Annie (10 page)

“Oh, good,” said Miss Hannigan, relieved. “For a moment there I thought—”

“No,” Miss Farrell happily interrupted, “she's going to be the daughter of a billionaire.

“A billionaire,” repeated Miss Hannigan, shaking her head in disbelief.

“And so I've dropped by here today, in person, to tell you that Annie won't be coming back here to the orphanage,” Miss Farrell went on. “Ever.”

“Ever,” Miss Hannigan said. “My, my, my, my.” Miss Hannigan got to her feet uncertainly. “Would you excuse me for a minute, please?”

“Of course,” replied Miss Farrell, grinning to herself as Miss Hannigan stepped out of the office, closed the door behind her, and went into the front hallway. From the office, Miss Farrell now heard Miss Hannigan let out the longest and loudest scream she'd ever heard. It was a scream of envy and frustration and rage that Annie had not only gotten away from her but was also about to become the richest child in the world. After a few moments, pulling herself together, Miss Hannigan came calmly back into the office and sat down again behind her desk. She stared glassy-eyed at Miss Farrell. “You got any more wonderful news for me?” she asked.

“No, I believe that's all the wonderful news for today,” said Miss Farrell, snapping shut her briefcase and rising. “So good day, Miss Hannigan.”

“Yeah, good day,” mumbled Miss Hannigan.

“Oh, and Merry Christmas,” added Miss Farrell.

“Yeah, Merry Christmas,” Miss Hannigan muttered. The minute that Miss Farrell left her office, she took out her pint of whiskey and finished it off in one long swig.

• • •

Outside in the hallway, as she was walking from the office toward the front door, Miss Farrell bumped into a tall, unshaven, hatchet-faced man in a battered tan fedora and a shabby brown pinstriped suit. With him was a heavily made-up, bleached-blonde woman of about twenty-five in a ratty fox-fur coat. “Oops, pardon me, blondie,” the man said with a wink at Miss Farrell. And then, as though attempting to be funny, he flapped his arms and loudly crowed like a rooster. Miss Farrell looked at the man and the woman with horror and quickly made her way out to Mr. Warbucks's waiting limousine.

As the limousine drove off down St. Mark's Place, a man shoved open Miss Hannigan's office door and sidled into the room. A cigarette dangled from one corner of his mouth, and his narrow dark eyes were hard and cruel-looking. “Hiya, sis,” he said to Miss Hannigan in a smooth, oily voice. “Long time no see.”

“Rooster? Oh, my God, it never rains but it pours,” said Miss Hannigan as she got up with a sigh from her desk. The man was her younger brother, Rooster Hannigan, whom she hadn't seen in years. The last she'd heard of him, he was serving a jail sentence up the Hudson River, in Sing Sing. “They finally let you outta the Big House?”

“Yeah, I got six months off for good behavior,” bragged Rooster.

“I'll bet—what were you in for this time?” asked Miss Hannigan. Rooster had been in jail off and on since he was fourteen years old, when he'd been picked up for robbing a delicatessen on lower Second Avenue. He was forty-three now, and a confirmed criminal who made a marginal living for himself by pretending to be a stockbroker and selling phony gold-mining certificates to gullible victims, mainly aged widows.

“Aw, some dumb old dame from Yonkers claimed I swindled her outta eleven hundred bucks,” grumbled Rooster.

“Oh, yeah, and why'd she say that?” Miss Hannigan asked.

“Because Rooster swindled her outta eleven hundred bucks,” drawled a bleached-blonde young woman who now swivel-hipped in the door behind Rooster. Miss Hannigan disdainfully looked her up and down. I should have known, she thought, Rooster never turns up anywhere without some cheap floozy in tow.

“Ah, Lily,” said Rooster. “Sis, I'd like you to meet a friend of mine from, uh . . .”

“Jersey City,” supplied Lily.

“Oh, yeah, Jersey City,” said Rooster. “Miss Lily St. Regis.”

Lily wriggled across the room, plumped down in the chair next to Miss Hannigan's desk, and crossed her legs. “I'm named after the hotel,” she explained in a deep, throaty voice, sounding like a bad imitation of Mae West.

