The LeBaron Secret (25 page)

“You don't
have
to,” Joanna said. “But it's better that way. I believe in the skin-to-skin method.”

“But how does it
start?
”

“It starts with”—and now they are both whispering, excited, giggling, their heads together over the teacups, and Sari is asking questions that she has often wanted to ask but has never found the right person to ask, and is now asking them of an almost total stranger. “It starts with—tickling.”

“Tickling? Ah. That's what I meant.”

“He tickles you. You tickle him. Down
there
.”

“
That's
what they don't show in the movies!”

“He tickles you—you begin to laugh—and then—but you've really got to try it for yourself, you know. And it would be best to try it with an experienced man—an older, experienced man. Meanwhile, you obviously know how to do the seduction part, and that's half the battle. You could give lessons in seduction.”

“I'll give you lessons in seduction, and you can give me lessons in the rest of it!” Sari said.

Then, sitting back in her chair, Joanna said, “Of course, my mother says that sex should be saved for marriage, but she's very old-fashioned. Since I believe in free love, I don't suppose I'll ever marry.”

And Sari realized that her new friend was ready to change the subject, and, it occurred to her, her new friend was perhaps not quite as worldly and sophisticated as she pretended to be.

“Will you get married, do you think?”

“Oh, I suppose so.”

“Who will it be?”

“Probably—Gabe Pollack.”

Joanna laughed. “Gabe Pollack. What a funny name. Is he handsome? Is he nice?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Older?”

“Yes.”

“Then you should do it with him first. That's my opinion, anyway. Are we becoming friends?”

“You know, I really think we are.”

“My friends call me Jo.”

“And me Sari.”

“Sari.”

“Jo.”

“Then I think there's one important thing we ought to do,” Joanna said. “I think we ought to make a pact in blood. Have you ever made a pact in blood before?”

“No.”

“Neither have I, but I know how it's done. Here's how we'll do it.” The bow on Joanna's blouse was secured with a bar pin. Undoing the clasp and removing it, she said, “First we each prick our right thumbs with the pin—just enough so there's a little drop of blood. I'll do it first, then you.” They pricked their thumbs. “Now we press our thumbs together hard, so our blood will mix. Now, repeat after me the oath of eternal friendship. ‘I, Assaria Latham—'”

“I, Assaria Latham—”

“‘—do solemnly swear that for now, and until the end of time, I am pledged in friendship to Joanna LeBaron, that in sickness and in health—'”

“In sickness and in health—”

“‘—each will turn to the other for aid, comfort, and assistance, wheresoever in the world we may happen to be, to be forever truthful with one another, each denying the other no secrets, in a spirit of pure and lasting sharing, for richer, for poorer, through thick and through thin—'”

“Through thick and through thin—”

“‘From this day forward, forever and ever. Amen.'”

“From this day forward, forever and ever. Amen.”

“Now you give the oath to me.”

Sari had not been able to memorize and duplicate Joanna's oath exactly, and they had giggled over that, but it came out essentially the same, and as they sat there giggling over their empty teacups in the Japanese Tea Garden, Joanna said, “You know I feel as though I've known you all my life.”

“So do I!”

“You're the sister I never had.”

“I never had a brother or a sister.”

“It's the oath that made the difference.”

“Now,” Sari said. “Tell me something. Remember that we've just vowed to be truthful.”

“Of course. What is it?”

“How many times have you actually done it with a man?”

Joanna frowned and looked quickly down into her teacup, and Sari could see the color rising in her cheeks. “How many—
times?
”

“How many times. Forever truthful, we just said. No secrets.”

“Well,” she said finally, “I guess—twice. Twice and a half, because the other was—we'd both had too much champagne. But—” and she looked up at Sari with a grin. “Promise you'll never tell anyone! Promise you'll never tell any of the other girls at Burke's!”

“I promise,” Sari said. Then they were both laughing.

“Oh,” Joanna cried suddenly. “I've just had an absolutely outrageous thought. You must have outrageous thoughts sometimes, don't you? All Geminis have them.”

