Lunch was Mr. Spotts's treat. He insisted upon La Caravelle.
"My last cholesterol splurge," he sighed sadly as the captain led them past the murals and seated them at a red velvet banquette along the wall of mirrors. "Today, I say the hell with those doctors! I am going to have my usual terrine de foie gras followed by poularde rotie a l'ail doux, and top it all off with a frozen cassis mousse in a ring of apple slivers, not to mention a nice vintage bottle of Chateau Margaux. If my heart gives out from all that pleasure, then so be it. At least I shall have had the satisfaction of dying quite contentedly."
When the appetizers came, Kenzie pushed her chair de crabe Caravelle desultorily around on her plate. That the mass of fresh crab meat with cognac dressing, caviar, and lobster roe was a symphony for the taste buds made absolutely no difference to her. She had simply lost her appetite at the news of Mr. Spotts's forced retirement—all the more so, since on the way over to the restaurant, he had dropped the bombshell that today would be his very last day at Burghley's.
She was still in a state of shock.
Mr. Spotts frowned at Arnold Li, who was picking at his truffle- studded foie gras with an equal lack of enthusiasm.
"Young man, the way you are eating that is really quite, quite unforgivable," said Mr. Spotts with a gesture of his fork. "Unless, of course, it is inedible, in which case I shall have to summon the waiter and register a complaint."
Arnold shook his head. "You know that's not it," he said tightly, putting down his fork, the tines resting, inverted, on the edge of his plate. He leaned across the table. "It's just that we can't imagine the department getting along without you!"
"Well, you two had better get along without me, Mr. Li." Mr. Spotts paused, smiling acidly, and righteously lifted a stern, crooked pinkie finger in that learned way of his. "Otherwise, that blonde nincompoop named for a Disney cartoon will see to it that our department's most precious asset, its reputation—in short, everything—will go right down the drain."
Kenzie took a sip of her Margaux. "What I want to know," she asked listlessly, setting down the wineglass and running her moist finger around its rim, but too lethargically to make it chime even feebly, "is now that you can't work, what are you going to do?"
"Do?" Mr. Spotts looked slightly taken aback. "Why, I'm not supposed to do anything!" He sighed deeply. "Unless you call retiring to the Sunshine State doing something?"
His perfectionist eyes consulted theirs and saw no reaction. He smiled grimly.
"My widowed sister, Cosima ..." he murmured, "has ... umn ... what I believe in Fort Lauderdale is referred to as an ... umn ... 'Waterfront French Renaissance Estate' ... if you can imagine such a contradiction in terms?" One eyebrow, the precise color of silverplate, rose in distaste and he tutted his tongue.
"An abomination. Spun-sugar Tara meets Beaux Arts on the Intra- coastal, as only a native Floridian could design. But such is life. It could be worse, you know. I have a generous pension and my not inconsiderable collection of Old Masters, which, though second rate, are nonetheless still quite superb. So you see, at least I'm not destitute." His lips broadened into a smile. "However, enough of this depressing subject! The reason I invited you both to lunch is not to talk about me, but to discuss your futures."
"Our futures?" Kenzie and Arnold chorused as one.
Mr. Spotts tucked his chin, tortoiselike, down into his chest and gave them a severe look from over his half glasses. "As of tomorrow, one of you shall have to take over the reins as head of the department."
Pausing again, he looked from one of them to the other.
"Well? Which of you shall it be?"
Kenzie didn't hesitate. "Arnold," she said.
"Kenzie," Arnold said simultaneously.
All three of them sat there in stunned silence before bursting into spontaneous laughter.
"In all seriousness," Kenzie insisted solemnly once they'd stopped laughing, "Arnold's far more knowledgeable about the seventeenth century than I am."
"Yes, but you're the expert when it comes to the eighteenth," Arnold told her. "And, you display far better leadership abilities, and are by leaps and bounds more diplomatic than I could ever be."
