until there came a point when he would be at The Box almost daily. She told Hademak she was keen to have as many dance lessons as possible before her return to Chile – but the truth was, there was no return to Chile booked, and though Rudy came, day after day, Mrs de Saulles only rarely bothered to come down from her little tower, even to speak to him.
Rudy didn’t seem to mind. He seemed to know what game she was playing – and since she paid him well for his time I have to presume he was grateful for the money. He would sit on the veranda gazing out over that garden, smoking one cigarette after another, with the cries of his employer’s love-making echoing overhead.
At first, when he came from the city, I would hide away, too shy to let him see me. But then one day Jack and I were in the garden when Rudy’s car pulled up.
Jack began to dance about – he adored Rudy, as I imagined all children would. In any case I snapped at him to be still and he stopped dancing at once. He looked at me consideringly – long and hard. He said, ‘Are you in love with Mr Guglielmi?’
‘What? Don’t be ridiculous!’
‘All the girls are. My papa said. So I don’t see why you wouldn’t be.’
‘For Heaven’s sake!’
Jack ignored my plea to stay quiet, and bounded over the garden to greet him. I hung back, watching with some jealousy, I suppose, as Rudy’s face lit up. He threw down his cigarette, caught the boy in his open arms, with that peculiar grace of his, and tossed him high in the air. You could hear their laughter through the garden – over the grunts and groans oozing from other quarters . . . Oh, I’m exaggerating, of course. But the truth is, it was wonderful to watch them together: an unexpected blast of joy in that miserable, complicated household.
I had planned to slip quietly away, but Rudy saw me before I got a chance. ‘Aha! Jennifer!’ he cried. ‘I was hoping I would see you! But where are you going?’
‘I’m going . . . ’ Where was I going? ‘Well, I’m going to the house, of course. But I shall be back in a minute,’ I said. ‘I have to fetch something from the nursery.’
I saw Jack mumbling something into his ear, then Rudy nodding solemnly, smiling slightly, glancing back at me.
‘That’s all it is.’ Jack whispered loudly. ‘You see?’
‘Oh, absolutely,’ Rudy said – loud enough for me to hear it. ‘How extremely fortunate for me.’
At which point I’m almost certain I broke into a run.
Madeleine was in the hall – at a loose end for once. ‘Wait up!’ she said, delighted to find someone to gossip with. ‘Have you seen who’s here again, Jennifer?’
‘I have,’ I said.
‘Surprised you’re not out there. Batting your eyelids.’
‘Oh, be quiet.’
‘He’s handsome.’
‘I know it.’
‘And so does she.’ She indicated the tower boudoir. ‘Crazy bitch,’ she added, because she always did.
Madeleine followed me into the nursery and I suppose half an hour passed while she filled me in with details, some of which I could have survived without, regarding the conversation she had only that morning overheard between Mrs de Saulles and my father.
‘Though it wasn’t really a conversation, to be honest with you, Jennifer,’ she was saying. ‘More a series of grunts.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
‘Yes, you do. And with me in the room, too! Good God, to look at them both – him an old man and her fragile as feather – on the outside. The crazy bitch. You wouldn’t believe they had it in them.’
‘Yes – well. The racket they make, I should think the whole of Long Island knows it by now,’ I said.
‘And there was me thinking, after a certain number of years, the mechanism stopped working. Didn’t you? A man as old as your father . . . ’
‘He’s not that old . . . ’
‘But the mechanism—’
‘Anything! Please! Can we talk of anything but my filthy papa and his ancient mechanism!’
We were laughing loudly, both of us, sprawled out lazily on the nursery floor. I looked up and there, standing side by side, were Rudy and Jack.
Madeleine gave a silly shriek.
‘Sounds like I missed an excellent beginning,’ Rudy said.
‘Not at all,’ I said, scrambling to sit up. ‘Actually Madeleine was being disgusting.’
‘I didn’t mean to interrupt.’
‘No, no,’ said I. ‘No no no.’
Madeleine guffawed.
‘Only Jack told me,’ Rudy said, ‘there was a steam engine up here, not working as well as it once did?’
‘Quite the opposite, Mr Guglielmi,’ gurgled Madeleine. ‘On the contrary. Ask Jennifer’s papa!’
How I longed to knock her out! Rudy looked for a moment as if he might be about to laugh himself – but then I suppose he saw the mortification on my face and thought better of it. He said, ‘Jack said he had a toy train that was broken. I thought perhaps I could fix it.’
‘And Jack is absolutely right,’ I said. ‘Madeleine—’ I looked at her, and almost – very nearly – started giggling myself. ‘How clever of Jack to remember. He and I have spent days trying to put the wretched thing back together. I’m not sure it can be fixed. Nothing we try seems to work . . . ’
‘Well, perhaps I could – ah!’ He spotted the components, strewn across the table, and right away settled himself before them.
And so the four of us wiled away a little time, with Madeleine and me on the floor, Jack on my lap, and Rudy at the table, with his back to us, bent intently over his work. We talked of this and of that – of nothing, really. I don’t remember a word of it. But I do remember Madeleine, as Rudy worked away, slotting together small pieces of metal – I can see Madeleine now, pulling a face at me, rolling her eyes and pretending to swoon.
Jack said, ‘Mr Guglielmi, poor Madeleine is coming down with something pretty serious.’
He didn’t look up. He said, ‘Oh, I don’t really think so, Jack . . . ’
Rudy moves like a cat. You don’t hear him when he approaches. And he sees things when he doesn’t seem to be looking. Hardly reasons to fall in love with a man, I know. Nevertheless, when he said that, as cool as anything, and without even turning around, I remember even Madeleine blushed. Afterwards she always pretended she disliked him.
The steam
