“Yes.”
“Can we look?”
“No. Lunch break, maybe.”
“Must be going well, Joan, or Joe wouldn’t even make a guess. Joe, Joan tells me that a rich person can’t have friends.”
“Hey, wait, I didn’t finish. Gigi, a rich person can have friends. But it has to be someone who isn’t interested in his money. Like you. Like Joe. Even that doesn’t mean he’s a friend. First you have to find him. Then you have to know this about him, which may be—is!—hard to find out. There aren’t many such people; even other rich people aren’t likely to qualify. Then you have to win his friendship, and that’s harder for a rich man than it is for other people.
A rich man gets suspicious and puts on a false face to strangers—and that’s no way to win friends. So in general, it’s true—if you’re rich, you don’t have friends. Just acquaintances, kept at arm’s length because you’ve been hurt before.”
Gigi suddenly turned around from the kitchen unit.
“Joan. We’re your friends.”
“I hope so.” Joan looked soberly from Gigi to her husband. “I felt your love in our Circle. But it won’t be easy, Gigi. Joe looks at me and can’t help remembering Eunice—and you look at me and can’t help wondering what effect it has on Joe.”
“We don’t! Tell her, Joe.”
“Gigi’s right,” Joe said gently. “Eunice dead. She wanted you to have what you got. Me—over my gut ache, all done in t’ Circle.” (Boss, do you mind if I get out for a moment and trot around in my bones? A girl likes to be missed a little.) (Eunice, we must not hurt him. It was all we could manage to heal him.) (I know. But the next time he kisses us I’m going to be tempted to speak up and tell him I’m here.) (Om Mani Padme Hum.) (Om Mani Padme Hum—and kark on you and Diogenes both. Let’s go home and phone Roberto.) (Sweetheart, we’ll stay here until we’ve cracked the bone and eaten the marrow.) (Okay, okay. That Gigi is as cuddly as Winsome, isn’t she?)
“Joe, I want us three to be friends and never break our Circle in our hearts. But I’m not going to put too much strain on it. Not fair to you, not fair to Gigi—not even fair to me. Gigi, I wasn’t saying I didn’t have any friends. I do have. You two. A doctor who took care of me and honestly doesn’t give a damn about money. The nurse he is about to marry who is the nearest thing to a sister I’ve ever had. My four driving guards—I’ve tried very hard with those four, Joe, because I knew they were your friends and Eunice’s. But that’s an odd situation; I’m more their baby they take care of than I am either employer or friend. And one, just one, friend left over from the days when I was Johann Smith—rich and powerful and mostly hated.”
Joe Branca said softly, “Eunice loved you.”
“I know she did, Joe. God knows why. Except that Eunice had so much love in her that it spilled over onto anyone around her. If I had been a stray kitten, Eunice would have picked me up and loved me.” (More than that, Boss.) (Sweetheart.) “And Joe, you know, or at least have met, my one friend who carried over. Jake Salomon.”
Joe nodded. “Jake okay!”
“You got to know Jake?”
“Close. Good aura.”
Gigi said, “Joe, is he the one you told me about? The fixer?”
“Same.” Joe looked back at Joan Eunice. “Ask Jake. Throne now.”
“Come on, Joan. He bites if you don’t pose the instant rest period is over.”
Joe fussed over getting them back into position, then moved both of Joan’s legs and one of Gigi’s into positions somewhat different from the original pose—stepped back and scowled at the change. . turned to his easel and started scraping part of the canvas with a palette knife. Gigi said quietly, “Now we won’t get to look at lunch break.”
“Why not?”
“God only knows. I’m not sure Joe knows why he makes a change. But something was wrong and now he’s abandoned the cartoon and is working directly from us. So it won’t be far enough along that he’ll be willing to let us look at it that soon. So freeze, darling. Don’t sneeze, don’t get an itch, don’t even breathe deeply.”