Free Fortune Is a Woman by Francine Saint Marie Page B

double.”
    “No charge, Paula. I’ll check with my secretary for cancellations and get back to you.”
    “Don’t give her my name, please. And thank you, but I don’t need your charity.”
    “I’ll leave payment to your discretion then. But you can trust my secretary won’t reveal your–”
    “I trust no one. I mean as a rule that is.”
    “Okay…I’ll make the arrangements myself then. How’s that?”
    “Dr. Kristenson, I thank you.” (click)
    _____
     
    “Yes, Jen?”
    “Lydia. Line one.”
    “Thanks, Jen. Well! Good afternoon, Ms. Beaumont.”
    “Helaine…I’m sorry if…do you have ti–?”
    “Two o’clock.”
    (The line crackled.)
    “Lydia?”
    “I–you were expecting me?”
    “Everyday, darling.”
    “Everyd–for how long?
    Helaine counted in her head. “Nineteen days.”
    “Nineteen days, Lana?”
    “Lydia.”
    “Nineteen days?”
    Helaine fidgeted with her pencil. “Two o’clock then?”
    “Lana, I thought–I really don’t know what I thought.”
    “My fault. Can you be here at two?”
    “Two o’clock. Definitely. I’ll see you at two.” (click)
    Nineteen days trying somehow to make it up to Lydia. Every subtle overture an act of futility. Nineteen days and nights Helaine had watched in dismay the woman tripping around the house anxious and shy, acting as if she was walking on glass, floundering at night like an amateur, stomping off to work in the morning, her libido in a pretzel.
    Talk about sensitive. Dr. Kristenson had forgotten about this part of Lydia’s nature.
    Two o’clock appointment for hypersensitive Lydia Beaumont. Helaine laughed out loud. Last attempt, my love. After this, I’m sending you for professional help.
    That didn’t prove to be necessary.
    _____
     
    Nineteen days in the doghouse. Every subtle overture an act of futility. Stomping off to work every morning for nineteen days in a row with her libido in a pretzel until she couldn’t be subtle anymore.
    Two o’clock appointment with Dr. Kristenson. Helaine was herself again. It took Lydia less than nineteen minutes to “pop her thing” as Venus liked to refer to it.
    Venus and her bad self and the street slang she had resorted to using to get a laugh or a rise out of her prim and proper ex-boss.
    She was in Japan, knocking them dead, and Lydia had received only two short communications from her. Progress reports. They were coolly addressed to “The Interim President” sent via Paula’s e-mail. Lydia might not even have had those if she wasn’t temporarily set up in Paula’s offices.
    Interim President Beaumont was up to her elbows in Paula Treadwell’s duties. It’s only when you fill someone else’s shoes that you can appreciate their burden. Lydia also appreciated the pep talks. And, of course, not having to hear about Venus Angelo.
    “How we have to live as opposed to how we ought to live, Beaumont. That is the real question.”
    Right.
    “Goodness is not a profession.”
    But what is it? Lydia was indulging Paula these day.
    “Goodness is imaginary. It’s a state of mind. And more important than that, a vice when surrounded by those without virtue.”
    Treadwell and Machiavelli.
    “Vice and virtue, Beaumont. That’s the perfect martini. I have it for breakfast myself.”
    Lydia laughed.
    “Straight up.”
    She needed her former assistant but was inexplicably angry at or about her. She couldn’t decide which. Maybe both at different intervals. The source of this disturbance, she believed, was their last encounter, but she couldn’t deny that she was at the same time extremely put off by the cold and distant shoulder she was getting now. As interim president she might have called the woman herself and given her a piece of her mind over it since she had her cell number and a secure line and the compunction to do it, but she was certain that the instant she heard Venus’ voice in her ear again that she would lose her resolve and thereby subject herself to yet more withering