The Importance of Being Kennedy (12 page)

They’d hardly finished cheering in the House of Commons when Hitler marched into Czechoslovakia anyway and the dailies that had said what a marvelous thing Mr. Chamberlain had pulled off said that was what came of trying to strike a bargain with a dictator. Kick had words with Lord Harry Bagnell. He told her if America really thought Hitler was none of its business it had a shock coming, and if it didn’t think that, then it should sack its ambassador for saying so. We didn’t see him at Prince’s Gate again after that, but Kick wasn’t grieved. Richard Wood and Billy Hartington were her favorites.

She had two invitations for the first weekend of November, to stay at Susie Frith-Johnstone’s house in Leicestershire and go to a costume pageant at Belvoir Castle, or go to Chatsworth House for Lord Billy’s sister’s birthday tea.

Fidelma said to her, “Go to the pageant. I would. A castle has to be better than a house. There’ll be ghosts and turrets and all sorts. Nora can run you up a costume. Stevens’ll give you a loan of his flashlight and you can go as the Statue of Liberty.”

“No,” she said, “I’m going to Anne’s birthday. I promised her. And you know Chatsworth may not be a castle, but I don’t think it’s just any old house.”

I should have gone with her, of course.

Mrs. K said, “Now, Nora, I want you to make sure Kick gets to Mass on Sunday morning. The Devonshires are very highly placed people and I’m sure like to do things correctly but they’re Protestants. They may just not think of it. When the Ambassador and I spent the weekend at Windsor Castle details like that were organized to perfection. A car was sent to take us into the town. Of course that was royalty. They don’t overlook a thing.”

But I didn’t get to Chatsworth. I missed my footing, running down the back stairs where Herself had said a twenty-five-watt bulb gave brightness enough, and turned my ankle so it blew up like a watermelon. Fidelma went in my place and I wasn’t sorry. I had two days of peace, reading Mrs. K’s magazines with my foot raised on a stool while London Jack kept Teddy and Bobby entertained, and Fidelma got to deal with the whys and wherefores of being a lady’s maid.

I said, “Remember, they’ll call you ‘Kennedy.’”

She said, “They can call me Tallulah. Doesn’t mean I’ll answer.”

But she came back whistling a different tune.

“It’s bigger than Lady Astor’s place,” she said. “Bigger than
Buckingham Palace, if you ask me. And you should see how many staff they have. The help have help. And land. There’s hills and woods and farms as far as the eye can see.”

Kick said, “And we saw your favorite driver, Nora. The one with the dint in his chin.”

I said, “He’s no favorite of mine. I hardly spoke two words to him.”

Fidelma said, “What driver?”

Kick said, “The one who drove us to the station. Stallybottom or something. He liked Nora. He remembered you from Compton Place, Nora.”

Fidelma said, “His name was Stallybrass. And he has no business liking anybody. He’s got a wife. She’s the pastry cook at Chatsworth. We had steak pies, Nora, with onion gravy, and the crust was so light it nearly floated away.”

I said, “I hardly even remember him.”

Kick said, “Well, he remembered you. He sent you his best regards.”

Mr. Kennedy went back to America for Christmas. Herself said he needed to see his ulcer doctor in New York, but they had plenty of good doctors in London and anyway, Washington was where he went first. Danny Walsh predicted he was getting the sack for speaking out of turn, but I didn’t see why the President would send for him if that’s what it was. All he had to do was pick up the telephone and we’d be on our way back to Bronxville.

As soon as it was known Mr. K would be away from home, Mayor and Mrs. Fitzgerald announced they’d pay us a visit. Then Jack decided he wouldn’t come to London for Christmas. Jack found His Honor hard to take, especially if Joseph Patrick was around getting the My Grandson the Future President treatment. Behind his back Jack and Lem Billings called him Grampy O’Blarney.

So Jack decided to go down to Palm Beach instead with a crowd of friends from college, and it was while they were there that something happened. It was Christmas Eve. They were trim
ming the tree when Eddie Moore telephoned from New York, wanting to speak to His Honor. All night the phone was going and by the time we went to Mass Mrs. K had her buttoned-up face on.

Fidelma said, “Everything all right, Mrs. Kennedy?”

“Perfectly,” she said.

A sure sign there was trouble.

