The Rich Shall Inherit (46 page)

Mike trailed after the agent, the parrot’s enormous cage clutched in his hand, as he showed him the dust-sheeted downstairs rooms and the vast kitchen with its ancient iron range. “The caretaker swears it works,” he told Mike as he stared at it doubtfully, “but I can’t guarantee that. Now let me show you upstairs. The cleaning woman has made up a bed for you and I think you should be comfortable enough for a few days.” Throwing open a pair of tall doors, he stepped back to allow Mike to enter. “I believe this was originally Madame Mallory’s own room, sir,” he said.

Mike put the parrot cage on a table near the window, staring first at the view of the garden from the tall windows, then at the fire burning cheerfully in the grate with a deep comfortable wing chair and a little embroidered footstool beside it. He stared at the big lonely bed beneath its draperies of gray-blue silk, and then he looked at the parrot, imagining the silent, chilly nights when there were just the two of them … Poppy and Luchay …. The parrot must know every piece of furniture in this room, every corner and cupboard, he’d know what it looked like with the warm summer sun streaming through the windows, and under the iced January moonlight; he’d know its scents, her perfume, and the overwhelming power of the lavender in full summer bloom in the flower beds. He watched as the parrot stretched its neck forward eagerly, searching the room, as though he knew he was home again, and knew that surely Poppy must be here….

Mike accompanied the agent to the door. “Thank you very much for all your help, Signore Fabiani,” he said, “I’m certain I’ll be comfortable here for a few days. Yes, I’ll make sure to leave the key with the caretaker before I go.” And then he climbed the stairs of the big silent house again, back to Poppy’s room.

Luchay’s head was tilted to one side, as though he was waiting to hear the light, eager footsteps he once knew.

“Well, Luchay, what d’you think?” Mike asked, standing in front of the fire, warming his frozen hands.
“Now
we’re getting there,
now
we’ll find Poppy, I feel it in my bones.” He stared
hopefully at the parrot as if expecting him to say something, but Luchay simply turned his head to one side and stared at him out of one unreadable topaz eye.

“Okay then, be like that,” Mike said with a sigh.

He put away his provisions in the kitchen, fed the parrot his seeds, and then with a second mug of hot coffee clutched in his hand, he wandered slowly through the house. He was puzzled by the heavy red velvet drapes, fringed and tasseled in gold, the massive ornate pieces of furniture, the uncomfortable red velvet sofas and dark gothic-looking dining room chairs. Somehow none of this fitted with his image of Poppy; he’d expected a lighter touch in her home, imagining it would be furnished with the graceful painted Venetian furniture of the region, and the pale colors and soft silks of Italy. Poppy had lived in the villa for over twenty years, and yet the house felt as though it had been locked in a Victorian Gothic time warp, untouched by her own personal style. Only in the bedroom, with its faded wallpaper and golden mirrors, the pale Persian rugs and blue-gray silk curtains, did he feel the real Poppy.

He pulled open the doors of an enormous French marriage armoire, carved with flowers and love knots. It was twelve feet wide and seven feet high, and it was filled to overflowing with clothes dating back to the turn of the century. The faint scent of gardenias wafted from the cupboard as Mike ran his eye along the rail of evening dresses and day dresses, and smart suits and coats. He pulled out an ice-gray satin ball dress swathed at its handspan waist with a cascading pink satin sash, staring at it curiously, wondering what the special occasion was when Poppy had worn it.

Pushing aside the long dresses, he searched the corners of the armoire for hidden journals, still hoping for a lucky find like the one he had at the ranch, but there was just a forgotten pair of blue satin slippers lying in the dust. With a sigh he let the clothes fall back into place, retrieving a soft tweed jacket that had fallen from its hanger. It was a man’s jacket, and well worn, with the name of a tailor in Rome; and he could feel something bulky in the pocket. His fingers closed around the cool, smooth beads of a necklace. He pulled it out carefully, exclaiming as he saw the five perfect rows of enormous creamy pearls with a magnificent diamond clasp. And there was more … a pair of large ruby-and-diamond drop earrings that glinted in the firelight like a dozen little rainbows. Mike whistled. “It’s a bonanza, Luchay!”
he said. “They must be worth a fortune! Now I’m starting to believe that Poppy was seriously rich.”

