Shades of Fortune (41 page)

I admire him, too, Mother. He is wonderfully ambitious and says his goal is to be a Justice of the United States Supreme Court. You see, I like and admire everything about him, and he is simply the nicest person I have ever met, and I think you will think so, too, when you meet him, but first, before I give him any answer, I need to know these other answers, and you are the only person in the world I can think of who can answer these questions for me. Please write to me here, or in Zurich, as soon as you can.…

Her answer was a long cablegram from her mother.

DARLING YOUR DADDY AND I SO EXCITED ABOUT YOUR NEWS
.
THIS IS THE MOST WONDERFUL THING THAT COULD HAPPEN TO YOU AND YOU MUST SAY YES
.
DO NOT WORRY ABOUT SMITH ETC
.
BECAUSE WHY IS COLLEGE EVEN IMPORTANT FOR A GIRL LIKE YOU
.
COLLEGES LIKE SMITH ONLY TURN GIRLS INTO BLUESTOCKINGS ANYWAY
.
SO EXCITED I CALLED YOUR GRANDPA IMMEDIATELY AND TOLD HIM THE NEWS AND HE IS THRILLED
.
HE KNOWS THE MOORES OF BOSTON WELL
.
DOESN
'
T REALLY KNOW THEM BUT KNOWS WHO THEY ARE AND WHAT THEY REPRESENT
.
A FINE OLD FAMILY
.
DARLING LOVE IS THE BIRD IN THE HAND AND THE RIGHT MARRIAGE IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IN ANY WOMAN
'
S LIFE ALWAYS BEAR THAT IN MIND
.
WHEN YOU COME HOME GRANNY AND GRANDPA WANT TO HAVE A LITTLE TEA TO MEET HIM
.
OH HOW LUCKY YOU ARE DARLING
.
YOUR DADDY WILL PROBABLY KILL ME FOR SENDING THIS LONG CABLE BUT IT
'
S TOO IMPORTANT FOR A LETTER
.
LOVE AND HUGS AND KISSES AND CONGRATULATIONS
.
MOTHER
.

19

Naomi Myerson (interview taped 9/5/87):

My relationship with my father? Well, let's put it this way, dear boy. I was his mascot. I was his logotype. You know the little girl on the bottle of Miray baby shampoo? That's me, taken from a photograph when I was eight weeks old. My third husband, who was a lawyer, used to say that I should have demanded a royalty for the use of my likeness on a commercial product. Just think of it. If I'd been paid a royalty of just two cents on every bottle of Miray Baby-Sham that's been sold since the product was introduced, I'd be the richest member of this family—instead of what I am, the poor relation. But when I was eight weeks old, I was hardly in a position to demand a royalty, was I? I was exploited, my third husband said. I was the youngest victim of exploitive child labor in the history of commerce.

I was also my father's guinea pig. When I was nine or ten years old, my father was expanding heavily into hair-care products. He had read somewhere that if a straight-haired person's head was shaved, the hair would grow back curly. My hair was always straight, and so my father had my head shaved to see if the theory was correct. My head wasn't just shaved once. It was shaved seven, eight, maybe ten different times, and each time the new hair began to grow back it was sent to his labs to be analyzed for signs of curliness. You see, he hoped that this experiment would help the scientists and technicians in his labs come up with an ingredient that would give a woman permanently, naturally curly hair. My hair always grew back as straight as before. But in the meantime, I was the only fourth and fifth grader at Spence who wore wigs. During recess, the other girls were always pulling my wigs off and hiding them. Were there psychological scars as a result of this experiment? I leave it to you, dear boy, to answer that question.

Other than in that hair experiment period, my father paid very little attention to me. Everything was focused on the boys. My brother Henry was supposed to take over the company. Edwee, in Father's grand design, was to be the first Jewish President of the United States. I needn't point out to you that this didn't exactly happen, nor is it likely to. My father's will told the whole story of how he regarded me. When my father died, my mother was left thirty percent of his Miray shares. My brothers, Henry and Edwee, each got twenty-five percent. Mimi was left fifteen percent, and I was left exactly five percent. You can imagine that I was in a state of shock when the will was read, and I realized how cruelly I'd been shortchanged.

