Inheritance

by Judith Michael

  "A few of them," Felix said shortly, dismissing it. "It won*t happen."

  He changed the subject. There was no reason to tell her about his other difficulties: the sly bastard who'd wormed his way into the family; and Leni, in New York most of the time now, and barely civil to him when she was home: almost a stranger. She was as serene and coolly elegant as ever, but he felt he had hold of her by the thinnest of tlveads. Her sense of duty, her need for security, her admiration for him as a powerful businessman all seemed to have eroded; it was as if the two of them had no connection at all anymore.

  But he did not press her, because he was afraid of breaking diat thin thread. Even a stranger was better than no one, and she seemed willing to stay on as his wife. He could always find a woman when he needed one; that wasn't the issue. Sleeping with Leni was far less important than knowing she was his wife, and knowing the world knew.

  "I've bought tickets to the Tanglewood Ball next month," he told her at dinner in June. They were in Allison's and Ben's Beacon Hill house, with Asa and Carol, and Thomas and Barbara Janssen; they never ate alone anymore. "We'll drive up that morning and see some of the country. I haven't had a day off in a long time."

  "I don't think I'll be free," Leni said quietly. "And we've done it so many times . . . Allison, you and Ben should go; it's a lovely affair."

  "Maybe we will," Allison said. "It will be good for Judd's sister or brother to get some culture right from the beginning."

  "Allison!" Leni exclaimed, and Alhson and Ben exchanged a smile the length of the table. "When did you find out?"

  *This morning."

  "When are you due? Oh, how wonderful for you both. And for Judd, though he probably won't think so at first. I'm so happy for you; isn't it lovely, so many good things happen-mg . . .

  Felix said nothing, letting the others talk, covertly watching Ben with a seething rage. Judd Gardner's son, sitting in

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  Owen's place, filling Owen's house with children, planning— Felix was sure of it—to take over the company and grab Owen's place there, too. The smug bastard, the conniving son of a bitch—he'd even made friends with Thomas Janssen and Cole Hatton—even Asa! And there was nothing Felix could do about it . . . nothing, nothing, nothing. At least not now. He hadn't given up; he never gave up when the stakes were high enough; he'd get rid of the fucking bastard. In spite of himself, even knowing how much control he would need in the next months with his board, getting rid of Ben Gardner was becoming the goal that pushed others aside.

  He brooded about it even in the car going home. Asa drove, talking now and then to Carol, beside him, while Felix and Leni sat in the back seat, not touching.

  "I want you at that ball in Tanglewood," he said when they stood at their front door in the warm night. "A number of people have asked about your absences; I can't ignore them, and I care what they think."

  "And what do they think?" Leni asked.

  'That we're separating. Some such nonsense."

  "But we're never together, Felix. How can it be nonsenseT'

  "You're my wife. I've always given you great freedom because it suited you— '*

  "—and you."

  "It suited both of us," he said.

  "It suited you to ignore me until you needed me, because you don't want intimacy. You only want the form of things. It's so much easier than dealing with real people and real emotions."

  "Bullshit. I knew what I wanted: I wanted you. You were the one who turned away, standoffish all your life, like your whole family."

  Leni put her key in the door, but he put his hand over hers, stopping her. He felt her cringe from his touch, and then the rage that was just below the surface exploded. "You're not walking away from me! You'll do what I say! I ask damn little of you, but I want you at that affair in Tanglewood and you'll tell me, now, that you'll be there."

  Panic swept through Leni. She could not bear his touch; she could not bear having him this close. But I'm married to him,

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  she thought incoherently; as long as I am . . . why shouldn*t he think . . . ?

  Why am I still here? I have a home in New York, and good firiends there; I have Allison and her family, and Thomas and Barbara, and Wes . . .

  But those were all known; they were part of her life. Everything else was unknown and frightening: divorce, being single, no longer being a wife. Losing a place and status that society recognized, losing the boundaries that kept life from being formless and open-ended.