Pulling out garments one by one, Mike searched systematically through the pockets, but found no more jewels. Instead he discovered dozens of folded-up little notes, written in the spidery, rambling writing of an old woman. Laying them carefully on the desk, he puzzled over them.

Some made no sense at all, like notes written by a madwoman as crazy reminders to herself. But some were painfully clear.

“As I grow older,” Poppy had written, “the better I understand that it is not
who
we are born that matters, but what we become.
Circumstances
are what form us—circumstances—and survival. For even when there is nothing left to live for, we struggle to survive. How odd is the human heart!”

And then there was another: “I’m content here, with my solitude and my jumbled thoughts, letting my mind wander along any path it chooses, picking a thought here, a memory there, like a bunch of mixed wildflowers.”

They were the pitiful, desolate jottings of a lonely old woman, Mike thought sadly, as he searched through the many they compartments of the Louis Quinze desk for more. He found hundreds of them, written on the backs of envelopes or on scraps of paper, and even on the flyleaf of a well-thumbed book of Keats’s poems. Intrigued, he opened the beautiful glass-fronted bookcases and searched the books, finding more scribblings … obviously, Poppy had written her thoughts down as they came to her, on whatever piece of paper she had in her hand at the time.

Setting his finds on the desk, he went to the kitchen to fetch a bottle of wine, and then he threw another log on the fire and began to read the notes, trying to sort Poppy’s thoughts into some kind of order.

It was dark outside and the snow was falling softly and steadily. The only sounds in the room were the ticking of Poppy’s little silver cherub clock and the falling of a log in the grate as he worked through the night, under the circle of light cast by a rose-shaded lamp.

He read for a long while, occasionally glancing up at the parrot; Luchay was on his golden perch, his head tucked under his wing, sleeping, Mike thought. He looked content, as though he could feel Poppy’s presence even though he couldn’t see her … maybe he was dreaming she was back with him in their
lonely exile, stroking his feathers with her soft fingers, whispering her secrets to him in her warm, melodious voice. Just the way she’d always done right from the beginning, in that cold little room in Marseilles with the girl in the attic coughing herself to death and the widowed fishwife on the ground floor sweeping her children out of their way as they passed, afraid they might be contaminated….

1899, FRANCE

Poppy sat as long as she dared over the small cup of coffee in the little fishermen’s cafe-bar in Marseilles thinking of the five francs and seven centimes left in her purse. Her expensive leather valise containing her entire worldly possessions was scuffed and dirty and intolerably heavy, and she dreaded the moment she would be forced to pick it up and trudge on her way again.

It was October and the burning sunny skies of summer that had plagued her wandering journey through Italy to the south of France had now changed to gray. A blustery mistral wind whipped the cafe awning until it crackled like the sails of a ship and she shivered, peering through the open door at the cozy interior where fishermen, in heavy dark blue sweaters and tall rubber boots, leaned against the zinc counter drinking rough red wine. They were dunking chunks of fresh, crusty bread into a hearty stew whose aroma had been torturing her for the past hour. Torn by temptation and hunger, Poppy reminded herself again exactly how little was left in her purse. For over a week she’d been existing on a small loaf, bought cheaply each evening when the bakery was about to close, and an occasional cup of strong milky coffee drunk for its warmth.

The cafe proprietor bustled toward her, whisking away her empty cup and staring at her inquiringly.
“Eh bien, mademoiselle. Vous désirez quelque chose?”

“Non, non, merci, m’sieur,”
she murmured, sliding reluctantly from the little cane chair and hefting her bag.

“Au revoir, mademoiselle,”
he said, puzzled.

“M’sieur?”
she called, turning back hopefully. “I wonder …
well, monsieur, I need a job. I thought maybe you’d need someone to help in the cafe. To serve or to clean … anything at all.”

She was so young and her expression so pitifully eager that he hesitated. “Well …” he began.

“Henri? What is it?” His wife glared at him from the doorway of the cafe. “What does she want?”

“Just a job. I thought she might help with the dishes ….”

“Dishes?
Her?”
The woman’s dark eyes raked Poppy shrewdly. “I’ll vow she’s never washed a dish in her life! Anyway, what does she want a job for? Those clothes she’s wearing must have cost a fortune.”

The cafe proprietor shrugged apologetically, avoiding Poppy’s eye. “Sorry, mademoiselle,” he muttered, wiping the zinc-topped table hurriedly.

