The Bungalow (29 page)

He returned my smile. “Of course you will, dear. Ring me with your return details, and I’ll be here to pick you up.”

I kissed his cheek before stepping onto the train. The conductor took my ticket and showed me to the small drawing room where I’d spend the next two days traveling across the country, alone.

It was late when the train pulled into Grand Central Terminal, and as it glided along the tracks, the city lights glistened. It was hard to imagine Mother making her home in this big, bold place so unlike Seattle.

I stepped off the train, and lugged my bag through the maze of people, pushing past a woman with far too many children, a man with a monkey holding a set of miniature cymbals, and a gray-haired transient extending his cap and muttering something I couldn’t understand.

Outside on the street, a sea of taxis waited. I raised my hand and caught the attention of a dark-skinned driver, who nodded and gestured toward the back seat.

I opened the door and stuffed my bag inside before sitting down. The air smelled of cigarettes and must. “I’m going to”—I paused to glance at the slip of paper in my hand—“560 East Fifty-seventh Street.”

He nodded absently.

My eyes blurred as I gazed out the window. The lights flashed—green, red, pink, yellow. Sailors on leave in stark white uniforms clung to women—blondes, brunettes, tall ones, short ones. The war hadn’t ended, but the tide had turned. You could feel it—from the little suburbs of Seattle to the vibrant streets of New York.

The buildings outside flicked by like frames of a film, one after the next, composing a picture that was both foreign and lonely. The cab finally stopped abruptly on a tree-lined street.

“Here we are, miss,” said the cabbie. I paid the fare, and he set my bag on the street, pointing up to a brick townhouse with a shiny red door.

“Thank you,” I said, turning toward the steps. I rang the doorbell, and moments later Mother appeared. It was almost eleven, but she stood in the doorway in full makeup and a red off-the-shoulder dress. A poorly balanced martini glass sloshed in her hand.

“Anne!” Mother cried, pulling me toward her with a freshly manicured hand. An olive bobbled out of the glass and fell to floor.

She took a rocky step back, and I dropped my bag and reached out to steady her. “Let me look at you,” she said in an unnaturally cheerful tone. Her eyes pored over me, then she nodded in approval. “The South Pacific was kind to you, dear. Why, you must have lost ten pounds.”

I smiled. “Well, I—”

“Come in! Come in!” She turned away from the door, and her red dress swished ahead.

I followed her, lugging my bag into the foyer, where a crystal chandelier, too large and gaudy for the small space, loomed overhead. “It’s not Windermere,” she said, shrugging, “but it’s home for me now. I’ve grown to love city life.”

She led me into a small front room with parquet floors and a Victorian sofa. “Of course,” she said, “I’m having it all redone. Leon is helping me with that.” She said his name as though I was expected to know him.

“Leon?”

“My interior decorator,” she said, taking another long sip from her glass. I didn’t remember Mother liking martinis in Seattle, nor did I remember her collarbones protruding from her chest. “He’s insisted on mauve for this room, but I’m not sure. I rather fancy a shade of teal. What do you think, dear?”

“Teal might be a little bold for this room,” I said honestly.

“That’s just the look I’m going for, dear,” she said, running her hand along a nearby wall. “Bold. Your father was so traditional.” She gulped down the last of her drink, then giggled. “I don’t have to be traditional anymore.”

I nodded, preferring not to discuss Papa with her in this state.

She shook her head. “Listen to me going on like this,” she said, reaching for a bell on a side table. “You must be exhausted, dear. I’ll ring for Minnie.”

She sounded the bell, and a small woman, no older than me, materialized moments later. “Minnie, be a dear and show Anne to her room.”

“Yes, ma’am,” she said in a squeak, reaching for my bag.

“Good night, my dearest,” Mother said, caressing my cheek. “I know you can’t stay long, but I have the morning packed with fun before your departure tomorrow. Go get some rest, sweetheart.”

“Good night,” I said, following Minnie up the stairs as Mother made her way back to the bar and reached for a bottle of gin.

The sound of a horn outside my third-floor window woke me the next morning. I pulled a pillow over my face, hoping to fall back into slumber, but with no luck. I glanced at the clock; it was barely 6:40, but I got up and dressed anyway. Mother would be waiting, and I wanted to spend as much time with her as possible before I boarded the ship.

The light shone through the windows downstairs, revealing a lonelier space than I’d seen the night before. There were no photos on the walls, or paintings. Mother loved paintings.

“Good morning, miss,” Minnie said shyly from the entrance to the kitchen. “May I make you coffee or tea?”

“Tea would be lovely, Minnie, thank you,” I said, smiling.

Moments later she appeared with a cup of tea on a tray with a plate with fruit, a croissant, and a boiled egg.

I eyed the tray. “Shouldn’t I wait for Mother?”

Minnie looked conflicted. “About that,” she said. “Well, it’s just that, well—”

“Minnie, what is it?”

