She sighed. “I feel reassured, Jake. But distressed about her husband. We must look into it. If he’s that unworldly, then there must be some way to subsidize him without his knowing it.”
“All right, Joan, we will try. But Joe Branca taught me—at my age!—that there are things money cannot buy. Not if the prospective seller is indifferent to money.”
“Will you have more sherry? And may I have another drop? If you can’t stay, I think I’ll ask to be put to bed and right to sleep. Skip dinner.”
“Oh, but you must eat, Joan. For your strength. Look, if I stay, will you eat?”
She gave him Eunice’s best sun-coming-up smile. “Yes! Yes, Jake dear! Thank you.”
Dinner was informal, service only by Cunningham and two assistants. Joan did her best to simulate a charming, gracious hostess—while trying not to appear greedy; everything tasted so wonderful! But she waited until coffee had been served and Jake had refused a perfecto and accepted a glass of port, and she then could say, “Thank you, Cunningham, that will be all,” before returning to personal matters.
Once they were alone she said, “Jake, when will I be up for a competency hearing?”
“Eh? Any time you feel well enough. Are you in a hurry?”
“No. I would be utterly content to be your ward the rest of my life.”
Her lawyer smiled slightly. “Joan, by the actuarial tables you now have a life expectancy of about sixty years; mine is more like ten or twelve.”
“Well. . . that’s hard to answer. But will you go on as before as my de-facto manager? Or am I asking too much?”
Salomon studied his glass. “Joan . . . once the court dissolves this guardian-and-ward relationship, there is no reason why you should not manage your affairs.”
(Joan! Change the subject; he’s trying to leave us!) (So I know! Keep quiet!) (Tell him your middle name!) “Jake. Jake dear. . . look at me. Look hard and keep on looking. That’s better, Jake—is it that you would rather not see me …as l am now?”
The lawyer said nothing. She went on, “Isn’t it better to get used to what is…than to run away from it? Wouldn’t she—Eunice—want you to stay?” (Keep slugging, Sis—he wants to stay.)
“It isn’t that simple . . . Joan.”
“Nothing ever is. But I don’t think you can run away from it any more than I can—for I won’t stop being what I am—her body, my mind—and you will always know it. All you accomplish by leaving is to deprive me of my one friend and the only man on earth I trust utterly. What does it take to change my name?”
“Eh?”
“Just what I said. I changed my surname from ‘Schmidt’ to ‘Smith’ when I enlisted on December eighth nineteen-forty-one simply by spelling it that way to a recruiting sergeant: No one has bothered me about it since. This time perhaps it must be formal, considering the thousands of places where my signature appears. It is technically a sex-change case, is it not? A court takes judicial notice, or some such, and it’s made a matter of record’?”
Salomon slipped into his professional persona and relaxed. “Yes, of course; I had not thought about that aspect—too many other details on my mind. Joan, your earlier name change was legal—although informal— because any person is free to call himself by any name, without permission of a court, as long as there is no criminal intent—to defraud, deceive, evade responsibility, avoid taxes, whatever. You can call yourself ‘Joan’—or ‘Johann’—or ‘Miniver Cheevy’—and that is your name, as long as your purpose is innocent. And pronounce it as you like. Knew of a case once of a man who spelled his name ‘Zaustinski’ and pronounced it ‘Jones’ and went to the trouble of publishing the odd pronunciation as a legal notice—although he did not have to; a name may be pronounced in any fashion its owner chooses.”
“Why did he do it, Jake?”
“His grandmother’s will required him to change his name in order to inherit—but did not specify how he must pronounce it. Joan, in your case a formal change of name is advisable, but it might be best to wait until you are no longer my ward. But de facto your new name is already what you say it is.”