Miss Hannigan scowled at Lily with undisguised hatred in her eyes. “Which floor?” she asked sarcastically.

“Don't you just love Lily, sis?” said Rooster. He could see that the two women clearly loathed each other at first sight.

“Yeah, I'm nuts about her,” Miss Hannigan spat out. “Rooster, do me a favor—get outta here and take the St. Regis with you.”

“Aw, c'mon, Sis, give me a break,” Rooster begged.

“Can it,” Miss Hannigan snarled. “Lookin' for another handout, huh?”

“Nah, I got eighty bucks comin' in the mail Thursday,” Rooster lied. “So's all I need is ten bucks to tide me over. I'll pay you back Friday, double, twenty bucks.”

“Uh-uh,” said Miss Hannigan. “Not even a nickel for the subway, Rooster.”

“Five bucks, Aggie,” pleaded Rooster.

“Ha, I gotta laugh,” chuckled Miss Hannigan. “Five bucks. You, with all your big deals and big talk. You was gonna be livin' in clover.”

“Oh, yeah, what about you?” Rooster retorted. “This place ain't exactly Buckingham Palace.”

“Oh, yeah, I'm on the city,” Miss Hannigan answered defensively. “Steady salary, free eats, free room, free gas and electric. I'm doin' all right.”

“Sis, let's face it,” said Rooster, putting his arm about his sister's shoulder, “you're doin' like I'm doin'.”

“Lousy,” Lily suddenly spoke up.

“Aw, Aggie, how'd the two Hannigan kids ever end up like this?” Rooster asked. “On the skids.”

“Me on the skids, no way, I'm doin' okay,” Miss Hannigan insisted, unwilling to admit that her life was empty and bitter. But Miss Hannigan and her brother had never had much of a chance in life. They'd grown up in a fifth-floor tenement on Rivington Street, on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Their mother had been a drunkard who'd spent most of her days sitting glassy-eyed in saloons, and their father had been a small-time gambler who'd been in constant trouble with the police. Both parents had died when the children were teenagers. Rooster had gone off to jail, and for a time young Agatha Hannigan had made a living for herself as a clerk in a grocery store. And then, when she was twenty-three, she'd had a piece of good luck. Her mother's older brother, Uncle Joe, was a member of Tammany, the Democratic political club that ran New York in those days, and for a hundred-dollar bribe, Uncle Joe used his influence at City Hall to get Miss Hannigan the job as headmistress of the orphanage. And she'd had the job now for more than twenty-five years.

Having had no luck in borrowing money from his sister, Rooster now quickly tried to figure out another way to get his hands on some cash. “Say, Aggie,” he asked, “who was the blondie I bumped into when I came in here? She looked like she had a couple of bucks she might want to lend to a nice guy like me.”

“She works for Oliver Warbucks,” Miss Hannigan told him.

“Oliver Warbucks?” Lily asked in astonishment. “The millionaire?”

“No, the billionaire,” Miss Hannigan coolly replied. “You dumb . . . hotel. She works for him in his mansion up on Fifth Avenue.”

“Fifth Avenue?” said Rooster with a scornful laugh. “He don't live on Fifth Avenue.”

“He don't?” asked Miss Hannigan with surprise. “Where does he live?”

“On Easy Street,” answered Rooster, his eyes narrowing with envy, “where all of the rich guys live—sleep 'til noon, clip coupons, and never do a lick of work. And Easy Street, sis, that's where yours truly, Daniel Francis Hannigan, is headed.”

“Yeah, I'll bet,” Miss Hannigan scoffed.

“So, sis, what was that dame doin' here?” Rooster asked.

“Bringin' me the wonderful news that one of the orphans from here, Annie—oh, God, how I hate that miserable kid—is gettin' adopted by Warbucks,” said Miss Hannigan bitterly. “She's gonna have everything. That rotten orphan is gonna have everything.”

“Crummy orphan, livin' in the lap of luxury, it ain't fair,” said Lily.

