Days of Winter (22 page)

Arranging herself against the pillows, Solange took a long look at Magda. “You’ve come to tell me something, yes?”

“Wise Solange …”

“And what is it?”

“I’ve waited five years for a man that I invented.”

“What does that mean?”

“There is no Rubin Hack.”

“Did you actually expect him to come back unchanged?”

“No … but I didn’t expect this … this shell, this stranger. …No, I didn’t expect that …”

“Is it his looks that upset you?”

“Solange, Rubin is impotent …”

“I take it you mean he was less than amorous last night”

“He couldn’t even touch me.”

“That sometimes happens to men who’ve been in battle.”

“And what am I supposed to do until he recovers …
if
he recovers?”

“You sound angry, as if Rubin were to blame.”

“I am angry, I admit it … we waited five years to say hello to a ghost.”

“Do you love Rubin enough to help him through this … perhaps the worst time of all?”

Magda got up and paced the floor. “I’m human too, Solange. I’ve waited so long for a husband to come home and love me—”

“Rubin certainly loves you. Are you confusing sex with love?”

“But sex is part of loving—”

“Of course it is, but Rubin needs your help. …Are you willing to give it?”

Magda felt like screaming. “What do you want from me, Solange?”

“I want you to be a woman. I told you that once before. Maybe you no longer love Rubin because he’s not quite so handsome. Maybe his scars repulse you.”

“I’m so
confused
… maybe it’s because we weren’t together enough before Rubin enlisted. …”

“I think it would do you a great deal of good to think of your memories of Paris
before
Rubin found you.”

Magda did not want to be reminded of those days, which, of course, was what Solange meant. “I resent your bringing that up, Solange. It isn’t fair … I’ve been faithful to Rubin.” She blocked out of her mind the one time with Camail. “I’ve been a good mother … I have.”

“You’ve also been a pretty selfish and self-centered person who’s very good when you get what you want. But when things aren’t to your liking, I’m afraid you’re capable of being just a bit ruthless. Rubin has changed physically, but he’s still the fine human being he always was.”

Magda seemed to be rooted to the floor. “
How dare you say such things to me?
”

“Because, my dear Magda, I think you lack gratitude, compassion. No one knows you as I do. …At this moment there are wives all over the world who will have to live with men who have lost their limbs … their eyesight. …Do you think that God has singled you out? You live too much in a world of make-believe, Magda. You wanted Rubin to come back to you exactly as he left. …”

“You’ve said quite enough, Solange. We can no longer be friends, not ever … not after this. …” And she rushed out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

Solange rang for Anne to get her suitcases. The time to leave the Hack household had come. She had wanted to go back to Paris the day the war was over, but she’d promised Rubin she wouldn’t leave Magda until he returned. Well, he was back now, and she could go home, a place she longed to see again, no matter what she found there. It would be better than staying.

Rubin didn’t seriously try to change her mind. She was, after all, French. She had been away a long time. But he hated to see her go. She had been a wonderful friend to him … and to Magda. He could never replace Solange.

Her parting from Jeanette was especially difficult. …“
Tante
Solange, please you can’t go, I won’t let you.” It had been
Tante
Solange, after all, who had been there the night she was so sick and mama was at the theater …
Tante
Solange, and Uncle Alexis, who had brought her balloons, taken her to the Punch and Judy Show, the carousel. …She asked if she couldn’t go with her aunt … After all, she knew her better than she did her father, who could keep her mother company … and Solange had to tell her, try to tell her, how much her father needed her too, how very special fathers were for daughters … more than aunts … and daughters were for fathers. She told her that they would write one another and remember each other on their birthdays and on Christmas. …“There, now, isn’t that a fine plan?” and Jeanette said, not very enthusiastically, that she guessed it was. …

And then there was Magda who in her fashion had surely loved Solange. And now she would have the full responsibility of her daughter, which she had feared even before her birth, which had made her resist having a child at all and might well have continued to if it had not been for the war and Rubin’s imminent departure. “I’m truly sorry for the things I said, for the way I behaved,” she said to Solange as they walked arm-in-arm toward the foyer just before Solange’s departure. “I will miss you terribly, you must know that,” and Solange thought, yes, for a time, but life goes on, and she thought too that she did love this strange, difficult, marvelous girl-woman, and wished devoutly that she had a little more wisdom, but corrected herself quickly, reminding herself that perfection had nothing to do with life. …

Magda stood now looking at her for what she was certain would be the last time. Her eyes were full of tears. “I love you, Solange. …I always will.”