It was always the same, Poppy thought, trudging dispiritedly down the narrow street. No matter how poor and worn she looked, there was something about her that told people she was different. No one wanted to employ her; not the women at the smart hotels in the fashionable resorts along Lake Como where she had inquired about a job as a lady’s companion, nor at Lac Leman, in Lausanne, where she’d placed a discreetly worded advertisement in the local journal. She had given her address at the modest
pensione
where, for a sum that only a year ago she would have thought nothing of squandering happily on a small box of exquisite Paris chocolates, she was given a room and three meals a day.

To her surprise, a week later there’d been a letter by her breakfast plate. She’d ripped it open, scanning it eagerly … a Mrs. Montgomery-Clyde would be pleased to see her that afternoon at three o’clock with reference to the position of lady’s companion.

She’d given the poor little drudge of a maid at the
pensione a
few coins, and asked her please to press her beautiful cream jacket and tobacco skirt. Then, brushing her red hair back as tightly as she could, she’d anchored it with a hundred pins, daring it to escape. She’d polished her shabby brown boots until they shone and steamed her battered straw hat over a hot kettle in the kitchen, tugging it anxiously back into shape.

She had invested precious francs in a brand-new pair of cream kid gloves, and pulling them on carefully, she’d examined the finished effect critically in the mirror, swinging around to peer
over her shoulder at her back view. The jacket that had once fitted so snugly now hung on her thin frame and she’d tugged at it anxiously. Later, as she waited nervously in the foyer of the Hotel Beau-Rivage for Mrs. Montgomery-Clyde to send for her, she’d thought she looked the role of the “demure” lady’s companion.

Fifteen minutes had passed, then half an hour and an hour. Leaving her seat by the potted palm nearest the door, Poppy had approached the desk nervously. “I wonder if Mrs. Montgomery-Clyde has forgotten?” she’d asked hesitantly. “I was supposed to see her at three o’clock.”

“I expect she’s still taking a nap,” the clerk replied indifferently. “She usually does after lunch. No doubt she’ll send for you when she wakes up.”

Poppy had begun to droop in her blue velvet chair, then, reminding herself she should sit upright and look alert just in case Mrs. Montgomery-Clyde should spot her, she’d sat up ruler straight. It was five o’clock and she had almost given up hope when Mrs. Montgomery-Clyde finally sent for her.

“Come in, girl, come in then. I sent for you five minutes ago, where on earth have you been?” The enormously fat woman in a lilac silk dress and a lot of diamonds had peered at her with puffy, faded blue eyes.

“I came as quickly as I could, Mrs. Montgomery-Clyde,” Poppy had replied, blushing angrily. She’d noticed the remains of a sumptuous tea on the table by the window and a half-eaten box of chocolates by the sofa.

“The least you could do is apologize,” Mrs. Montgomery-Clyde sniffed, popping another chocolate into her pursed little mouth. “And what
background
, might I ask, do you have for the position of lady’s companion?”

“None really, Mrs. Montgomery-Clyde,” Poppy had said apologetically. “I mean … I was sort of companion to my Aunt Melody in California—”

“California!”
the woman had snorted. “How barbaric! And where is your aunt now? Why are you here? Alone and seeking employment?”

Poppy had lifted her chin in the old defiant attitude. “Reduced family circumstances force me to look for work since … since my aunt …”

“I see,” Mrs. Montgomery-Clyde had said hastily, not wanting to hear the boring details of her aunt’s funeral. “Well, then,
come over to the window. Stand here, in the light where I can see you properly.” Screwing a large gold-rimmed monocle into her left eye, she’d scrutinized Poppy mercilessly.

“You are seeking a job as a lady’s companion,” she’d said icily at last, “in a Paris suit that cost more than you would earn in a year? And a
Worth
suit, if I know my fashions. Now, how did you come by that, my girl? Not honestly, I’ll be bound!”

“Not honest?” Poppy had gasped, burning with humiliation. “Not
honest?
Why you miserable, fat, greedy old woman! How dare you suggest I’m not honest!” Her blue eyes had traveled angrily over the fat woman’s stunned face. “My mother and father bought me that suit, and I’ll bet they could buy you ten times over. You are disgusting,” she added contemptuously, “all
you
have, Mrs. Montgomery-Clyde, is money. And that can’t buy everything.”