Mourning Glory by Warren Adler Page A

the death of a spouse. She would
simply be taking advantage of an opportunity to bring joy, affection and
rejuvenation, perhaps even love, to a grieving man, filling the void caused by
a profound loss. Where was the harm in that? She could be the silver lining in
the dark cloud.
    On the practical side, at least she would be trolling where
the fish were. That, too, was not a crime. All right, so she had a hidden
agenda in the pursuit, and the means might be considered blatantly cynical and parasitic,
but the end result, if it occurred, would be beneficial to both parties.
    At least she would have a well-defined objective, and the
fact was that she considered herself a good person, a well-brought-up woman
from a traditional Catholic, rigidly moral and religious Italian family.
Certainly she would be closer in generational mores to such a man than she was
to her own daughter. She would be an asset to a good man, especially a kindly,
decent and generous man, a very generous man. To whom, she vowed, she would be
exceedingly grateful, body and soul.
    Yes, she decided, she would repay a man dearly for such
kindness and generosity. Images of herself engaged in the required sexual
gymnastics stimulated another rising giggling hysteric. She would practice
giving great head with a banana and encourage the use of Viagra. Stop this, she
urged herself, remembering with a hot, angry blush the scene with her daughter
and her disgusting copulation a mere couple of hours before.
    Marrying rich would certainly offer expanding opportunities
for Jackie. She would meet a better class of people the higher up they went on
the economic ladder. She'd be driving a great car, a Porsche maybe, and buy her
clothes at Saks or Bonwit's or Bergdorf's, clothes of her favorite designers.
    Perhaps, too, the boost in fortune might get her into a
good Ivy League college like Harvard or Yale, which would give her
opportunities for success unimaginable in her present status. She would be able
to network, meet the offspring of America's elite, connect with the people who
made the big decisions and meet well-bred young men and women. God knows she
needed that. Especially young men who respected her. No more skinhead idiots
brandishing swastikas, white trash animals on motorcycles who forced her into
unsafe sex. Money attracts money and a better class of people, she decided; the
more money the better.
    It comforted her to daydream about a brighter future for
her daughter. Of course, this did not detract from the benefits that would
accrue to her. She supposed she was not without her material needs. She could
envision her own closets full of designer clothes and velvet-covered boxes
filled with jewelry, the real thing, and a regimen of exercise and massage to
keep her figure tight and, when the time came, a tuck or two here or there.
Were these crass aspirations? Perhaps. But her man might want her to obey the
conventions of the class, and she would be a willing participant.
    Then there were the house or houses they would live in. She
would read Architectural Digest with a specific purpose in mind. After
all, she wouldn't be expected to live in the same house where he had lived with
his late wife. No way. She would have to put her own stamp on things. Create
her own individualized world for his new life. Indeed, it would be her house
that would be a candidate to appear in Architectural Digest , and she
would be featured in those photos entering some posh ball in Palm Beach or New York or Paris, London, Venice. God, it was wonderful to think about.
    Such thoughts convinced her that there was, indeed, a point
to Mrs. Burns's suggestion, once one got beyond the bold idiocy of the idea and
the necessary subterfuge that would be entailed. That was the hard part. The
initial phase, the acting, the dissimulation. And, calling a spade a spade, the
lying, the outright lying. But if her intentions were basically honest and
good, not evil or sinister or selfish, where was the