"My God!" Mr. Spotts could only shake his head in exasperated wonder. "Other people would be tearing each other's eyeballs out for such an opportunity! But you? The two of you just sit there, insisting that the other is the better qualified! I must say, never in my entire life have I ever run across anything quite like this. No, never." Then he frowned thoughtfully. "Still, we don't have much time in which to decide this. I have a meeting scheduled with Mr. Fairey for this afternoon. He shall want my recommendation by then. So?" His eyes flicked back and forth between them. "Which of you wants to be in charge?"
Kenzie and Arnold sat there, silently digesting what he had just said. In truth, while neither of them was loath to get promoted, both of them were dedicated professionals for whom quality was not negotiable—both only wanted what was best for the art form to which they had dedicated their lives.
"If it's all right with you, Kenz," Arnold said slowly, "I'd rather not be saddled with all the politics. Besides, you really are the best as far as diplomacy's concerned."
"Well, if you're certain," she said dubiously.
"Of course I am. You know I'm happiest when I'm left alone to either pore over art, or thumb through volumes of dusty reference books. If I'd wanted to deal with management, I would have joined IBM or AT&T."
"Well, then." Mr. Spotts sat forward. "Now that we have that ... umn ... little matter out of the way, there is one last thing."
Kenzie looked at him questioningly, but instead of replying, he reached for the battered old leather satchel he always lugged around with him, and which was on the banquette beside him. Unclasping it, he opened it and lifted out two small, flat packages wrapped in plain brown paper and secured with Scotch tape. Looking slightly embarrassed, he handed one across the table to Kenzie, and the other to Arnold.
"What's this?" Kenzie asked.
"Oh ... umn ... just a little ... you know ..." The old man waved a hand dismissively. "Something to remember me by."
"Oh, Mr. Spotts!" Kenzie chided. "You shouldn't have!"
"But I did, and that is my prerogative. Well?" He gestured impatiently. "Don't just sit there looking stupefied. Open them!"
Kenzie and Arnold tore away the wrapping papers. Then they sat there, staring at a small framed picture in stunned silence.
"Why it's ... it's ..."
Kenzie's voice deserted her while her eyes followed every line of the exquisite study of a baby rendered in pen, brown ink, and a purple wash on blue paper, its effect heightened here and there with traces of black and white chalk.
"A Zuccaro!" she finally managed in a breathy whisper. "The one retouched by Rubens himself!"
Slowly she raised her eyes and stared across the table.
"My God, Mr. Spotts! You know I couldn't possibly—"
"Now, now. You not only can, my dear, but you must. Really, I find this most embarrassing ..." Mr. Spotts glanced around, visibly distressed. "Yes, yes, most embarrassing indeed ..."
"And this!" Arnold said shakily.
Kenzie balanced her weight on the back of Arnold's chair as she half stood, looking over his shoulder at the picture in his hands.
"Tiepolo," she murmured automatically, needing but one glance at the buff paper with its red chalk and highlights of black and white. "To be precise," she added, "Giovanni Battista Tiepolo's Bishop Saint Healing a Young Woman."
"All I ask is that you enjoy them," Mr. Spotts said. "Hang them on your walls and derive pleasure from them. Think of them as part of your nest eggs."
"Oh, Mr. Spotts!" Kenzie whispered, tears coming into her eyes. "You know we can't possibly—"
"In that case," the old man said cryptically, "perhaps it will make you feel better to know that these are not ... umn ... exactly outright gifts?"
"Oh? Then what are they?"
"They're conditional. You know ... they come with strings attached?" Mr. Spotts made marionette-controlling motions with his gnarled fingers.
"Strings?" Arnold asked, his interest piqued. He sat forward. "What kinds of strings?"
Mr. Spotts eyed them both solemnly over the rims of his half lenses. "What I need," he sighed quietly, "is to extract one promise from each of you."
"We'd gladly do that anyway," Kenzie assured him. "There's no need to give us presents!"
"I know." Mr. Spotts nodded. "But this particular favor ... well, it's a rather large one." He stared intently from one of them to the other.
"Just name it," said Kenzie.
The old man was silent.
"Yes, just say the word," pressed Arnold.
"Save the department!" Mr. Spotts's voice was soft but harshly bitter, like a brittle, arctic wind. "That's the one thing I ask!"
