Destined by Gail Cleare Page A

to
Princeton University. I spent four years in New Jersey.”
    This was surprising. Somehow I had
pictured him at Oxford, or the Sorbonne, or some school in the Ukraine. It was
hard to imagine him as an Ivy Leaguer.
    When we got outside he did the one
most perfect wonderful thing he could possibly have done to win my heart
forever. We walked up to the Mercedes and he tossed me the keys.
    “Want to drive?” he suggested, knowing
the answer.
    “Oh yes,” I replied. “Thank you!”
    I jumped into the driver’s seat, slid
it forward, adjusted the mirrors and fastened my seat belt. He handed me a pair
of Ray Bans. I felt like a movie star.
    “Where are we going?” I asked,
shifting into gear and pulling out into the street. The car moved like an
animal, lithe and graceful.
    He leaned back in his seat and waved
his hand casually.
    “Just keep driving,” he said. “I’ll
tell you where to turn.”
    He directed me onto the Interstate and
we headed north. I stepped on the gas and pulled into the stream of traffic.
The Mercedes flew down the road so smoothly and quietly I barely noticed when
we hit seventy-five. He was playing a Putamayo World Music CD called “Latin
Lounge” on the surround sound stereo system, singing along with the Spanish
lyrics. I came up fast behind a truck and dodged over into the passing lane to
go around it. The Mercedes responded to my every command like a purebred horse
schooled in dressage. I thought, right , and it flowed gently back into the cruising lane.
    We had dinner on top of a mountain in
Vermont. The wide glass sliding doors of the restaurant opened onto a flagstone
patio that perched high above the long view. We could see New York State to the
west, where a glimmer of tangerine sunset still gilded the undersides of dark
purple clouds. The Interstate stretched out below us to the south, a thin
string of twinkling headlights that lead back toward Massachusetts. Overhead, a
million stars were sparkling. It was spectacular.
    The night was warm, so we sat on the
patio. Tony ordered a bottle of champagne, specifying Veuve Cliquot , which I had never tasted before.
They had the salmon I’d been craving and served it with an Asian plum sauce
that was delicious. Tony ordered the duck and offered me a bite, which I
refused. When eating something delicious, I don’t like to confuse my taste buds
by mixing in other flavors. I am a purist.
    We ate and we talked. He told me about
growing up in Rome with his Czech parents, who were both teachers. His full
name was Antonin Novak, but he had dropped the extra syllable to make it easier
for Americans to pronounce. His family had summered at Lake Como, on the Swiss
border, before the American movie stars discovered it and it became so fashionable.
He loved boating, and had been on the crew team in college. He had one sister,
who was now living in Montreal. After college he went to graduate school in
international business and was recruited by a large multi-national firm to work
in their offices in Hong Kong. In addition to his native tongue, he spoke
fluent Mandarin Chinese as well as Russian, Spanish, French, Italian and
English.
    “A friend of mine and I were hired to
create the standardized distribution routes for Coca Cola in Hong Kong, “ he said.
“Before we did it, nobody had ever formalized or kept track of this
information. We wrote a software program to make it easy to update and track
changes. Then we sold it back to Coca Cola, and to four other American firms
who were developing the area.”
    His eyes shone. “That is how I won my
freedom,” he said. “Now I can dabble in this and that, and indulge in my
obsession for collecting beautiful objets d’art .”
    “Like Mr. Paradis,” I commented.
    “Yes,” he nodded, “Like my friend
Henry. He and I first met under very unusual circumstances, you know, in a
bazaar in Hong Kong. But, that is another story. Now, I want to hear about you.”
    I reflected that my own origins were
not