I'll See You in Paris (32 page)

Win chuckled.

“You're right,” he said. “Conrad. Proust. Mere footnotes. Single entries in the index. ‘Please refer to page ninety-three.'”

“But, a piece of criticism if I may,” Pru said, lifting a John Galsworthy from the shelf.
The Skin Game
.

“Please, yes. If there's one thing I lack at the Grange it's a constant barrage of flak provided by family and friends. It's like music that's abruptly gone out.”

“I didn't realize you were feeling so neglected.” Pru coaxed the book back into place. “I'll try to step up my game. Anyhow, if you ask me, the phrase ‘avid reader' is too tepid. You've used it at least three times in your book.”

“You've a better description, I suppose?”

“Avid is for girls who hide flashlights beneath their pillows so they can finish the latest Nancy Drew after the lights go down.”

“Like our Miss Valentine, I presume.”

“Yes,” she said. “But unlike Lady Marlborough, I never once read so much that I had to spend a week in bed with black bandages over my eyes.”

“Fair enough. I'll try to be more descriptive.”

Win pivoted around to face her.

“You know, I was thinking,” he said. “That here we are writing the duchess's story…”

“
We're
writing her story?”

“Yes. We. Did you not just offer editorial notes? So. Here we are penning Gladys Deacon's tale and perhaps somewhere, someone else is writing the story of us.”

“The story of us?” Pru balked. “Sounds like a snore. And I'm not a fan of novels with protagonists who are writers. Get some originality, people.”

“But, Pru! Think about it!”

Win was starting to get that peppy way about him, the big eyes and spaniellike bounding. It charmed Pru every time.

“Think of all the great writers Mrs. S. has known,” he said. “All the folks in her index. Maybe in an alternate universe someone famous is doing a turn on all of us. The duchess can be in
our
footnotes.”

“Did you take LSD or something?” Pru said with a snort. “Some of Mrs. Spencer's laudanum? Because you're not making a lick of sense.”

“I'm clean as a whistle! We haven't even partaken of Welsh wine for over forty-eight hours. Humor me. Who would write about the duchess?”

“Uh, I thought
you
were writing about the duchess?”

“I've got it!” He snapped his fingers. “George Bernard Shaw. He would do a bang-up job with the old gal.”

“Well, he did hate Winston Churchill, so they have that in common.”

“Yes! As G.B.S. famously wrote the man: ‘I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my new play; bring a friend … if you have one.'”

“‘If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance,'” Pru quoted, playing along.

“And, by gosh, are there family skeletons.”

“He hated hunting, too,” Pru added. “Just like Mrs. Spencer. ‘When a man wants to murder a tiger he calls it sport; when a tiger wants to murder him he calls it ferocity.'”

“Aces!” Win said. He did a little hop-dance toward the shelf at the far end of the room and pulled from it a red leather book. “Here we go, another Shaw quote! ‘War does not decide who is right but who is left.'”

At once Pru's face fell, and with it the temperature in the room.

“Oh fecking hell! Too much. Too much, Seton! Okay. Proust could write her too, you know. Though I suppose that's a stitch obvious.”

He shoved the book back into its place.

“Proust should write about himself,” Pru said, still smarting from the war comment.

She shook her head, trying to rattle away the feeling along with it.

“No, no, no,” Win said. “Where's your originality? Blenheim practically screams Proust!”

“Blenheim?”

“Yes! It's perfect! He could go on and on about that sprawling space in true Proustian fashion. Like his own writing. Interminable. Over a hundred characters per part.”

“Mrs. Spencer did call the palace neurotic,” Pru said. “And Proust was a total head job. But mostly I find his style introspective and Blenheim is as ostentatious as it gets. Give me more gold! More statues! Paint my eyes on your ceiling in dizzying pattern!”

“Forget Blenheim for a minute. What about Tom?”

“Tom?” she said, gawping.

“Yes, you know, Tom from the barn?”

“I'm familiar with the trope. You believe he really exists?”

Oddly, Mrs. Spencer hadn't brought up his name in some time. Not since Win showed up, Pru didn't think.

