I couldn’t get a direct flight, which meant I flew into Reagan instead of Dulles. We passed over the Pentagon and its gaping hole. A small reminder of the larger damage, a reminder of why you’re not here.
You take care of business over there and then hurry back home. We have so much to talk about. “You will tell me everything. In the aftermath we will come home bringing to your comfortable armchairs that slight weariness exquisite at twilight and it will be a year before dinner is served.” Those are the word of Gladys Deacon, Duchess of Marlborough, as said to Bernard Berenson, the man she loved.
I’ve been to England and to Paris. I’ve seen Boston, if only in my mind. I met a writer and a duchess. I saw my mother in love and found out about my dad. Yep. That old topic. It’s nothing I can go into over e-mail. But wait until you hear the rest.
I’ve seen these places and feel like I’ve traveled a million miles. Now, after looking back, I’m trying my hand at moving forward. Yesterday I mailed an application to Harvard University. It’s not what you think.
I applied for a six-month research fellowship, with the Berenson library, the very same Berenson I “met” on my trip. I didn’t have the easiest time describing my qualifications and, oddly, “fake researcher” doesn’t look all that impressive on paper. But years ago my mom applied for a job with nothing to back her up. Turned out for the best, in the (very long) end.
And what of the formidable Laurel Haley? Well, she stayed with Gus. That’s right, the man from the pub you were so worried about. See how I could never fit these things in an e-mail? For now, let’s leave it at this. My mom and Gus went to Paris once. And in Paris they remain.
You’re doing your job—safely, I hope—but I wish you were here. At age twenty-two I’m an unexpected empty nester and this old farm is too quiet by myself. Don’t worry. I do have some company, in the form of some very sick little girls who want to find some freedom on a horse.
Six months, seven months, whatever it takes. I might not be in Virginia, but that doesn’t mean I won’t be here for your return. When you arrive, we’ll celebrate. Then we’ll sit in our armchairs, in the weary twilight. You’ll talk about the fight. As for me, I’ll have a magnificent story to tell.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
I came across Gladys Deacon when researching my first book, A Paris Apartment, a novel based on the real-life discovery of an abandoned apartment in Paris. Inside this home, among hundreds of other magnificent relics, was a previously unknown Giovanni Boldini portrait, which eventually sold for more than €2 million at auction.
While digging into Boldini’s life, I studied every luminary he brought to canvas. Amid renderings of such notables as Sarah Bernhardt, Consuelo Vanderbilt, Edgar Degas, and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, one woman outshone them all, her background every bit as colorful as the painting itself. This woman was Gladys Deacon, the Duchess of Marlborough.
Born to a wealthy Newport family, the dazzling Miss Deacon considered herself continental through and through. Though privileged, no one would accuse her of being sheltered. By age twelve, Gladys Deacon found herself in the middle of a worldwide murder scandal. At fourteen, she declared her love for the Duke of Marlborough, her future husband. She was living independently in Paris at twenty, finally married at forty, and turned up in a dilapidated Oxfordshire manse at almost a century old.
Here was a woman who carried a handgun, went temporarily blind due to excessive reading, and declared herself “a miracle”: “Differential calculus was too low for me!” Her political savvy was no less impressive. “Of course I’m well-informed! I’ve slept with eleven Prime Ministers and most Kings!” She used this extensively gathered information to heckle her chief nemesis, Winston Churchill: “[Hitler] had the whole world up in arms. He was larger than Winston. Winston could’ve have done that!” All that, and they say she could’ve prevented World War I.
Because of these and many other details, when it came time to write, I immediately honed in on Gladys Deacon as the story’s heart. Hugo Vickers’s captivating biography Gladys: Duchess of Marlborough helped ignite the spark. The book contains a seemingly endless collection of duchess quirks and quotes and also inspired the character of Win Seton, but he is in no way meant to represent Vickers.
While my book is a work of fiction, I’ve used many of Gladys Deacon’s actual mannerisms and adventures. She did tour the world with Coon. Proust did try to detain her in Rome by having her arrested. The kidnapped POWs, passion for firearms, and proliferate spaniels are all historically accurate as well.