Part 11 (1/2)
As if on cue, the waitress appeared. Rapidly glancing from one of them to the other, she asked, ”Mr. Alt has ordered a bottle of champagne for you, with his compliments. At what point would you like me to bring it? With dessert?”
Before Kristin could object, Roy told the young woman that it would be fine. To Kristin he said, ”Do you mind? Sy is a sensitive sort, like most people who can be ruthless on demand. I don't want to offend him. You don't have to drink it.”
She made a face of mock outrage. ”You want it all for yourself.”
”Great,” said Roy, taking it to mean she would cooperate; he could never tell. ”Then we will make it a celebration.”
Jonathan was quite right about the lamb shank, the tender flesh of which became almost molten in its sauce, and had he appeared again, Roy might have urged him to come tomorrow and collect the Lotus. But the sensitive chef had apparently been so miffed by Kristin's rejection of the mousse of smoked trout that he was not seen again throughout the meal.
It was Kristin who made note of his absence. She said, smirking sweetly, ”That's a pity, because the duck breast is heavenly. Do I see artichoke hearts with your lamb?”
”I would give you a taste, but I've always seen you turn down Sam when he makes such offers.”
”One of the many things you can do with a husband, or anyway one like Sam, which might be misinterpreted by someone else.” She rolled her eyes. ”I wonder if even a wife could do that with Jonathan.”
”He's married?”
”You thought he was gay, didn't you? Sam does.”
Roy swirled the cabernet in the long-stemmed, big-bowled gla.s.s. ”I suppose so.”
Kristin was laughing silently. ”I think he's probably not married, not that it would mean-”
”That he's h.o.m.os.e.xual,” Roy said quickly to prevent her possible embarra.s.sment, though she had not indicated the onset of any.
”It isn't so much that I don't like to eat off anyone else's plate,” said Kristin. ”I just don't want to have to pay them back from mine.”
Roy was amused by this confession, maybe even more so when he decided it was a lie. It occurred to him that he had never seen her drink from a gla.s.s or cup of Sam's. Not that he was on watch for that sort of thing or any other particular of Kristin's existence. He had always been at pains to ignore her as a woman, in the physical sense. That had been easier to manage with her than with someone of more ample proportions, a.s.sertive hair, vivid coloring, darker eyes; someone fuller and smaller. For example, long as he had known Francine, often as he had had her, tiresome as she could be, he had ever been keenly aware of her flesh, the swell of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, which changed with the kind of fabric that covered them; the curve of her hip, different with each sort of turn she made, in fury, in mirth or depression or triumph.
The waitress mounted a filled ice bucket on a chromium stand next to the table and twistingly embedded the bottle within the ice, then from a pocket produced a little card and gave it to Kristin.
Kristin read the card and silently transferred it to Roy. Printed in the middle of the white rectangle was seymour alt, attorney at law, below which was handwritten: Complimenti! S.A.
”Sy isn't all bad.” Roy returned the card to Kristin's side of the table.
She was scowling. ”What does Jonathan charge for Cristal? Two hundred?”
Roy's smile became more generous. ”Cristal for Kristin would seem appropriate.”
”I trust Alt won't think I'm beholden to him.”
”He'll write it off as a promotional expense,” Roy said seriously, ”and won't have any expectation whatever, unless at some point he has a client whose interests are opposed to yours; then he'll expect to defeat you. If on the other hand he represents you, he will expect to destroy your adversary. In the practice of his profession Sy is not hampered by a conscience. Yet at home he's a family man, devoted to and even bullied by his wife and children. If you know him only in the one role, seeing the other would amaze you. You'd a.s.sume either one or the other was a hoax, but neither is.”
”Maybe both are.”
”That might be too deep for me.” Roy reached to give the champagne a twist in its frigid bath.
”No, it isn't,” Kristin said. ”It's just a new way to look at something familiar to you but not to me; therefore I'm free to do it. How well does he know Sam?”
”I couldn't say.” This was a true statement. He had a feeling that her fundamental concern was always for Sam, and the rest of what she said was treading water. The fact was she really loved Sam. Roy could not understand why that recognition tended to offend him. Sam was his best friend. How awful it would have been if she did not love the man. But the old question remained: What did she see in him?
Kristin said without warning, ”Tell you what, Roy. Before the bottle is opened. I've had all the wine I can drink tonight, and I don't want the burden of having to b.u.t.ter up an attorney I don't know and do justice to an extravagant champagne I didn't order. I've already hurt Jonathan, whom I do know. Why not go for still another self-important personage?”
Could this be some kind of old-fas.h.i.+oned bitterness against men when she had done so well in a realm they once dominated? You never saw a male bank officer nowadays.
Wincing, Roy asked, ”You want to send it back?”
Kristin showed her first weakness: She tried to explain. ”I should have turned it down earlier. I wasn't going to until he sent his business card.”
For the life of him, Roy could not see the unique bad taste in that: Alt was congratulating her on her success in what was certainly a business.
He pushed his chair back. ”I have to go say a word to Sy.”
She weakened her position further. ”I'm sorry if I put you in an awkward situation.”
Roy stood up. ”After all, he works for me, not vice versa. This is just a courtesy.”
He went looking for the lawyer's table and found it semicircled by one of the corner banquettes. Alt was with his wife, a handsome brunette of indeterminate age, with a high bosom and, had she been afoot, a regal carriage. In her presence Sy seemed more her lawyer than her husband.
”Hi, Dorothea.”
She gave him a radiant grin and continued to be the only person in his entire life who called him by his given first name, with which some years earlier he had supplied her, in answer to an idle question, at one of the Alts' New Year's Eve parties.
”Royalton!”
It took an awkward and uncomfortable lean to reach her for the double-cheek kiss, but she would expect no less. Alt meanwhile kept crunching on a seafood salad as if he were alone at an otherwise unoccupied table.
”Who's tonight's beauty?” Dorothea asked, nodding vigorously in the appropriate direction.
”The new branch manager at First United.”
”Excuse me?”
”The bank,” said Roy. ”She's Sam Grandy's wife.”
”Well,” Dorothea said, smiling naughtily, ”you might be more discreet about it.”
Sy Alt looked up from his mollusks. ”For a change Roy's not being illicit, Dodie. Sam's his close friend. Sam's in the hospital.”
Alt's wife winked at Roy with a heavy-lidded eye. ”I hope the change is not permanent. I want a whirl with you first. Sy's only your lawyer.” She was one of those respectable women who enjoy such badinage.
”Dorothea, I don't think I'm man enough for you.” He spoke earnestly to Alt. ”We're taking a raincheck on the champagne, Sy. Kristin doesn't feel good. I'll tell Jonathan to hold the bottle for her and Sam to drink when he gets home.”
”You don't need my permission.”
Roy saw that he was nevertheless offended; on the other hand, in Alt's professional scheme of things-surely closer to Kristin's than the mystique of a dilettante dealer in vintage cars-this might redound to her advantage.