Danny Walsh said that piecing things together from what he’d been able to hear, Jack had gotten into a bit of a scrape and strings were being pulled. That was where Mayor Fitzgerald came in. He knew even more useful people than Mr. K did.

A motor accident, I thought, and so did Danny. Joseph Patrick and Jack both drove like loonies. But Fidelma reckoned there had to be a girl in the picture.

“He’s knocked a girl up,” she kept saying. “I’ll bet you. Or he got too fresh and now she’s made a complaint.”

Fidelma tried to get something out of Mayor Fitzgerald. She was always a trier.

She said, “All those telephone calls, Your Honor, and at Christmas too. No rest for the wicked, eh?”

“Oh you’re right, dearie,” he said. “But what a wonderful thing, to be able to talk to a person in Boston as if he’s in the next room.”

It was to be a long, long time before I got to the bottom of what all that had been about. The phone calls stopped, Jack was apparently out of the doghouse, and then Mrs. K got a cablegram to tell her that Associated Press had voted her Outstanding Woman of the Year 1938. All her troubles were forgotten then. She was so happy she dusted off the pianoforte and played so that Mayor Fitzgerald could sing.

It seemed to be the only song he knew, so he sang it over and over and he was no Morton Downey. That’s more than twelve years ago and I’m not ready yet to hear it again.

Right after the New Year we were going to St. Moritz so the children could ski. I went in to see Herself about the packing and there she sat with a pile of 1938 calendars she’d bought in Woolworth. They sold them off for practically nothing at the end of the year. She was scribbling out the days of the week and writing in the changes.

I said, “That’s a fearsome job. Is it worth the bother?”

“Yes,” she said, “it is. Take care of the cents and the dollars will take care of themselves. Now, dear heart, I’m just wondering whether we’ll need both you and Fidelma in Switzerland. I’m wondering if one of you might not stay in London and do something with Rosie. It’s such a waste of money to take her skiing.”

She often went into one of her economy drives at the start of a new year.

I said, “Well, you know I don’t mind. Skiing’s just wet clothes and frozen feet to me.”

She said, “Being Ambassador has been a terrible drain on us, you know? People think everything is provided but that’s not the case at all. We’ve been put to enormous expense.”

I said, “Were you thinking of letting me go?”

“No,” she said, “I wasn’t thinking that at all. I depend upon you greatly, Nora, but we do have to reduce our expenditure. Shoe repairs, for instance. I believe you’ll find the charges are much lower outside of Kensington.”

That was her mentality. She’d have you wear out your shoe leather walking to save sixpence.

She said, “Last year was a particular burden, of course, bringing out two girls. I think we won’t give a ball for Eunice this year. A small dinner will be quite enough. Euny isn’t a ball kind of girl.”

I said, “So will I stay behind while you’re skiing?”

“Yes, dear,” she said. “Do something nice with Rosie. Take her to the Wax Works or the Zoological Gardens. She’s trying so very hard at Belmont, I’d like to encourage her with some little treats. Let her choose for herself. Within reason.”

I knew what Rosie would want if she had her druthers. A kiss and a cuddle from London Jack.

I was half out the door. She said, “Nora dear, please don’t worry we’ll be letting you go. This is going to be a busier year than ever and I shall absolutely depend upon you. I think we can anticipate a Royal visit to Prince’s Gate this year. Their Majesties are going to America, you know? And it’ll be for us to give them a great send-off. They’ll come to dinner. That’s something you won’t have seen in your future when you came to us at Beals Street.”

I said, “We’ll be staying on then?”

“Yes,” she said. “Why?”

I said, “The Ambassador never seems to stay anywhere long. You know, always on the go.”

She laughed. “Well, dear,” she said, “we’re certainly here for the foreseeable future. But who can say what exciting things next year might bring.”

The White House, Danny Walsh reckoned.

He said, “Your Man’s going to run, it’s as clear as day. And that costs a small fortune. That’s why she’s tightening her belt.”

Fidelma said, “That’s it, Brennan. She wants the shoes heeled in Notting Hill from now on so there’ll be more money to put in the First Lady Gown Fund.”

Me and Rosie had a fine time while they were all gone skiing. I fetched her into town on a bus and the underground train, and
we both had our hair done and tea in Marshall & Snelgrove and tried on a load of hats we had no intention of buying. She told me all about this Montessori teaching.

