Well. Not until this little glitch in the economy corrects itself.
“Champagne?”
I turned and her body was as beautiful as the bubbly. Smiling, she handed me a glass and said, “I’ve never had such a wonderful afternoon in my entire life.”
We drank to that.
We were married, my golden stockbroker and I, seven weeks after I first took him to bed. Not quite a whirlwind romance, but close. Of course, I had to meet his parents, just the once, a chore we all handled reasonably well.
We honeymooned in Caneel Bay and had such a lovely time we stayed an extra week. Bruce was so attentive, so charming, so — how shall I put it? — ever ready. And he got along amazingly well with the natives; they were eating out of his hand. In no time at all, he was joking on a first-name basis with half a dozen fellows I would have thought of as nothing more than dangerous layabouts, but Bruce could find a way to put almost anyone at ease. (Once or twice, one of these fellows even came to chat with Bruce at the cottage. I know he lent one of them money — it was changing hands as I glanced out the louvered window — and I’m sure he never even anticipated repayment.)
I found myself, in those first weeks, growing actually fond of Bruce. What an unexpected bonus! And my warm feeling toward this new husband only increased when, on our return to New York, he insisted on continuing with his job at Rendall/LeBeau. “I won’t sponge on you,” he said, so firm and manly that I dropped to my knees that instant. Such a contrast with my previous marital experience!
Still, romance isn’t everything. One must live as well; or, that is, some must live. And so, in the second week after our return, I taxied downtown for a discussion with Oliver Swerdluff, my new insurance agent. (New since Robert’s demise, I mean.) “Congratulations on your new marriage, Mrs. Kimball,” he said, this red-faced, portly man who was so transparently delighted with himself for having remembered my new name.
“Thank you, Mr. Swerdluff.” I took my seat across the desk from him. “The new situation, of course,” I pointed out, “will require some changes in my insurance package.”
“Certainly, certainly.”
“Bruce is now co-owner of the apartment in the city and the house on Long Island.”
He looked impressed. “Very generous of you, Mrs., uh, Kimball.”
“Yes, isn’t it? Bruce is so important to me now, I can’t imagine how I got along all those years without him. Oh, but this brings up a depressing subject. I suppose I must really insure Bruce’s life, mustn’t I?”
“The more important your husband is to you,” he said, with his salesman’s instant comprehension, “the more you must consider every eventuality.”
“But he’s priceless to me,” I said. “How could I choose any amount of insurance? How could I put a dollar value on Bruce?”
“Let me help you with that decision,” Mr. Swerdluff said, leaning that moist red face toward me over the desk.
We settled on an even million. Double indemnity.
“Strike while the widow is hot.” Unattributed, I guess.
It did all seem to go very smoothly. At first, I was merely enjoying Stephanie for her own sake, expecting no more than our frequent encounters, and them somehow the idea arose that we might get married. I couldn’t see a thing wrong with the proposition. Stephanie was terrific in bed, she was rich, she was beautiful and she obviously loved me. Surely, I could find some fondness in myself for a package like that.
And what she could also do, though I had to be very careful she never found out about it, was take up that shortfall, those pennies between me and the white medicine that makes me such a winning fellow. A generous woman, certainly generous enough for that modest need. And I understood from the beginning that if I were to keep her love and respect and my access to her piggy bank, I must never be too greedy. Independent, self-sufficient, self-respecting, only dipping into her funds for those odd sixpences which would bring me, in Mr. Dickens’s phrase, “result happiness.”
The appearance of independence was one reason why I kept on at Rendall/LeBeau, but I had other reasons as well. In the first place, I didn’t want one of those second-rate account churners to take over the Morwell — now Kimball — account and bleed it to death with percentages of unnecessary sales. In the second place, I needed time away from Stephanie, private time that was reasonably accounted for and during which I could go on medicating myself. I would never be able to maintain my proper dosages at home without my bride sooner or later stumbling across the truth. And beyond all that, I’ve always enjoyed the work, playing with other people’s money as if it were merely counters in a game, because that’s all it is when it’s other people’s money.
Four lovely months we had of that life, with Stephanie never suspecting a thing. With neither of us, in fact, ever suspecting a thing. And if I weren’t such a workaholic, particularly when topped with my little white friend, I wonder what eventually might have happened. No, I don’t wonder; I know what would have happened.
But here’s what happened instead. I couldn’t keep my hands off Stephanie’s financial records. It wasn’t prying, it wasn’t suspicion, it wasn’t for my own advantage, it was merely a continuation of the work ethic on another front. And I wanted to do something nice for Stephanie because my fondness had grown — no, truly, it had. Did I love her? I believe I did. Surely, she was lovable. Surely, I had reason. Every day, I was made happy by her existence; if that isn’t love, what is?
And Stephanie’s tax records and household accounts were a mess. I first became aware of this when I came home one evening to find Stephanie, furrow-browed, huddled at the dining-room table with Serge Ostogoth, her — our — accountant. It was tax time and the table was a snowdrift of papers in no discernible order. Serge, a harmless drudge with leather elbow patches and a pathetic small mustache, was patiently taking Stephanie through the year just past, trying to match the paperwork to the history, a task that was clearly going to take several days. Serge had been Stephanie’s accountant for three years, I later learned, and every year they had to go through this.
So I rolled up my sleeves to pitch in. Serge was grateful for my help. Stephanie, with shining eyes, kept telling me I was her savior, and eventually we managed to make sense of it all.
It was then I decided to put Stephanie’s house in order. There was no point mentioning my plan; Stephanie was truly ashamed of her record-keeping inabilities, so why rub her nose in it? Evenings and weekends, if we weren’t doing anything else, not flying out to the cottage or off to visit friends or out to theater and dinner, I’d spend half an hour or so working through her fiscal accounts.
Yes, and her previous husband, Robert, had been no help. When I got back that far, there was no improvement at all. In fact, Robert had been at least as bad as Stephanie about keeping records, and much worse when it came to throwing money around. A real wastrel. Outgo exceeded income all through that marriage. His life insurance, at the end, had been a real help.
And so had Frank’s.
It was a week or two after I’d finished rationalizing the Robert years — two of them, though in three tax years — that my work brought me to my first encounter with Frank. Another husband, last name Bullock. Frank Bullock died three and a half years before Stephanie’s marriage to Robert Morwell. Oh, yes, and he, too, had been well-insured. And with him, too, insurance paid double indemnity for accidental death.