Seizure (Part VII)

This is a continuation. To start from the beginning, click here.

Her father sat in silence not only because he was marshalling the courage to speak—itself a phenomenon incongruous with his personality—but also because, to both his regret and pride, he had discovered Tess to be utterly unafraid of long silences, a streak of cruelty he himself had often employed in his dealings with troublesome rivals and subordinates. Suddenly, her father straightened himself as if he were going to break the news of someone’s termination. Tess tensed perceptibly. Her father took another draught of his brandy and, placing it on the table (the clink of glass on glass), began:

“For some time I’ve been rehearsing what I was going to say to you now—ever since your mother died, in fact…I thought, hmm—I really have no idea how you’re going to react to any of this—I believe that you deserve the truth, regardless of the improbability or impossibility of it. Hmm. Of course, you’re going to think the old man has lost his mind. I’ve gone all Heart of Darkness on you. On the other hand, it is my duty to tell you, there are things in this world that defy explanation, and disbelief in them does not make them any less true. And I have sat you down to tell you some things that defy explanation but are nonetheless true. Now, it looks like you are thinking exactly the things at this point that I would have thought you would be thinking, because your face is abjectly incapable of disguising your thoughts. Hmm…that’s exactly the expression your mother had on her face when she and I began this very same conversation. Have I told you lately how much you remind me of your mother?”

Here her father paused as though seriously awaiting an answer. Tess detested rhetorical questions masked in serious inquiry.

“Never heard that one before!” Tess said quickly and somewhat sneeringly, irritated by the idea that her time, evidently unlike that of anyone who spoke with her, was a consumable scarcely worth considering. “Did you have something momentous to tell me, or are you having second thoughts now? You would like to postpone this until you got your courage up or your thoughts together, perhaps?”

These were confrontational words reminding her father that the direct and simple were far superior to the circumspect and convoluted, words that hit home with a man of action! All the fumbling and dithering began to disperse, and a mindful confidence took its place. A new aspect emerged—the face of the merciless, ruthless businessman, one whose streak of cruelty often served his ends. Taking such barbs from others, namely, Tess’s older sisters, he considered intolerable because they were invariably executed in passionate fits or without weighed premeditation. Amanda in particular had always found her father’s indulgence toward Tess’s comments shocking and unfair, but what she neglected to bear in mind was that her father placed a high premium on effective verbal jousting, a skill for which Amanda’s poor brain would never be wired.

“Well played, and now we’ll get on to the bad news.”

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