“Mr. Schwartz was here last night,” she said nervously, searching for my understanding, or approval.

“Do you mean Leon?”

“Yes, ma’am,” she said. “He arrived after you turned in.”

“Oh,” I replied. “And Mother’s still asleep?”

“Yes.”

“Minnie, is he still here?”

She looked at her feet before gnawing at her thumbnail.

“He is, isn’t he?”

Minnie looked relieved to share the secret with someone. “When he comes to stay, I often don’t see her until after twelve, sometimes one.”

I nodded, trying my best not to show the disappointment I felt. “Then I’ll take my breakfast right here,” I said, reaching for the tray. “Thank you.”

“Oh, Miss—Miss Anne,” Minnie stammered nervously. “You won’t tell Mrs. Calloway that I—that I told you anything, will you?”

I patted her plump hand reassuringly. “Of course not,” I said. “It will be our secret.”

An hour later, I stepped outside the apartment and onto the street. I had five hours before I needed to make my way to the dock to board the ship. I hailed a cab, unsure of my destination.

“Where to, miss?” the driver asked.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I only have a few hours left in the city. Do you have any suggestions?”

The driver smiled, revealing a gold tooth. “That’s funny. Everyone around here seems to know exactly where they’re going.”

I shrugged, looking up at Mother’s apartment. The shades in her bedroom window were still drawn. “I used to think I knew where I was going. I thought I had everything figured out, but . . .”

The driver’s face grew worried. “Listen, miss,” he said, “I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”

I shook my head. “You didn’t.”

“Hey,” he said, producing a folded brochure from his jacket pocket. “You like art?”

I thought of the painting I’d left in the bungalow. How I longed to have it in my possession just then. “Yes,” I said. “I do.”

“Then I’ll take you to the Met.”

“The Met?”

He looked at me in the way one looks at a child. “The Metropolitan Museum of Art.”

“Yes,” I said, smiling. “Perfect.”

“I hope you find what you’re looking for,” the driver said with a wink.

“Me too,” I said, handing him three crisp bills from my pocketbook.

Minutes later, I stood before the great stone building, with its enormous ivory columns flanking the entrance. I climbed the steps to the double doors, walking inside to an information booth straight ahead.

“Excuse me, ma’am,” I asked. “You don’t, by chance, have any paintings by French artists here, do you?”

The woman, about Mother’s age, nodded without looking up from her book. “Of course we do, miss. They’re all up on the east wing of the third floor.”

“Thank you,” I said, heading to a nearby elevator. It was foolish, I knew, to think that I’d find any of Gauguin’s paintings here. Yet, I longed to know if the small canvas in the bungalow bore any similarity to his other work.
Could Tita have been right about the true owner of the bungalow? And its curse?

I exited the elevator on the third floor. Aside from a little boy with a red balloon clutching his mother’s hand, and a security guard standing near the west wall, the floor was empty.

I moved from painting to painting, reading the placards underneath: Monet, Cezanne, and others whose names I didn’t recognize. When I’d scoured the entire room, I sat down, defeated, on a bench by the elevator.

“Excuse me, miss.” I looked up to see the security guard walking toward me. He pulled his spectacles lower on his nose. “May I help you find something?”

I smiled. “Oh, it’s nothing. I had a silly idea that I’d find the work of a certain artist here. But I was wrong.”

He tilted his head to the right. “What artist?”

“Oh, a French painter, one who did the majority of his work in the South Pacific. I’d have better luck searching in France.”

“What’s his name?”

“Paul Gauguin,” I said, standing up and pressing the Down button for the elevator.

“Well, yes,” the man said, “we do have some of his work.”

“You do?” The elevator’s chime sounded and the door opened. I stepped back and let it close.

“Indeed,” he said, pointing to a door a few paces away. A gold padlock hung from its handle. “The wing is closed for maintenance now, but, seeing how much you’re interested, I might be able to open it up—for a special occasion.”

I beamed. “Could you?”

“I have the key right here,” he said, patting the pocket of his pants.

I followed him to the door, where he slipped a brass key into the lock and held the door open for me. “Take all the time you need,” he said proudly. “I’ll be right outside.”

“Thank you,” I said. “Thank you ever so much.”

I slipped inside the door, letting it close with a click behind me. The room was small compared to the wing outside, but the walls were crowded with paintings. At first I didn’t know where to begin—with the landscapes on the right or the portraits to my left—but then a canvas caught my eye, a beach scene on the far wall. It looked
familiar
, somehow. It would be too much to hope that the artist who had once lived in the bungalow could have painted this same stretch of beach, but as I walked closer, the idea didn’t seem too far-fetched.

The canvas revealed a yellow hibiscus bush near a thatched-roof bungalow.
Our bungalow.
The silhouette of an island woman lingered on the shore. It looked like a companion to the scene on the canvas in the bungalow—like a photograph of a scene shot right before the other.