land, with a drive of seventy yards or so, and space enough for a large, bleak garden.
In England, Papa and I had stayed in plenty of magnificent houses while my father (before they grew tired of employing him) painted portraits of their owners. And, really, it wasn’t even as though The Box were particularly large, not compared to the houses I knew in England – and certainly not compared to some of the other houses in the area. Nevertheless there was something indefinably glitzy about it. Mr Hademak was right about that. To my English eyes, fresh from all the deprivations of war, The Box seemed to offer comforts that in Europe had yet to be even imagined: as many bathrooms as there were bedrooms, for example, or not far off it, and hot, running water in all of them; and electrical lighting in every part of the house, even the servants’ rooms. The kitchen was fitted with an electrical icebox – something I had never even seen before – and another electrical machine specifically for making waffles! And in the drawing room on the ceiling there was a wonderful electrical fan. The Box had all these things and more. In its construction, it seemed every possible human comfort had been pandered to.
Yet for all that it felt uncared-for. Cold. There was my father’s – not especially good – portrait of Mr de Saulles, which hung importantly in the large white entrance hall, but other than that there were very few pictures. Nor even much furniture. And what furniture there was appeared ill assorted and unconsidered: a heavy leather couch here, a feeble rattan armchair there, and a hotchpotch of rugs across that great big, elegant drawing-room’s floor. Luxurious – and yet unloved. From the moment I walked into it I could sense it was an unhappy house.
Madeleine was summoned to Mrs de Saulles’s bedroom within minutes of our arrival, and I didn’t set eyes on her again until the following morning. In the meantime Mrs de Saulles seemed to have no interest in meeting me. She had dispatched her young son and temporary nurse to spend the day in the city with his (and my) father. So, I wandered about behind Mr Hademak trying to prise from him what, exactly, my duties would be. He was terribly vague about it. ‘Oh, just make the little soldier to giggle!’ he said irritably. For which, by the way, I was to be paid twenty dollars a week, with Sundays off. A better deal than Madeleine, then.
Poor, sweet Jack. I miss him. He turned out to be the sweetest, gentlest little friend in spite of all the turmoil that surrounded him. Afterwards I wrote several times to him, care of his grandmother. I wonder if the letters even reached him. I never received any reply, not once. But I think about him often – his bravery, mostly. And the way he looked at his mother with so much love and sorrow on that terrible, awful day . . .
Mr Hademak took me to the little boy’s nursery: the only room in the house that seemed to have any warmth to it. A jumble of Jack’s drawings leaned against the mantelpiece, and there was hardly an inch of the place that wasn’t cluttered with some new-fangled plaything: model cars and mechanical guns, circus sets and a doll-sized piano that really worked, and a steam engine that could puff around its own railway track . . . And aeroplanes that could be wound up and flown, and Houdini magic sets and . . . His father never came home without a carful of new toys for him.
‘But he doesn’t play in here much,’ Mr Hademak said airily. And then, after an unusual pause, ‘You’ll be kind to him, I’m sure, Miss Doyle. He has many toys, but he has . . . ’ He stopped for a moment. ‘Well . . . his parents adore him, of course. But – perhaps you have discovered it . . . ’ He flashed me the shyest of smiles and blushed. ‘When you are young there are many ways to be lonely.’
I nodded. A pause.
‘Tell me, are you fond of watching the flickers, Miss Doyle? I am very fond of watching the flickers. I can’t keep away. Each Sunday, if Mrs de Saulles allows it, there I go to the movie theatre at Westbury, or at Mineola. Wherever they have a movie showing. And my favourite star – who is yours? My favourite of all the stars is, of course . . . Miss Mary Pickford! Do you admire her, Miss Doyle? I hope so!’
I would have liked to answer since, from what little I had been permitted to see of them, I was already quite a fan of the movies – and of Mary Pickford, too. But just then a telephone message came through informing us there were to be fifteen for dinner, and after that Mr Hademak had no time for me.
I would have preferred to stay up there in the nursery, but he insisted I come down to the kitchen, where I only got in everyone’s way. I tried to make conversation with the cook. Unsuccessfully, since she was Spanish, and always surly. There was a kitchen-maid, too, whose name I don’t even remember. She was from Mexico. Not that it matters. In all the long months I stayed at The Box I don’t think I ever heard her speak. Certainly, she didn’t speak to me that day. Nobody did much, except Mr Hademak, and only then so he could boast about the evening’s guests. There was to be an Austrian count and his heiress wife, he said, and the Duke of Manchester, and various others, all of them amusing to Mr Hademak in one way or another.
‘ . . . and finally there is Mr Guglielmi,’ Mr Hademak said regretfully. ‘But he is not quite a guest . . . Mr de Saulles only likes him to come so the other guests have an opportunity to watch Miss Sawyer dance. He comes once a week to teach Mrs de Saulles the tango – I believe Mr de Saulles pays his travel expenses . . . ’
‘He’s a professional dancer?’ I asked.
‘A dance instructor. And recently a new professional partner for Miss Sawyer. Not as good a partner as her last, in my small opinion. He was just a gardener not so long ago. And he iss a wop. So although he eats in the dining room,’ he said again, ‘he iss not quite a guest . . . ’
They arrived – the guests and the not-quite guest – in a noisy motorcade, four vehicles in all, with Mr de Saulles, and the woman, Joan Sawyer, whom my father had told me was our host’s mistress, in the front car. After them came a second car, and a third, both crammed with dinner guests, joyously attired. (After wartime London, it was amazing to see how colourful and prosperous they looked!) And in the final car – which stopped directly in front of us – sat the temporary nurse, who had earlier been dispatched to the city with the little boy, and the not-quite-guest, Mr Rodolfo Guglielmi.
That was the first time I glimpsed him, gazing moodily out of the automobile window, smoking a cigarette, with the boy, Jack, fast asleep against his shoulder . . . And even then, when I was so impatient to be reunited with my father, when there was so much new to look at, the sight of him made me stop. He looked quite detached amid all the activity – all the noisy people in their joyous hats, clambering out of their cars, shouting and laughing. He sat very still. More handsome than any man I had ever seen. His thoughts seemed to be miles away.
Mr Hademak and I stood side by side at the front door. I think he was rather put out to have me there – as uncertain as I was of my not-quite-guest-like status. Actually, it was difficult for both of us to know where I was meant to fit in for there was my father, climbing out of the same car as the duke. (‘There! I told you!’ whispered Hademak. ‘That one – the great big chubby one – that is His Grace, the English duke!’) There he was, my father, clapping His English Grace on the great big chubby shoulder, laughing and joking with an elegant woman in vibrant yellow dress. And there was I.
‘Ah!’ cried my father, looking up at me, with love and warmth and blissful forgetfulness, I truly believe, as to where the two of us had only hours before left off. ‘There she is!’ He left the yellow woman and strode towards me. ‘My very own little Jane Eyre!’ He laughed, enveloped me in his arms, lifted me off my feet and kissed me. The familiar smell of alcohol, tobacco and his cologne . . . I can smell it now – I can feel the wash of relief I felt then, as his great arms wrapped me in it.
‘How is it, Lola, my sweet girl? Have you had a delightful day?’
The
