Pictures of the Past (15 page)
F
inally, his sojourn to and from Europe had gone full circle. The trip that would define his entire being for the rest of his life had come to an end. When the train made its final approach into Union Station in Chicago and Taylor exited down the metal steps of the Pullman car following the porter with his luggage, he took only a cursory glance to see if Emily was there and was neither surprised nor disappointed that she was not.
But then, just down the concrete walkway, skirting people and steel beams, struggling to catch his attention with extended waves of his arms, was a very welcome and familiar face. It was Gregory, his closest contemporary among the house staff, who greeted him warmly, with more of a hug then a handshake.
“Sir, it’s good to have you back. I will be happy to update you on anything at home. You look well, but…”
They were walking at a lively pace, with Gregory now leading the porter toward the automobile, though continuing the conversation as he glanced back over his shoulder.
“But,” Gregory continued, “I want to say…distracted…I know, of course, you are looking for Miss Emily. So I regret to be the one to tell you some disappointing news. You see, she was called back to Newport earlier in the week. She was beside herself to have to go home just days before you were finally returning.”
“Really, Gregory? Is everything OK?”
“Mr. Taylor, I believe that her father suffered a serious injury.”
“Oh, my God. And Emily can be so fragile with bad news—How did she take it?”
“I confess that much of what I know about her father’s condition I overheard. But I was called upon to help her pack up her things and escort her to the train.”
“That must have been a big job,” he said wryly.
“Again, I must confess that there were three of us packing.” He looked at Taylor with a sideways smirk and they both burst out laughing.
“Oh, I’m so sorry, Mr. Taylor. It is not my business to judge.”
“It’s OK, Gregory. I obviously know exactly what you must have gone through. I’m not sorry I missed it— although I should have been there for her.”
“Well, your mother and father did their best to comfort her before she left—but she does have a way.”
“Can you tell me what happened?
“It seems like a freak combination of illness and accident. It appears Mr. Kendall was sailing—they say he might have blacked out from exposure or had a heart attack. He let go of some lines, the boom whipped around and knocked him before one of his sons could react. When he was brought ashore, he was unconscious. I’m not sure if he is still hospitalized or convalescing at home.”
“My God, that does sound serious,” Taylor responded. “I’m glad she went immediately and didn’t wait for my return.” Taylor felt guilty thinking that the timing of this event had worked well for him. He would have an opportunity now to gain perspective on all that he had experienced in Europe. He would have additional time to decide how to proceed with plans that he had been formulating on the voyage home.
T
he most striking feature of Emily Kendall, the reason why people were drawn to her for immediate second glances, was the contrast of her whitish skin against her thick, dark auburn hair. Her features were perfect and petite, the small nose—the almond-shaped eyes with dark brown pupils and lids domed with high-arched dark brows. Though her perfectly manicured hands were thin and almost child-sized, her frame was slim, but not short. Simply, she looked like a porcelain doll come to life. And it should have been no surprise that her spoiled and entitled manner was a result, undoubtedly, of a mother who had enjoyed dressing that doll from birth through adolescence in the most stylish and expensive garments—accessorizing with little mink muffs and pearls from the time she was a toddler. Trips to New York throughout her childhood included overnights at the Plaza Hotel and a suite filled with clothes from Saks Fifth Avenue. Following an afternoon of shopping, sometimes the five- or seven-year-old Emily would fall asleep on the big tufted chairs of the exquisite Palm Court Restaurant, in the midst of drinking a root beer float, her black patent leather shoes dangling off her feet, as her mother sat with friends and sipped tea.
As a young adult, Emily held herself in a straight, regal manner, and when she waved to friends across the campus lawn, she used just the slight twist of the wrist motion that royalty employed on long parade routes. She was one of those beautiful young women that seemed snobbish and unapproachable, and yet made you wonder if she was actually teeming with the same insecurities and angst as any girl her age.
She was not. Emily had been pampered and coddled first by parents and adoring grandparents and then by a court of three older brothers, who playfully tormented and teased her, but protected her like knights in armor and put her firmly in place on her pedestal.
Initially, all that Emily Kendall could concern herself with was the inconvenience of her father’s infirmary. She had just spent an extended period of time in the Chicago area, occupying herself with the gracious hospitality of her circle of friends, as well as the Woodmere family. She knew she was wearing on them all and had actually been thinking of returning home soon, but certainly not until after the next weekend with its full schedule of garden parties and with two new dresses waiting in her wardrobe for their debut. But, in truth, if she had known Taylor would have extended his stay abroad, she would have enjoyed the time back at Newport, Rhode Island, with her brothers and her friends, attending the whirlwind of summer parties there that continued, but certainly more limited due to the current economic conditions.
Actually, it hadn’t been her idea to stay with the Woodmeres for more than a few weeks that summer, and certainly not to remain there once Taylor left for Europe. But her mother had insisted.
