The House of Dreams (16 page)

“I'd be happy to take a look at your work,” I said.

She weighed me up with that clear blue stare of hers. “I will meet you in town next weekend. I have my ballet class in a hall near La Vieille Charité at two o'clock on Saturday. There is a little café with red shutters just down the road.” She backed away, raised her arms to a graceful fifth position, her pointed foot arcing the snow. “I'm meeting a friend there after the class.”

“A boyfriend?”

She grinned. “No, a girl if you must know.” She looked back over her shoulder as she walked away. “You'd better go, my mother doesn't like trespassers.”

I crawled back through the gap in the hedge and jogged along until I caught up with Annie. She was trailing her hand against the branches again, and I reached up and did the same. I caught her, once or twice, looking at me—a glimpse of her eye, her lips. I could hear her mother coming, a tirade of complaints rattling from her lips like keys in a tin can. As I neared the garden, I could hear the auction beginning on the terrace. “Annie,” I whispered to her, and she stopped walking and turned. I reached through the leaves to her, bobbed my head until I found her, her gaze, her smile. I pushed aside the branches and touched her fingertips. Then, as her mother's voice reached me clearly, she turned and was gone, as swift and silent as a bird in flight.

 

EIGHTEEN

F
LYING
P
OINT
, L
ONG
I
SLAND

2000

G
ABRIEL

“Annie…,” I say quietly. The girl is watching me. I have to be careful. “You made short work of those,” I say to her.

“I was starving,” Sophie says. She runs her finger through the last of the blueberry juice and sucks it clean. That's the kind of thing that would have got me going a few years back, but now, nothing. “Thank you,” she says, dabbing her mouth with her napkin. “They were very, very good.” She checks the recorder still has tape left and reaches into her bag for a pen and notebook. As she flips through the pages, words jump out at me:
Vita. Gabriel. Why?
“Let me just check something,” she says.

“Sure.”

Sophie flicks through her notes. “According to the research I've done, you moved to the Château d'Oc, which is near…”

“Carcassonne.”

“Yes, you were near Carcassonne in 1938, correct?”

“Yes.” Which way is this heading?

“And in the summer of 1940, you were living alone there with Vita?”

“Most of the time.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, people came and went.”

“Such as?”

“Quimby, my dealer. Friends,” I say vaguely. She's not buying it.

“I heard you were a recluse by then.”

I pick up the sugar shaker and stir a slow stream into my coffee before I remember the doctor had told me to cut it out. “Did you now?” I look directly into her eyes as I put it down. “As you can see, I don't much like company, still.”

“You seem to have a houseful today.”

“Family. That's different.”

“Talking of family…”

Oh God, here it comes.

“Tell me about your son.” She has the good grace to blush slightly. “I mean, if it's not too painful?” Her eyes flicker down to her page and she unscrews her ink pen.

“Who the hell uses a fountain pen these days?”

“I do. At least for important things.”

“Like writing to me?”

“So you
did
get the letters.”

“And about me,” I say, reading her notebook upside down. I tap it with my dry old finger. My nails are curved and hard, more like claws these days.

Sophie hesitates, looks from her notes to me. “I thought you're dyslexic.”

Clever girl. I'm going to have to be careful. “Maybe I struggled with
War and Peace,
but I get by.” I wait for her confidence to waver and hope she doesn't push that line of inquiry. “I don't give a crap what people say about my work, but you're not concocting some fairy tale about me and Vita just to suit the story you're trying to conjure up. You're wrong about that, I told you. I never stopped Vita doing anything.”

“But these photos of Vita's studio…,” she says, sliding the black-and-white photos onto the table. Oh God, my heart's racing again. It's there, staring her in the face. Maybe I'm in luck, maybe she's not noticed, not seen? But then, I know in my gut she has. She hinted as much in her letter. Perhaps if I can get her to focus on Vita, she'll forget. “Lambert?”

“Quimby took them.”

She checks her notes. “You say he was your dealer?”

“For a time.”

“Look, I don't believe you when you say Vita was no good. I mean, it's hard to make out, but these paintings look … well, to use your word about her, dazzling. Why did she never show them?”

My gaze falls to the images. I know them like the lines on my palm. Vita didn't paint them. I did. “They were the beginning of something,” I say to the girl. Or maybe the end.

