A Lady of Good Family (15 page)

Miss Jekyll has grown fat. (Please do not show this letter to anybody. I write freely when I write to you, but others might harshly judge, and rightly so, my lack of charity.) She has the mannerisms of one who no longer seeks to charm. She slurps her tea and chews cake hurriedly, as if eager to be elsewhere. Indeed, we almost took our tea standing, so rushed was she. When she walks her head juts forward like a
laborer’s, and her very round cheeks shake like a blancmange being carried to table.

Oh, but her garden! I had been warned by Mr. Strachey that Miss Jekyll did not like to speak to strangers of her earlier artistic efforts, before she began this garden. As a young woman, Miss Jekyll had been a painter, and one of considerable talent, had been the general consensus. But eye trouble had forced her to give up close work in order to preserve what was left of her failing sight. That was when she began gardening. Daisy, I remember that night at the fair, when my voice failed, that terrible sense of betrayal by one’s own body. It does seem telling that both Miss Jekyll and myself, disappointed in other arts, turned to gardening. I never think of it as a second best, but as my true course in life, found after other experiments failed, and I’m certain she does as well. “A living painting,” she called her garden. Her garden is a delight. No other word will do.

In it, the artist has come back to life. There is such a miracle of color, such a temptation of texture, such a delight of shape! No oil canvas could have created the majestic delight she has constructed here at Munstead. In this garden the viewer does not stand before the art, as one does in a gallery, but in it, surrounded by joy.

Miss Jekyll currently lives in a newly built
and temporary house she calls a “hut,” designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, since she and her mother have decided to live apart, and the mother, of course, occupies Munstead House.

“After Mother is gone, the house will go to my brother, Jekyll,” she told me, a touch of acid in her voice. “I need my own home. Do you have a brother, Miss Jones?”

When I answered in the negative, I thought I saw a glimmer of jealousy.

The hut is a sweet little cottage, and the tenement dwellers of the Lower East Side would think themselves deceased and in heaven to occupy such a place, but Miss Jekyll eagerly awaits the completion of her own house. It is being designed to suit her own needs: windows will minimize light to avoid the pain that glare causes her; passages will be wide, and there will be a sheltered place to sit in the courtyard; all the cupboards are to have glass doors so she can admire her collections.

“My house is to have an overhanging gallery, somewhat like a cloister,” she said, and there was a twinkle in her eye. “Single women belong in a convent, or a house that reminds one of the convent, don’t you think, Miss Jones?”

“Not at all,” I said, knowing that I was being tested. “Marriage is no requirement for a fully lived life.”

We paused as she plucked a beetle from a vine and crushed it between her fingers. “A garden is not for the squeamish,” she said.

But Daisy, it is when Miss Jekyll speaks of gardens that she comes to brilliant life. She seems young again when she talks of plans for borders of pansy, fern, and geranium, of lily ponds and orangeries, and woodland trails she calls “road poems.” Her eyes shine.

Her garden is still young, but she has designed it brilliantly, so that every time a corner is turned, a curving path followed, the eye is delighted anew. The lilies were blooming during my visit, and I saw she had planted them so that, during blossom time, they would be surrounded by greenery, not other flowers.

“It is a great mistake in the garden to plant so that different flowers bloom at the same time,” she instructed me. “They must be situated to their own best advantage; otherwise, you end up with a busy hodgepodge of color and shape and fragrance, like a disordered closet.”

I pretended to jot this down in my notebook, but I had already come to that conclusion myself. Gardens fail when people expect too much of them.

“You have just come from Italy, I understand,” Miss Jekyll said to me, poking at a weed with her
walking stick. “It is disconcerting, isn’t it? All those straight lines. Too much geometry and not enough nature. And some of the villa gardens haven’t a single posy in them. They are all box hedge and stone walls and fantastic fountains. Avoid straight lines, Miss Jones. They do a garden much harm. Color. That’s what a garden needs. And a sense of mystery rather than grandeur.”

“I agree,” I said. “They should be a place where children can play.”

“And where young women can fall in love.”

I must have blushed.

“Oh, dear,” she said, smiling. “Italy has much to answer for, hasn’t it? Is he a penniless nobleman?”

“You are mistaken,” I said.

