The Young Apollo and Other Stories Read Free Page A

jail.
    "I can only thank God that my poor mother didn't live to see this second disgrace in her family," Camilla moaned to herself as she contemplated the headlines of the evening paper.
    But of course she couldn't just sit and sigh. She would now have to help steer her poor niece through this crisis, drawing from her own experience to teach her how to handle the falling away of friends, and even relatives, and how to maintain the oasis of a cherished home when the condemned man was released from incarceration. She wrote to Genevieve to ask when it would be best for her to come and received an answer suggesting a wait of some days. Bronson was planning an appeal, of course, but as a reversal of the conviction was believed by his lawyers to be unlikely, he had opted to start his jail term at once to get it over as soon as possible.
    It was a week, therefore, before Camilla presented herself at her niece's splendid Park Avenue duplex. She found the beautiful blond Genevieve, radiantly clad as usual, in the front hall taking what seemed to be a lively leave of some ladies who had been calling on her. As they departed she turned to her aunt with a cheerfully welcoming smile.
    "Darling Aunt Millie, how sweet of you to fly to my side! Come in, come in."
    Camilla followed her into the great drawing room, done entirely in gleaming white except for the ebony arms of the chairs and table legs and the black jade of the lamps. On the walls hung canvases of Picasso, Miro, Pollock, and Jasper Johns. She declined all offers of tea or a cocktail and sat quietly for a moment in an armchair, gazing sadly at her hostess.
    "I had to come," she said at last. "I was waiting until the first rude shock was over. I knew you had to face that with Bronson and the children."
    "And that was typically tactful of you, you old darling. But as it happens you've come just at the right time to hear some wonderful news."
    "Really? Is it the appeal? They think it will work?"
    "No, no, no. That's quite hopeless, I'm afraid. But what our able lawyers
have
achieved is to get Bronson into a minimum-security prison. One that's almost like a country club. He can see me quite freely. He can even run his business from there. And I know he'll be on his best behavior, so he should be sprung in only eighteen months. And if there are any nasty types among the jailmates—you know, you never can tell—I'm told we can easily arrange to pay them off when they come out, so they'll leave Bronson strictly alone."
    "I see you're being very practical about this."
    "Doesn't one have to be? Didn't you? And then, of course, we have a couple of friends who've suffered through the same rigmarole. They've given us some very helpful advice."
    "And the fines? The ones I've read about? They seemed so huge to me. Will you have to make changes in your life-style?"
    "Not a bit. It sounds rather lordly to say it, auntie, but sixty million doesn't make that fatal a dent in Bronson's fortune. We may have to give up the place in Arizona, but we'll certainly keep Southampton, Jamaica, and this old flat. And to tell the truth, I was getting a bit sick anyway of all that sand and cactus."
    "I guess not having to cut down may help assuage public opinion," Camilla commented, now in a drier tone. "People seem to have a great respect for money these days."
    "These days? When didn't they? But what do you mean, auntie, by assuaging public opinion?"
    "Well, when something like this happened to your uncle, we had a lot of trouble even with some of our oldest friends."
    "You mean they were ashamed of him?"
    "Well, yes. They seemed to feel he had betrayed them."
    "You mean the ones who had lost money because of what he had done?"
    "No, no." Camilla was beginning to feel frustrated and even a bit vexed. "I mean the ones who thought he had been dishonorable. That he had let down the system in which he had been raised." She paused, and then finally brought it out. "They thought he had given the New Dealers