A Fashionable Affair (4 page)

Patsy got up early Saturday morning and went for a
run in the park. She was just getting out of the
shower when the phone rang. Wrapping a towel
around herself, she went into the bedroom to
answer it.

“Patsy?” said the voice on the other end.

She recognized it instantly. “Hi, Michael, What’s
up?”

“I’m afraid I have a rather hysterical client on my
hands this morning. I’m not going to be able to get your car back to you after all.”

He sounded quite matter-of-fact, not apologetic
at all. “Oh,” Patsy said. “Well, when do you think
you’ll be able to get in?”

“Not this afternoon, either. But I was talking to
Sally earlier and she wondered if you’d come out to
dinner. She’ll meet you at the train. Then I’ll drive
the car to Sally’s and you’ll have it to get back
home.”

Patsy stared at the phone in disbelief. But her
voice, when she spoke, was quite calm. “You want
me to take the train out to Sally’s so I can collect my
own car, which you borrowed, because you don’t
have the time to return it yourself.”

“That’s right.” He sounded quite cheerful. “If
you can’t make it, I’m afraid you’ll have to wait for
the car.”

“I’ll come.”

“Great. Sally said she’d give you a call this morn
ing. See you later, then.”

“See you later,” Patsy repeated and hung up in a
slight state of shock. She had had no intention of
going to Long Island. Why did I say I’d come? she
asked herself. I don’t need the car this weekend. I
should have made him bring it back tomorrow. She
shook her head in bewilderment at her own behav
ior and went over to her closet. I suppose it does
behoove me to be a little accommodating, she told
herself as she chose slacks and a blouse. After all, it is very nice of Michael to take on my problem. And it will be nice to see Sally and the kids.

She finished dressing and went back to the
phone. She was going to have to break another
date.

* * * *

She took an afternoon train out of Penn Station.
Sally, as promised, was waiting for her at the Long Island station.

“Hi, Sal,” Patsy said, giving her best friend an
affectionate kiss.

Sally smiled, her hazel eyes bright with pleasure.
Strange, Patsy thought, she had never noticed that
Sally’s eyes were the same color as Michael’s.
Michael’s lashes, however, were definitely longer.

“I’ve got the gang,” Sally said, gesturing to the
two kids in the back car seats. She took Patsy’s over
night bag and put it in the rear of the station
wagon, then got into the driver’s seat. Patsy slid in
next to her and turned to grin at the children.

“Hi, Steven! How are you?”

“Hi, Aunt Patsy,” the three-year-old returned
with enthusiasm. “Did you bring me something?”

“Steven,” his mother said despairingly.

Patsy laughed. “I did. And I brought something
for my godchild, too. Hi, Matthew.” The baby gur
gled in reply.

“What is it?” Steven asked.

“You’ll see when we get home,” Patsy answered,
and turned back to Sally. “Is Steve on duty today?”
Steve Maxwell was an orthopedic surgeon at Long
Island Medical Center on the north shore.

“Yes, but he should be home for dinner. Michael
is coming too. He was sorry to put you to the
trouble of coming out, but I’m glad you did. It’s so good to see you.”

Patsy hadn’t thought he sounded at all sorry, but
she refrained from saying so to Sally. “It’s great to
see you,” she said instead, and meant it.

“Michael’s very busy,” his sister explained. “Last-
minute tax returns, you know.”

They chatted comfortably during the ten-minute
ride to Sally’s house, a big old colonial with a
fenced-in yard containing a gas grill, picnic table,
sandbox, and swing set.

“The house is looking great,” Patsy commented as she looked around the front hall and the living
room. “You had the floors done.”

“Yes. Finally. And we had new linoleum put
down in the kitchen. My next big job is to refinish all the doors.”

* * * *

Patsy was playing blocks with Steven on the floor
of the family room when Michael came in. She
didn’t hear him at first. Sally was in the kitchen and
had opened the door before he had even knocked. Michael stood for half a minute in the doorway
watching her play with the little boy. She had a
truck in her hand and was pushing it along a track
they had built with the blocks. They were both mak
ing rumbling noises and Patsy was crawling on her
hands and knees when she noticed a pair of Top-
Siders in the doorway. She looked up and met a
pair of amused hazel eyes. “Oh,” she said. “I didn’t know you were here.”

“Well, I am,” he replied amiably.

“Uncle Michael! Uncle Michael!” Steven
shrieked, and hurled himself forward.

“Hi there, tiger,” Michael said, swinging him up into his arms.

“Did you bring me anything?” Steven asked.

Patsy laughed and got to her feet. “He’s got it
down to a science.”

“Of course I brought you something,” Michael
answered. He put his nephew down, reached into
his pocket, and removed a small magnet and a
penny.

Steven was absolutely delighted and raced off to
show his mother.

“I brought him a long black cord from an old
dress of mine,” Patsy said. “He adored it. He was
winding it around every doorknob in the house
until we decided to play blocks.”

Michael chuckled. “Between us, we’re spoiling
him to death.”

Patsy dusted off the knees of her wide-wale cor
duroy pants and looked at him from under her
lashes. They were very lovely lashes, artfully dark
ened and naturally long—almost as long as his. He
really looked very fit in those chino slacks and navy
Izod shirt, she thought.

“Did you manage to soothe your hysterical client?”
she asked as she straightened up.