  Vm too old for that, she thought.

  But other women do it; I'm not alone. Thousands, hundreds of thousands of them take the risks rather than live a half-life. . . . She remembered the wise words she had spoken to Allison about marriage that morning at tiie Cape. Why couldn*t she use her own words to make a different kind of life for herself?

  "Fm talking to you!" Felix raged through clenched teeth. Leni had not heard whatever he had said, but his hand was gripping her arm and they were standing very close in the white circle of the porch light, almost as if they were lovers.

  **Let go of me, Felix. Let go of me." Hearing herself say the woids freed something inside her: she could talk, she could act, she could break out of her cowardice. **We started this way; let's not end the same way.'*

  **What the hell are you talking ^ut?"

  **We started with you grabbing my arm and pulling me out of Judd's building. You even struck me. I don't want to end the same way." She jeiked her arm from his and, caught by surprise, he let her go. Swiftly she unlocked the door and slipped into the house.

  He fc^owed her into the living room. A lamp had been left on, and its soft glow made the flowered chintz furniture homey and inviting: it was a room where there should have been love. Instead, they stood at opposite ends of it, like combatants, Felix standing ramrod straight, as be remembered Owen standing when he was being stem.

  **Ho one said anything about ending," he said harshly. **We have a marriage as good as most people's—where die hell do you get these sentimental ideas that people aie hiq^y and lov-

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  ing? You*ll stay where you are; you're better off than most. You've got your lover in New Yoric— "

  "What?"

  "You've been seen together, more than once. But it doesn't matter. As long as you're discreet and live properly when you're here with me, we'll stay as we are. There's no reason to change; I won't change—"

  "But I will." Her voice was low, and that was more ominous to Felix than if she had screamed at him. "I want a divorce, Felix. I've let this go on, and I shouldn't have. We don't have a marriage—we don't have any kind of marriage at all—and I can't imagine why you think so, why you tolerate whatever happens, even an unfaithful wife. Let it go, Felix, let it end; don't make me fight you; there's nothing left worth fighting for."

  "You are not going to walk out on me. You're mine and you'll stay— ''

  "No. No, no, no. I bought into that once; I really believed I belonged to you. But not anymore. I'm forty-eight years old, and I'm not going to five half a life any longer."

  "It's more of a life than you ever had before! I took you out of the gutter and gave you everything— *'

  "You took me from the bed of a man you'd robbed and destroyed!"

  There was a sudden silence. "Ben," Felix rasped. "He told you. The bastard. To turn you against me. That's what he came here for. But he's a liar, whatever he told you— *'

  "He didn't he," Leni flung at him. "He didn't teU me anything about you I didn't already know."

  **When? How long?" He waited, but she was silent. "Then it was Judd. You saw him after we were married, and he told you. Weak-livered son of a bitch . . . took my money and broke his word."

  **He kept his word," Leni said sofdy, "I never saw him again."

  "You're lying. How else would you know? It was one of them. ..."

  "What difference does it make? If I'd really listened to the two of you that day, I would have known wh
at was happening, and everything would have been different. But it doesn't

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  matter anymore. All that matters is that I won't live with you anymore." She clasped her hands in front of her, wondering why it was so frightening to say these things. *There's nothing left for me to like about you, Felix, or even to be impressed by. I was impressed for a long time, and I thought that meant I loved you, or admired you, or respected you. Now none of that is true. I don't even like you anymore.**

  'Then goddam you for a whore and a liar!*' he roared. '*Fucking in New York and coming back here as if you belong here—!**

  "You said I belonged! To you!" Her hand flew to her mouth, as if to stop her anger. Leni Salinger was supposed to be cool and controlled; she never shouted. "You're right. I shouldn't have come back. But why did you let me? Why do you want me now? What kind of man are you who wants a woman who doesn't want him?**