“What is it?”

“I'd like you to make love with my brother. And let me watch!”

Now it was Sari who, despite herself, was blushing. “That
is
an outrageous thought,” she said.

“Of course I'm only joking,” Joanna said quickly, “even though Sigmund Freud is absolutely full of that sort of thing. But wouldn't that be the cat's pajamas?”

Sitting there, in the fading afternoon, whispering, giggling, two sixteen-year-olds, they had gone on and on, talking of everything in general and nothing in particular, sharing outrageous thoughts (dreams of going to Hollywood to become a movie star, et cetera, et cetera), while Sari felt herself being drawn closer and closer into the web of Joanna LeBaron's exaggerated charm. What was it about Joanna that drew Sari to her? Whom did Joanna remind her of? The Van Dusen Sisters, of course. Like them, she seemed a finished person. She was like them, but nicer.

Years later, it was possible to see why Joanna had gone on to become one of New York's most glamorous and successful woman advertising executives. She was a consummate bullshit artist.

“Well, where
is
Mr. Pollack?” Sari is demanding of his secretary. “You realize that this is Assaria LeBaron calling.”

“Right now, Mrs. LeBaron, Mr. Pollack is on a PSA flight to Los Angeles, and obviously I have no way of reaching him. He has appointments in L.A. all afternoon.”

“What is he doing in Los Angeles, when I need him here?”

“It's a business trip, Mrs. LeBaron. If he should happen to phone me, I'll tell him that you're trying to get in touch with him.”

“Well, then let me talk to that other fellow, the one who works for him, the redhead, the reporter—What's-his-name. Oh, what
is
his name? You know who I mean!”

“Archie McPherson?”

“Yes. Let me talk to him.”

“Hold on, and I'll try to connect you,” Gabe's secretary says.

“Archie,” she says when he comes on the line, and now she is speaking in an altogether different voice, sweet and cozy and persuasive, her motherly, her grandmotherly voice. “Archie, dear, how are you? But I don't know why I should even be calling you, because you betrayed me, didn't you? You told Gabe that I gave you that story about Melissa paying off the rock group, and you weren't supposed to do that, were you? That was supposed to be our secret.”

“I didn't tell him, Mrs. LeBaron. He guessed it, and there was no way I could deny it.”

“How many times have I told you to call me Aunt Sari? Well, it doesn't matter, Archie, and I forgive you. The story ran, and I liked it very much, and you'll still get your check. Don't worry.”

“Thank you, Mrs. LeBaron.”

“Please—Aunt Sari.”

“Aunt Sari.”

“Good. Now there's one other thing you could do for me, Archie. You still see Melissa, don't you?”

“Yes. From time to time.”

“Well, I want you to go on a little fishing expedition for me, Archie, with Melissa.”

“Fishing?”

“Yes. For information. From Melissa.”

“Tell me what sort of information you'd like to know.”

“Melissa made a very peculiar accusation to me the other night. It concerned her—parentage. She's made these sorts of accusations before, but never so—vehemently, I guess is the word.”

“Her parentage?”

“Yes. That's all I can tell you now. But I need to know—it's terribly important that I know—whether Melissa has some—well, peculiar notions about me, and about her father. If you could take her out, and get her on this subject, and perhaps find out what these notions are, and how much she feels is based on fact, and how much is just—fantasy.”

“I see.”

“Then if you could relay this information to me, I'd appreciate it. This must be strictly confidential, of course, between you and me. Whatever you find out would not be for newspaper publication, you understand that.”

“I understand.”

“I consider you this town's fact-finder
par excellence
.”

“Thank you.”

“If you get her a little drunk, she might open up. A few drinks might help. You see, a couple of months ago she made a completely unplanned and, unbeknownst to me until recently, trip to Switzerland, to Saint Moritz, where she was born. I'd like to find out what was behind that, if anything. If you get her a little drunk, and get her on the subject of Switzerland, she might tell you something that she'd never tell me. Do you understand?”

