“I would like a Martini,” she said.
“Good. I’ll have one too. Would you prefer that I order dinner for both of us?”
“Yes, please.”
He studied the menu while the waiter was getting the Martinis, ordering quickly when the waiter returned. She lifted her fragile glass and let some of the Martini slip down her throat; it was dry and strong and did her good.
“I won’t ask you what you said to Shirley Burns this afternoon,” he said. “I’ll only comment that it must have been most effective.”
“I’m sorry that it turned out as it did,” she said. “I went there to try to influence her to keep the shop and let me manage it, but I was not very successful.”
“That was apparent. I believe I warned you that she wouldn’t be receptive to the idea.”
“Yes, you did. It was something, however, I felt I had to try.”
“I can understand that. As I said earlier on the telephone, you are to continue in your present position so long as I am in control of Aaron’s estate. If you still want to, that is.”
“Yes. I want to stay on for the present.”
“Have you considered what you will do when the shop is sold?”
“I’ve been trying to think, but I’ve been unable to come to any decision.”
“Perhaps there will still be a place for you under the new owner, whoever it may be.”
“I’ve considered that too, but I don’t feel I should depend on it.”
“No. You’re right there. It doesn’t pay to anticipate these things.”
He drank some of his Maritini. Then placing the glass on the table, he laced the fingers of his hands above the glass in an odd kind of pose.
“Have you thought of trying to acquire the shop for yourself?” he said.
“I’ve thought of it, but I don’t see how I could manage it. I estimate that it will sell for around two hundred thousand dollars, which is to me an incredible amount of money.”
“Your estimate is pretty accurate, certainly, and it’s a very large amount of money to anyone. Well, I only mention this as a possibility, although a remote one, because I am convinced from Aaron’s comments and my own observation that you could make a big thing of it. The initial investment, I concede, is a problem. If you decide, however, to try to swing it, I suggest that you talk with Bill Tyler at the Security Bank and Trust Company. He is a client of mine, and I would be glad to speak to him in your favor.”
“Thank you. You are very kind.”
“Not at all. I believe you have real talent and could make a success of the business, that’s all. Or perhaps that’s not entirely all, either. The truth is, I like you very much — as Aaron did — and I would like to see you do as well as he wanted you to do.”
She looked down at her folded hands in her lap, presenting in the posture an effect of demureness that seemed to him all the more appealing because she usually appeared so deliberately sophisticated. To his generosity she felt an intensity of gratitude that clotted her throat and choked her. When the feeling had diminished, her throat clearing so that her breath passed through it easily again, she looked up from her hands and smiled.
“You see? Regardless of what you say, it returns to kindness. You are under no obligation at all to be concerned about me.”
“All right. It doesn’t matter. Let’s just say that my concern, whatever the basis, is genuine, and I would like to help you if I can. Do you think you could handle a loan sufficiently large to buy the shop?”
“I’m sure that I could successfully pay it off in a reasonable time, if that’s what you mean, but I don’t see why anyone should accept my confidence as security for so much money.”
“Have you no security besides your talent and your confidence?”
“No. I own nothing except my personal things, which are of little value.”
“You could mortgage the shop itself, of course.”
“Would that be sufficient? I know so little about these things.”
“Ordinarily it wouldn’t, I’m afraid. However, if you could impress Bill Tyler as favorably as you have impressed Aaron and me, it might. I doubt that he would risk bank funds in that amount, but he has a large personal fortune, you know.”
“You mean he might be willing to loan me the money personally on a mortgage?”
“If you can convince him that it’s a good investment. There’s another angle, too, that I’ve thought of. He might be willing to buy the shop himself and put it under your management. Much the same sort of arrangement you wanted Shirley Burns to agree to. This wouldn’t be as big a thing for you, but it would possibly be more appealing to him because he’d stand to make a much larger profit than interest on a loan.”
“I see. I hadn’t thought of that. Do you suppose he would be interested? Why do you suggest Mr. Tyler?”
“It would be up to you to make him interested, with what help I can give. I have suggested him because I know him well, because he’s a millionaire who can afford to consider such investments, and because he has the kind of imagination that just might be intrigued by a different sort of venture like this.”
She looked down at her hands again. Now it was excitement instead of gratitude that she felt, but it had the identical effect of clotting her throat and making it difficult and a little painful to breathe. Before she could look up and respond, the waiter arrived with their dinners. She was glad to see he had ordered capon, which she liked, for she was conscious all at once of being much hungrier than she had realized. His thoughtfulness and wisdom in anticipating her hunger seemed to be, on top of everything else, another subtle claim upon her. They began to eat and to talk of other things, when they talked at all. A few minutes before ten, while they waited for coffee, he looked at his watch and said he had a telephone call to make. Excusing himself, he went away, and she sat and watched him go, wondering idly, without real interest, whom the call would be to — a client or a friend or his wife. Then she realized that she did not even know if he had a wife or not, and had not even thought to find out. The combo finished one number and began another, and the one they began seemed quite familiar, something she should recognize. She followed the rhythm and tried to identify it, but she could not. Then a voice spoke her name at her shoulder, and the voice sounded as familiar as the music, something she should also recognize, but couldn’t. She looked up at the face of a young man, a rather handsome young man with dark and slightly curly hair, and the conviction of familiarity remained. Then, when he smiled in a hesitant way that seemed to suggest an inner uncertainty regarding his welcome, she recognized him, with an emotional reaction which she would not have expected and for which she was in no way prepared. She had not thought to see him again, and had felt no desire to see him again, but now seeing him, she could not understand why she had been so indifferent.