She smiled. "I've always wanted to drive along the coast in a car that doesn't make a new noise every fifty miles."
"The old station wagon only made the noise on hills," he protested.
"And the entire coast has hills, Walter."
Michael laughed. He looked at Emily and said, "I think we have our answer. If the car passes an independent mechanical inspection and the paperwork confirms its provenance and condition, I'd like to move forward with the purchase. Full asking price, subject to the usual documentation. My parents will make the final decision after the inspection."
Emily blinked. She had processed expensive transactions before, but never one of this size. The instruction did not arrive as a theatrical gesture thrown at John's empty desk. It arrived at the end of a real conversation about a car the couple genuinely loved. That difference mattered to her. She opened a notepad and asked whether Michael wanted to arrange the technical inspection through the gallery's independent specialist or appoint one of his own.
"Both parties should be comfortable with the inspector," Michael replied. "You can send me the documentation options."
She thanked him and took the steps required to begin a legitimate sale. Arthur watched from a distance, increasingly aware of how close the gallery had come to losing not only a major transaction but its moral credibility. He was tempted to congratulate himself for recovering the relationship. Then he remembered that the relationship had been recovered by the employee he had reprimanded the day before. The realization made him stop before saying something foolish.
Michael asked Emily to join them near the sitting area when the preliminary documents were prepared. Eleanor insisted she sit rather than stand beside them like an attendant. Michael thanked her again for treating his parents with kindness, and Walter added that her answers had been more useful than several conversations he had had with sales professionals over the years. Emily felt her cheeks warm and tried to redirect the praise toward the gallery's product training.
"You did the work," Michael said gently. "You don't need to pretend otherwise."
He then addressed Arthur. "The sales agreement should reflect Emily as the associate responsible for this transaction. I want the commission credited to her under the gallery's normal compensation arrangements. I don't want part of it shifted to anyone who didn't serve my parents. Is that possible?"
Arthur replied that it was, subject to written documentation and normal internal approval. The commission on a completed sale of that size would be substantial, even after the gallery accounted for its consignment obligations and business costs. Emily understood enough about the numbers to feel almost dizzy. She also knew that the transaction had not closed yet. Michael's willingness to buy was genuine, but a responsible professional did not treat a promised sale as completed revenue until the agreement was properly executed and the inspection conditions met.
"Mr. Bennett," she said, "that's very generous, but I don't want this to become a reward for what happened yesterday. I want to earn the sale by doing my job properly."