“There’s no shouting,” she said. “I like it. You can do painting or clay or weighing and measuring. All kinds of things. It doesn’t matter if you’re slow.”

She’d filled out again, a guaranteed sign she was happy, and her Mammy was hundreds of miles away so I wasn’t going to put her on any silly regime. Me and Gertie Ambler took her to Drury Lane to see
Dick Whittington
and we had wine gums and choc ices and joined in with all the singing and booing and hissing. We were going along just dandy till the interval. She needed the powder room and I trusted her to go on her own. The bell was ringing for the second half and she hadn’t come back. Gertie went searching in one direction, I went the other. I found her in the Stalls Bar, the only one left in there, smoking a cigarette and talking to the man who was putting up new bottles.

I said, “Did you serve her drink?”

“Bar’s closed,” he said.

She had a pack of Park Drive, nearly full, but there wasn’t a cigarette left whole by the time I’d finished with it.

I said, “What has your Daddy always told you about smoking? Hasn’t he told every one of you he’ll give you extra money if you don’t start with cigarettes? Nearly twenty-one and you start a daft habit like that.”

“Joe smokes,” she said.

I said, “Then Joe’s a fool. Is that what you’re doing now? Copying fools? Why are you doing it?”

She said, “It looks nice.”

I said, “Well, it doesn’t smell nice. How can you teach nice little children smelling like an ash can? And boys won’t want to dance with you.”

“I’ve got gum,” she said. I could tell she was going to go straight back out and buy more smokes.

The curtain had gone up. We had to push along the row to get to our seats, treading on everybody’s toes. Dame Trot was singing.

Gertie whispered, “That’s your song, Nora.”

Mother to dozens was about right. I suppose I’d taken it for granted I’d have weans of my own someday, and when you’re young, the ticking of the clock doesn’t bother you. Later on, it was one of those things, if I stopped to dwell on it I’d get a funny old ache in my insides. “A touch of the what-ifs,” I always called it. But life rolled along and there’s nothing like keeping busy to get rid of the what-ifs. All those fine places I visited with my Kennedys. I’d never have seen the half of them if I’d married Jimmy Swords. I’d have sat at home darning socks while he was in the pub planning a revolution.

Fidelma and Mrs. Moore brought the children back from Switzerland while Herself continued her vacation. “Traveling throughout the Mediterranean,” according to Mrs. Moore.

She was in Greece when the Holy Father passed away and she went directly to Rome, so she’d be there when the new Pope was named.

This is an opportunity to be part of history,
she wrote to Bobby.
Be sure to keep all my letters. They will be a precious memento of this important time in our lives.

It meant she missed Teddy’s birthday and Kick’s and Jean’s and not for the first time. We made them a little tea party though, and Mr. K arrived just in time for it, and Jack with him. He was
looking better. He was through the spots and pimples, finally, and carrying himself like quite the smart young buck.

I said, “And what was all that commotion about over Christmas?”

“Don’t know what you mean,” he said. “What commotion?”

Kick said, “Oh come on, Jack. Even Grandpa looked pretty mad about it. Did you rear-end somebody’s car?”

“No,” he said. “Oh, yeah. It was nothing. Busted taillight.”

She said, “Well, was it, like, the Governor’s car or something? It didn’t seem like nothing. The phone calls must have cost more than the damage.”

He said, “You know what, Kick? You need an interest in life. You get way too excited about every little thing goes on in mine.”

Teddy said, “Was Daddy mad? Why didn’t you make Lem say he did it?”

Bobby clipped his ear. He said, “Because that’s not what you do, Ted. Thou shalt not bear false witness.”

Teddy said, “But he could of. And then made an act of contrition.”

When the new Pope was elected I thought Mr. K would turn a cartwheel. It was Cardinal Pacelli, who’d been to tea at Bronxville and allowed young Teddy to sit on his knee.

“
Our
Pope,” Mr. Kennedy called him. “Now we have ourselves our own Pope.”

He said all the children were to go with him to the coronation. Only Joseph Patrick was traveling and couldn’t be contacted. Mr. Moore said there might be a problem, because seats were hard to come by and the invitation was really only for Mr. and Mrs. K, so they could represent the President.