“Of course he exists!” Win said. “I've seen his home.”

“His home? You mean the proverbial barn?”

“That's the one. I walked through it on my way onto the property. You wouldn't believe the stuff in there. I think the…” He batted the air. “Never mind. But, yes, Tom exists.”

“Holy cow,” Pru replied, dumbfounded by his assuredness.

Tom existed and Win did not seem to doubt this. He didn't even have the good sense to be alarmed.

“Okay, Tom would be written by … um … Conrad?” she said, still dizzy.

“Conrad?” Win twisted up his face. “How's that?”

“Joseph Conrad. Also known as J
ó
zef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski. He deemed himself a Pole, through and through. Assuming Mrs. Spencer's own Pole exists, he's her longest-standing friend and she simply cherishes Conrad.”

“Oh! I used to revel in his books,” Mrs. Spencer told Pru once, before Win Seton stumbled onto the scene. “I wanted to take to the sea at once!”

No wonder the woman had a copy of
Sailing Alone Around the World
in her collection. The longer Pru lived at the Grange, the more simpatico she felt toward Mrs. Spencer. Maybe, in the end, they'd need
two
beds at the O'Connell Ward, side by side.

“Ah, Conrad,” Win said. “‘We live in the flicker.' That's a good one.”

He whipped out a notepad from his back pocket and began to scribble.

“You're writing this down?” Pru asked.

“Yes, this might be the best interview I've conducted to date. Naturally, Edith Wharton would write you.”

“Me?” Pru squawked. “She writes about the privileged class!”

“The Kelloggs are pretty privileged, far as I can tell.”

“Doesn't count. I was never part of their family. I'm an orphan, remember?”

“The fetchingest orphan to ever exist. Sorry, Miss Valentine, I'll have to overrule you. Wharton is a prime choice. She wrote with humor, wit, and warmth. Her characters were always beautiful.”

“I do adore her stories.”

Pru sighed, conceding that perhaps the reason she loved Wharton was because she wanted to live in the worlds she created, which happened to look a lot like Charlie's.

“‘Set wide the window,'” Pru quoted. “‘Let me drink the day.'”

“‘If only we'd stop trying to be happy, we could have a pretty good time.'”

“That sounds more like Mrs. Spencer than it does me,” she said. “I'm closer to Henry James. His protagonists are often young American women enduring oppression and abuse.”

“Somehow I don't like where this is headed.”

“Oppression.” She pointed directly at him. “And abuse. All wrapped up in one writerly package.”

“Ah!” he said, laughing now. “So I'm the antagonist in this story. Domineering you with my tyranny!”

“Yes. Exactly. And as for you, Evelyn Waugh is the clear choice. His novels center on the rise of mediocrity in the common man.”

“There's nothing on the rise about my mediocrity.”

Bump. Bump. Thump. Stomp.

“What in the world?” she said.

Thump. Stomp.

Together Win and Pru wrenched their heads toward the door. They'd been too loud, too aggressively spirited in their repartee. There was no telling how Mrs. Spencer would react, catching the two of them in her sanctuary, in the hidden den of books.

“We're in the shit now,” Win murmured.

At once, the Duchess of Marlborough burst through the door, the purple silk gown wafting out behind her like a sail on a ship. In her hands she held a radio.

“Mrs. Spencer, let me explain,” Win said, speaking fast. “We stumbled upon your impressive library—”

“Shush!” she yipped, scrambling about for an outlet. “I knew you two were prowling around in here. Someone moved my Bennetts.”

She fiddled with the radio knob. Pru winced at the shrill of the static.

“Well, we're glad you've joined us,” Win babbled on. “Not to worry, nothing dodgy happening here. We're having no fun a'tall without your observations and clever bon mots.”

“Enough!” Mrs. Spencer said. She looked up. The muscles in her neck twitched. “Listen, you fool. Something is happening.”

“What do you mean ‘happening'?”

She turned to face Pru.

“This war of yours. I think it's about to end.”

 

Fifty-six

RADIO BROADCAST

If you're just joining us, today at the Majestic Hotel in Paris, the governments of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, the Republic of Vietnam, and the United States signed an agreement to end the Vietnam War.

