The Charmers (20 page)

I was asleep, still in that same hotly perfumed bed, hugging a pillow with his scent on it, when he came back, triumphant. He commanded me to sit up. I did so, clutching the soft linen sheets modestly over my breasts because somehow, with daylight seeping through the curtains and somewhere the smell of bacon that tingled my toes I wanted it so much, and a fully dressed man looking at me with a delighted expression of one who brings a great surprise, it seemed only proper to behave modestly and not command him to get back into bed immediately, though I should have liked that. Besides, he was holding something behind his back and I knew that meant a present. And not just the street-corner roses this time, he was too eager for me to admire what he had.

He looked so young, so serious, torn between wanting to give me his surprise and worry that I might not think it as wonderful as he himself did.

“For goodness' sake, darling Rex, just give it to me,” I said, laughing as I lost patience. I was a woman just woken from sleep, I wanted to bathe, brush my hair, eat that bacon with a slab of homemade bread that tasted the way bread should taste in Paris, and besides, love him though I did, I did not trust his taste.

He came and knelt at my bedside. I reached out to stroke that little tuft of blond hair that spiked up at the crown of his head despite his applications of a delightful smelling pomade, purchased in London, I knew, from a firm called Trumper.

“My love, my only love,” was what he said to me as he offered me the long blue leather box, inscribed with the name of a famous Parisian jeweler who, I knew, designed for royalty.

Forgetting all about modesty in my excitement, I accepted the box and with first a long smiling glance at my young lover, I clicked it open.

It was lined in velvet, a dark violet color, across which lay a rope of evenly matched pearls in a true mouthwatering cream. Each pearl shone with a deep luster, and when I looked more carefully I saw each one was a tiny bit different, a slope to one side of the bead, another a little rounder, yet the whole absolutely perfect. The clasp was a lion's head in gold, catching a pearl ball in its open mouth.

It was perfection. More, it was a gift from a man who truly loved me. Our tears mingled as he slipped the rope of pearls over my head, smoothed them over my breasts, kissed my neck where the golden clasp lay.

“I would like to marry you,” he said, his voice gentle yet strong.

Of course I knew he would, right that minute, that is, and I would have liked to marry him, but one of us had to be sensible, face facts, even at an emotional moment like this, when his declaration came with a fortune in pearls.

I allowed my mind to drift from the reality of who I was, to pretend for a few minutes that I was a real titled lady, that we lived together in his English manor house, with a cook in the kitchen and a nanny in the nursery taking care of our three children, a boy and two girls, and the two of us, ever young, ever in love … Dreams are like that. They can ruin reality.

I realized I was stepping on our dream when I smiled and thanked him with a million kisses for the pearls, assured him I would love him forever, when the truth, known only to myself, of course, was that I was never absolutely sure I loved him, or knew even what love was. I knew only that I cared deeply for him, that I admired him, that I loved his body, his eager youthfulness, that tuft of hair that sprang from the crown of his head. I loved his charm. But I knew it could not last.

I wore those pearls for the year we lived together, but the even greater gift he gave me was his love. And beyond that, even more of a miracle to a young woman like myself who had never known a true “home,” who had never owned property, never thought to do more than pay rent for a fashionable house in Paris. He built me the Villa Romantica.

 

38

Of course the villa was not there yet, but we drove together to the place it would be, in that lovely Delage, chauffeur in gray uniform at the wheel, champagne chilling in the silver bucket, flowers fresh each morning in the silver vases, always lily of the valley. I remember the scent so clearly across all these years. And thank God, I also remember what young love felt like.

The Villa Romantica took a mere twelve months to build, mainly because of my insisting that I intended to occupy it in the New Year when I would hold a party in celebration—a costume party, with every guest masked, the women in feathers, the men in black silk. I had no idea what kind of omen this might represent. And why should I?

