The Greatest Man I Never Knew

The greatest man I never knew
Lived just down the hall
And every day we said hello
But never touched at all
He was in his paper. I was in my room.
How was I to know he thought I hung the moon.

 

“Hi, Daddy.”

Warren looked up and saw his only daughter standing timidly in the doorway of his study. He leaned back and carefully placed his pen on the leather blotter that covered his desk.

“Hello, Mitsy. What brings you by this evening?” He gestured towards the chair in front of him.

“Daddy!” she chided as she moved into the room, and sat down in the comfortable red leather chair. “I still live here, you know.”

He quirked a brow at her. “No. I wasn’t at all certain that you were still living here. You haven’t been here in over a week.”

Mitsy squirmed. “Yes, well … I …you see, I um ---”

“Mitsy.”

“Yes.”

“Your mother told me you were staying with Charles Prescott.” He paused. “If you can’t tell me that, then I have to wonder if you’re ashamed of that fact.”

Mitsy flushed and looked down. “Have I let you down?”

Warren stood and carefully walked around the desk. He stopped in front of Mitsy’s chair, and pulled her up by her hands. His large frame towered over her tiny one as he placed his hands on her shoulders. “Look at me, Mitsy,” he demanded.

She looked up in trepidation.

“Melissa, I have not been, and never will be, ashamed of my daughter,” he spoke meaningfully. “You are the best thing to ever happen to me and I’m infinitely proud of your accomplishments.”

“Oh, Daddy!”

Mitsy threw her arms around her father and began to sob into his chest.

“There, there,” he said comfortingly as he patted her back. “It’s nothing to cry over.”

“Oh, Daddy!” she sobbed into his chest. “I’ve made such a mess of things!”

“Nothing that can’t be fixed, baby girl,” he crooned. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

The sobbing intensified as she choked out a reply. “Charlie … Charlie is ashamed of me. He kicked me out.”

“I’ll kill him!” William growled, pulling away from his daughter. “Where is he? I’ll kill him with my bare hands.”

“No, no, Daddy. It’s not like that,” Mitsy explained.

“He’s made you cry,” he pointed out. “I made it clear to that young man that if he hurt you in any way, he would answer to me.”

“Oh, Daddy!” Mitsy frowned as she attempted to regain her composure. “You didn’t! Please tell me you didn’t.”

“Charlie didn’t tell you?” he asked.

“No,” she replied tearfully.

“Well, I’ll give him that,” he said gruffly. “But I’m still going to kill him.”

“Maybe you better wait until you hear the whole story,” she sniffled. “You’re probably going to agree with him.”

“Why don’t you tell me the whole story then?” he suggested, pulling her towards the leather sofa in his study.

It didn’t take much more prodding before Mitsy had confessed everything to her father. It started with her summer job in the mailroom where she had skipped out early one day, causing an important proposal package to be delayed, included her dissatisfaction with her many jobs, her resignation, and finally the events of the evening where she had stood Charlie up for his important business dinner.

William Thornhill listened and never interrupted or asked a question. His only action during her recital was to pull a handkerchief from his pocket and hand it to his daughter.

“So, then Charlie told me not to come back, that I wasn’t the girl he thought I was.”

“I see.”

“What do you think, Daddy? Will he ever forgive me?”

William shook his head. “Let’s not start with Charlie, sweet pea. Let’s start with your first job.”

“Why?” she sniffed.

“Mitsy, I’m going to be honest with you.”

“You knew?” she said sadly.

He shook his head. “No. I never heard anything about it. Whoever covered for you that summer didn’t do either of us a favor.”

“What do you mean, Daddy?”

“I mean that if I had known the facts of what happened, that you did indeed shirk your responsibility for fashion week, I would've fired you.”

“Really?” She brightened up for the first time that evening.

“Yes. Really. Mitsy, Simon tells me you’re a first rate accountant. That your department runs smoothly without a hitch, your close is perfect and on time every month, and that you’ve never missed a deadline. He said you execute your responsibilities flawlessly.”

“Simon said that about me?” she squeaked in surprise.