“Emily, you just stay in Kenilworth and establish yourself as his intended,” she had instructed her. If this conversation had been in person, not on the phone, her mother would have witnessed the familiar pouty sulk of her twenty-one-year-old daughter.
“Mother, there are so many other girls I know who are my age and not yet brides.”
“Then believe me, my dear,” her mother continued, “they have mothers just like me scouting out prospects. Or maybe they have no concerns for their futures. But honestly, as my only daughter, I want to know you will be set and secure. Lord knows I will worry how the boys will establish themselves, but I have less control over that.”
Her mother’s last statement caused Emily to pause and quizzically wrinkle her forehead. What did those words mean? Her father had said he would always take care of her—and her brothers—all of them. Why was her mother speaking so strangely now, she wondered, but she set aside those thoughts to challenge her mother’s instructions to remain. “I know you are already equating me with your spinster sister, Aunt Ella, but I think your concerns are unfounded,” Emily said, as she reminded her mother that before Taylor, even when she first started seeing Taylor, she always had a following of boys interested in her at school and at Newport.
“Well, the same was true with Aunt Ella,” her mother continued. “You know that, Emily—pretty as you are today, when Ella was young she was a dazzling figure in the new fashion of dresses that were so slim and figure flattering after decades of puffy ornamentation. My God, when we were younger, I was so jealous of her—she could have had her pick of any of the boys. I would keep my boyfriends from coming home when she was around, as she would intoxicate them just by walking into the room. Well—you see what happened to her—she let her moment pass and then her debutante years—and then the next years. And here she is alone without a man because she let her prime slip away.”
“Mother, you are truly exhausting,” Emily returned, picturing her smart, exotic aunt, usually dressed replete with a stylish hat and black netting covering one eye. She was always a commanding presence with her skirt suits and textured hose—and thick high heels that accentuated the curves of her calves. “Aunt Ella is not alone and you know it. Aunt Ella—well—she has a girlfriend. You know it, although you won’t say it; she is in a lesbian relationship.”
“Now, I have told you not to speak like that ever, and especially not to me. You know how those kinds of rumors get started at girls’ boarding schools. They are vicious and unfounded lies. My sister shares an apartment in Manhattan with another female associate at her design firm and you need not read more into it. And if she had acted sooner on her many choices, she would not have found herself the subject of such malicious and unreasonable gossip that, frankly, I find at this time too unnerving to continue to discuss.”
“Oh, Mother—you don’t become a lesbian because you kept turning down men—you turn down men because you want women.”
“Emily—I am hanging up now. You just stay in Chicago and wait for Taylor to return.”
And with that, Emily heard only the final slam of the phone on the receiver.
But now that conversation was weeks in the past and Emily had been called back to Rhode Island before Taylor finished the final leg of his trip home by land from New York to Chicago. It was as if she was a young child again and could not or refused to comprehend the severity of the situation with her father. But perhaps this worked well for her, as she had a long, solitary trip back to Newport and would travel best if she were not in a distraught state.
The news at home was not good, and so Charles, their chauffeur, chose to drive in silence from the Boston train station to the compound at Newport. This was not something that Emily had registered as unusual, as she always found him remotely proper (and he found her to be a snobbish brat). He had actually begun a conversation inquiring as to her health, but, as usual, she returned no such salutation, and so he let the silence fill the air.
I
t was only a few months after Taylor returned back to Chicago from Europe and his stop in New York that he received the desperate call from Emily and knew he was expected to be with her in Newport. In those months, Taylor had tried not to act distracted at home or at work, but had thought of nothing but being reunited with Sarah. They wrote letters with a far greater efficiency than either postal system could manage, and Taylor surprised himself with a talent for composing love sonnets. Although he had given his parents detailed accounts of his experiences abroad, they were mainly limited to business interactions. He struggled with admitting his feelings toward Sarah until he could resolve the situation with Emily. But with this call, he knew he could no longer simply maintain a phone relationship with her on the pretense that he was giving her time alone to be with her family.
“Taylor, I thought you’d never come.” Emily glided toward him, smiling and holding out her arms, as he stood at the opened front door of her home. Watching her advance, he felt a turning pitch in his stomach. What was he doing here? He shouldn’t be here. But now that he was, he knew he should be meeting her approach halfway. He was willing his feet to move forward, willing his hands to reach for hers. But his brain was no longer controlling his actions—his heart was. And his heart was still with Sarah Berger of Berlin.
Luckily when Emily fell into his arms, she buried her head into his broad chest and did not search out his eyes.
“Don’t even look at me. I’m a pitiful mess,” she said. “Please, say you won’t go away. Please say you won’t leave me. Papa is gone. I am alone.”