“Marginally. He got himself into a mess, I’m
afraid.”

“What did he do?”

“Tried to be clever with his taxes. It’s going to
cost him plenty to bail out.”

“Oh, dear. I can understand why he was hyster
ical. Can you help him?”

“If he’ll listen to me. The advice I’m giving him is
good, but I rather doubt he’s going to take it.”

“He sounds like a nuisance,” Patsy said frankly.

Michael shrugged. “My favorite clients are
incompetent nuisances with their affairs in a mess.”

“Like me?” Patsy asked sweetly.

“Like you. What’s this racehorse I see you own?”

Patsy decided to go along with the change of sub
ject. “Ebony Lad? He’s a darling, and he’s done
very well this year. He started to come on last fall.
Earl Hibbard, his trainer, says he’s a late bloomer.
He was a bust at three, and now at four, he’s
turning into a winner.”

“And a tax deduction.”

Patsy laughed. “Yes. And he’s
much
more fun than shopping-center shares.”

“Uncle Michael!” Steven raced back into the
room, and in a few minutes he had both adults on
the floor playing blocks with him.

* * * *

Sally fed the kids first and then put them to bed, so when the four adults finally sat down to dinner,
peace reigned.

“I’m delighted to see you, Patsy,” Steve said as
they ate Sally’s delicious veal parmigiana, “but sur
prised. You don’t usually spend your Saturday
nights so tamely.”

“Yes,” Sally added, “where’s Don?”

“Sulking,” Patsy replied.

“Did you stand him up?”

Patsy smiled and took a bite of her veal. “Ter
rific,” she approved. “I told him I was having a problem with my taxes.” She shrugged gracefully.
“Really, he was quite petulant. Just like a little boy.
Or—no. Little Steven and Matthew aren’t petulant
at all. They’re much nicer than Don, in fact.”

“Exit Don,” Sally remarked dryly, and her hus
band laughed.

Patsy took another bite of veal. “Yes,” she said, “I
rather think so.” She looked at Sally’s husband.
“How do you like the hospital, Steve?”

His blue eyes blazed. “It’s great,” he raved, and
proceeded to tell her all about it.

Sally, seated across the table from her friend,
turned to Michael. “I’ve got a particularly tricky
math problem for you,” she said. “One of the grad
uate assistants brought it to me and it’s a beaut. Will
you look at it after dinner?”

He looked suddenly alert. “Sure.” He began to
ask her questions and soon the two were involved in a highly technical, totally incomprehensible conversation.

“Do you still have that crazy cleaning woman?” Steve asked Patsy, abandoning the topic of the hos
pital.

“Who? Oh—May, do you mean? Yes. She still
cleans my apartment, and yes, she’s still trying to convert me.”

“Convert you to what?” Michael asked, and Patsy,
glad of an excuse to look at him, turned her head.

“She’s an evangelical type, always trying to save
me from my sinful life. Poor thing, she’s a bit
bonkers, I think.”

“She’s not only bonkers,” Steve said, “she’s damn
offensive. I don’t know how you put up with it.”

“I usually try not to be home when she comes,”
Patsy replied. “The day you were in with the chil
dren was the last time I actually saw her.”

“It’s ridiculous,” Steve said impatiently. “Why
should you have to flee from your own house? Why
don’t you just hire someone else?”

“Because if I fire her, she’ll be out of work. I
mean, who else would put up with her, poor soul?
And the money she makes from me supplements
her social-security check.”

“Michael, do you remember Mr. Gerstner?” Sally asked.

“God, yes.”

“Mr. Gerstner was another one of Patsy’s sad
cases,” Sally explained to her husband. “He taught
history at Central High, and he was a disaster. The
kids literally ran wild in his room. Once some boys
set a pigeon loose in the classroom—a real live pig
eon.”

Steve looked unimpressed. “So? Every school has
an ineffective teacher like that.”

“Patsy felt sorry for him,” Sally continued. “She
felt so sorry for him that she stood up in class dur
ing the third week we had him and told everybody off. It was quite impressive. Patsy, who never lost
her temper at anything.”

“Did they listen to you?” Steve asked.

Patsy just smiled.

“What do you think?” Michael said. There was a
look of humor around his mouth.

Steve grinned. “Everyone’s dream girl. Of course
they listened to her.”

“For the rest of the year,” Sally reported, “that
class was angelic. Mr. Gerstner thought he had died
and gone to heaven.”

“Adolescents can be horribly cruel,” Patsy said.
“They don’t necessarily mean to be, but they often are.”

“Patsy is never cruel,” Michael said, “except to her boyfriends.”

“I’m never cruel to anyone,” Patsy said firmly.
Michael looked amused but said nothing. Patsy felt
an unfamiliar flash of annoyance. “Anyway,” she
continued crossly, “what do you know about my
boyfriends?”

“Not much,” he replied cheerfully, “except that
you’re cruel to them. Look at this Don fellow—cast
off because he made the mistake of being petulant.”

“Well, I don’t see that I have to put up with all
sorts of infantile behavior just because a man thinks
he’s in love with me.”

“Of course you don’t,” Michael agreed.

Patsy’s eyes actually flashed with temper.

“Haven’t you ever been in love, Patsy?” Steve
asked.

“She’s always in love,” Sally said. “The problem is
it never lasts.”