Within Reach Read Online Free PDF Page B

coward.”
    “A coward? No, no, darling. You simply set higher standards for yourself.”
    “Daddy set higher standards for me, you mean.” She rolled her eyes. “I was so innocent that if I’d tried the smallest thing, I’d surely have been caught, and if I’d ever been caught, Daddy never would have forgiven me.” Her smile faded. “It was bad enough giving up tennis. He doesn’t ever mention that now, does he?”
    “He goes to matches whenever he can. You know he’s always loved the game. But, no, he doesn’t sit there fantasizing that it’s you on the court. He accepts things when he has no choice.”
    Danica idly pushed a forkful of crabmeat around her plate. “I’m sorry that it didn’t work out. He would have been proud if I’d been able to make it.”
    “Are you sorry it didn’t work out?”
    “In terms of the game, no. I just didn’t possess that all-fire determination it took to be number one, at least not in that field. And besides,” she sighed, “it’s over and done. Maybe I’m like Daddy in that respect. I’ve accepted the fact that I’ll never make it to center court at Wimbledon.…Strange to be talking this way ten years after the fact.”
    Not at all strange, she realized, though sad. There were many things she had never discussed with her mother, because Eleanor Marshall was first and foremost William Marshall’s wife. That Eleanor had a daughter—that William had a daughter—had always seemed incidental.
    “By the way,” Eleanor went on, “I understand that your friend Reggie was given a run for her money at the Virginia Slims tournament in New York.”
    “How did you know that?”
    “Your father was reading an article about young Aaron, uh, Aaron—”
    “Krickstein.”
    “Thank you, darling. Anyway, he was reading that article and the other headline caught my eye. Have you heard from her lately?”
    “We had lunch together last Saturday.”
    “You did! But I thought she was going on to Florida with the rest of the tour.”
    “They do have time between tournaments, Mom. Reggie was visiting someone here. Actually, she was thinking of skipping Florida altogether.”
    “Can she do that? Doesn’t she have a commitment to the sponsors?”
    “Commitments only go so far. If a player is injured, she doesn’t play. In Reggie’s case, she’s mentally exhausted. One season finished and the next began on its heels, and she needs a break.”
    “From what I read I can understand it. She won by the skin of her teeth. That kind of thing has to be exhausting, both physically and mentally.” Eleanor arched a brow. “Maybe while she’s here she’ll get you to play.”
    “She has other things on her mind.”
    “But I’m sure she’d love to play with you.”
    “I’m not playing. You know that.”
    “Mmmm, and I feel badly. You were good , darling. There was no reason why you had to give it up completely just because you couldn’t be number one.”
    “You make me sound juvenile.”
    “Well, aren’t you carrying it a little too far?”
    “No.”
    “Darling, you were the fourth ranked player in this country—in this country —when you were sixteen. That was a feat that took quite some doing. And now nothing. How long has it been since you held a racket in your hand?”
    Danica met her mother’s gaze. “The last time I held a racket was on Saturday, June 2nd, three days before my eighteenth birthday.”
    “You see?” Eleanor exclaimed. “It’s been ten years! Isn’t that a little silly?”
    “Not to me. I’d had it with tennis.”
    “Your shoulder was injured.”
    “It was much more than that,” Danica argued softly. “We discussed it at the time, Mother—Armand and I, you and Daddy and Armand. I wasn’t happy. I didn’t want to play. My shoulder would have healed enough to continue, but I just wasn’t interested.” She counted to five. She was sure that if she and her mother were to get into a similar discussion in a week or a month, Eleanor