“You’ll be OK. You’ll be OK,” he said, gently smoothing the fullness of her hair—but he made her no promises—though at this point that did not register with her. He had come to her immediately upon news of the death of her father, as it would be his perceived duty to be with her during the mourning period. But as much as he would have liked to have told her the truth right away and lift the burden from his shoulders, it was not about him feeling comfortable; it was about comforting her. It would be cruel to be totally forthcoming about his new relationship right now.
“Emily, you know I am so sorry about your losing your father—I’ve said it on the phone—but I am glad I can say it to you now face to face. I know that is something we both valued—closeness with our fathers.”
When Emily finally withdrew from Taylor’s arms, she still kept her head directed away from him, for it was memories of her father that were her focus now.
“You know, Taylor,” she began, barely audible through short breaths and sniffles. She was leading him to sit with her on the front veranda. “It doesn’t seem that long ago that I was at my Presentation Ball. We did the Father-Daughter dance—and even then I was remembering backward in time—dancing on his patent leather formal shoes at my older cousin’s wedding when I was about eight years old. Always looking up at him—always envying my mother for her handsome husband. Wishing someday I would be as fortunate. Do you know what my dad said to me at the debutante dance? In the middle of our dance, he told me I was even more beautiful than my mother. For so many years I kept that a secret—I didn’t want to hurt Mother’s feelings. But I knew how immature I could be and that one day when she was controlling me and I wanted to wound her that I would toss it in her face.
“And you know what—I did. We were fighting over some silly thing—probably a dress I wanted to buy—and I was frustrated by her—criticizing the fit—and so I let go of the trump card I had been holding. ‘You’re jealous,’ I said, ‘because father said I was more beautiful than you.’”
Emily paused now, finally looking up at Taylor. “And you know what she said?”
“Was she hurt?” he asked.
“Oh, no. She had her answer as quick as a split. ‘Poor dear, don’t you know that all fathers say that to their daughters. Silly girl—so vain.’”
Despite his determination to withhold overt affection from her, so as not to mislead her, he felt the great compassion for her that connects all human beings and he had no heart to withhold a hug. He put his arm around her, lay his cheek on hers, and smoothed back her hair. This was not about them—their relationship. This was about consoling someone at the time of a devastating loss.
Again, Emily was sobbing softly. “As she said it, my eyes grew wide and my chest heaved, and then, just like she had hoped, my whole body deflated like a balloon that had a slow leak.” This Emily explained without looking up, and then she raised her head once more. “And now I am abandoned by the parent from whom there was nothing but unconditional love and left to ‘parent’ the remaining immature one.”
“No,” Taylor insisted, “I know your mother adores you—I have seen that—she was always negotiating what was best for you.”
“Best for her,” Emily shot back. “And one more thing—and this is what my father said next as I curtsied and he bowed at the end of the debutante dance—‘One day I will dance with you at the Father-Daughter dance at your wedding’…But it won’t be so—he will never see us wed—and one of my brothers will be recruited to take his place—oh, nothing is as it should be. I feel like Alice in the book—
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
— where nothing is normal and you have to adjust to a new reality.”
His head jolted immediately and he snapped at her in response. “What did you say?”
She did not understand his sudden hostility and so she repeated cautiously, “I just meant it’s like I’m Alice shrinking in the rabbit’s house—or maybe boys aren’t familiar with that story.”
He became hardened to her again. “You are not like her. You are not like Alice.” And there was a coldness in his eyes that she had been hearing in his voice these last weeks.
“OK,” she said. “I don’t know what I said that disturbed you. I’m sorry.” And she ran back into the house, reiterating in a soft cry under her breath, “Everything is wrong.”
He silently berated himself. Certainly, her comment was innocent and did not deserve his strong retort. But he knew for sure that he now needed distance between them. At this point he was envisioning no such future with Emily—no wedding—no brothers walking her down the aisle. He had eyes only for Sarah, and in his dreams it was always Sarah walking toward him in a white dress, and it was her father, Emanuel Berger, to whom he returned a slight bow as he “gave away” his daughter in marriage.
Finally, the next day, he decided to tell Emily about the Berger family of Berlin and his fears for them, explaining that he was especially concerned for their daughter, Sarah.
“Oh, how sad, a young child,” Emily responded, seeming empathetic and forgetting for one moment her own cares. “How old is the girl?”
“Well, I believe she is seventeen or eighteen,” Taylor said cautiously.
And then Emily changed her body language to a more posturing pose and a wary look came to her eyes, as she leaned back and looked directly at his face. “Is there more that you are not telling me? Is this why you stayed longer in Europe? Is this behind your new coldness?”
Again, Taylor was too harsh. “Emily, there is a big world out there, not just your little existence. This is about terror and the plight of persecuted people.”
Again, Emily cried. At this point, Taylor recognized that his presence was not serving the needs of either of them, and at the end of the mourning period, he packed his bags to return home to Chicago. But he still did not have the courage to be totally honest with Emily, and he hated himself for that.