Mr. K said, “Eddie, you know that’s not the way I operate. If you want something, the thing to do is just step forward and stake your claim. There’ll always be people ready to tell you why you can’t have what you want, but once you’ve grabbed it they’ll think twice about taking it from you.”

Danny Walsh went to Belmont to bring Rosie home and Mrs. K sent me my orders. The girls were all to have new wool coats
and lace mantillas, white for Jean and black for the others. Mr. Moore took care of the boys, black single-breasted for Bobby and a dark blue knicker suit for Teddy.

Fidelma said, “That chair the Cardinal sat in when he came to the house, it’ll be under a glass dome the next time we see it. There’ll be nobody allowed to breathe on it, never mind rest their behind.”

We caught the Golden Arrow boat train to Paris and then the Rome Express, and I didn’t get a wink of sleep what with the rattling and the swaying and men coming aboard to check your papers and Jean and Teddy in and out of their beds all night long, fiddling with every little gadget. I was afraid they’d open a door and go tumbling out, or pull the cord that stops the train. The conductor said there wasn’t a hotel room to be had in Rome, but we were fixed up. Mrs. K had got us four suites at the Excelsior and limousines to meet us at the train station.

She hadn’t seen the children in six weeks but she started straight in. Bobby needed a haircut, Rosie was carrying too much weight, Kick’s nails were chewed to the quick. Where had I bought the girls’ stockings? How much had we paid for Teddy’s suit?

Poor Eddie Moore was sweating over the seating arrangements for the coronation. He kept saying, “They’ll never get in. It’s two tickets per country.” But they did get in. The cars came for them early and they got front-row seats. There were eight dignitaries bounced from their seats so the young Kennedys could have a grandstand view. And some black looks, too, according to Kick.

She said, “I’d sooner have stood and so would Euny and Pat. And Teddy could have sat on Daddy’s lap. But Mother said we were entitled. It was kind of embarrassing.”

Mrs. K was certainly full of herself. She’d come a long way from that retiring little body in Beals Street.

She said, “It was the most beautiful occasion I ever saw, Nora, and particularly wonderful for us because His Holiness is a personal friend. But it isn’t over yet. On Wednesday Teddy will receive his first Communion, and tomorrow we’re all going to visit with the Holy Father, for a private audience. And that includes you and Fidelma. I’ll lend you each a piece of lace for your head, but you must promise to be very careful with them. They’re handmade Venetian.”

“Now, Brennan,” Fidelma kept saying, “pass me that old rag would you while I shine my shoes.”

I said, “My guts are churning already. What are we supposed to do when we get in there? Do we have to say anything?”

She said, “Of course we don’t. Won’t it all be in Latin? Just don’t look at me else I’ll burst out laughing.”

But we didn’t feel like laughing when it came to it. We walked miles down corridors to get to the room, and there were guards posted all the way. Nobody said a word. All you could hear was Teddy’s new shoes squeaking and Herself tap-tapping along in her high heels. Mr. K went in first and after five minutes the doors opened to let the rest of us inside.

I’d expected the Holy Father to be on a throne, with his vestments on, but he was sitting in an ordinary chair in just his house cassock and his little white cap. He’d looked more impressive the day he came to Bronxville. He remembered Teddy, of course, and he allowed him to take a picture with his Kodak camera, and then he gave us all rosaries. He was dishing them out from a big box on his table. The children went up first and then me and Fidelma. I wish now I’d dared take a close look at him but my heart was in my mouth. Christ’s Vicar on Earth giving me a rosary. Everyone who went up, he said something. Fidelma said it sounded like “Pay for three.”

I said, “I think it was ‘Pray for me.’”

“That’d be it,” she said. “Because he only gave me the one rosary, and I’d no money on me anyway. God, Nora, I was all atremble. I couldn’t think straight.”

Me neither. I wished I could have it all over again, so I could pay proper attention.

When the audience was over we were taken to the Sistine Chapel, to see where the cardinals sit while they’re deciding on a new Pope; then Mr. and Mrs. K went off to a reception and to a dinner at the American Embassy, which left us in peace. Mr. and Mrs. Moore took the children for a spaghetti supper, “bisgetti,” Rosie called it, and me and Fidelma tried our luck with the old parley italiany. Sure they’re a friendly, helpful people, the Italians, and saucy too. I reckon we could both have gotten ourselves husbands if we’d put our minds to it and told Mrs. K where to stick her Venetian lace.