“No, it ain't fair,” Rooster agreed. “But listen, sis, if an orphan from here is that close to big-time dough, there's gotta be a way we can cut ourselves in for a piece of it.”

“Yeah, sure, but how?” asked Miss Hannigan.

“I don't know . . . yet,” replied Rooster with a sinister grin. “But there's gotta be a way. Gotta be. And I'll think of one. Even if we have to, you know, kidnap this Annie and knock her off.”

Now, Miss Hannigan, Rooster, and Lily huddled together, whispering, trying to come up with a plan to make themselves money out of Annie's involvement with Oliver Warbucks. And although Annie had no way of knowing it as she splashed around in Mr. Warbucks's pool, her life was suddenly and frighteningly in danger.

L
ater that afternoon, in his Fifth Avenue mansion, Mr. Warbucks was talking on the telephone with President Roosevelt in Washington when Miss Farrell came into his oak-paneled study to report on her progress in arranging for Annie's adoption. He was holding the telephone away from his ear, because President Roosevelt seemed to be doing all the talking. “Yakety yakety yak,” whispered Mr. Warbucks to Miss Farrell as President Roosevelt talked on and on.

“Yes . . . yes, Mr. President,” said Mr. Warbucks into the phone, at last getting a chance to speak, “I'll grant you that Barney Baruch and I are not exactly standing in breadlines. Yet . . . no, I'm not asking for your help! I've never asked for any man's help and I never will!” Mr. Warbucks was furious at President Roosevelt's suggestion that Oliver Warbucks would ask for anyone's help, for he took immense pride in being a self-made man who had battled his way to the top entirely on his own. “Listen, Mr. President,” Mr. Warbucks heatedly went on, “I'm telling you that you've got to do something about what's going on in this country, and do it damn fast! All right, we'll talk about it further when I come down to the White House on Wednesday.” Miss Farrell whispered to Mr. Warbucks that he should perhaps be a little friendlier to the president. Mr. Warbucks shrugged, sighed, and then said into the phone, “I'll tell you, Mr. President, why don't the two of us bury the hatchet? And you come here for supper on Christmas Eve on your way to Hyde Park. Wonderful. Good-bye, Mr. President.”

Mr. Warbucks hung up the phone and frowned. “If I'd thought he was going to say yes I never would have asked him,” he complained. “Grace, find out what Democrats eat.”

“Yes, sir,” nodded Miss Farrell.

“Oh, and take a note,” Mr. Warbucks added. “Wednesday morning, at eleven a.m., I have a meeting at the White House with President Roosevelt and his Cabinet.”

“Yes, sir,” said Miss Farrell, handing him the adoption papers that his lawyers had drawn up and explaining that the signed release from the orphanage would be placed on file at the Board of Orphans the following morning. “Everything is in order, sir,” she went on. “There's nothing standing in the way now of your adopting Annie—these papers simply have to be signed by you and a judge, and she's legally your daughter.”

“Good,” Mr. Warbucks said. “Good work, Grace. Now, has the package from Tiffany's arrived yet?”

“Yes, sir,” answered Miss Farrell, handing him a small package wrapped in blue-green paper and tied with a red ribbon. “It came just a few minutes ago.”

“Good,” said Mr. Warbucks, nervously hefting the package in his hands. “I'm going to give her this thing and then tell her that I want to adopt her. Where is Annie?”

“She's in her bedroom, sir, writing another letter to her friends at the orphanage,” Miss Farrell said. “I'll go get her.”

“Fine,” murmured Mr. Warbucks, suddenly looking shaky and unsure of himself, not at all like one of the most powerful men in America. “Damn, what's come over me?”

“You don't have to be nervous, sir,” soothed Miss Farrell. Tears glistened in her eyes, for she was moved to see her coldhearted employer looking so vulnerable and uncertain. For years, Miss Farrell had been secretly in love with Mr. Warbucks and had always sensed that, beneath his tough exterior, he was a warm and kind man. And she wanted to weep with joy now at the discovery that what she'd always felt about him was really true. “Annie is going to be the happiest little girl in the world when you tell her the news,” she sang out.

