Sarah went pale. “Paternity! Let’s go inside.” She unlocked the door and steered Maggie to the comfortable chair across from her desk. “Now what is this?”
“A woman filed a claim against him in China, saying she has his child.”
“Are you serious? In China?”
“Yes, and because of the agreements between our two countries, this claim can be ruled on in China and collected from there.”
“Collected,” repeated Sarah.
“Generously,” said Maggie.
“What are you going to do?”
“Go there, right away. I have no choice. I’ve never asked you, in twelve years, not even when Matt died, but now I’m going to need a month off.”
“Please! Doll! We run old columns all the time when someone has an emergency. You’re the only one who’s never asked for that. Don’t even worry about it. And a year ago” — Sarah looked at her, eyes soft with unspent empathy — “I told you to take off. Remember? I practically begged you.”
“I know.” Maggie reached over and clasped her friend’s hand. “The truth is, work kept me going. I needed it. I’ve always been like that. I’m stronger when I’m working. I don’t know how I’d ever have made it through without it.” She looked up. “I’m better lately. Just so you know.”
“Good. By the way, your last check came back.” Sarah showed her the envelope. “Do you have a new address?”
“I got a new P.O. box, one closer to where I’m living.”
“Where are you living?”
“In the Marina,” she said, and left it at that.
Sarah wrote down the new mailing address. “Thanks. Anyway, of course you can go, take a month off, we’ll use an old piece. Don’t even think about it. Maybe it’ll be good for you, actually. You should make the best of it. Recharge.”
Maggie spoke carefully. “Do you feel I need to recharge?”
“No. No, it’s not that, it’s just . . .” Sarah paused, caught between friendship and responsibility. “Lately you don’t seem that excited about food. You must have noticed it too. I don’t get the old sense of wonder.”
I don’t either, Maggie thought sadly. “In which stories did that bother you?”
“Well. The one on the Pennsylvania Dutch. Couldn’t you have found anything charming about them?”
“You’re talking about people whose principal contribution to cuisine is the pretzel. Who make perfect strangers sit at a table and share fried chicken. Whose idea of a vegetable is a sliced tomato. And don’t get me started on their pie!”
Sarah smiled. “See, you’re as wonderful as ever. Just go off like that. Let yourself go.”
Maggie laughed.
“And don’t forget that part, too. You always found the happiness in food.”
“I’ll try.”
But now Sarah’s small smile melted, and concern took its place. “Do you think — there’s no possibility this is true, is there?”
“You mean Matt? I have no idea. Did he tell me anything or lead me in any way to think anything? No. He went to China on business sometimes, but so did all the lawyers in his office.”
“You went there with him.”
“I did, once, for a week. Three years ago. Nothing. And you know me. I am watchful. Being attentive is the way I write, and it spills over. I sensed nothing. But this, if it happened, would have been a few years before that. I can’t think like this, Sarah, is the truth; I’ll go crazy. I have to go and get a lab test, and that’s that. Then on from there.”
“It’s going to be a difficult trip,” Sarah said, now as her friend.
Maggie nodded. “And just when I was getting the guy kind of settled in my mind, you know? And in my heart. Plus, to be honest, Sarah, even though it’s necessary and all, it’s not really a good thing for me not to be working, even for one month. I perform better at everything when I’m working.”
“Are you saying you’d rather work?” said Sarah.
“Of course I’d rather work, but I can’t. I have to go there and see to this.”
Now a new smile, different, the impish smile of an idea, was playing on Sarah’s face. “Would you like to work while you’re in China?”
Maggie stared. She wrote only about American food. “How?”
“File a column from there. We can run an old one — I already told you, it’s no problem, you have some classics I’d love to see again — but we also have an assignment in China. It just came in. I can give it to anyone, in which case I’d have to send someone. Or I