Memory is a funny thing. I spend more time thinking of the past than the present these days. It is more detailed, more full of life, than the days I drift through now. Just like that, I'm back in the Château d'Oc. I am more there than here in the café with the girl. I can still hear myself, my old voice worn out by years of sea air and pipe tobacco, rabbiting on to Sophie, weaving a string of lies, the story she wants to hear, but I'm long gone.

Here is the beat of my heart, racing in my chest as I follow Quimby into the house. Here is the thrum of hooves on the hard earth as Vita rode into the party. Here is the pulse and the rush and the pull of the past. I'm back, I'm back, and I can't bear it. I close my eyes, push on, past the fire. The days, the months, fast-forward, and the memories kaleidoscope until I am safe again at Air-Bel, the night I met Annie and my life changed track forever.

 

NINETEEN

V
ILLA
A
IR
-B
EL
, M
ARSEILLE

1940

V
ARIAN

That night, Air-Bel swung to the tinny sound of American jazz, picked up on the shortwave radio. The reception rooms hummed with conversation and laughter, and blazing fires danced in the hearths. From the kitchen drifted the sound of pots clattering on the stove and the voice of the chef, Madame Nouguet, shouting orders to the housemaid, Rose. Above, children's footsteps clattered across the wooden boards, muffling for a moment as they ran across a rug, then racing on, their excited voices pealing like bells through the old villa.

“We shall christen this house Château Espère Visa,” Varian said, raising his glass of wine. He stood before the crackling hearth, his hand resting by the stopped clock.

“Perfect!” Mary Jayne cried. “Haven't we been calling this old place the château?” she said to Miriam. They sat beside each other on the sofa, legs curled beneath them. Their cheeks were flushed with wine and the warmth of the fire. “Of course, ‘château' is a bit grand.”

“Well, I think it's a swell place,” Varian said as he joined them. He placed his glass of red wine on the marble fireplace and reached for the bottle to top up the girls' glasses.

“Thanks,” Miriam said, smiling up at him.

“So, has Miriam told you the good news?” he said to Mary Jayne. “Her visas have come through. Miriam is getting married.” He raised his glass. “We should make a toast. To Miriam and Rudolf!” He chinked his glass against hers.

“Why didn't you tell me?” Mary Jayne said quietly to Miriam.

“I didn't want to spoil tonight.” Miriam looked crestfallen. “I told you not to say anything, Varian.”

“Typical,” Mary Jayne said under her breath. “Damn it, Davenport. I knew you'd get your papers sooner or later, but I'm going to miss you.” She squeezed her friend's hand. “And it's just as we've found all this.” She pointed across the room. “Tell me again, Varian, who are these people?”

“That chap's a writer. Well … a writer and a revolutionary,” Varian said quietly. “He's in great danger because he's spoken out against Stalin. In fact, he was the first writer to call the regime ‘totalitarian.' He's been in and out of prison for years, and he's stateless and penniless now. I believe a lot of his family are either imprisoned or in gulags.”

“How terrible.”

“I hope this old place is a refuge for him.”

“Varian certainly loves it—you should have seen him!” Miriam said. “He's been like a child all afternoon, going from room to room, looking in all the drawers.” She glanced up as the children raced through, running after Dagobert and Clovis. “I don't know who's had more fun, Varian or that lot.”

“I said you'd love it.” Mary Jayne sipped her drink.

Madame Nouguet appeared at the door. “Dinner is ready to be served.”

*   *   *

The table was laid for twelve in the heavy, Spanish-decorated dining room. The room had the natural exuberance of a funeral parlor, with faux Córdoba leather walls and heavy mahogany table and chairs. As the group filtered through, Mary Jayne directed everyone to their places. “I'm so glad you could join us for dinner,” she said pointedly to Varian.

“Thank you for inviting me,” he said.

“I'm not sure what Madame Nou…” Her voice trailed off as she saw André whisk away a red cloth from the center of the table. “What on earth?”

Varian pulled back her chair. “Thank you,” she said, craning forward to look at the pile of leaves arranged in front of her.

Varian adjusted his horn-rimmed glasses and squinted at the arrangement. Just then, one of the twigs moved and swiveled a triangular head toward him. “Ha!” he cried in delight. “A praying mantis.”

