the Times on you. I didn’t want to talk to them myself.”
“But you’re the head of the family now. I’m not,” I protested.
“And you’re a journalist. A respected journalist. You know better how to deal with the dreaded press than I do.”
“Luciana could have spoken to them. She’s Sebastian’s daughter.”
“You’re his ex-wife,” he shot back.
“Oh, Jack, please.”
“Okay, okay. Look, she’s been out of it all day, ever since we got here. She can barely speak to me, never mind the New York Times. You know how fragile she is. The least little thing upsets her.”
“It always has. I never even expected her for supper tonight, even though she accepted. I knew she wouldn’t come,” I retorted. When we were children growing up together, Luciana had usually been the one to hang back, to drop out, to claim tiredness, even sickness, when she didn’t wish to do something, or if she was faced with a difficult situation. But fragile she wasn’t. I knew that for a fact. She was strong. And tough. Not that Luciana ever let anyone know this. Dissembling came to her readily and with great ease; she was a facile liar, an expert spinner of tall tales. Her father once told me she was the cleverest liar he had ever known.
“How about a drink?” Jack said, cutting into my thoughts about his half sister.
“Of course!” I exclaimed, jumping up. “How rude of me. What would you like? Your usual scotch? Or a glass of wine?”
“Scotch, please, Viv.”
I went to the antique Georgian table near the door, which held a few bottles of liquor and a bucket of ice. I fixed his scotch, a vodka on the rocks for myself, and carried them back to the fireplace. Handing him his glass, I sat down.
He muttered his thanks, took a great gulp of the amber-colored alcohol, and stood nursing it in both hands, ruminating.
“It’s been a terrible day,” I said. “The worst day in a long time. I still can’t quite accept the fact that Sebastian’s dead. I keep expecting him to walk in any minute.”
Jack made no comment, merely sipped his drink and rocked back and forth on his heels.
I regarded him over the rim of my glass, thinking how unsympathetic and without emotion he was. I experienced a little spurt of anger. Jack could be so cold, cold as an iceberg. At this moment I hated him, as I had sometimes hated him as a child. His father had been found dead this morning, and in the most peculiar circumstances. Yet he was behaving as if nothing had happened. And he certainly wasn’t showing any signs of grief. It struck me as being most unnatural, even though father and son had never really been close. I had been distressed for the entire day, fighting tears, engulfed by sadness. I mourned Sebastian, and I would go on mourning him for a long time.
Suddenly, without preamble, Jack said, “They took the body.”
Startled by this announcement, I gaped at him. “You mean the police took the body away?”
“Yep,” he answered laconically.
“To Farmington? For the autopsy?”
“You got it.”
“I really can’t stand you when you’re like this!” I exclaimed, and I was surprised at the harshness of my voice.
“Like what, sugar?”
“For God’s sake, come off it, you know what I mean. So cold and hard and detached. Half of it’s pretense anyway. You can’t fool me. I’ve known you for the best part of your life and mine.”
He shrugged indifferently, drained his glass, went and poured himself another drink. Walking back to the fireside, he continued, “That detective, Kennelly, told me we’ll get the body back tomorrow.”
“So quickly?”
He nodded. “Apparently the Chief Medical Examiner will do the autopsy first thing tomorrow morning. He’ll take out tissue and organs, plus blood and urine samples, and—”
Shuddering, I shouted, “Stop it! You’re talking about Sebastian! Your father. Don’t you have any respect for him? Any respect for the dead?”
He gave me an odd look but made no comment.
I said, “If you have no feelings for him, so be it. But just remember this, I do. I will not permit you to speak of him in such a heartless, cold-blooded way.”
Ignoring my remarks, Jack said, “We can have the funeral later this week.”
“In Cornwall,” I murmured, trying to adopt a softer tone. “He once told me he wanted to be buried in Cornwall.”
“What about a memorial service, Viv? Should we have one? If so, where? More importantly, when?” He grimaced. “As soon as possible. I have to get back to France.”
Though he was infuriating me again, I held myself still. Exercising great control, I responded calmly, “In New York. I think that would be the best place, certainly the most appropriate.”
“Where?”
“At the Church of St. John the Divine,” I suggested. “What do you think?”
“Whatever you say.” Jack flopped down in the chair near the fireplace and regarded me for the longest moment, a speculative look entering his eyes.
“Oh, no,” I said, catching on at once. “Oh no, no, Jack! You’re not going to talk me into arranging the funeral and the memorial. That’s for you to do. You and Luciana.”
“You’ll help, though. Won’t you?”
I nodded. “But you’re not going to shrug off your responsibilities, as you have so many times in the past,” I warned. “I won’t allow you to do that. You are the head of the Locke family, now that Sebastian’s dead, and the sooner you understand this the better. There’s the Locke Foundation to run, for one thing, and you’ll have to pick up the torch he dropped when he died.”
“What do you mean?” he asked quickly, sharply, his eyes instantly riveted on mine. “What torch?”
“The charity work, Jack. You’ll have to carry on where he left off. You’ll have to tend to the sick and the poor of the world, those who are suffering, just as he did. Thousands are depending on you.”
“Oh, no! No way, sugar. If you think I’m going to hand out money like a drunken sailor, then you’re crazy. As crazy and as foolish as he was.”
“This family’s got so much money it doesn’t know what to do with it!” I cried, furious with him.
“I’m not going to follow in Sebastian’s footsteps, trailing halfway round the world and back, dispensing largesse to the great unwashed. So forget it, Viv, and don’t bring it up again.”
“You’ll have to run the Locke Foundation,” I reminded him. “As