We did a bit of pointing and playacting till they brought us a dinner and I don’t know what half of it was, but we’d a lovely drink called Chianti wine that went straight to Fidelma Clery’s head, and ice cream to finish, though it was bitter cold outside.

We had to have the children dressed and ready to go by seven for Teddy’s first Communion, which was no easy thing, because Rosie kept disappearing, hoping to see a bellhop who’d caught her eye, and Teddy was lolloping around, complaining his collar was too stiff and his pants were itchety.

Jack said, “Ted, you’re a pain. If I were Nora I’d put you in a hair shirt.”

“Nora has to be nice to me,” he said. “Or I’ll tell Mother and then she’ll be let go.”

Jack said, “You’re the one should be let go. I reckon the Moores should adopt you, Teddy Baby. I’m not sure we want such a whining little brat for a Kennedy.”

The Mass was held in the Holy Father’s own chapel, just a plain little place, although Our Lady did have the electric light in her crown, which Fidelma thought was a very miracle. And when it was all over Teddy tried to give me his candle, sidling up to me, calling me Darling Nora, trying to make amends for his cheek.

Herself said, “Oh no, Teddy. You must keep the candle. It’s a souvenir of a very special day.”

“Sorry,” he whispered to me. “Sorry, sorry, sorry.”

Mrs. K traveled back with us as far as Paris and there we left her, with more shopping to be done. She was going to America to help with the King and Queen’s visit and she wanted to be sure of turning heads with her gowns.

Mr. K said, “Spend as much as you like, Rosa. I want you to show those snoots back home the Kennedys know how to do things. And if you run across that bitch from Baltimore, don’t curtsey to her.”

She’d been invited to dinner at the American Embassy in Paris and the Duke and Duchess of Windsor were going to be there.

She said, “Now, Joe dearest, I’m not going to create a scene. The Windsors are just a pair of has-beens, and if a little curtsey makes them happy I’m not going to ruin their evening. I’ll just bob a little bob.”

He said, “Well, I’d be happier if you didn’t. I begrudge them even a nod of the head. We have our friendship with Their Majesties to think of. And I’d never have taken this damned job if I’d thought it would oblige you to curtsey to a tart.”

Jack said, “So now it’s ‘this damned job’? Not all it’s cracked up to be, eh, Excellency? Ambassador to the Court of St. James’s not so great, hunh?”

Mr. K said, “I tell you, it’s a thankless posting. You end up out of pocket and the papers are always hoping you’ll goof, that you’ll
speak out of turn or do something you shouldn’t have, good news being no news. I’ll finish my time here, but frankly I can’t wait to go home.”

Jack said, “But you’re definitely not going to run next year?”

“No,” he said, “I’m not. Your mother would like it, I know, but I’ve worked out a little agreement with FDR. If he runs for another term, I’ll back him. Then he’ll back Joe for governor of Massachusetts in ’42.”

Jack whistled. He said, “Does Joe know?”

Mr. K said, “He knows I’m working on his future.”

We were no sooner back from the boat train than Billy Hartington was on the doorstep looking for Kick. There was a cocktail party at Ginny Vigo’s that evening and then everyone was going on to the Café de Paris for dancing.

Kick said, “I don’t know. We’ve been traveling all day. My hair’s a real mess.”

“Is it?” he said. “I think it looks rather wonderful.”

Rosie said, “I’ll come. I haven’t been dancing for ages.”

But Kick wasn’t having that. “No, Rosie,” she said. “You’re not invited this time. I can’t drag you everywhere with me.”

Rosie’s eyes filled up.

Billy said, “Oh but it’d be fine, Kick. Why not? Ginny absolutely wouldn’t mind.”

“No,” she said, “she’ll make a pest of herself wanting partners. You don’t know what she’s like. She won’t sit out a single dance. And anyway she has to go back to Belmont. Go get your things ready, Rosie. Danny’s taking you first thing. And if Mother were here she’d agree with me.”

Billy felt bad about it, you could tell. He was a proper young gentleman.

“Well then,” he said. “Well then. But another time, I’m sure.”

That was the night Rosie broke a water glass. She picked it up from her night table and hurled it at the wall.

