The Family Fortune Read Online Free Page A

Starbucks. Our picture had only as much clarity as it could get from all Starbucks being just alike. “And you would not believe who I saw.” She paused. When no one responded, she continued. “It was none other than Tootie from The Facts of Life .” She ended with a flourish.
    â€œThat’s nice,” Teddy said. He gave her a twisted smile. I knew that he had no idea that The Facts of Life was a dead sitcom from the 1980s. Even if he knew, he wouldn’t have cared. He was not impressed by celebrity. He was much more interested in having an old Boston name and the old Boston money that went with it.
    â€œOh,” Miranda said with feigned interest and less enthusiasm. We were not a television-watching family. My mother had seen to that. When we were children, she had orchestrated our spare time like a symphony. Miranda had been a tennis champion. Winnie had won ribbons for dressage, and I was told I could have been an Olympic skater if I had given the time to it. My mother thought it unnatural for a child to focus too much on one thing, so I became a very good skater, but nothing more.
    Miranda made up for her childhood television deficiency by becoming addicted in college to a soap opera called All My Children . My assistant, Tad, was named after a character in All My Children, and though I’d never seen it, I thought the idea of naming your child after a soap opera character delightfully silly. My little sister Winnie, a housewife in the suburbs, has also made up for the dearth of television, and now she compares almost everything in life to an episode of Seinfeld .
    â€œAnd I saw, if you can believe it, Sally Struthers in Ralph’s. That’s asupermarket,” Dolores said. She was trying for more traction, but the ground she was treading was just too slippery.
    â€œWho?” Priscilla said.
    â€œYou know. From All in the Family .”
    â€œI don’t know,” Pris said, “and I’d rather not know. Dolores dear, whatever happened to your husband, Mr. Mudd?”
    The silence in the room took on a shape of its own. Dolores tucked a fugitive hair behind her left ear and summoned all her dignity.
    â€œWe had a falling-out,” she said.
    â€œSo I assumed,” Priscilla said. She took a sip of coffee. Priscilla had the posture of someone who never dropped fine china.
    â€œThey just didn’t get along.” Littleton stepped into the ring to defend his daughter, but compared with Pris, he was a mere featherweight.
    â€œIf you must know,” Dolores said, “my husband, Howard Mudd, was gay.” She sank her chin toward her pert breasts in a gesture that was calculated to inspire pity.
    â€œBefore or after you married him, dear?” Priscilla lowered her voice and made it soft and inviting.
    My father shot Pris a glance meant to let her know that she’d gone far enough. No one was allowed to be rude to guests at his table.
    After the meal, we took our remaining coffee back into the sitting room.
    Dolores sat down on the edge of a settee and took a sip of coffee. Littleton stared at her until she looked up.
    â€œOh yes, right. I must be going or I’ll miss the concert,” Dolores said.
    I still believed that the concert was a complete fabrication.
    â€œThank God,” Priscilla said.
    â€œPris.” Teddy and I spoke at the same time. If we didn’t watch out, Priscilla would soon be shooing Dolores out of the house on the end of a broom. I wasn’t entirely sure this would be a bad thing, but it wouldn’t be polite, and the Fortunes were nothing if not polite.
    â€œShe shouldn’t be here. It’s as simple as that,” Priscilla said.
    Dolores put her cup down on an inlaid table and stood up.
    â€œI’ll be heading out, then,” she said.
    â€œI wish you didn’t have to leave,” Miranda said. “The afternoon will be so boring without you.”
    Dolores looked at her