Read Online Where Love Has Gone by Harold Robbins - Free Book Online Page B

the award. “Make it fifty percent.”
    “Twenty-five percent,” she said quickly. “After all, my daughter still has to pay her gallery fees.”
    “Just a moment, Mrs. Hayden. This is going a little too fast for me. Let’s see if I understand what you’re saying. You’re hiring me as a press agent to help Nora get the Eliofheim Award?”
    “That’s right, Mr. Corwin.”
    “And if she gets the award, we then enter into an agreement whereby I become her personal representative, agent, manager or whatever for a period of ten years? For this I will be paid twenty thousand a year plus twenty-five percent of her gross earnings from her work?”
    Mrs. Hayden nodded again.
    “What if she doesn’t get the award?”
    “Then there wouldn’t be much point in any agreement, would there, Mr. Corwin?”
    “No, of course not,” he said. He looked at her shrewdly. “If we made the agreement, who would pay the guarantee?”
    “My daughter, of course.”
    “It might happen that she wouldn’t gross enough to make it worth her while.”
    “I doubt that would worry her.” The old lady smiled. “Nora is a wealthy woman in her own right. She has an income of more than a hundred thousand a year from a family trust.”
    Sam stared at her. He had known that Nora had money but he’d never realized it was anywhere near that much. “I’m curious about one thing, Mrs. Hayden. Have you talked to Nora about this?”
    She nodded. “Of course, Mr. Corwin. I wouldn’t have discussed it with you unless I had Nora’s full consent.”
    Sam took a deep breath. He should have known that. But he couldn’t keep himself from asking another question. “Then why didn’t she speak to me herself?”
    “Nora felt lit would be better if you and I discussed it first,” the old lady replied. “Then, had you not agreed, her relationship with you would not have been disturbed.”
    Sam nodded. “I see.” He fumbled in his pocket for his pipe and put it in his mouth thoughtfully. “Of course, you both realize that if I undertake this job, my decision on all business matters would be final?”
    “Nora has the greatest regard for both your integrity and acumen, Mr. Corwin.” “You’ve just made a deal, Mrs. Hayden.”
    “Nora will be very pleased.”
    “Where is she? There are a number of things we’ll have to discuss.”
    “I’ll have Charles call her,” Mrs. Hayden said. “I believe she’s in the studio.”
    She pressed a button and the butler appeared in the doorway. She asked him to call Nora and turned back to Sam. Her voice was deceptively gentle. “I too am very pleased, Mr. Corwin. It will be a great comfort to me to know that someone besides myself is concerned with Nora’s welfare.”
    “You can be sure that I’ll do my best, Mrs. Hayden.”
    “I’m sure that you will,” she said. “I won’t pretend that I always understand my daughter. She’s a very strong-willed person. I don’t always approve of her behavior.”
    Sam didn’t answer, just sat there sucking at his pipe and looking at her. He wondered just how much she really knew about Nora. Her next statement made it clear that there was very little that she didn’t know.
    “I imagine I might be considered old-fashioned in many ways,” she said, half apologetically. “But at times my daughter seems—shall I say—quite promiscuous?”
    Sam studied her cautiously for a moment. “May I speak frankly, Mrs. Hayden?”
    She nodded.
    “Please understand, I’m neither defending Nora nor condemning her. But I think it’s most important that you and I understand what we’re talking about.”
    She was watching him as carefully as he had watched her. “Please go on, Mr. Corwin.”
    “Nora is no ordinary person,” he said. “She’s highly talented, perhaps a genius. I don’t know. She’s finely strung, acutely sensitive and highly emotional. She needs sex the way some people need liquor.”
    “Are you trying to tell me politely that my daughter is a