“Kick’s a bloody, bloody bugger,” she was shouting. “A bloody, bloody bugger.”

It took two of us to hold her still until she calmed down.

Fidelma said, “Nice kindergarten teacher you’re going to make, using words like that.”

Rosie said, “I wouldn’t have been a pest. I only wanted a dance.”

Fidelma said, “I know you did, darling. And you’ll have plenty. You heard what Lord Billy said. Another time. But you do have to be up early, to get back to your studying.”

I said, “Think of it, Rosie. You’ll be a certified teacher and all Kick’ll have will be a pair of worn dance shoes.”

Kick had half a dozen invitations to the country for the Easter holidays, but it was Billy Hartington’s she accepted, to go to Chatsworth. She said of all the boys he was the only one who had sweet sisters and a nice house.

Mrs. K said I was to go with her.

She said, “I know you’ll make sure she goes to Mass, Nora. When Fidelma went with her she allowed her to sleep in late like the Protestants.”

Chatsworth is in Derbyshire, plumb in the middle of England. We took the train, along with Minnie Stubbs and Cynthia Brough, and we were met at a town called Bakewell. Lord Billy’s brother Andrew was there in an open-top roadster to pick up the girls. A shooting brake had been sent for the luggage and the maids. The driver looked only about sixteen, a skinny kid, in a livery that swamped him.

Cynthia Brough’s maid said, “You’re new. What’s your name?”

“Wildgoose,” he said. “I were on boilers but I put in for a change.”

She said, “Stallybrass usually collects us.”

He said, “No telling who you’ll get this weekend. We’ve a right houseful.”

Minnie Stubbs’s maid said, “I hope that doesn’t mean the maids have to double up. I’m accustomed to my own room.”

Brough said, “Perhaps Wildgoose here’ll double up with you.”

Poor lad. His ears turned bright red.

He said, “You’ve been here before then?”

Stubbs said, “I’ve lost count. I hate these country weekends. They’re forever changing their clothes. And if you do get five minutes to yourself there’s nowhere to go. Where’s your nearest picture house?”

He had to think. “That’d be Chesterfield,” he said.

“See what I mean?” she said. “Nothing out here but cows and sheep. And trees. Look at them.”

I said, “I haven’t been here before.”

Brough said, “This is Kennedy. She’s American.”

“Aye,” he said, “they told me there was more Americans arriving. We’ve Mr. Fred Astaire arrived last night. Very nice gentleman.”

Fred Astaire’s sister Dellie was married to Billy Hartington’s uncle Charlie Cavendish.

We drove up from the town, thick hedgerows on either side, and then as we came out of a bend in the road he slowed down, nearly to a halt.

He said, “Are yer set? Look out yer winder an’ you’ll get a treat.”

Brough said, “We know. We’ve seen it.”

He said, “I were talking to Kennedy.”

And there it was, across the river. A great square stone house built on a rise, with East Moor rolling away behind it, and sheep
grazing in the park. Chatsworth House. I’d have sworn it was pink, but on Sunday morning when I saw the same view, it was more the color of honey.

“One hundred and seventy-five rooms,” he said. “I’ll wager you haven’t got nowt like this in America.”

Stubbs said, “Blenheim’s better.”

“Nay,” he said. “Bonniest house in the land, this.”

Chatsworth was a bit of a shambles, truth to be told. They’d closed it up the previous year when the old Duke died, and Billy Hartington’s folks were only just getting round to moving in. They’d been cozy down in their own little house and loath to leave it, I suppose, for such a palace of a place. It had a nice atmosphere though, and it was well run, considering the miles you had to walk to get anywhere. They needed skates on to get dinner served before it was cold on the platters. In those big houses you did better below stairs. You got your food hot, and you could eat it wearing proper clothes, not filmy little dinner gowns and your arms covered in gooseflesh.

We had roast pork with cracklings and applesauce, that first night, and Bakewell puddings, with jam from Chatsworth strawberries. That was the first time I saw Hope Stallybrass. Tall and stout and red-faced from the ovens. She was giving orders, counting out the savories that were to be carried upstairs, watching so everything for our dinner would be ready at the right moment. There was an empty chair across from me until Walter Stallybrass ran in, smoothing down his hair, just as grace was being said.