Read Shades of Fortune for Free Online Page B

practice—we all should practice our smiles from time to time—but Mimi’s smile is a curiously intimate smile, a communicative smile, a smile that seems to have words in it. When Mimi smiles at you, her smile seems to take all of you in, saying, in the process, that you have never looked better, healthier, prouder, more sure of who you are and where you came from; that you, this perfect new you, impeccably put together as you have always wanted to see yourself, are the only person living in the world whom Mimi has ever wanted to see or talk to. Naturally, there is also a reverse effect. When Mimi turns this smile away from you, as she must, you feel that you have been left floating in some limbo, without a friend left in the world. The patroness of that smile has fallen in love with someone else.
    â€œAunt Nonie,” Mimi says, “I want you to meet our special guests of honor, Sherrill Shearson and Dirk Gordon. I’ll tell you why they’re going to be so special to us as soon as everybody’s here.… Oh, and here’s Jim Greenway, who’s also special. Jim’s going to write about us in Fortune magazine and so, of course, you’re all under strictest orders to say nothing but the nicest things about us. Mr. Greenway isn’t interested in family skeletons.”
    â€œNot true. I like family skeletons,” Jim Greenway says.
    â€œAh,” Mimi says with a look of mock disappointment. “Then you’re in for a letdown, I’m afraid. This family doesn’t have any skeletons.”
    â€œOh, but we do! We do! ” cries Granny Flo in her piping voice.
    â€œWell,” Mimi says with that rich and easy laugh of hers, “if anyone knows which closets they’re hiding in …” Turning from Greenway, she says, “And you must be Mr. Williams, Aunt Nonie’s friend.”
    â€œBusiness associate,” he says.
    â€œHow exciting! Later, you must tell us all about it.”
    Felix moves among the guests, taking drink orders, and a maid in a black uniform appears with a tray of canapés.
    â€œWhat’s that? ” Sherrill whispers to Dirk.
    â€œIt appears to be artichoke bottoms stuffed with caviar.”
    â€œOoh, caviar! ” She helps herself to one and takes a tentative bite. “Oooh, it’s salty .”
    â€œYes, I rather expect it would be.”
    Speaking to whomever might happen to be within earshot, and gazing straight ahead of her with dead, dull eyes, Granny Flo says, “My daughter’s real name is Naomi, after Naomi in the Bible, but everybody has always called her Nonie. When she was a little girl, she was such a stubborn little thing, and I was always saying to her, ‘No, Naomi, no, no, no, no, no .’ And after a while, before she did anything, she’d look at me and say, ‘May I do that, Mama, or is that a nonie?’ And I’d say, ‘No, that’s not a nonie,’ or, ‘Yes, that’s a nonie,’ whichever thing it was she wanted to do, and that’s when I decided to call her Nonie. My husband, Adolph Myerson, used to say I was good at naming things. My newest daughter is only two years old. Her name is Itty-Bitty. That’s right, I’m eighty-nine, and I have a daughter who’s just two years old! She’s my little Yorkie, and she’s as itty-bitty as they come. She weighs just two and a half pounds. She follows me around, wherever I go, and because I’ve lost my eyesight I have to be careful not to step on her, but she seems to understand because she stays just behind me, making little sounds for me to tell me where she is— whiff-whiff-whiff . I thought of naming her Whiffy, but I didn’t. I named her Itty-Bitty. I used to live in a big place, but now I live in a hotel. Itty-Bitty is the only dog who’s allowed to live at the Carlyle. Now my friend, poor Mrs. Perlman, on the other hand.…”
    â€œMother, do shut up!