Monday morning, ten o'clock. The reputation committee met in the small conference room on thirty-eight, the one with the view of a brick wall. Three partners and the general counsel, arranged on one side of the table like a deposition panel. I sat on the other side alone and felt, absurdly, nineteen again.
The general counsel cleared her throat. "Evelyn, this is entirely informal. We wanted to give you the opportunity to share, on your own terms, anything about your personal situation the partnership might benefit from understanding."
I had prepared nothing, which for me was unprecedented and therefore honest.
"Nineteen years ago, before I joined this firm, I placed a child for adoption," I said. "That child is now ten. His adoptive parents are deceased. He has been in foster care and is currently in a shelter placement. I am petitioning for temporary guardianship."
Four faces. Four different calculations.
Harold Finch, who had hired me, leaned forward. "Evelyn. Are you certain this is wise? The press, if it ever —"
"There is no press," I said.
"There is always press," said Gane, who had somehow been invited despite not being on the committee. I looked at him for a long moment.
"Richard," I said, "do you have a question, or are you here to take minutes?"
"Just concerned about the firm's reputation. The managing partner vote is in five weeks, and the partners will want a leader whose full attention is on the firm."
There it was.
I stood up. I hadn't planned to, but the chair had become intolerable.
"Let me save everyone some time," I said. "Yes, this will be complicated. Yes, there may be a court proceeding. No, I will not be withdrawing from the managing partner race, and no, I will not be treating my son as a public relations problem." The word son landed like a dropped glass. "If the partnership decides that disqualifies me, that's the partnership's decision. But I will not be having any more voluntary conversations about it."
I walked out. Dana was waiting in the hall with my coat.
"How bad?" Dana asked as we walked.
"Terminal. For them or for me, unclear."
In the elevator I did something I had never done in that building: I pressed the button for the garage, because I didn't want anyone to see me at the curb. Thomas was already there, leaning against the sedan, and when he saw my face he didn't ask anything. He just opened the door.
"Where to?" he said.
"Home," I said. "Then Connecticut. I need to see my mother."
We pulled out into the gray Monday light, and I watched the firm shrink in the side mirror until it was just another building.
Chapter 10: Margaret
Connecticut in late November was the color of old paper. Thomas drove me up on a Saturday morning, and I watched the city thin out into trees and then into the kind of town where the hedges had opinions.
My mother's house was a colonial on two acres she maintained with the ferocity of a woman defending a reputation. She was waiting at the door. Seventy, straight-backed, silver hair in the same bob she had worn since I was twelve. She looked at the car, then at me, and something in her face told me she already knew why I was here.
"Mother," I said.
"Evelyn." She stepped aside. "Thomas, you'll come in for coffee."
"I'll wait, Mrs. Vance," he said.
"You're a good man," she said, and meant it, which annoyed me — she was always kindest to the people I hired.
Inside, the house smelled of lemon oil. She poured coffee without asking if I wanted any, and we sat across the kitchen table, and for a moment I was twelve again, waiting to be told what I had done wrong.
"I found him," I said.
She didn't blink. "I know."
"You know."
"Priya called me two weeks ago. She felt I should be aware, before — before whatever comes next."
Of course she had. My mother had been building networks of obligation since before I was born.
"He's ten," I said. "His adoptive parents are dead. He's been in foster homes and he ran away, and he's been living on the street. He found me with a photograph."