“Thank you, Magda, and I you, but there are others who also need your love. Give it with all your heart.”

And then she was walking out to meet Rubin, who would see her to Victoria Station where she would leave for home … and, to his regret, out of his and Magda’s immediate life. …

In the days that followed, Rubin’s strength began to return. As life once again took on a semblance of sanity, his spirits began to lift.

He gloried in Jeanette. She gave him a sense of purpose he had thought was lost. He no longer felt so useless. They took long walks together, and the familiar London streets and parks did much to raise his spirits.

Magda noticed the changes. Thank God, she thought, at least he no longer sat for hours gazing into space. Their nights, however, were still the same. Loveless. Rubin’s slight rally from his earlier depression seemed to have an inverse effect on Magda … perhaps because she could afford at last to allow herself some of her own true feelings without the awful guilt Solange had made her feel when she first voiced them. The facts were she was still rejected by the family except for Leon and Deborah, and even Leon seemed cooler of late. Rubin was an object of sympathy, but sympathy was not love or even strong affection. It was nobody’s
fault
… damn it … but it was the way it was. And then there was Jeanette, constantly with Rubin now, almost as though Magda didn’t exist. All right … she was his daughter and it was natural he should want to make up for lost time … but
she
had lost time to be made up for too. …God, to resent one’s own child … and yet in a way she did—admit it. From the first, wasn’t she more Rubin’s than hers … his desire, not hers …?

There were days when she felt she was breaking apart, and this was one of them. She decided to try to make some conversation with Rubin. “Have you seen Leon this week?”

“No, but I spoke to him.”

“What did he have to say?”

“He wants to talk to me about some legal matters. …”

“Legal matters?”

“Yes. It’s probably about the estate. …”

She had something important to talk about too, and she might as well bring it up now. “Rubin …? I don’t want to upset you … but … well, you know I never wanted to live here … and now that you’re home … Rubin, please, let’s go back to Paris. We’ll be happier. You said you wanted to paint …”

She waited for his reply. When there was none, she said, “Rubin, you seem to have left me.”

“No,” he said, “I haven’t left you, but you’re asking me to do something I simply can’t do.”

“I thought, eventually, that that was what you wanted to do. …In fact, you once told me your father advised it—”

“
He
advised, and besides, that was before the war. …I can never leave London, Magda. This is my home. I never realized before now how much I love it.”

“And what about me?” she asked softly. “Don’t I matter?”

He came to her, holding her. “You are my life, Magda … you and our child … but the past is over. No, dearest, I can’t leave this place, it’s like a safe port after all the—”

“But for me it’s like a hell. I’ve nothing here, I’ve been ostracized. Even Leon seems to have changed toward me—”

“No, darling, that isn’t true, it’s your imagination. You’ve had a very difficult time, God knows, but now I’m home. …”

That night Rubin reached out for her. He held her close and kissed her … felt her … explored her. …And at last she felt him grow hard. She helped him find his way as he entered her. It was something less than fulfilling, but at least she felt some release. …

Later, Rubin said, “It will be better, Magda … I promise it will. You’ve been very patient. …I love you. …”

She was asleep before he finished talking.

In the morning, lying there beside him, she felt on the edge of tears. His well-meaning solicitude was more than she could bear. She could still feel the touch of his body … his near-fleshless ribs, his bony thin legs stretched across her. …Oh God, he was like a cadaver.

But Rubin was comparatively cheerful … at least he’d regained some of his self-esteem as a man … as he chatted about going to see Leon and then they’d all go for a walk in the park. …

Magda begged off. A headache.

