Diary of a Yuppie by Louis Auchincloss Read Free Book Online Page B

your new firm."
    "I wonder if you can possibly understand why I had to do this to you, sir."
    "Oh, I think I can." Blakelock removed his pince-nez and rubbed his eyes forcefully, as if he were trying to dislodge some intrusive object beneath the eyelids. "I have given the matter considerable thought since I learned of it two days ago. I even took yesterday off to play golf alone and ponder it. You younger men must see me, I concluded at last, not only as a man who is out of date but who is a hypocrite. You hear me invoking the ideals of the past while trying to garner the profits of the present. It is not an attractive picture, and I at first resisted it. I think I even at last rejected it. But that is not the point. The point is: do
you
honestly believe it to be true? And I concluded that you do. So that putting together a law firm
in petto
out of our employees while ostensibly working loyally for us becomes the only logical course of action to protect yourself and others."
    I had imagined the various reactions that this crafty old man might adopt or even simulate: righteous indignation, thunderous denunciation, withering sarcasm, icy silence. I had not anticipated this particular brand of humility, and my heart seemed to miss a beat as it struck me that it might augur a real danger. A pathetic, self-blaming Blakelock could put me in an ugly light in the business community. If he was going to wail and beat his chest, crying "
Mea culpa
" and "My son, my son," would our orderly withdrawal from his firm not take on the appearance of a ruthless raid?
    "I was going to come to you, of course, sir, when our plans were complete."
    "You mean, when it would be too late for me to take preventive action?"
    "That is one way of putting it. What I was really afraid of was your power of persuasion. You may be surprised to hear it, but I feel that I owe you a lifelong debt for all you have taught me."
    "I am surprised to hear it. Surely I did not teach you to dismember a law firm which, in its trust and naivete, had offered you a partnership."
    Ah, that was better! I thought I could make out the gleam of something like hate in that eye. "No, sir, you did not teach me that. I simply did what I thought I had to do, as you yourself have just put it. But because of my great affection and respect for you, because of all my obligations to you, I feared that I might not be able to resist any urging on your part that I abandon my plans."
    "Your affection and respect for me, Service?" Blakelock's tone rose shrilly now, but almost at once he caught himself up. Was I wrong in suspecting that he had flared my eagerness to have him take an angry stand? "Well, I suppose people have different ways of expressing those feelings. I daresay there will be those who will criticize you with some harshness, but you and I know how rapidly even the sharpest criticism in this city dies away. Particularly if your new firm is successful. As I'm sure it will be."
    "We have modest hopes, sir."
    "No doubt. And of course you will keep a watchful eye on your young employees. You will know of what they are capable."
    I smiled at this, but my smile was not returned. "Well, I see that words tend to bitterness," he continued. "And I have no wish to be bitter. Let us turn to the practical details of our severance."
    But it was when I came home that night at nearly ten o'clock, after both girls had gone to bed, that I discovered that, if my life had taken a brave step forward in one direction, it had come to an ugly halt in another. Alice was sitting on the sofa in the living room without a book or a drink or even a cigarette. She had obviously been sitting there grimly, waiting for me to come in.
    "Blakelock called you?" I surmised.
    "He came to see me. This afternoon. In my office. He suspected that you would not have told me. Perhaps that you had not dared. He wanted me to have his version of what happened before yours."
    "In case I should color it?"
    "On the contrary, he