Gorham nodded. Then he suddenly felt a wave of guilt. What was he thinking of? This was his father, who was dying.

“I could stay …”

Charlie shook his head. “I’d rather you kept studying. I’ll call you when I need you.” He smiled again. “I’m really pleased to see you.”

“Is there anything I can get you?”

“I don’t suppose you’ve got any grass?”

Gorham was about to say, “Oh for God’s sake,” but he bit the words back. Instead he just sighed. “Sorry, Dad. I haven’t.”

It was one of the causes of friction between them. Gorham had smoked marijuana only once in his life. That had been the weekend after he graduated high school, back in ’66. He remembered his hesitation, how his friends had told him that Bob Dylan had introduced the Beatles to grass in ’64, right here in New York, and that their best work had begun from then. Was all that stuff really true? He had no idea.

But Gorham had never done it again. Maybe he hadn’t particularly liked it the first time. Perhaps his innate conservatism and caution had set in. He had friends who were getting into LSD, with terrible results, and in his mind he associated hard drugs with soft. Whatever the reasons, he ran with a group of friends who, for the most part, didn’t do drugs, and it embarrassed him that his father did.

“It looks like a big mess outside. Garbage bags everywhere.”

“It is.”

“Nothing dims our affection for the city, though.”

“Right.”

“I guess you still want to come and be a banker here?”

“Family tradition. Except for you, that is.” Had he allowed a hint of rebuke to creep into his voice? If so, his father had chosen to ignore it.

“Do you remember your grandmother giving you a Morgan silver dollar when you were a boy? It’s nothing to do with the Morgan bank, you know. It’s the name of the designer.”

“Remember? I keep it with me every day. It’s my talisman, the badge of my destiny.” Gorham grinned a little sheepishly. “That’s rather childish, I guess.” In fact, the dollar had a more critical significance than that. It was the reminder of the family’s past as bankers and merchants, in the days when they still had wealth—the wealth that his aberrant father had never even attempted to get back.

But rather to Gorham’s surprise, his father looked delighted.

“That’s good, Gorham. Your grandmother would be so pleased—she wanted to give you something you’d value. So you’ll try to get a job with a bank as soon as you graduate?”

“That’s right.”

“It’s a pity my father isn’t here, he could have helped you. I know some bankers I could ask.”

“It’s okay.”

“Bankers like people like you.”

“I hope so.”

“Do you worry about the draft?”