Control by William Goldman Read Free Book Online

of Nelson ’ s brains, they ’ ll own the world. ”
    Was that a compliment? Charlotte wondered. She decided it was.
    “ There are all those positives and but three negatives: he is not beautiful, he is not young, and you don ’ t love him. ”
    Wasn ’ t that last alone a good enough reason to say no? Charlotte wondered. (Her father ’ s bright eyes burned.) Charlotte decided it wasn ’ t.
    The courtship was perfunctory but totally civilized. He wanted nothing physical from her. At least now. He talked of the children he wanted, his visions for them. Occasionally, when he took her hand she wondered if it was preparatory to a more serious maneuver but it never was. Had it been, she would have been dutiful. Charlotte suspected that Nelson Stewart was never going to be inflamed with passion. Well, the same could be said for her. So far, at any rate. Sex was a duty and she knew when the time came she would prove competent.
    He lived on Fifth, in what Charlotte thought a perfect place to begin married life, but he felt it was far too small. So he bought an enormous house on Gramercy Park, with an added small place in the back that would be fine for staff. The house had many bedrooms, each child would obviously have his own. (He wasn ’ t crazy to teach daughters the ways of the Market.) And the private park across the street would make life easy for Charlotte when pram time came each day.
    During this period, she realized certain things her father had told her were true. Nelson Stewart was indeed shy. Remarkably so for a man of his power. The Market was everything, and he did all that he could to keep distractions to a minimum. Example: his clothes. He bought them only from Brooks Brothers. (He put great faith in brand names. Brooks was impeccable, you could trust the place. And at the start, he insisted Charlotte frequent Lord & Taylor for the same reason: trust.) And when he shopped at Brooks, he had his own salesman whom he would contact before his visit and outline his needs. So as he reached the store, all was in readiness, shoes, shirts, suits, whatever else. Laid out in one special area, his salesman hovering. Nelson would enter, always exactly on time, enter, pick, and be gone. He had a fine wardrobe but it was doubtful if he ever spent more than ten minutes in the store at any one time.
    Their wedding was dutifully covered by the Times. A city the size of New York is obviously too large to have such a thing as a Most Eligible Bachelor. But on any list of five, W. Nelson Stewart would have properly belonged. So there was publicity, even though he shunned it when he could.
    They honeymooned in Europe for almost a month, during which time they had sex weekly. Charlotte did her best to pleasure him, but she was always slow to moisten while he was always quick to come, something of a problem.
    Life in the ensuing months was almost entirely quiet. Nelson Stewart liked his home life that way. He was a Bostonian and never really enjoyed the pace of Manhattan, but if you were in the Market, Boston simply wasn ’ t good enough, not if you had skills such as his. So they rarely went out. The only restaurant he frequented was Sweet ’ s, the great old place on Fulton near the river. He went there because he felt it was easily the finest fish house in town. And also because, he said, it somehow reminded him of home.
    Before their first year was out, Charlotte gave birth to W. Nelson Jr., the event damaged only by the hack work of the surgeon. Charlotte never realized, until months later when she had done her best to get her stomach flat again, the extent of her vanity. She exercised relentlessly after her firstborn.
    But alas.
    The next year Burgess (named after the father ’ s father) came along but after that there would be no further children. It was simply not medically sound. That news obviously saddened Nelson—he would never have his brood now—and he turned more than ever toward his empire.
    Charlotte mothered the