The Surrey soil, I was delighted to find, has much in common with our own soil at Bar Harbor, and Miss Jekyll grows many of the plants I grow in my Reef Point garden, ferns and whortleberry, hosta and delphinium. The blues she achieves in her garden are magnificent, not faded or anemic but as bright as the Madonna’s robes in a medieval altarpiece.

When I described this to Mother later she raised an eyebrow. She worries that Rome has softened me toward papist viewpoints; Rome, or my friend there.

He was on his way to Paris. Daisy, have you heard anything of him? My mail has not yet reached London.

The meeting with Miss Jekyll was informative, but not a great success, I fear. It was that initial impression we shared of each other, for as I found her old and unattractive in a decidedly spinsterish way, she must have found me overyoung, perhaps flighty. We parted as fellow gardeners, but not as friends. It would greatly surprise me if she wrote to me, as she promised.

Mother and I returned to London, a little weary, a little anxious. We go to Scotland next, but after that . . . Paris. Father, the lawyers, the divorce. I will have to be very attentive to Mother, for she will surely be in low spirits. There will be no time for leisurely walks.

If you hear anything of him, be sure and write me, Daisy.

Be well, dearest friend. I remain your own,

Beatrix

•   •   •   •

Dearest Beatrix,

I have had no news of Amerigo Massimo, but Mrs. Haskett leaves her card almost daily. So far, I have ignored her. The children are well, though Athena had a slight fever for a day or two.

Mr. Winters and I are not on the best of terms at the moment. Yes, it is the old problem. When you are in Scotland, you might ask your uncle for advice on my behalf.

Always your loving friend,
Daisy

I
n August, there was a great migration of English folk and their visitors to the north, to the Highlands. After visiting London and Surrey, Minnie and Beatrix joined this migration. They took the overnighter to Scotland and then a local coach to Loch Earn. They spent a few days hiking and golfing, and then continued on to Millden Lodge in the lovely, wild heather–scented Glen Esk, where Minnie’s cousin, the famous New York lawyer John Lambert Cadwalader, rented a shooting lodge for the season.

Ever since Minnie’s husband had abandoned the marital home and relationship, John Cadwalader had been her adviser, and guardian to Beatrix. It was Mr. Cadwalader who had declared, years before, that Beatrix had the intelligence and temperament to make a success of whatever she wanted to do with her life. He had meant it, and even the very young Beatrix knew that such praise was not to be dismissed as mere flattery.

Mr. Cadwalader was a bachelor, one of those elderly
gentlemen who appeared never to have been young or reckless. I had met him only once but felt an instant respect for him. He had fine white hair, a high-bridged nose, curling white mustaches, and a habit of thinking long and hard before answering even the simplest of questions. I wondered what Beatrix would tell him, and what he would say.

•   •   •   •

“L
ovely weather,” Beatrix wrote in her next letter. “Spending days and days roaming over the moors or following the guns in the field. The house is full of a hunting party, most of the male persuasion, stomping around on the gravel, torsos crisscrossed with hunting bag straps, unloading rifles.”

I had thought in Scotland he would seem quite distant. This place is as far from Rome and its moods as I could imagine. The only ruin is the old gatekeeper’s cottage, and there are no fountains but natural springs, no topiaries or other forced contrivances, only wild meadows and forests. Yet Amerigo still seems with me, somehow. That day in the catacombs, in Rome. I thought he was there, that he had somehow followed us. I saw something, Daisy. Something that, even as I saw it, I knew it wasn’t real. Yet there it was. A shadow, a form, and it was him, as if a part of him had left his body and stayed with me.

Perhaps it was astral projection. I read about
it in theosophist tracts from Madame Blavatsky. Projection is probably no stranger than seed germination, which is the most wondrous miracle I can think of. But why would such a thing happen? I do not know him well. Despite that, he has rooted in my mind. He grows there, steadily. The acorn will be an oak soon, and I will never be rid of him. What do I wish? To be free. To continue to be free. To pursue the path I have chosen. Yet there he is, standing before me, on that path. What do you think of his smile, Daisy? You saw him there, at Mrs. Haskett’s soiree in Berlin. It is a good smile, isn’t it?

Uncle says under no conditions are you to leave Mr. Winters. If you do, you will lose the children. He has made inquiries through his banker and various friends in London and Paris. He believes you should ask Mr. Winters to deed the New York house to you. He has lost a considerable amount, and to keep the children safe you should own property outright. Will he agree to this?

