my briefcase, along with a copy of the petition.
Paul
scanned my notes and quickly said, It looks like a good fifteen mill before
taxes, considering all the real estate. That means about nine mill net for your
girl, if shes recognized, and George likes her case, so far.
What
Pauls estimate meant for me was a fee of some nine hundred thousand. Once the
case was settled I would ask him to help me minimize my taxes by means of
income averaging or something like that. But I now felt in a position to offer
to buy out Margos share of our building and dissolve DE Properties. When that
transaction was done, I would celebrate it by removing the Ash and the Unicorn
from the lintel.
Im
happy to hear that, Paul. You know that Margo plans to petition on behalf of
Peters boyfriend.
Not
a chance, Paul said. I supposed that he was echoing his cousins sentiments.
George Mandros is, by San Francisco standards, a conservative. He once worked
for Dianne Feinstein. Of course shell get a fair hearing, Paul added, and
smiled knowingly.
Of
course, I said.
Anyway,
thanks for the work, Gary. Ill be done quickly.
I
know.
I
appreciate the confidence. And, on a personal level, Cindy and I would like to
have you over for dinner some time.
That
would be great, Paul. Give her my regards. We shook hands and I left Pauls
office. On my way out the receptionist, a slim young black but not very
African-looking woman, chirped, Bye, Mister Einhorn. I did not remember her
name, so I simply said Bye and smiled back.
For dinner I had my leftover enchiladas. I realized that I
was eating enchiladas for the third day in a row, and, counting Roccapulco, for
the fourth time in five days. I was transported, in a Proustian way, to that
Saturday morning when I was twelve and saw Elena come out of my fathers study,
wearing a robe, while I heard my father folding the sofabed inside. As she
walked past me toward her room, Elena smiled at me as though what had happened
were the most natural thing in the world. I was by then aware enough of my own
desires to understand my fathers needs that my sick mother could not meet, but
the understanding did not mitigate the deep distress that I felt. My mother
sensed my sudden unease, and a few weeks later she told me that it was she who
had instigated the liaison. She also told me then that Elena had a husband in
Mexico, whom she had left, and three children, the youngest of whom was a
thirteen-year-old daughter. I asked Elena about her family, and she showed me a
picture of her daughter, named Socorro, whom I found beautiful. For some years
thereafter I felt myself drawn to girls who looked Mexican. In my high school,
to my regret, there were very few of them. I now wondered if, in my attraction
to Chris Martinez, I was reliving that part of my adolescence.
After
dinner I decided to call Greg. I felt curious about what had happened Sunday
afternoon in Sebastopol.
It
was kind of anticlimactic, Greg said. Mom did finally call back. But before
that a friend of Jills came over to help, and Jill introduced her as my
girlfriend Megan, so I realized that when I told them that my mother and
her girlfriend Joyce would be coming, they might not have gotten it that they
were a lesbian couple, and, given how Republican they are, I didnt know how
they felt about gay people.
There
are gay Republicans, you know.
I
guess so, but I told Mom what I knew, and she decided not to come. Told me to
make up an excuse. I decided to stay, just out of curiosity and also to be with
Rebecca. And it turned out that there were several gay couples, male and
female, among the guests.
You
just never know, do you?
No,
you dont. Also, I heard Carl trashing Bush, mainly for being a hypocrite and
not being really conservative, whatever that means. But, anyway, Dad,
thanks for your advice. It turned out to be moot, but it was good.
I
wonder if any of your friends who did not grow up with two lawyers say moot.
They
say mute, Greg said, and we both laughed.
After
hanging up I thought about Greg some more. I admired the fact that, at
twenty-one, he had a girlfriend for whom he felt more than mere lust, something
that I didnt experience until I was two years older and found myself in love
with his mother.
The
thought of mere lust brought me back to Chriss just sex. It now
seemed curious that she had formed the kind of dichotomy that my mind was
associating with post-adolescence. What was more, she had formed it at
incipient middle age as a defense against repeating the mistakes of past years.
Now, it seemed to me that a certain lack of judgment, of discernment, of
clarity about ones feelings was part and parcel of being in a state of sexual
attraction, at any age. My own confused feelings about Chris were, in this
regard, paradigmatic.
There
are occasions when I sense the philosophy minor that I pursued at Berkeley
along with my comparative-literature major (French and Spanish) catching up
with me. This was one of them. But this time the sensation went beyond the
substance of what I had learned and to the person of one my teachers, a
professor who at the time was one of the most radical leftists on campus Free
Speech Movement, antiwar demonstrations and who later, on becoming wealthy as
an owner of apartment houses, turned into an anti-tax, anti-rent-control
rightist.
Would
I be liable to a like transformation when the windfall of my fee from Libby
came due? I had already thought about minimizing my tax bill. No one likes to
pay taxes, but for rightists the dislike is categorical while for liberals like
me its conditional, I like to think, on our dislike of the governments
spending priorities.
But
it was not simply a matter of a windfall. I know my profession well enough to
know that, in the wake of the publicity about my mysterious clients coming out
of nowhere to inherit a prominent mans estate, I would come into prominence as
an estate lawyer, and would henceforth be in demand. All it takes is one big
case is an oft-heard adage in my circle of solo practitioners. I was now,
quite probably, on the way towards becoming a wealthy man. If I were a rich
man, I began to sing to myself.
And
I would not fall into the trap of arrogance. I would not tell myself that I was
immune to the poisonous charms of wealth, that I would not be affected by it in
ways that had up to that time seemed to me unappealing, that I might not come
do disdain Two-Buck Chuck. But I would try to follow the Socratic path of
self-awareness.
It
was time to read the new New Yorker.