The Memory of All That by Nancy Smith Gibson Page A

questions I have. I visited with Alice earlier this afternoon. She said she has known me since I was a little girl, which you had told me, and that my mother and I lived in the apartment across the hall from her. She said my mother worked for your father.”
    “Yes, she did.”
    “Tell me about my mother.”
    “I don’t know much, really. I’m sure Alice knew her better than I did.”
    “Tell me what you do know.”
    “She was my father’s executive secretary until she died suddenly of a heart attack.”
    “And she started working for him when I was just a little girl?”
    “I guess. I would have been a kid myself then. I’m four years older than you.”
    “How old am I?”
    David stared at her. It was hard to fathom she didn’t know the simplest things, like her age.
    “You’re twenty-eight, and I’m thirty-two.”
    “Do you know where we lived before we moved here? Alice said we had just moved here when my mother went to work for your father.”
    “No, I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone mention that.”
    “So we moved here, and she went to work.”
    “I might as well tell you something else about that. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but it shadows some of the attitudes in this house.”
    Marnie looked at him questioningly. “OK,” she said hesitantly.
    “My mother believes your mother was my father’s mistress. Your mother went to work immediately as his executive secretary instead of his promoting someone who already worked at Barrett’s and knew about the business. His secretary was getting ready to retire when he went on a business trip. When he came back, your mother moved here and went to work for him. He met her wherever it was he went. My mother thought he met her and brought her here to be his ‘piece on the side,’ as my mother called it. My parents had an awful fight about it. I can still remember hearing it, even though I must have only been nine or ten. But he wouldn’t give in to Mother and fire Pamela—that was your mother’s name. He said she was a damn good secretary and he wouldn’t tear up his office staff on Mother’s say so.”
    “Do you think she was his mistress?”
    “I have no idea. Possibly. But she was an excellent secretary, I know that. He had a hard time replacing her when she died.”
    “And I went to work there then?”
    “You went to work at Barrett’s then, and in a way it had to do with her death. Let me start further back in the story, though.”
    “I’d like to know when and how we met. Your mother made it sound like I was out to catch you from the first.”
    The smile flickering on his face was not a pleasant one. “She was pretty accurate about that.”
    Marnie sat back, abashed to think such a thing could be true. At first, she thought maybe Ruth’s problem with Pamela had caused her to say the things she had about Marnie, but this statement, at least, was true. She wondered if the other hateful things Ruth said were true.
    “To be truthful, we were just kids when we first met. Alice brought you to work with her a couple of times, but being four years younger than I was, and a girl to boot, I didn’t pay much attention to you.
    “The next time I remember meeting you was when you worked at the Roadhouse. You were in those short shorts and tight tee shirt and flirting with everyone who came in. Everyone in town knew who you were. At least the men did.”
    Marnie closed her eyes. She screwed up her courage to ask the question she might not like the answer to. “You intimated at lunch that I did more than flirt with the men. Is that so?”
    “You gave the impression you slept around, but I don’t know if that was true.”
    She covered her face with her hands. The lavender scent of the hand lotion she had applied earlier soothed her. Breathing deeply, she dropped her hands into her lap.
    “Is that when we started dating?”
    “No, I was dating Celeste, sort of engaged to be engaged. Our parents were good friends and encouraged the