“This is my favorite,” she said, sighing.
Calder’s Circus is a miniature reproduction of an actual circus. It’s made out of all these cool everyday materials—wire, cork, wood, cloth. Because it’s about the circus—and because it’s kind of like a diorama—what it most made me think of was being a child again. The tininess and the preciousness of it. And you know how going to the circus is such a treat when you’re a kid. It’s like getting ice cream cake with pink candles. I don’t know, maybe I was feeling sentimental that day because of Clover being twenty-eight and having to look forward to a dinky thing like perfume, or the little girl in Central Park who had dreamed, for all we knew, of trees made out of emeralds and what life would hold for her. Maybe it was my new haircut, and how it seemed to mark in a very clear physical way the ending of one period of my life (little Franny with long mouse-colored hair) and the beginning of another (sophisticated Franny—I hoped?—with her cropped Parisian do). Maybe it was just the characters in the circus. Like, the elephant made me think of a toy I’d had when I was a baby, an elephant named Sebastian, and what had become of him. What had become of all of my old toys, in fact?
Anyway, what I’m trying to say is looking at Calder’s Circus made me very sad, and I said so to Clover. I asked her if it ever made her feel that way.
“Oh, yes, Franny, my sweet,” said Clover, eyes wide. “Every, every time.”
13
Belgian Chocolates at the Sherry-Netherland
Theo’s old friend Leander came to town a couple of nights later. With Clover’s permission, we had agreed to meet at this old hotel, the Sherry-Netherland. Clover dropped me off outside the entrance. I was wearing the cream sharkskin sheath and the black velvet bow in my hair. It was a hot evening, but I loved how cool my neck and shoulders felt with my new haircut. I just felt this kind of keenness.
“Won’t you come in with me?” I asked her.
“It’s your night, Franny. Your entrance.”
And then she smiled and waved goodbye, disappearing down Fifth Avenue into the dusk.
I had never been to the Sherry-Netherland. But I remembered it being mentioned in Eloise when she talks about there being pigeons on the roof of the Sherry-Netherland, so I knew it had to be near the Plaza. The name had stuck with me all these years because it was just so luscious. The Sherry-Netherland: it sounded like a big box of chocolates.
Speaking of the Plaza, Val and I snuck in there one time just to use the bathroom. (Clover gave us that tip: hotel bathrooms are the best. Just hold your head high and walk in like a lady.) Well, the bathrooms at the Plaza must be the most splendid in the whole city if you ask me, and Val loved the whole place, the deep reds, the leopard pillows, the hot-pink lights, everything. But when I looked around the lobby of the Sherry-Netherland, I knew that it was much more to my taste than the Plaza. I’ll tell you the difference: the Plaza is like a big glitzy engagement ring, a new one. The Sherry-Netherland is like a tiny delicate one in an antique setting. Maybe it even has a few tarnishes here and there but it’s truly romantic. The Sherry-Netherland is like an old jewel sunk in the city. The decor is soft terra-cotta reds and dusty chocolate marble and dull golds. I love it.
Leander was waiting for me at the bar. I knew him instantly because it was August now, the city was starting to empty of people, and there were only a handful of people at the bar. Who else could the distinguished white-haired gentleman be?
I went up to him and introduced myself, using my full name, the way Aunt Theo would have wanted me to: “Hello, I’m Frances Lord.”
“Charming,” Leander said. “But please tell me that you really go by Franny.”
“Sometimes,” I said. “But I’m growing out of it a bit now, you know. I’m fourteen.”
“Of course you are,” said Leander. “But of course you are.”
“My sister is seventeen,” I went on. “She used to go by Val, but now everyone calls her Valentine. It’s much more appropriate.”
“Theo told me there were two sisters. She said the older one was supposed to be very beautiful but that from what she could gather the younger one was more interesting. I can tell she was right, Franny … May I call you Franny?”
“Certainly.”