“You're damn right she is,” growled Mr. Warbucks, returning to his usual gruff manner, “and I'm not nervous. Now get her in here.”

“Yes, sir,” said Miss Farrell with a smile, and a minute later she led Annie, who was wearing a pale-blue velvet dress and white patent-leather shoes, into the study. “I'll . . . I'll leave you two alone,” said Miss Farrell, stepping from the study and closing the door behind her.

“Hello, Annie, how are you this afternoon?” Mr. Warbucks asked cheerfully.

“Fine, thank you,” Annie replied nervously. She wasn't exactly sure what Mr. Warbucks wanted to see her about, but she was certain that it was something bad. It had never been good news when she'd been called into Miss Hannigan's office at the orphanage. “How are you, sir?”

“Fine,” Mr. Warbucks answered, “fine.” With his hands trembling slightly, Mr. Warbucks picked up the adoption papers from his desk. “Annie,” he began, “the time has come for the two of us to have a very serious discussion.”

“Oh, it's okay, you're sending me back to the orphanage before Christmas, right?” asked Annie.

“Of course not,” Mr. Warbucks assured her, taken aback that she'd even think such a thing. “Annie, can we have a man-to-man talk?”

“Sure,” said Annie, taking a seat in a large brown leather chair next to Mr. Warbucks's mahogany desk.

“Annie, before we go any further, I think you should know a few things about me,” said Mr. Warbucks, nervously clearing his throat and beginning to pace about as he spoke. “I was born into a very poor family in what they call Hell's Kitchen, right here in New York. Both of my parents died before I was ten. And I made a promise to myself—someday, one way or another, I was going to be rich. Very rich.”

“That was a good idea,” Annie gravely observed.

“By the time I was twenty-three I'd made my first million,” Mr. Warbucks went on. “Then, in ten years, I turned that million into a hundred million dollars.” Mr. Warbucks stopped, shook his head, and sighed at the memory of the vast fortune he'd amassed at so young an age. “And in those days that was a lot of money,” he continued. “Anyway, making money is all I've ever given a damn about. And I might as well tell you, Annie, I was ruthless to those I had to climb over to get to the top. Because I've always believed one thing: you don't have to be nice to the people you meet on the way up if you're not coming back down again. But lately, since you came to stay here, I've realized something. No matter how many Rembrandts or Rolls-Royces you've got, if you have no one to share your life with, if you're alone, then you might as well be broke and back in Hell's Kitchen. Annie, do you understand what I'm trying to say?”

“Sure,” chirped Annie, who in fact wasn't sure at all.

“Good,” said Mr. Warbucks.

“Kind of,” Annie said hesitantly.

“Kind of?” asked Mr. Warbucks.

“Damn!” Mr. Warbucks exclaimed. It had been truly difficult for him to bare his most private feelings to Annie, and now all that he'd said had come to nothing. He looked around, spied the package from Tiffany's on his desk, and picked it up. “I was in Tiffany's yesterday and picked up this thing for you,” he said, handing the package to Annie. “I had it engraved.”

“For me?” asked Annie, unwrapping the small package. “Gee, thanks, Mr. Warbucks. You're so nice to me all of the time.” Annie opened the Tiffany box and saw that it contained a silver locket. “Oh, gee,” she said in a small voice, obviously unhappy about the present.

“It's a silver locket, Annie,” Mr. Warbucks explained. “I noticed that old, broken one you always wear, and I said to myself, I'm going to get that kid a nice shiny new locket.”

“Gee, thanks, Mr. Warbucks,” said Annie, trying to sound pleased about the gift but not succeeding very well. “Thank you very much.”

Mr. Warbucks stepped around behind Annie and reached for the clasp of her old locket. “Here,” he said. “we'll just take this old one off and—”

“No!” cried Annie, leaping to her feet and backing away from Mr. Warbucks. “Please, don't make me take my locket off. I don't want a new one!”

“Annie, what is it?” asked Mr. Warbucks, stunned by her unexpected reaction to his gift.