I almost fell for the inevitable Marie Antoinette costume but caught myself just in time, realizing there would be at least a dozen others in the same powdered wigs and billowing skirts. I went for the Cinderella look instead; the most charming silken rags in cream and coffee and a touch of raspberry to set off my red hair that I wore not in its usual braid but wrapped round and round my head in a great fiery swirl, studded with the sort of large diamond pins the true Cinderella would never have seen, until she captured her prince, that is. And maybe not even then. After all, we don't really know the ending of that story, do we? Not the way you are about to know the ending of this one.

Let me tell first how wonderful my Villa Romantica looked, pale pink against a midnight blue sky, lanterns hanging from the branches of the newly planted, though mature, trees that looked as though they had been there forever.

We were to welcome in the year 1938. Peace was all around us, at least those of us who ignored the saber-rattling emanating from Germany and its raucous, hotheaded maniacal leader. All we heard was the soft dance music and the music of the sea and the nightingales, and even the cuckoos that could wreck any girl's romance remained outside the window, cuckooing like the clocks the Swiss made.

Was there any night more blissful? Just warm enough for bare shoulders; just cool enough later for a man to lend his jacket to slip over those shoulders; just elegant enough to dress in your best, the latest Paris fashion, the biggest jewels taken from bank vaults and displayed like play stones around elegant necks and on elegant arms. Myself, I wore the pearls. I also wore the new ring, the sapphire from Ceylon where all the most beautiful sapphires were mined, and sold via Amsterdam, where the most expensive and largest stones are cut by craftsmen who are artists too, so every facet catches the light and gleams, a bit of deep blue heaven.

And who was the man that gave me this precious gift?

It was not Rex, who I had unselfishly sent back to his debutante. It was Walt Matthews, known as “Iron Man” Matthews because of his daring adventures in parts of the world most of us never venture to go. He had survived not only the sinking of the then-brand-new and biggest liner ever built, the
Titanic,
but had rescued many passengers from the ship, refusing to take a place in the last small orange life raft, knowing he had no chance. Yet, survive he did in a sea so cold it froze his feet until he feared he could no longer kick or swim, then suddenly he hit the warm Gulf current. He drifted for hours until he was picked up by a passing cruiser. Such is life, or death, he said, in an emotional speech he made about his experience. He also said he never feared death again after that.

I told him later that he only survived so he could find me, and fall in love with me. I was his fate. He said he fell for my scent. Evening in Paris it was called, or in French, of course,
Soir de Paris
. It was by Bourjois and I never knew if I was more enamored of the pretty cobalt-blue bottle with the silver stopper, or the violet-lilac scent itself.

We met, not in Paris, but in London, where I had gone to visit an art exhibition and to see old friends. The exhibition was held in a gallery on Bond Street, which suited me as it meant I could at the same time take in the new fashions displayed in the shop windows, and in particular a small jewelry store called, I believe,
A La Vieille Russie,
which naturally showed beautiful items from the old Russian Court that had to be sold by émigré desperate for money in the new country in which they were now condemned to live.

In my faulty memory, I'm trying to recall whether I went first to the art exhibition and fell in love with the man, or whether I went the jewelry store first and fell for the sapphire. Either way, I ended up with the man and the ring, and later, a painting. And of course, the painting turned out to be the most treasured possession of my life, even more so than the Villa Romantica.

The exhibition was not an important one, simply a hundred or so artworks propped up against a stone wall, not even on tables—they were considered so unimportant—brought in by would-be sellers verging on starvation and for whom a few English pounds might make the difference between a future and no future. Of course I was happy to help. I had been where they were, not so long ago.

There were also a number of more valuable paintings on display that were not for sale. One caught my eye. There was something familiar about the location captured in that painting. I stepped back to take a second look. It was by an English artist, J. M. W. Turner. A river scene, turbulent water with white crested waves, the bank grayish-green in the rainy light that so often covers the English countryside, only emphasizing its loveliness. A small inn hovered over the river, seeming almost ready to tumble into it, with a second-floor window projecting over it, diamond paned, with deep red curtains half-hidden behind the glass. Somehow, I felt I knew that inn; knew that room with its bowed window, and the red curtains I would draw tightly to shut out the night, shutting out the world so I might be alone with the man I truly loved.