And that's not the worst of it When my brother Henry died—unexpectedly—he left a third of his shares to Alice and two thirds to Mimi. That little maneuver made Mimi the largest family stockholder in the company. Next came my mother, then Edwee, then Alice, and then, right down at the bottom of the ladder, as always, me. And there's even worse to come! You might say that five percent of my father's Miray shares would be worth, today, quite a nice piece of change, and you'd be right. They would—if I could ever get my hands on them! But no, the others all got their shares outright, but mine were locked into an irrevocable trust, and all I'm allowed to touch is the income from it. And since Mimi believes in keeping dividends small, and in plowing earnings back into the company for research and development and blah-blah-blah, that income is pretty damn small. And who are my trustees, whom I must go to groveling for every extra penny I might need? In addition to two bozos at Manufacturers Hanover, my trustees are my mother, Edwee, and Mimi—who inherited her trusteeship from Henry. My trust runs until the year two thousand, and if I die before then, who gets my shares? According to my father's will, they're to be divided equally among any surviving grandchildren. But there's only one surviving grandchild, and that's guess who? Little Miss Mimi. Mimi is going to inherit all my shares! Do you begin to see the reasons for my bitterness?

Even if my mother were to die tomorrow, and leave half her shares to Edwee and half to me (and there's no guarantee she'll do that), I'd never have the position and the clout in the company that the others, particularly Mimi, have. If I'm lucky, Mother will leave a little to me, a little to Edwee, a lot to Mimi, and a lot to Mimi's son, and I'll be screwed again.

That damned trust! There they sit, on all the money I have in the world, and whenever I try to wheedle a few pennies out of them, they get together and practice saying no to Nonie. They've gotten very good at it: “No, Nonie, no, no, no, no, no.”

And let me tell you one more thing, confidentially. Should I ask you to turn off your machine? No, because this is true, this is a fact. The fact is that I could have run the company just as well as Mimi has. Every idea she's had could have been my idea. This new fragrance line of hers, for instance. I'm an expert on fashion, and an expert on fragrances. I could have developed that. I could probably have done it even better. What would it have been like if the new fragrance had been called Naomi, and not Mireille? Would it have been different? I say yes. Would it have been better? I say yes! If you ask me, Mimi's new fragrance is much too
herbal
. Want to bet her new fragrance will bomb? I'm betting on it.

But of course I never had the position and the clout in the company that Mimi had when she struck—pounced on the company—when the iron was hot, after Henry died. But I never had anything, never had zilch, never had zip, with my miserable five percent from my father's miserable will. “To my beloved daughter, Naomi,” my father's will said. Ha! He could have said, “To my beloved Baldie.” That was what they called me at Miss Spence's School. “Baldie. Baldie Myerson.”

My relationship with Edwee? Well, Edwee is interested in lots of things that don't particularly interest me. He's interested in art, for instance, and antiques. You've seen Edwee's house; it's like a museum! As you can see from my apartment, I like modern things. My apartment is almost high-tech, don't you think? I don't like musty old books, old paintings, old rugs, and all that. In fact, you've just given me an idea. Maybe you can help me. Edwee has this plan, this scheme, which he wants me to help him with. I need a witness. I need someone to witness a private agreement he and I have made. Now, do turn off that machine, because what I have to show you is
strictly
confidential.…

That was when I learned about Nonie's involvement with Roger Williams, and about Edwee's plot to gain possession of his mother's Goya.

I was appalled by what she showed me. How, I wondered, could I possibly help her as a “witness” to this pathetic document she and her brother had signed, and how could I be a participant in this crazy, possibly illegal, maneuver that she and her brother were about to embark upon together?

And yet, at the same time, I was swept by a sudden wave of pity for her. As I read, and reread, the document, not knowing what to say to her, I sensed that this was a frightened, even desperate, woman. She was also a woman who, despite her slim-ness, her stylishness in a dark green Adolfo suit, her gold rings and bracelets and careful
maquillage
, was not young. Though no one knew Nonie Myerson's exact age, she had to have been born around 1920 and therefore must be in her late sixties. She had become, I knew, a creature of the evening hours and rarely ventured out of doors in broad daylight when shadows would etch the cat-scratch lines about her ears and eyes and mouth. Even today, though her apartment faces an expansive view of the East River, all the curtains in her rooms were drawn to exclude the sunlight, which had become her enemy, and to preserve the pink lamp-glow of twilight in her house.