“This locket,” began Annie, fingering the cherished locket that she'd worn all her life, “my mom and dad left it with me when . . . when they left me at the orphanage.” She was struggling not to cry. “And there was a note, too! They're comin' back for me. And, oh, I know I'm real lucky, bein' here with you for Christmas, but . . .” Tears began to stream down Annie's cheeks, and for the first time that she could ever remember, she was crying. “But . . . I don't know how to say it,” Annie went on, sobbing, her face wet with tears, “the one thing I want in all the world . . . more than anything else, is to find my mother and father. And to be like other kids, with folks of my own!”

From the next room, Miss Farrell had heard Annie shouting and crying, and now, as she came into the study to investigate, Annie went running to her and, sobbing, buried herself in Miss Farrell's arms.

“Annie . . . Annie, it'll be all right,” said Mr. Warbucks, dazed and nearly heartbroken to discover that Annie preferred her unknown parents to him. “I'll find them for you. I'll find your parents for you.”

“Shh, shh, baby, it's going to be all right,” said Miss Farrell consolingly. She held Annie tightly in her arms and stroked the child's hair as Annie continued to cry and cry.

Mr. Warbucks, feeling foolish and unwanted, stood helplessly in the middle of the room. “I'll . . . I'll get her a brandy,” he murmured, and rushed out of the room with a glint of tears in his eyes.

After several minutes, Annie at last stopped crying. She stepped away from Miss Farrell, rubbed her tear-reddened eyes, and sadly smiled. “I'm sorry,” she said.

“There's nothing to be sorry about, dear—you're allowed to cry, too, like other children,” said Miss Farrell. “But from now on you'll have nothing to cry about. Because Mr. Warbucks will find your mother and father. I promise. If he has to put everyone in his organization on the job. If he has to pull every political string there is to pull. Up to and including the White House!”

“Gee whiz,” exclaimed Annie in a sudden change of mood, “he's sure a powerful man.”

“He sure is,” said Miss Farrell with a smile.

Meanwhile, in his bedroom, having thought better of bringing Annie a brandy and having instead himself downed a shot of brandy, Mr. Warbucks was already on the phone to Washington, to J. Edgar Hoover, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. “J. Edgar, this is Warbucks speaking,” Mr. Warbucks said with authority into the phone. “For a special project of mine, to find the lost parents of a young New York girl, I want fifty of your best G-men . . . For a day, a week, months. For however long it will take to do the job. Put them on vacation and I'll pay the costs. No matter how much . . . Fine. When can I have them? . . . Tomorrow morning. Good. Oh, and J. Edgar, I want Eliot Ness . . . What? Well, just take him off the Dillinger case!”

With that, Mr. Warbucks hung up the phone on the F.B.I. director and, once again in command of himself, strode back to his study and stood towering over Annie. “Annie,” he ordered, “give me your locket.”

“But Mr. Warbucks,” Annie hesitated, “I just told you that—”

“I understand,” Mr. Warbucks told her. “But it could be our best clue. We'll hand it over to the F.B.I. and they'll trace where it was bought. And then find out who bought it.”

“Okay,” agreed Annie, reluctantly taking off the locket and handing it to Mr. Warbucks. She thought for a moment and then reached into her pocket and took out her note, which, like the locket, she had with her always. “And maybe they should have my note, too,” added Annie, handing the note to Mr. Warbucks.

“Yes, a good idea,” Mr. Warbucks said. “You watch, Annie, I'm going to mount a coast-to-coast search for your parents the likes of which has never been seen before. If we have to, we'll check on every husband and wife in America. And we'll find them. In fact, Annie, you may be meeting your mother and father within a couple of days.”

“Really?” asked Annie.

“Really,” said Mr. Warbucks.

“Oh, boy!” cried Annie happily. “I gotta go write a letter to the kids at the orphanage about this!” And she went dashing off to her bedroom. Mr. Warbucks motioned for Miss Farrell to go, and she, too, went from the room, leaving him standing alone in his study. He picked up the adoption papers from his desk and flung them to the floor. Then he sat wearily down at his desk. “Well, that's it,” he said to himself with a sigh. “I'll find her mother and father for Annie and lose her for myself.” And, with that, Oliver Warbucks put his head down on his desk and wept.