“Two, male and female,” André said, settling in the chair opposite Varian. “Just watch.”

*   *   *

The dinner continued late into the night, long after the sparse meal had been eaten and the servants had retired to bed. People danced in the hall, swinging to the jazz tune crackling through the ether from Boston, and the air in the dining room swirled with wood and cigarette smoke, the table littered with empty wine bottles and overflowing ashtrays. For the first time in months, Varian felt truly at ease—he lounged back in his chair, shirtsleeves rolled up, tie loose around his throat. He smiled benevolently as he looked around, at Miriam with her head thrown back, laughing as she danced; at Mary Jayne admiring the tiger's-tooth necklace Jacqueline had strung around her neck; at Danny, who sat with his arm slung over his wife's shoulders as he debated with the men. For the first time in his life, Varian had the feeling that he had come home. It felt almost indecent to be this contented, enjoying a simple dinner with friends in a setting as perfect as this.
And yet,
he thought, his eye caught by a movement at the center of the table. How long could this last? How long until they were kicked out of the country, arrested, or worse? Varian reached for the bottle of wine as Gussie passed it to him and nodded his thanks.
How long will we be safe?
he thought as yet again, Varian's attention returned to the two praying mantises stalking each other at the center of the table. It was how he felt every minute of every day—under threat, from the gangsters, the cops, the Gestapo. He glanced at Mary Jayne. Even her relationship with Killer put them at risk.

“Aren't they marvelous?” Breton said, interrupting his thoughts.

“Where did you find them?” Varian asked André.

“In the greenhouse,” he said, peering closely at them. “It's almost time.” He sat back. “Have you seen the garden yet? Old Dr. Thumin's greenhouse is quite marvelous. I think I shall work in there.”

“Are you managing to write, in spite of it all?”

“One must always write.” André drained his glass.

“What are you working on?” Varian said, and hesitated. “If I may ask?”

“Something new.” He reached into his breast pocket, and Varian glimpsed a folded sheet of paper scored with looping green handwriting. “A new poem.” Then he lunged forward, pointing at the center of the table, his eyes glittering with satisfaction. “There!”

It seemed to Varian that the flames, the candles in the dining room, the firelight, flared and glowed in André's eyes the very moment that the praying mantis bit down on the head of its mate.

 

TWENTY

F
LYING
P
OINT
, L
ONG
I
SLAND

2000

G
ABRIEL

Whenever I see one of those lumps of amber fashioned into a paperweight in those fancy decorator's stores that Annie likes browsing in, I think of the summer of 1940. I stopped in the street to look at one in the window of a store last time we went to town. Annie had on that old blue dress of hers I love so much, and she was laughing, chatting to an old friend about the grandkids. I could hear her talking, and the thrum of the convertibles driving nose to tail up the main street with their identical cargoes of guys in Ralph Lauren polo shirts and khakis and their expensively blond wives and kids who look like they are out of a catalog. The light was bright and clear, but as I looked at that amber, it seemed to darken and I felt again the heat, the weight of the Château d'Oc, and the taste of the dust in my mouth, and I saw the sulfurous yellow tang of the sky over the hills. I can't remember what the paperweight was sitting on, some flimsy-looking desk or writer's table or something too small to ever be a useful working surface, but it was the quality of the light caught in it that stopped me. It reminded me of looking into a tin of golden syrup. I didn't buy it, of course. What is it they call that style the decorators are all crazy for now? Shabby chic. I don't get that at all, the fakery and faux finishes. Something should be what it is, of its time. It should have heart and authenticity. Everything I have in my life is shabby, but it's beautiful and useful and real, and it's grown shabby because I've loved it and used it. Why is everyone looking backward, instead of creating something new and marvelous now, hey? These decorators just get some kid in a garage to beat up some piece of pine junk, triple the price, and stick it in the window of one of their little chichi shops in East Hampton, artfully scatter a few magazines or papers around, and then hold it all together with a great piece of amber. What do I know—that's probably plastic, too. Anyway, you can guarantee that stuck at the heart of the amber there's some hapless insect. That's how I felt before I met Annie—trapped. Even thinking of it now, my breath tightens.