She watched me intently as I studied the sad little letter of agreement with its “whereases” and “to wits,” and, as though sensing my thoughts, she said urgently, “Don't you see? I've got to have
something
. I can't go through the rest of my life being nothing more than Adolph Myerson's daughter. Help me, dear boy.
Aidez-moi
.”

“I just don't see,” I said finally, “how my being a witness to this could be of any help to anyone.”

Her eyes narrowed slightly. “It could help, believe me.”

“And you want me to add
my
signature to this?”

“That won't be necessary. It's enough that you've seen it, and know about it. That could help me, later on. And later on, it could also help you. You see, if Edwee plays straight with me, you can forget you ever knew about this. But I think he may be planning to double-cross me. If he tries to double-cross me, you could put that in your story—everything. You could ruin him.”

In Mimi's Fifth Avenue apartment, the telephone rings distantly and, distantly, the call is picked up. A few moments later, Mimi's butler, Felix, appears in her living room with tea: a silver teapot, a china teacup and saucer, a folded napkin, and three slices of cinnamon toast in a silver rack, on a silver tray.

“Who called, Felix?”

Felix places the tray on a small table beside Mimi's chair. “It was another of them, I'm afraid.”

“Another of them?”

“There have been quite a few of them lately, madam. The telephone rings, I answer it in my usual way, and the caller immediately hangs up, breaking the connection. It is most annoying, if I may say so.”

“Really? How many of these calls have there been, Felix?”

“As many as six or seven a day, madam. Usually in the evening, or on weekends, like today.”

“I see.”

“May I suggest,” he says, “that madam might consider having her private number changed?”

“Yes,” she says.

“Shall I call the telephone company business office on Monday morning and have that taken care of?”

“Well, let me think about it,” she says. “It's such a nuisance having to give out a new number to everyone you know.”

“Yes,” he says. “But may I suggest that someone is becoming quite a nuisance to you?”

“Yes. Well, I'll think about it, Felix.”

He hesitates beside the tea table, adjusting the tray so that it sits at a slightly more convenient angle for her. He clears his throat, fussing unnecessarily over the angle of the tray. “There's one more thing,” he says. “If I may speak to you.”

“Certainly,” she says. “What is it, Felix?”

“When I was preparing Mr. Moore's suits to go to the cleaner's this morning, I found a letter in his jacket pocket. I thought perhaps that you should see it.”

“Oh?” she says. “Why would I want to see it, Felix?”

“I'm not suggesting that you would
want
to see it, madam. I'm suggesting that perhaps you
should
see it. There's a difference between want and should.”

“I take it,” she says, “that you have read this letter, Felix.”

He says nothing, merely bows slightly.

“I don't really enjoy reading other people's mail.”

“It did occur to me,” he says, “that there might be a connection between this letter and these telephone calls.”

“I see,” she says again.

“Suppose,” he says, “that I just leave this letter with you, and madam can decide to do with it what she wishes.” He withdraws a blue envelope from his vest pocket and places it beside the tea tray, address side down.

“Thank you, Felix.”

He bows again and discreetly leaves the room.

Mimi fills her teacup and, for a moment or two, gazes at the back of the envelope, which is blank, revealing no information. Then she slowly picks the envelope up and turns it over. It is addressed, in a rounded, rather schoolgirlish hand, to his Wall Street office and is marked “Personal—Confidential,” with the dots over the
i
's in “Confidential” indicated by little circles. She sees that the envelope is postmarked “New York, N.Y. 10010,” revealing that the sender posted her letter somewhere in the Chelsea area.

All Mimi's principles are under assault as she balances the envelope between the thumb and forefinger of her right hand. In the 1970s, when her son, Badger, was at boarding school and college, there were several friendships that appeared to be of a dubious nature, and the parents of his contemporaries traded horror stories of incriminating letters, publications, seeds, and powders uncovered in laundry sacks, at the bottom of closets and dresser drawers, stuffed into innocent-looking tennis shoes, and found in other hiding places during clandestine searches of children's rooms: the copies of
Playboy
and
Penthouse
stuffed under mattresses and sofa cushions, the tubes of airplane glue in the desk drawers of boys who had no interest in model planes, the yellow, lozenge-shaped capsules in Benzedrine inhalers. It was her duty as a parent, her friends had told her, to ferret about among a teenager's possessions looking for such objects: “You have to know what's going on!”