Every Tuesday and Thursday Bambi Parker spent her lunchtime at the Vertical Club on East Sixty-first Street. The way she figured it, she was twenty-four, going on twenty-five, and not getting any younger. Besides, at Burghley's you never knew who you were apt to run into. It behooved a single young woman to always be in shape and look her absolute best.
After thirty minutes of concentrated workout, she peeled off her lime green and shocking pink Spandex exercise outfit, showered, dressed, repaired her makeup, and moseyed on back to Burghley's, eating a container of non-fat, lemon-flavored yogurt while checking out the windows of the clothing boutiques along the way. When she finally returned to the auction house, she headed straight for one of the second-floor employees' powder rooms.
This particular one, which she frequented, was known as "The Club," since it unofficially doubled as sorority house for the most popular among Burghley's army of Seven Sisters-educated arts majors—trust-fund babies all—every one of whom was biding her time working in an appropriately genteel job until Prince Charming came along.
Then, once they were swept off to the grand townhouses and penthouses of the upper East Side of Manhattan, plus oceanfront weekend "cottages" out in the Hamptons, or bucolic country estates in the rolling hills of northwestern Connecticut, the roles they now played would be reversed, and the self-perpetuating cycle become evident: Burghley's ex- employees would trade the expertise gained working at the auction house by becoming its most knowledgeable clientele.
Even before opening the door of "The Club," Bambi could already hear the noise coming from within. It sounded like an aviary—albeit, judging from the chatter and coos, trills and squeaks, and more than a few Locust Valley lockjaws, a highly elite aviary consisting of only the most carefully select and singularly bred of all species.
Bambi felt right at home as she squeezed between two girls to get at the long stretch of mirror above the sinks; sometime back, the more enterprising among them had taken up a collection, so that a row of frosted makeup bulbs was installed all the way across the top. A fiercely unflattering light, it was perfect for its purposes.
"Hiya Bambs!" greeted the reflection of the preening blonde leaning into the mirror on her right. "Howareya?"
Bambi smiled into the mirror at Elissa Huffington, who could have been a model if the Social Register Huffingtons hadn't instantly put the skids on that particular line of work. But Elissa didn't rate much of a reply from Bambi—she was one of Bambi's major competitors in the Great Manhunt for Mr. Right.
"Well?" Elissa asked through a barely moving mouth as she slid Perfect Pumpkin lipstick across her lips. "Aren't ya gonna share the news?"
"News? What news?" Bambi leaned into the mirror, thickening her lashes with lightning strokes of an eyelash brush.
"What news! About your boss—what else!"
"Well? What about him?"
"You mean ... oh, Christ! You would be the last to know!"
"Know what?" Bambi's eyelash brush was a blur.
"That 'The Translucent' is finally retiring—that's what!"
Bambi's eyelash brush stopped moving. "Say that again?" She stared at Elissa's reflection.
"Gawd!" Elissa rolled her eyes. "It's about time, isn't it? I mean, if anyone's an antiquity, it's gotta be him ..." Elissa kept her voice deliberately light and chiding, but her sharp eyes, catching Bambi's reflection, gratified her to no end: the tidbit had elicited the hoped-for reaction.
But after a moment, Bambi sloughed off the news with a shrug, leaned back into the mirror, and resumed brushing her lashes. "There've been rumors about Mr. Spotts's retirement since the very first day I started working here," she said dismissively.
"Yes, but this time it isn't a rumor. This is on the up-and-up."
"Oh?" Bambi's eyes flicked suspiciously sideways at Elissa. "Says who?"
"Says Sheldon D. Fairey's assistant secretary. She overheard the whole thing. You might as well face it, Bambs. Today's your boss's last day on the job. So. Who d'you think'll get promoted? You? Kenzie? Arnold? Or d'you think they might bring in an outsider?"
Bambi abruptly felt physically ill. Why haven't I been informed? she railed silently, wanting to clutch the sink and retch. Was that the reason those three traipsed off together? Purposely leaving me behind because they decided to discuss succession?
She could practically see them, thick as thieves. Hunched over a dim table like a cabal. Whispering. Scheming. Hatching their plot ...