*   *   *

But to begin at the beginning. Our meeting was a whirlwind event, a pickup if ever there was one, in a public place in front of dozens of people. We simply stood there, eyes linked, so deep into each other with that physical impact that happens so rarely but cannot be ignored when it does. We were unaware of other people staring, amused no doubt by our obvious sexual frisson. There was no hiding it, I was smitten so hard my legs turned to jelly and my body to liquid, while he carefully held the paper program booklet over his masculinity. “Would you join me for a glass of champagne?” he asked. Of course I would. I would have joined him in bed right there and then, had he asked.

Though I was realistic where sex was concerned, emotions were quite another matter, and something I had been careful to exclude from my life. I was twenty-five years old, never married, never likely to be, not with my reputation. In fact my only offer had come from the delicious Rex, and even then I had known in my heart it was not real. He had meant well, he loved me, it was the appropriate gesture for a gentleman to make to the woman he loved. I will remember him always, for that. And for what came later, because when I needed help, he was there for me.

Anyway, before then, and in fact right there and then, I was in love with Walt “Iron Man” Matthews.

I can remember exactly what I was wearing that night: a black Chanel dress with long, tight, silk-mesh sleeves and a prim white satin collar. Black satin heels, of course, with small diamante bows on the backs, not on the front as is more usual, but then I was never one for the usual. Of course I'd had them moved there. It caused quite a lot of comment and envious female glances, I can tell you.

I wore black silk stockings with a seam up the back as was the style, tricky to keep straight but very sexy. I'm sure every man there wondered where those seams ended up.

My Iron Man certainly did. And it was all the two of us had expected of each other. Was it really love? I ask myself even now. And yes, it was. He was, in fact, the only man I ever truly loved.

We were to stay at that inn many times, in that same spacious room overlooking the river, drawing closed those red damask curtains but leaving the diamond-paned window open so we might hear the river rippling its way toward the weir, where it would fall in a great tumble of white froth into infinity, and perhaps, oblivion. It was as though that river could foretell my future.

 

39

One year was exactly what we had together. One perfect year that I was to remember for the rest of my life.

We spent that perfect year at the Villa Romantica, shunning the everlasting parties, sharing glasses of the local wine over dinners often cooked by myself, a talent I had not known I had, never having taken much interest in food before. But now the markets were all around, with produce grown in these local hills, milk and cheeses from local cows, flowers bunched and tied with ribbons by our local girls. And I loved every minute of it, everything about it, and I loved my man.

How wonderful it was to say that. My man.

We spent every second together, often in the spacious kitchen while I fried the breakfast bacon (usually late in the afternoon). The smell always made my mouth water. He would slice hunks off a huge crusty loaf and rub them in the bacon fat in the pan, letting them soak up the juices until just crisp enough to add bite. Coffee brewed slowly in the new drip machine, leaving me to crave it, hurrying it on while it took forever it seemed. The buttercup-yellow plates and coffee bowls were already on the table. When the coffee was finally ready, I filled those bowls almost to the brim, adding just a splash of rich, creamy milk, picking up the bowl with both hands to drink. A custom my man considered barbaric, having been brought up to use cups with handles at the table, though I suppose it was alright to drink beer in mugs without a handle. Anyhow, barbaric it might seem to a foreigner like him, but to a French woman like me, it was breakfast heaven.

I would slowly come awake with that coffee, sitting in the sunshine, the breeze just sufficiently cool to be pleasant, the cuckoos thankfully gone to their daytime rest. The small gray cat that had adopted us sprawled, paws stretched out in front of him, certain that tidbits would be tossed his way. It was a scene of such peace I could never have foretold the violence that was to come.