“Yes. I see.”

“And you'll be well compensated for this one, Archie. Particularly if you learn anything—interesting. Have you bedded her down yet?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Have you been to bed with her? If you did, that might help, too.”

“
My God
, Mrs. LeBaron, I—”

“Don't be angry. I happen to think my daughter is a very attractive woman, and you're a very attractive man. Melissa is a few years older than you, perhaps, but most men find her attractive. People used to say she reminded them of the actress Joan Fontaine, and she's always shown rather a preference for younger men. Her sexual appetites are perfectly normal, and you shouldn't have any difficulties there. This is only a suggestion, of course. Unless, of course, you're gay.”

There is a brief silence on the other end of the line. Then he says, “No, I'm not gay—not that it's really any of your business.”

“Of course it isn't. I only mentioned it because most of the men in this city seem to be gay. Or so they say. And I only mention it because this is nineteen eighty-four, and I wanted you to know that I'm no sexual prude—about you, or about my grown daughter.”

“Yes,” he says gruffly. “Well, I'll see what I can do.”

“Good. And remember Switzerland.”

“I will. But I'm not promising anything.”

“Thank you, Archie.” A sigh.

She replaces the receiver in its cradle, but with the dead, dissatisfied feeling that somehow the conversation had not gone as well as it might have. Am I losing my touch? she asks herself. Am I losing control?

Somehow, this day, which had managed to start out badly, still is not going well.

Melissa, Melissa. Where did we lose sight of you? So much wrong advice along the way. Hard advice, hard taken. Come back, Melissa, come back. But how can you come back to a place you never seemed to be, never seemed to belong?

Perhaps it was being the first child, and for so many years the only child, and the fact that both mother and child had nearly died in childbirth, that had made them all too anxious with her, too much on the lookout for little signs of something that might go wrong. They had fussed over her too much, pampered her too much, indulged her too much, worried over her too much, given her too much. Perhaps that was it. In the beginning, the theory had been that this adorable child, this special child, should be given anything and everything it wanted, anything that money could buy. This had been in the 1920s, when the LeBaron fortune seemed limitless, and it had pleased Sari to shower the little girl with all the things she herself had never had, never even dreamed existed, as a child—the handmade dresses from Best's and DePinna and Magnin's, the dollhouse and furniture, the collection of dolls and other toys, every variety of stuffed and cuddly creature. Her nursery had been fitted out with a miniature theatre, complete with stage lights and movable sets, furniture and other props, designed for marionette performances. And in those days there had always been a nurse—a series of nurses—for Melissa.

But even as a toddler, she had been extraordinarily exigent. She would demand, for instance, that her playpen be filled with all her toys. Then, one by one, she would throw them all out, and then scream until all the toys had been returned to her, at which point the process would be repeated. Once, when one of the nurses had locked her in the nursery as punishment for something or other, she had gone to the window and thrown out all her toys. Then she had thrown out all the bedclothes from her bed, along with everything else she was able to lift and carry to the window. All of this lay festooned across the shrubbery in front of the house on Washington Street. By the age of three, Melissa's temper tantrums had become an almost daily fact of life.

“Miss Melissa is having one of her fits,” Thomas would say. “She says she's going to hold her breath until she dies.”

“Please don't call them fits, Thomas,” Sari would say. “There is no epilepsy in this family. It's just—” But what was it?

At six years old, she was still wetting her bed regularly. Doctors were consulted. “Ignore her, and let her outgrow it,” one of them had said, but it was becoming a hard problem to ignore. “Put her in a diaper and rubber pants,” another doctor, Dr. Obermark, had suggested. “When she sees she's still being treated as an infant, that will shame her out of it.” But that hadn't worked, either, and the minute the diaper was soaked, Melissa would scream until it was changed for her. “Have her nurse wake her up, once an hour, during the night, and sit her on the toilet—that will stop it,” another specialist recommended, but it hadn't, and nurses did not remain long when bound to such a regimen.