Her chest suddenly felt as if a boa constrictor had coiled itself around her, and was relentlessly tightening its grip.
Suddenly her heart skipped a beat and something hard and steely gleamed in her eyes. The corners of her lips curved into a bladelike smile. Well! If the matter of succession was being discussed over lunch without her, then fine! She had a trick or two up her own beautifully tailored sleeve, and a better one than that kissy-kissy little triumvirate could ever come up with!
"Anyway, I'd check it out if I were you," Elissa was saying, giving Bambi a pointed look. "Catch my drift?"
"I do, and thanks, 'Liss." Bambi hurriedly stuffed her makeup back into her purse. "See you later."
"If ya hear anything new, you'll let me know? Us debs have got to stick together, right?"
"Uh, right," Bambi said. "I'd better run along now. 'Bye!"
She backed out from the row of chattering girls who, with her departure, immediately spread out further, sensing, more than seeing, additional precious inches of elbow room becoming available.
In the vestibule outside the powder room, Bambi squeezed into one of the phone booths, shut the door, and deposited a quarter. She didn't want to use her office phone—not if she wanted to make certain she wouldn't be overheard should the trio return early from lunch. This was one call which required the utmost privacy—and urgency.
Punching the highly secret number of Robert A. Goldsmith's highly private line down on Wall Street—the one telephone which bypassed his platoon of secretaries—she waited through one ring, two, three—
Then:
"Robert?"
Bambi used her best itty-bitty wittle girl's voice.
"It's me—Bambs. Listen, I'm in a phone booth, so I've got to make it real short."
She cupped her hands around the receiver and glanced quickly over both shoulders, making certain no one was standing within earshot.
"I just heard that the head of my department's retiring," she whispered into the phone. "I want that job, Robert. I want it so badly I can taste it!" She took a deep breath. "I'll do anything to get it. And by anything, I mean anything."
Bambi was alone in the office and considering cutting out early when the telephone chirruped. She stared reproachfully at her extension, wondering whether or not to answer it. She knew that she should, but that was beside the point.
Why not skip out early? Why even answer that damned insistently chirruping phone?
Suddenly it occurred to her that it might be Robert, and she lunged for the receiver. "Old Masters!" she breathed perkily. "Ms. Parker speaking!"
A voice which definitely did not belong to Robert A. Goldsmith said, "Hello? This is Zachary Bavosa of the legal firm Calvert, Barkhorn, Waldburger, and Slocum. I'm calling on behalf of a client of ours."
Bambi suppressed a sigh. "And how may I help you?"
"A client of ours who ... er ... wishes to remain anonymous ... has inherited a painting. A Holbein, to be exact."
"Yes ... ?"
"Both Christie's and Sotheby's, as well as several private dealers, have determined it to be genuine, and have appraised its value at somewhere between twenty and thirty million dollars."
Suddenly Bambi was all ears. "And you wish a third opinion, I take it?"
He chuckled. "Oh, no, Ms. Parker. We're quite convinced it's genuine. Our client wishes to sell it."
Then what's the catch? she wondered. If it's the real McCoy, both Christie's and Sotheby's must be chomping at the bit to handle the sale. Why call us, also, unless there's a problem? "We'd be glad to take a look at it," she said carefully. And then, in a reflex action, Bambi threw caution to the four winds and plunged right on it. "I'm sure we'd be delighted to handle it!"
He was silent for a moment. "I could bring it by tomorrow, along with the pertinent documentation of its provenance. Would eleven a.m. be convenient for you?"
Her heart skipped a beat. "Eleven a.m. will be fine," she assured him. "Just ask for me. Bambi Parker."
Well, well, well! she thought as she hung up the phone. What a coup! From the sound of things, the Holbein will be the star of the next Old Masters auction! She could see it already. We'll put it on the cover of the catalogue. Send out press releases and watch a bidding war break out. Chances are, it might even set a world record for the artist. Bambi could barely contain her excitement. I can't wait to see Kenzie and Arnold's expressions. They'll be so envious they'll want to tear my eyes out!