  He looked at her, his face turning sallow as he remembered a time he had stopped kissing her because she was struggling against him. But then he had been so sure of himself: he had defeated Judd and somehow he knew, absolutely, that he would get Leni for himself. Now nothing was sure and for the first time Felix began to believe he would lose his wife, and he was terrified. "I need you,*' he said, almost inaudibly. 'Too many things are happening that I didn*t expect. I need someone to count on. Danm it, I haven*t anyone to count on!*'

  Leni gazed at him. He was sixty-one years old, and in all those years he had not made one friend or kept one relative close enough to count on. He stood there, slouching now, his hair gray and grown long in back, his mustache still dark, trying to be Owen Salinger, who was loved by everyone.

  "I need you! Do you hear me? I need you!*'

  "It's too late," she said quietly. "If you'd said that twenty years ago—or ten—my God, even five . . . but then tf you'd been able to say it, or even think it, you'd have been a different person, and none of this would be happening. But now it*s too late.**

  "It's not too late." He drew himself up again and walked the length of the room to her. "That fool isn't worth a single memory, much less a lifetime, and his son is no better. If you think I'll let you choose them over what we have together— '*

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  "Don't touch me!" She dodged his outstretched hand and ran to the foyer. "We have nothing together, can't you understand that? Haven't you heard anything I've said?" She took the first step of the stairway to the second floor. "I'll say it again. I'm divorcing you, Felix. I apologize for not doing it years ago—^I apologize for being a coward—but I'm doing it now, and there's nothing you can do to stop me. You wouldn't anyway; you don't want a scandal. You want the world to envy you."

  "Just a minute!" His face was dark; he felt as if he were about to burst. "Where the hell do you think you're going?"

  "To my bedroom. We've said everything there is to say; I'll talk to my lawyer in the morning— '*

  "You will not spend the night in this house.'*

  "What?"

  "It's my house. Get out!"

  "What are you talking about? It's our house."

  "I bought it; you live here on my sufferance. Get out!"

  Leni stood indecisively on the stairway, looking at him, framed by the archway into the living room. She had been the one to make the house what it was: she had chosen the furniture, bought the paintings, organized the dinner parties. But it was all on Felix's money. "If that's what you want," she said at last. "I can stay with AUison and Ben. And tomorrow I'll go to New Yoik— "

  "You can go to hell, but you won't stay in that house either."

  "That is my house! I chose it and furnished it— **

  "It's mine, bought with my money, maintained by my money, and you will not set foot in it again."

  "Felix, you can't do this."

  "Can't? Can't? You have no idea what I can or can't do. You're a romantic fool; you always were. I'm putting new watchmen on the New York house; their instructions will be to keep you out. You can stay with your lover."

  "I'll stay in the Beacon Hill hotel!" she flung at him.

  "You fucking bitch, get the hell out of here!" His face was contorted with rage, but he was holding his mouth tight. He looked like a child trying not to weep, Leni thought suddenly.

  But she was ashamed of herself; she was the one who had

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  acted like a child, taunting him with Laura's hotel. "Fm sorry; I shouldn't have said that. Felix—please—it would be so much easier for both of us, and the family, if we could do this together, if we could cooperate— "

  "Cooperate!" He spat the word. "With an ungrateful whore? I took you from a mattress on the floor and made you a woman who could go anywhere, and you never thanked me, never told me you knew what I saved you from. You never thanked me for the company I built for you! Cooperate? When did you cooperate with me? I didn't ask you to be here all the time, I didn't ask you to tell me your problems, I didn't ask you what you did all day. All I asked was that you make me feel proud. What have you done to make me feel proud? Not a goddam thing. I had to do it all myself, everything myself—^** He took a harsh breath. "Get out of my house," he said, his voice dull. "Get out. I don't want you here."

