Read Online The End of the Book by Porter Shreve - Free Book Online

ginger curls playing about the pale, translucent skin at her temples. In her Nile-green tea dress and long white gloves she rushed through Gallery 25, scanning each painting before moving on to Gallery 26. “There’s Nettie McCormick.” She pointed to one of the portraits, of a silver-haired woman in a red velvet toque with teal feathers. “She’s looking awfully stern.”
    â€œYou know her?” George asked.
    â€œShe’s been to the house many times. She’s actually a lovely woman, one of the city’s great philanthropists. Her late husband, Cyrus, invented the grain harvester. As you might imagine, she’s richer than Croesus.
    â€œAnd look,” she continued. “It’s Valerie Root! I recollect the very day she sat for that portrait. We were in school together, and she broadcast the news unabashedly. A bit of a spoiled girl. Her father was the architect John Wellborn Root.”
    â€œI know that name,” George said.
    â€œOf course you do. He designed the Monadnock Building. You work every day in one of his masterpieces.” George was six years older than Margaret, but she had a way of making him feel as if their ages were reversed. She went on, “Father says that John Wellborn Root would have been the finest architect of his generation had he not died young. Valerie has some talent, too. She’s quite good on the piano. Just the other day she sent us a wedding announcement. She’ll be marrying a Mr. Edgar Fletcher of Winnetka. I can’t tell you how many of my schoolmates are getting married this summer.”
    â€œIt appears you’re at that age,” George said. “I’ve been thinking a lot about marriage myself—”
    â€œAnd over there is Marshall Field.” Margaret glided across the threshold to the next gallery and stood before the portrait of a nattily dressed but dyspeptic-looking man who held his cane and hat in a way that suggested he was eager to get to his next appointment. “Have you met the great man?” Margaret asked.
    â€œI’ve shopped in his store.” George had removed the ring from the box this morning and nested it in an inside pocket. He touched his coat to confirm that the ring was safe.
    Margaret held up her hand to whisper, “He’s rather intolerable. And if the rumors are true, his first wife was a drug addict and died in France under mysterious circumstances. He had a longtime affair with his best friend’s wife. And his son, Marshall Field Jr., is a well-known habitué of the famous Everleigh Club.”
    â€œThe bordello?”
    â€œYes. I hear it’s very posh. Have you been?”
    George reddened and shook his head. “Certainly not!”
    â€œI’ve embarrassed you,” she said with delight, then whirled around the room browsing the other portraits.
    George was about to cross into the last gallery of the exhibition when Margaret extended her arm to stop him. “Not another step,” she said. “Now put your hands over your eyes. No peeking! The surprise is in this room.”
    George did as he was told. Margaret’s behavior gave him pause, and reminded him acutely of their different origins. How could she consent to marry the son of a small-town innkeeper? And even if for some curious reason she did say yes, he had to wonder why he would want to spend the rest of his life feeling like a hanger-on. His every accomplishment from this day forward would be attributed to his marrying well. He could choose not to work another day in his life or, like the Canadian Mountie, spend all his waking hours at the office, and the perception would be the same. He felt as if the eyes of the elite were following him from room to room, impressing upon him that he had no business consorting with the only and eligible daughter of Alfred J. Lazar.
    George had a passing wish to be back among ordinary people, the hermit and the child of the state, the