Daisy, I have become sunburnt, and somehow fond of both boiled oats and overcooked venison. It is almost as if each landscape creates of us a different person. Yesterday I was on Black Moss moor, flat on my back and looking up at the clouds, finding cows and sailing ships in their
ever-changing shapes. Imagine me thus in the Borghese gardens. I would have been carted away to an asylum for loose women.

If the landscape creates the person, and in a garden the person creates the landscape, then it is to be considered a true relationship, not only a pastime.

Dearest Daisy, all will be sorted out properly. I feel it. Both for you and me. Be brave, and believe and trust your loving friend,

Beatrix

Mr. Winters had taken me to Monaco for our honeymoon. On our first evening there he had, for the first time, approached a gaming table. “Amusing,” he had said after an hour. The next afternoon, he had sat for two hours. And every day after that, till we returned home, poorer than when we had left.

My husband was by nature of a generous disposition, despite the early training of his aunts in Switzerland, who counted the sugar cubes as you put them into your tea. But to deed property? It didn’t matter that we had purchased the Fifth Avenue house with money from my trust. A wife did not financially separate herself in this way.

But I would. For the children. A woman should possess her own little corner of the world, I thought. Else she is little more than a servant in her own home, unprotected from any disaster. I had chosen Gilbert for my husband, and looking back on my marriage it seemed that had been the last choice I had been
allowed to make, that I was excluded from all serious discussion about finances or politics. Whenever Gilbert and his male friends wished to discuss William McKinley, or the Dreyfus affair, or coal miner strikes in Pennsylvania, or the failures of some of their investments because of the depressed economy, they did so behind closed doors. I and the other women, left behind in the drawing room, spoke of fashions and children.

We were legally not much better off than children. How could we be, since we had no say in the running of our households and certainly no say in the running of our country?

I had six children and a husband who could no longer control his gambling. I would own, at least, the house purchased with my father’s money.

Mr. Winters balked at the proposed arrangement and then sulked. He did not approve that I had spoken of our financial situation to Beatrix and Minnie, that they had in turn spoken of his gambling losses to Mr. Cadwalader.

“Unheard of,” he said, turning white and pushing away his plate. The maid who had been serving a dessert of peaches and cream backed out of the room, sensing the storm to come.

“But, Gilbert, many wives own property,” I protested.

“No,” he said, banging his fist on the table. He repented of that. A gentleman does not show temper. “We will discuss it no longer,” he said more quietly.

Mr. Cadwalader sent other letters to his lawyer, my bank, and my husband. I have no idea what was in these letters—a touch of blackmail, the threat of scandal—but they achieved their mission. Mr. Winters finally agreed to deed the Fifth
Avenue house in my name, on condition that he would still manage my financial affairs. Fair enough, I thought. What husband would give up that right? What wife would demand it? Mr. Wharton managed Edith’s finances; Minnie’s divorce was more about the ultimate separation of finances than the emotional separation they had agreed upon years before.

I took my first steps to becoming a self-determining person, even though only a woman.

•   •   •   •

G
ilbert’s bad temper continued, so as I waited for Beatrix and Minnie to arrive in Paris, I occupied myself with outings for the children, which pleased their governess greatly. I often passed her little closet and saw her, feet up on an ottoman, napping or reading a popular novel.

With the girls in tow, I visited exhibits about the wireless telegraph and Mr. Diesel’s combustion engine, went riding in the Bois de Boulogne, took long walks down the tree-lined avenues of Paris. My daughters were all like me, fair-skinned blondes who liked to get their own way. That was charming in children, but dangerous in matters of the heart, and I was already worried about Jenny, knowing in advance she would choose an inappropriate gown for her debut and make a questionable marriage. Our children do tend to repeat our own mistakes, despite how much they design to do the exact opposite.

I wished with all my heart that Robert and Gil were with us as well, but as Mr. Winters said, they were no longer children but young men who must begin to make their way in the world.

Little by little Gilbert almost, but not quite, forgave me for requiring that the New York brownstone be put in my name. He even accompanied me to the private party at Princess Esterhazy’s to see the moving pictures of Louis Lumière. They were short, only a few minutes each, but how amazed we were to see moving photographs! One was called
The Gardener
and it showed a young rascal stepping on a hose and drenching the gardener. Beatrix would have found it amusing and I thought I might try to wrangle another invitation to the princess’s once Minnie and Beatrix had arrived.

