In the ensuing silence Thomas Appleton stared at the three television screens as if he were waiting for the commercial to end and the show to begin. He sighed, rolled his shoulders, and finally said, “The girl, Gillian, ran off with a man, came here, and Sabrina hired you to find them. Is that correct, Mr. McNally?”
It was the story I had spread around but the fact that he was asking for confirmation suggested that he didn’t believe it. No fool, Mr.
Appleton.
With a show of surprise I poured a little oil on the fire and stated,
“You’re familiar with Sabrina’s daughter’s name.” What the hell, I liked the ambiance of the PBICA but I had no intention of spending the entire day here.
To be sure,” he said. “It’s no secret. I mean the woman and her daughter do get their names in the press.”
If he insisted on shadewboxing I would simply leave the ring. “I’m sorry, sir, but client confidentiality is sacrosanct even after I’ve closed the books on a case. If your purpose, for whatever reason, is to learn why Ms Wright hired me I’m afraid I’ll have to abort this meeting.” I half rose to prove my resolve.
Appleton restrained me with a hand on my elbow. “Of course, Discreet Inquiries. Friends have told me the name factually delineates your work ethics. My compliments, Mr. McNally. But the truth of the matter is, I did ask you here for just that reason.”
“Then I can see no further reason to continue this game of cat and mouse, Mr. Appleton. It’s been a pleasure, I’m sure.”
“Oh, not so fast,” he again held out a restraining hand. “Can we make a deal, Mr. McNally?”
With a shrug I countered, “That depends, sir. What’s in it for me?”
He smiled. “I like you, Mr. McNally. I like you very much. I even like your white cotton trousers and your red-and-white-striped hop sack jacket. I hope it starts a trend.”
“If it does, Mr. Appleton, I will give the ensemble to Goodwill. I like to think of myself as one of a kind.”
Now he laughed with gusto. “And judging from your ethics, Mr. McNally, you are just that.”
Without a pause I said, “But it’s my ethics you want to compromise, Mr.
Appleton.”
“So it is. Will you hear me out?”
“Only a fool refuses to listen, sir. What are you putting on the table?”
“A thirty-year-old secret. Interested?”
And what must I give in return, sir?”
“First, your word that you will never repeat what I tell you and, second, you will tell me if Sabrina Wright’s visit to Palm Beach has anything to do with that secret. Deal?” He actually held out his hand which I shook, for the second time that day.
“Deal,” I responded.
He took a deep breath and exhaled the words, “Gillian Wright is my natural daughter.” With that he raised his eyes upward as if he expected the ceiling of the New Media Lounge to come down upon us in retribution for either his productivity or his confession thereof. It didn’t.
“This is not Sabrina’s first visit to our Island,” he expanded on his confession. “She was here some thirty years ago when we were both students. It was labeled spring break and Fort Lauderdale was the hot spot for that holiday. As I recall it was a hundred and ten in the shade and very drunk out. Sabrina and I had what some poet called a brief encounter.” “Playwright, sir. Noel Coward,” I corrected.
“Playwright or poet, the result was Gillian,” he said.
To add a little romantic nostalgia to the tale I asked, “Was Sabrina very beautiful, sir?”
“Let’s say she was available, Mr. McNally.”
“Please, sir, call me Archy.”
“And you call me Tom.”
There is nothing like talk of sexual transgressions and ethics bashing to evoke intimacy between men of good breeding. Having melted the ice we fell into the drink and went with the floe.
“I’m afraid, Tom, the reason for Sabrina’s visit has much to do with your brief encounter.”
He nodded as if resigned to his fate. “I thought so,” he said. “I am not an insensitive man, Archy, and I didn’t exactly leave Sabrina in the lurch. In fact, monetarily speaking, she was far better off after our brief encounter, believe me.”
Now that he had opened up to me I saw no reason to pretend I didn’t already know his secret. Also, certain that Appleton would never talk to anyone about this conversation I felt I wasn’t compromising my former client’s position by revealing facts of which Tom Appleton was already painfully aware. “She told me as much,” I revealed, ‘and I’m not one to cast the first stone.”
“She told you everything?” he asked.
“Everything but your name. She did not divulge that.”
“So if I hadn’t called you, you would never know…”
His voice died away and he shook his head woefully. “What fools we mortals be,” he lamented. Then, perhaps to rationalize his actions, he added, “I couldn’t take that chance, I had to know what she’s up to.
I’m a widower, Archy, and I would now gladly acknowledge Gillian and to hell with what anyone might say, but such a move could prove disastrous for those innocent of any wrongdoing. You know my son is involved in state politics?”
“So I’ve heard, and with a bright future, they say.”
Appleton started in his chair. “More than bright. There’s talk of a run for the Senate, the U.S. Senate, that is, within the next four years. Any hint of a scandal would cause his backers to run scared.”
“He has nothing to do with the brief encounter,” I said.
“But he has everything to do with me, and in politics guilt by association is a fact, not a figure of speech.”
“I assume your son is happily married,” I ventured.
“He’s married, Archy, that’s for sure. She’s photogenic, and that seems to make them both happy. She’s given him the requisite number of children, boy and girl, employs no staff off the books, subscribes to no less than four charities, the recipients of which are Asian Americans, African-Americans, Native Americans, and Hispanic Americans, and she wears her hair in the style of the late Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. They’re what the pols call a dream couple and I don’t intend to turn the dream into a nightmare.” In the manner of a harassed executive being confronted with a hostile takeover he leaned toward me and pleaded, “What the hell does Sabrina want, Archy?”
“Only to protect you,” I assured him.
I believe that we humans come equipped with a sixth sense that, at this early stage of our evolution, we cannot access at will, but the uncanny thing does make itself known for no discernable reason at the oddest of moments. This was one of them. Call it intuition, inspiration, instinct, precognition, or plain old gut feeling, but when I spoke those words to Thomas Appleton I knew as sure as I was sitting in the New Media Lounge of the PBICA that Sabrina’s mission was to protect herself first, and Thomas Appleton only as long as it didn’t jeopardize her position.
Why was she so unyielding in her determination to keep the name of Gillian’s father a secret? Because of the deal she had struck with Appleton? I no longer believed that. In fact my gut feeling said Sabrina Wright didn’t give a dam for Thomas Appleton per se after all these years, yet she was willing to sacrifice her daughter’s affection, such as it was, to protect him. This was not the stratagem of a survivor.
Appleton’s eyes searched my face like a child wanting to believe in the tooth fairy when common sense, and the kid next door, told him it was all a crock. Tom,” I said, “Sabrina knows your name and address, correct?”
“Sure,” he answered.
“Therefore she didn’t hire me to find you. Correct?”
“I know all that, Archy, but who’s the man that got away?” he questioned.
Never had so many been so concerned over five words from a gossip column that didn’t mean a thing to anyone, including the columnist. I explained their meaning to Appleton as best I could and gave him what I believed to be their source.