Street. I can’t live on Park Avenue like the will says I have to do if you’re living next to the slums. As soon as I get things organized, you can find a house you like and you can keep on sewing.”
Elsa’s laugh rang out loud and clear over the wires. “God bless you child. You be careful now. If you act the fool, you could be broke in less than a year.”
“Don’t worry, Auntie. You’re the only person I’m telling about this money. I’m just taking care of it for Heddy. ’Bye for now.”
“Well, I’d better get started. I suspect Miles would give anything to deprive me of this blessing,” Gina said to herself. She phoned the Daily News and placed ads for a chauffeur, wrote a letter of resignation from her job, mailed it and took a taxi to the building on Park Avenue that, according to Heddy’s will, belonged to Gina Harkness. One look at Heddy’s mammoth three-bedroom apartment, and Gina threw up her hands. She definitely would not live in that cheerless place, even if it did overlook some of the most expensive real estate in the world. She phoned Miles.
“I have no use for most of this stuff. I’ll get somebody to catalog it and put it on e-Bay for sale,” she said.
“You can’t do that, Gina,” he said. “No woman in your position would consider such a thing. She would choose what she wants to keep, and give the rest to a charity. A charitable organization will go there and collect whatever you don’t want.”
“Thanks, Miles. I suppose you’ve counseled a lot of heirs about the disposition of unwanted items. What charity do you suggest?”
The lawyer offered a couple of suggestions and she thanked him, hung up and called Harlem Children’s Zone. With considerable difficulty, she dismissed her suspicion that Miles enjoyed letting her know he thought she was out of her class. Still, she needed Miles. And, until she got a firm footing in her new life, she would call upon him. She didn’t know the value of Heddy’s belongings and couldn’t decide what to keep and what to give away, so she asked Miles to help her.
Immediately, she realized that she could and should have engaged an expert, for Miles delighted in providing her with advice that she didn’t need and that didn’t interest her in the least. Furthermore, she suspected that his knowledge was less broad than he led her to think.
Even so, she stopped by Miles’s office one Tuesday morning at the end of March to show him her lease for the Park Avenue apartment, evidence that she had fulfilled that term of the will.
“So you have chosen an apartment for yourself,” Miles said, aware that she had closed Heddy’s apartment and had the managing agent list it for rent.
She told him she had and enjoyed letting him know that she had engaged a decorator without any advice or assistance from him. She had begun to suspect that not only her status but her five foot nine inch height, that placed her well above him when she wore three-inch heels irritated Miles. The man was a shade under five-eight. Gina suspected that her height wasn’t the only thing that irritated Miles. He probably wished that Heddy had left her money to almost anybody, as long as the person was white.
“What’s the proper salary for a chauffeur?” she asked him.
“Hmm. I’d say around forty grand,” he said.
Gina had interviewed several men for the job, but none of them suited her. Heck, she didn’t even need a car in New York, much less a chauffeur, but she was determined to abide by the terms of the will.
“Haven’t you found a chauffeur yet?” Miles asked her one afternoon when she visited his office to get a paper notarized. “You’ll soon be moving into that apartment, and you want to make a good impression. You’ll need that driver,” he said.
“I don’t need any such thing.” She flung the words at him, angry that he thought she needed the trappings of wealth to meet the expectations of her narrow-minded neighbors. “Incidentally, I fired my decorator, and I’m going to furnish my apartment according to my own taste, so it’ll be a while before I move in. That decorator’s taste would send me to an asylum.”
His left eyebrow lifted slowly and remained up. “Gina, a woman in your position does not run from store to store looking for furniture and vases.”
“I don’t give a damn,” she said in exasperation. “Maybe women in my position don’t have my level of competence. By the way, I’ve rented office space on Madison Avenue, and the name on the door reads, Heddy Lloyd Foundation For Homeless And Abused Children And Women, Inc.” She handed him a card that identified her as president of the charity.
“Well,” he said through pursed lips, “you don’t seem to need me.”
She refused to dispute him and remained silent.
Gina didn’t enjoy the trip from her apartment on Broadway at 125th Street to her office on Madison Avenue at Thirty-eighth Street. It was either a long bus ride that included a transfer, or she could take the subway plus two buses. “My Lord,” she said to herself one morning as she walked to the subway in a heavy downpour, “I can afford to take a taxi to and from my office. What have I been thinking?”
Before the end of the day, however, the taxi was a moot point. At 5:00 p.m. her destiny walked into her office. One look at the man—tall, smartly dressed and drop-dead handsome—and her heart turned somersaults.
“I’m Justin Whitehead,” he said, offering to shake hands. “You advertised for a chauffeur, and I want the job.”
Gina simply stared at him.
“Mind if I sit?” She nodded toward the chair. “Before you say no, please check my references. I need this job. I’m a good driver, I only drink when I’m off duty, I don’t smoke and I’m punctual. I was raised to be respectful to all human beings and I am loyal.” He leaned forward. “Ms. Harkness, I promise you will not regret hiring me. I’ll always support you in every way that I can. You can depend on me.”
She opened the portfolio, read his letters of reference, put them back into the envelope and looked at him. She had no basis for turning him down, and especially not in view of the other seven applicants she’d interviewed. But why would this gentleman take a job as a chauffeur? She had a feeling that she was about to make her first big mistake as an heiress. He might be a gentleman and a good driver, but he was also a sexual tornado. Considering her limited experience with smooth-talking, knock-out-your-eyeballs men, she didn’t think it wise to hire him.
She started to tell him that he was overqualified for the job, but his hopeful expression stopped her. She knew what it was like to look for a job and have door after door closed to her. He wasn’t the potential problem—she was.
“All right. The job involves irregular hours. The pay is forty-thousand dollars a year and you don’t have to wear a uniform, although I expect you to wear a jacket and tie. Get the picture? Does that suit you?”
His eyes lit up with a brilliant twinkle, and his wide grin exposed a set of perfect, sparkling white teeth. “It’s more than I hoped for. I can’t tell you how grateful I am.”
His happiness touched her charitable heart, and she couldn’t help smiling in return, for nothing pleased her more than to have been able to brighten someone’s day. He raised himself to his full height, which she guessed to be around six foot four, and walked over to her desk. She wouldn’t swear that she didn’t shiver at the thought of touching his hand. When he extended it, she hesitated, though