Mrs. Haskett continued to leave her cards with us on a daily basis. It began to feel almost threatening. I knew she wished to know when Beatrix and her mother would arrive in Paris, but I could not guess why.

And then one afternoon I ran into Amerigo Massimo at the Louvre. He was standing before one of da Vinci’s paintings of the Madonna, his hands behind his back, peering wistfully up at the winged angels surrounding the Virgin.

“How marvelous to have wings,” I said, breaking into his silence.

“Truly,” he agreed. “One could simply fly away. How good to see you, Mrs. Winters.”

“And you, Signor Massimo. Are you in Paris for long?”

“A week or two. Business matters. Don’t you think this Madonna looks a little like our Beatrix? The hair, the complexion.”

“A little,” I agreed. “She would prefer a larger landscape in the background, though. She prefers paintings of gardens.”

“Yes. When we looked at the Caravaggios in Rome she said that to me.”

We stood for a minute, pretending to study the painting, wondering what else could be said that would not open some floodgate. “Will you take a cup of tea with me in the café?” I finally asked.

“I can’t stop thinking about her,” he said, once the little serving maid had brought a tray with tea and biscuits to our table. “Normally, you see, I do not care for American girls. They are . . . What is the word? Silly. Or grasping. Italian girls are better brought up, better mannered.”

I nodded. Giovanelli had said the exact same thing to me, years before. And then he had tried to kiss me, in the moonlit Colosseum, before Mr. Winters had finally caught up to us to interrupt that kiss.

“Beatrix—Miss Jones, I mean—is different. She has—what is the word?—gravitas.”

“Yes,” I agreed. I declined to specify what made her different, that childhood of cold silence between mother and father, the father openly appearing with his mistress in New York, defying the convention not of faithfulness, for many broke that vow, but of discretion. Beatrix was more serious than other girls, and for good reason.

“Does she speak of me?” he asked.

The table next to us filled up with a family: husband and young wife, and a row of little boys in sailor suits who clamored for ice cream. I was glad for the distraction—the rattling of chairs
over the floor, the wails of the youngest child—because Signor Massimo had asked a question I should not answer.

“Can you tell me what brings you to Paris?” I asked. He understood immediately. His face shifted, like a door being closed. The pleading left his eyes; he sat up straighter.

“I am negotiating with clients about a painting I wish to sell. A very old painting. One of Sassetta’s studies for
The Wolf of Gubbio
. Mrs. Haskett has shown interest but will not make up her mind about it.”

“The St. Francis legend,” I said, finishing my tea.

“You know it?” He showed surprise. Charmingly, only one eyebrow rose, not both, giving him a mischievous look.

“The story is in one of my little boy’s schoolbooks, along with the fables of Aesop.”

“Yes,” he said with a tight smile. “That is very American, I suppose, placing the saints alongside the fable writers.” There was disapproval, and I wondered if Beatrix had considered how the two might mix in a single household: European Catholicism and New England Protestantism. It did happen. Plenty of American girls had married Old World Catholics, but their fathers often required, by way of their bankbooks, that the children not be raised as papists. It made for an unhappy situation when one of them, as one must, breaks the marital agreement or the parental promise.

“Has the painting been in the family long?” I asked gently.

He laughed, but it was not a happy sound. “Very long. Since it was painted, and it is my father’s favorite. But you see . . .”

“I understand.” I reached over the table and touched his hand.

“Thank you. Between you and me, Mrs. Winters, I do not have my father’s blessing in this venture. He wishes to raise funds in other ways.”

I should have been more alert, paid better attention. But I thought Amerigo simply meant they might sell land instead of art.

“If I can help, please call on me,” I said.

“You are kind. Perhaps when Miss Jones is in Paris you will allow me to take you and her, and her mother of course, out for a luncheon, or to the opera.”

“Perhaps,” I agreed.

We rose, and he took out his wallet to pay for our tea. He counted out the coins very carefully, and when he walked away, after that courteous little bow required of well-bred men, there seemed to be a hint of despair about him. He was, as my grandfather would have put it, between a rock and a hard place, needing to sell what should not be sold.