“Yes. He also said he couldn’t get you to take on additional responsibility, make recommendations or stand up to him when he made unreasonable demands. In fact, he said the only initiative you ever displayed was when you hired Beatrix to look at the division’s security. And then you didn’t support her.”

Mitsy was silent.

William stroked his daughter’s hair, marveling that the beautiful and intelligent creature sitting next to him was something he had a hand in creating.

“When I took over Control & Venture from your Uncle Conrad, it was in terrible shape. For over a year, it was touch and go. At one point, we were six days away from going under and then a big payment from a customer saved us. After that, we were able to sell two of our unprofitable groups and your mother and I never looked back. We reviewed sales reports every morning over breakfast. Even after you were born, your mother would nurse you at the table while we reviewed the flash reports. She’d take you into the office, work until one or two, and then bring you home for the day. She couldn’t bear to turn you over to a nurse or nanny. When you got too big to stay at the office and not be a distraction, she stepped down from some of her duties and stayed home with you.”

He paused and shook his head. “We had a lot of fun, your mother and I. But it was a lot of work.” He took a deep breath. “Mitsy, I’ll never let a family member run Control & Venture into the ground again. We had to split the company into separate divisions to be able to sell those units that were unprofitable and shore up the divisions that remained. My plan was to put it back together, with you and your mother. Both of us wanted you to learn the business from the inside out. We – well no, to be fair it was me – I wanted you to know all the operations, even the most basic.”

Mitsy was quiet. “Why didn’t you ever let me do more?”

“Why didn’t you ever ask?”

“Because – because I thought I was where you needed me, I guess.” Mitsy shook her head. “No, that’s not right. It was because I thought I had to prove something first. I thought that you didn’t have any confidence in me. When the promotions never came, well, then I didn’t have any confidence in me, either.”

William stroked her hair and gave her an apologetic look. “I should’ve listened to your mother.”

“Yes, you should have.” Bitsy spoke from the doorway.

“In all of this, Mitsy – I don’t think your mother’s ever been wrong.”

“Maybe once,” Bitsy smiled.

“When was that?” he asked.

“When I agreed to let you handle things your way,” she laughed. “Are we making progress in here?”

“Yes, we’re making progress in here,” William replied.

“So it’s agreed then. Mitsy’s staying with Control & Venture.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

The father and daughter answered at the same time and then stared at each other.

“Mitsy, I thought you’d stay now that we’ve cleared the air.”

“No, Daddy. I can’t. Simon accepted my resignation, and when he did I agreed to sign a three-year employment contract with Kingston Technology.”

“But I thought you said you hadn’t signed it,” he replied. “You told Charlie that if I wanted you to stay, you would. I do want you to stay, Mitsy, as a divisional president, not as a comptroller.”

“Thank you, Daddy.” She reached out and touched his cheek, giving him a smile. “It’s the job I’ve wanted for years.”

“So we’re all in agreement: you’re staying.”

“No.” Mitsy shook her head. “I may not have signed the contract yet, but I gave my word to Margaret Gaitley. Charlie was right about that. If I’m going to run my own company one day, then the first thing I need to make sure of is this: that people know when Melissa Thornhill gives her word, you can take it to the bank.”

“Okay,” William answered grudgingly. “But in three years, I’m coming after you with a vengeance. You’ll be recruited like the top draft pick in the NFL.”

“Yes, and by that time Kingston will be a force to be reckoned with,” she smiled. “Everyone will be recruiting me like a top draft pick in the NFL.”

The three Thornhills hugged. The tension in the room had dissipated.

“Is anyone here hungry?” Bitsy asked. “I came to tell you two that dinner was ready.”

“I’m starved,” Mitsy declared. “I hope it’s something good.”

“Chicken Piccata,” she answered. “I believe that’s your favorite.”

“There are a couple more things we need to discuss,” William mentioned.

“Can’t they be discussed over dinner?” Bitsy asked, her eyes narrowing at the thought of cold chicken piccata.

“Yes, I suppose,” he replied slowly. “But Mitsy could answer one of them right now.”

“What’s that, Daddy?”

“The murder of Charlie Prescott. Can it wait until after dinner?”