“And then, after the wedding?” Grandison Whiting asked, as he untwisted the wire fixed to the cork of the second bottle.
“After the wedding Daniel shall carry me off whithersoever he will for our honeymoon. Isn’t that lovely: whithersoever?”
“And then?” he insisted, thumbing the cork.
“Then, after a suitable interval, we shall be fruitful and multiply. Starting off this early, we should be able to produce litters and litters of little Weinrebs. But you mean, don’t you, what will we do?”
The cork popped, and Whiting refilled the three glasses.
“It does occur to me that you’ll have rather a gap to fill before the next academic year begins.”
“That assumes, Father, that our years will continue to be of the academic variety.”
“Oh, you must both get your degrees. That goes without saying. You’ve already settled on Harvard — wisely — and I’m sure room can be found there for Daniel too. So you needn’t alter your plans in that respect. Only defer them.”
“Have you asked Daniel if he wants to go to Harvard?”
“Daniel, do you want to go to Harvard?”
“I know I ought to. But where I really did want to go was the Boston Conservatory of Music. But they turned me down.”
“Fairly, do you think?”
“Sure, but that doesn’t make it hurt any less. I just wasn’t ‘accomplished’ enough.”
“Yes, that was my sister-in-law’s opinion, too. She said you’d done wonders for the short time you’d studied, and in view of the fact that you evidenced no innate talent for music.”
“Oof,” said Daniel.
“Did you think we never spoke of you?”
“No. But that’s a pretty deflating opinion. The more so because it’s very close to what someone else once said, someone who was also… knowledgeable.”
“On the whole, Harriet thought very highly of you. But she didn’t think you were cut out for a career in music. Not a very satisfying career at any rate.”
“She never said that to me,” Boa objected.
“Surely because she knew you’d have passed it on to Daniel. She had no wish to wound his feelings gratuitously.”
“Then why are you telling him, Father?”
“To persuade him to make other plans. Don’t suppose, Daniel, that I’d have you give up music. You couldn’t, I’m sure. It is a passion, perhaps a ruling passion. But you needn’t become a professional musician to be serious about music. Witness Miss Marspan. Or if she seems too dessicated to serve as a model to you, consider Moussorgsky, who was a civil servant, or Charles Ives, an insurance executive. The music of the nineteenth century, which remains our greatest music, was written for the discerning delectation of a vast audience of musical amateurs.”
“Mr. Whiting, you don’t need to go on. I’ve said the same thing to myself many times. I wasn’t suggesting that it’s the Boston Conservatory or nothing. Or that I have to go to a music school at all. I would like to take some private lessons with someone good—”
“Naturally,” said Whiting.
“As for the rest of what I ought to do, you seem to have it all laid out. Why not just say what you have in mind, and I’ll tell you how it strikes me?”
“Fair enough. To begin with the immediate future, I’d like you to go to work for me here at Worry. At a salary, shall we say, of forty thousand a year, paid quarterly, in advance. That should be enough to set you up. You’ll have to spend it, you know, as fast as it comes in. It will be expected that you flaunt your conquest. To do less would show a lack of appreciation. You’ll become, for a time, the hero of Amesville.”
“Our picture will be in all the papers,” Boa put in. “And the wedding will probably be on the tv news.”
“Necessarily,” Whiting agreed. “We can’t afford to neglect such an opportunity for public relations. Daniel will be another Horatio Alger.”
“Tell me more.” Daniel was grinning. “What do I have to do to earn my preposterous salary.”
“You’ll work for it, believe me. Essentially it will be the same job you did for Robert Lundgren. You’ll manage the crews of seasonal workers.”
“That’s Carl Mueller’s job.”
“Carl Mueller is getting the sack. That is another aspect of your triumph. I hope you have nothing against revenge?”
“Sweet Jesus.”
“Well, I have something against revenge, Father, though I won’t enter into an argument on theoretical grounds. But won’t other people whom Daniel has to work with resent him if he takes Carl’s job away?”
“They’ll resent him in any case. But they’ll know (they already do know, I’m sure) that there are objective reasons for firing Carl. He’s rather systematically taken kickbacks from the hiring agencies he works through. His predecessor did as well, and it may almost be thought to be one of the fringe benefits of his job. But I hope that you, Daniel, will resist the temptation. For one thing, you’ll be earning something over double Carl’s salary.”
“You realize,” Daniel said in as neutral a tone as he could manage, “that Carl will lose his draft classification along with his job.”
“That’s Carl’s lookout, isn’t it? By the same token, you stand to inherit his exemption. So I suggest that you do have that P-W housing removed from your stomach. Harvard’s security network is probably a few degrees tighter than mine. You wouldn’t want to be setting off alarms every time you went to class.”
“I’ll be only too happy to be rid of it. As soon as I start the job. When would you like me to report?”
“Tomorrow. Drama requires despatch. The more sudden your rise, the more complete your triumph.”
“Mr. Whiting—”
“Still not ‘Father’?”
“Father.” But it did seem to stick in his mouth. He shook his head, and said it again. “Father, the one thing I still don’t understand is why. Why are you doing all this for me?”
“I’ve never tried to resist what I regarded as inevitable. That is the secret of any very prolonged success. Then too, I like you, which sweetens the pill considerably. But it wasn’t my decision, ultimately. It was Bobo’s. And it was, I think, the right one.” He exchanged a nod of acknowledgement with his daughter. “Old families need an infusion of new blood from time to time. Any other questions?”
“Mm. Yes, one.”
“Which is?”
“No, I realize now it’s something I shouldn’t ask. Sorry.”
Grandison Whiting didn’t press the point, and the conversation moved back towards the laying of plans, which (since they were not to be carried out) need not be reported here.
The question Daniel didn’t ask was why Whiting had never grown his own beard. It would have been so much easier in the long run, and he’d never have run the risk of being accidentally unmasked. But since the answer was probably that he’d tried to grow one and it hadn’t come in to his liking, it hadn’t seemed diplomatic to ask.
Daniel decided (among the many other plans that were formed that night) to grow a beard himself. His own was naturally thick and wiry. But after the wedding, not before.
He wondered if this were the fate he’d foreseen for himself so long ago, when he was pedalling along the road to Unity. Every time he’d gone to Worry, he’d had to pass the same spot on the road where he’d stopped and had his revelation. He could remember little of that vision now, only a general sense that something terrific was in store for him. This was certainly terrific. But it wasn’t (he finally decided) the particular benediction that his vision had foretold. That was still up ahead, lost in the glare of all his other glories.