Beginning on twenty-eight January a cease-fire will go into effect. North and South Vietnamese forces are to hold their locations and American troops will withdraw within the ensuing sixty days.

Prisoners of war on all sides will be released and allowed to return home. The parties to the agreement will assist in repatriating the remains of the dead. Reunification of Vietnam will be carried out step-by-step through peaceful means. And now, a word from the president of the United States, Mr. Richard Nixon.

“At 12:30 Paris time today Tuesday, January 23, 1973, the Agreement on Ending the War and Restoring Peace in Vietnam was initialed by Dr. Henry Kissinger on behalf of the United States, and Special Adviser Le Duc Tho on behalf of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.

“The agreement will be formally signed by the parties participating in the Paris Conference on Vietnam on January 27, 1973, at the International Conference Center in Paris.

“The cease-fire will take effect at 2400 Greenwich Mean Time, January 27, 1973. The United States and the Democratic Republic of Vietnam express the hope that this agreement will ensure stable peace in Vietnam and contribute to the preservation of lasting peace in Indochina and Southeast Asia.”

 

Fifty-seven

 

GD: During the war, I remained in Paris.

WS: It must've been a time of great challenge.

GD: You're telling me! You couldn't get a cab at all to come to that quarter.

WS: I was referring to the general living conditions. The men off to war. The women home and nervous. Rationing. The lines for food. Not to mention the threat of German occupation.

GD: Oh, Germans. [Snort] And I never had issues with rations. There were plenty of men left in the city happy to share their spoils.

WS: I'll bet. So you stayed in Paris for the duration? That's a long time for someone like you to remain in one place.

GD: The first German shells didn't even hit Paris until March of 1918. I was in the city when it happened. One landed thirty yards before me. My skirt was blown straight over my head!

WS: That must've been quite the sight. Especially for the sugar-sharers. Ha. That's a good euphemism. Pru, write that down.

GD: You think it's funny that the city was bombed? That I was thrown to the sidewalk, which was nothing compared to the four people I saw in front of me, blown to atoms.

PRU: Blown to atoms. Her favorite wartime anecdote.

GD: Later that night, I found shrapnel lodged in my sable shawl. The fur saved me from certain death.

PRU: I'm just going to leave you two alone …

GD: Sit down, Miss Innamorati. I'm not finished and it would serve you well to hear my tales.

PRU: But I …

GD: Not to worry. I won't talk any more of people being blown to bits. I'm well aware of your background in that area.

PRU: You told her?

GD: He didn't have to tell me. Return to your seat. Can we jettison your theatrics for now and return to my story? Good Lord.

WS: Please, Mrs. Spencer. Proceed. I'll keep her theatrics in check.

PRU: HEY!

GD: It wasn't too long after this that they found Mother's body in the salon at her palace, left rotting for a fortnight.

WS: Sickening and tragic.

GD: Who found her and how she died I never learned. It took eleven days to contact me, which the Italians blamed on the war. I'll tell you something. This news hit harder than the metal to my mink. Mother was no longer in the world. She died in a way she would've despised. Undressed. Old. And inexorably alone.

[Tape is silent for ninety seconds]

WS: I'm very sorry, Mrs. Spencer.

GD: She never got to see me married. Mother always believed I'd end up with Sunny.

WS: Sunny … as in the Earl of Sunderland. Are you finally admitting…?

GD: Yes, you've won the battle, all right? I was married to the Earl of Sunderland. The Duke of Marlborough. Congratulations. You beat an old woman into submission. I hope you feel quite proud of yourself.

[GD's eyes glisten in the candlelight]

WS: Mrs. Spencer, my apologies if I was being insensitive or if I've hurt you …

GD: [Ignores writer] It's what Mother wanted for me. A marriage like that. But she never saw it happen. Unless, you know.

[GD looks heavenward]

WS: She knew. I'm sure of it.

GD: I never took you for a religious man Seton. [Deep sigh] Her death changed everything for me. I decided to hell with it. Time to toss propriety out the window.