As Rubin waited at the door of Leon’s house, he wondered briefly why Leon had seemed to make a point of suggesting he come alone. He’d hardly have brought Magda along to a discussion of business matters in any case. …Magda had mentioned that Leon had been slightly aloof, but he was certain she, and he, were reading something into nothing.

It was the first time he’d been in Leon’s house in years, he realized, as Leon now came forward to greet him.

“Rubin,” he said, “how are you getting along?”

“I feel better every day. It’s good to be back in London.”

“Yes,” said Leon, “isn’t it …? Sit down, Rubin, and let me tell you straight off the situation we’re faced with.”

Rubin sat down.

“Rubin, I’m afraid you’re in for a rather bad shock, but I just don’t know how I can delay telling you any longer—”

“What is it?”

“Our solicitor came round a few days ago to speak to me about you.”

“Why didn’t he call me?”

“Because I told him how ill you’ve been. The truth is … Magda has spent almost all of your inheritance. …In fact, there isn’t enough money to pay your creditors.”

Rubin was stunned. He shook his head in disbelief. “That can’t be true. …When I left London there was fifty thousand pounds. How could she possibly have spent so much in less than five years?”

“She’s been very extravagant, I’m afraid.”

“Still, fifty thousand pounds? I don’t believe it. …There must be a mistake.”

“There’s no mistake. I’ve been over all the accounts.”

Rubin was completely bewildered.” That was all the money we had … she
knew
that. …Still, with the money from Father’s estate, we should be all right.”

“Unfortunately,” Leon continued, taking a deep breath, “you and I were not here when Father was dying, and it seems Maurice talked Father into giving him power of attorney, since you and I were not here, in case Father died before he could make a new will. Which is exactly what happened.”

“What does that mean … in concrete terms?”

“Father’s will is null and void.”

Rubin went white. “I don’t understand. Is Maurice withholding my share? Where do I stand in terms of the estate?”

Leon finally answered. “Without, I’m afraid, a shilling.”

“And Maurice has done this?”

“Before Father died, Maurice convinced Father that there should be someone to provide for the family and invest the money, in case we didn’t return … especially for the sake of the children.”

Rubin laughed.” You have no children at all, and I have one, so that means Maurice and Phillip.”

“That’s right.”

“How did you find out about all this?”

“Shortly after I came home Maurice and Phillip called me into the conference room. Maurice did all the talking. He told me his side of the story.”

“And how are you to be treated, Leon?”

Leon hesitated “…The same as Phillip and Maurice.”

“But not me … and you allowed them to do this to me?”

“Rubin, I fought with them. I said things I never thought I’d say to a brother. But Maurice will not give an inch.”

“And what about Phillip?”

“Phillip is on your side, but Maurice has the power of attorney and, believe me, he will not budge. Worse, he’s convinced that he’s justified.”

“But why? What have I—”

“It’s his hatred for … Magda. It’s become an obsession. …He’s punishing you for her. He even had Magda investigated right after your marriage. He … they … know about her past—”

“I see. …” said Rubin. “Is there anything else?”

Leon gave Rubin an envelope containing a record of Magda’s extravagances. “Try not to be bitter, Rubin. I’m going to help you. We’ll work out something. …”

Rubin hardly heard him. He was trying to think about how to tell Magda, how to sort out his feelings. How could Maurice, his own flesh and blood … and Magda … In the car on the way home he berated himself for having been an incredibly stupid ass, for being so irresponsible as to expect a young woman, a girl, really—who knew nothing about the value of money—to take over control of so much. At first he was staggered by the contents of the envelope Leon had given him from their solicitor, a record of expenditures for parties, jewels, gowns and gifts, and then once again he tried to remain calm as he reminded himself that she had been left as abruptly on her own, in her fashion, as so many millions of others at the outbreak of war. Her life had been wrenched, too. …Still, he thought as he put the records back into the envelope and took up the package that Leon had also given him—somewhat reluctantly, he’d thought at the time—and tore it open to examine its contents, as much as he could justify or at least explain her spending—he’d try not to think of it as extravagances—he couldn’t help feeling a resentment, even an anger. …Who, after all, wanted to come home to find himself without resources, stripped by his own brother, spent to the bottom by his young wife …?