The Great Man by Kate Christensen Page A

“A man you profess to admire and revere.”
    â€œWhy wouldn’t I be curious about his life?” he asked mildly.
    In lieu of an answer, she took a loud slurp of tea. Then she lit a cigarette without asking whether it would bother the baby. Her own mother had smoked like a sailor through both her pregnancies and her children’s childhoods, and both she and Oscar had wound up chain-smokers themselves, but so what? Not the end of the world.
    â€œWhy don’t you like Teddy?” Henry asked.
    â€œThat’s what you’re really wondering, isn’t it,” Maxine said, “now that you’ve met her and been sucked in…. Isn’t there anyone you just don’t like?”
    â€œOf course.”
    â€œCall it biochemical, call it taste, call it bitchiness. I really don’t care what you call it. Unlike everyone else, apparently, I see right through Claire, and what I see I can’t stand.”
    Henry leaned forward on his elbows, so the steam from his untouched teacup curled up to bathe his sweating face in yet more moisture. “What do you see?”
    â€œOh, think whatever you want,” Maxine said. “I have no interest in dredging up all that old shit with Oscar’s little mistress. That’s the last thing I feel like talking about. I’ve had a bad day.”
    The baby opened his mouth and began to scream.
    â€œSo have I, actually,” said Henry. He picked up the baby and held him against his shoulder, gently patting his back. This looked to Maxine like a plausible solution, but it didn’t help. The baby wailed. Henry reached into his bag and pulled out a bottle. He stuck the nipple in the kid’s mouth. The kid fussed initially, then shut up and started to suck. “Breast milk,” Henry said. “Expressed from my wife’s breast, to be deployed in case of emergency.”
    â€œI never had kids myself,” said Maxine. “And I don’t envy those who do.”
    â€œI’m in no mood to argue,” said Henry. “Believe it or not, though,” he added, “it’s not
all
screaming and shitty diapers and sleep deprivation.”
    â€œReally,” said Maxine.
    â€œEvery now and then…” Henry gave himself over to watching Chester’s mouth suck at the bottle. “It’s like they say. All the old clichés are true.”
    â€œProbably why they’re old clichés,” said Maxine. “Listen, I’m sorry to cut this short, but I’ve got to take a nap before I go out tonight. Was there anything else—”
    â€œWhy don’t you like Teddy?”
    She blinked at him. “You are persistent,” she said. “I suppose that’s an admirable quality.”
    Henry waited; she didn’t say anything more. He switched to another tack. “Why did Oscar stay with Abigail?”
    â€œI find it flattering that you credit me with the assumption that I would know the answer to that.”
    Again, he waited; again, she clammed up.
    â€œWhy didn’t Oscar leave Teddy any of his paintings, or any money?” he asked.
    Maxine finished her tea. “I guess because she had no claim to any of it.”
    â€œI’m sorry to keep you,” said Henry. “I’m just trying to—”
    â€œWas there anything else?”
    â€œWhy do you ignore Oscar’s daughters?”
    â€œYou mean Teddy’s daughters,” she said before she could stop herself.
    â€œWhy do I mean Teddy’s daughters?”
    â€œYou’ll have to ask them that.”
    â€œBut how do you know what they’d say if you never see them?”
    â€œI pick things up through the air, like a radio.”
    With a victorious expression Maxine didn’t care for at all, Henry said, “I will ask Ruby and Samantha. But I’m very interested to know why you chose not to recognize them as your nieces.”
    â€œChalk it up to a complete lack of