  Leni watched him as he sank into a chair and sat with his back to her. For the first time in their marriage she felt sorry for him, she pitied him, but she had no desire to comfort him. "Good-bye, Felix," she said quietly, and taking her shoulder bag from the table in the foyer she left the house. She hesitated before getting in her car— bought with my money, maintained by my money, and you'll stay out of it —but she had no other way to get to Boston. Felix had not followed her to stop her, so she got inside and started the engine, and then drove back to town on the same highway they had driven barely an hour earlier. But this time she was alone.

  "The fact is, I'm on to something," Sam Colby told Paul over coffee and dessert. Emily had gone to bed. AH through dinner in Paul's Sutton Place apartment Colby had talked about old friends, most of them dead now or off somewhere in retirement, and about his parents, whom he recalled with a misty memory that made them more lovable than he could have imagined when they were alive. But when Emily left, Paul steered the conversation to the art thefts. "Yep, I'm on to something," Colby repeated, absently watching the housemaid bring a fresh pot of coffee. "It's a good feeling, let me tell you, after all these months of nothing. I hate nothing. Some smart-ass crook out there making a fool of me: bad way to feel."

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  *That must mean more interviews," Paul said casually. "FU make sure I have a cameraman ready."

  "Nope. Sorry, but nope. I have to do this alone for a while, ril tell you when I'm ready."

  "Now look, we've been through this. I'm trying to make a film, and you told me I'd have all the help I need. You also told me everything was all right at the Serrano interview, so there's no reason I can't go along on others. You know danm well I won't violate any secrets; I'll hold everything until your investigation's done, but I've got to film it.'*

  "I want you to, Paul, honest to God, but . . . well, shit, let me think about it."

  "I had a new idea the other day," Paul said. 'Tell me what you think of it. What I'd really lice to do in this film is trace two lives: yours and the life of a painting. I'd follow the painting from the artist who creates it to the collector who buys it to the thief who steals it— "

  "You left out the guy who commissions the theft."

  *There may not be one."

  "More and more there is. No other way to get rid of the really valuable pieces. I mean, you're not going to take a Van Gogh to your friendly Brooklyn pawnshop. The big money is fix)m collectors who'll pay anywhere from fifty thousand up to a million for a painting they'd have to pay three, four, ten times as much for if they bought it direct. Or that they couldn't get, period, because it wasn't for sale. Pledged to a museum after the owner's death, something like that."

  Paul nodded. H
e had his pencil out and was making notes. "Well, then, sometime after it's bought at auction or through a gallery, someone commissions its theft. I want to talk to him. Or her. And after that, the thief who steals it. And then you."

  "How you gonna find the guy who commissions it? And the thief?"

  "I thought you'd give me some names from those impressive cases you've solved. Or the case you're working on now. Let me in on your investigation, step by step, not just an interview here and there, and when you've got it solved, let me talk to everyone you've talked to, but by myself."

  "Can't promise that. But I'll do the best I can. This is a big deal, believe me; what I'm on to is very big. And when I'm

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  ready, you'll get it before anybody else. In time for your film, if you're willing to wait a little bit."

  "How long?"

  "How the devil do I know? Investigations are like lovemak-ing; you never know how long they'll take until you know what you've got in hand and how good it is. What do you care, if you get a good film?"

  "This one's been optioned, Sam. One of the television networks wants it. They're helping fund it, and they've given me a deadhne."

  Colby stared at him. "TV? Network TV?"

  "I won an award in Paris," Paul said dryly, "which made me an instant celebrity of sorts. The network's been wanting something on art ever since auction prices went through the ceiling, and true-to-life detective stories always get an audience. They want it in January."

  "January? Six months? That's plenty of time."

  "I have to finish fihning, and I can't always schedule interviews when I want them, some I have to repeat for one reason or another, and then I have to edit the whole thing. Six months isn't that long."

  "I'll have it wrapped up before then."

  Paul was silent.

  "You can't rush an old man, Paul. I have my own ways of doing things; that's how I got my reputation. And I promise it'll be worth your wait."

  "All right. I'll woric around your investigation. But you'll tell me as soon as you can. And let me film it."