I can’t explain it to myself, not in words. If I tried to talk to Mam, I know the way she would look at me and it would be too much for me to see in her eyes the love and the worry and, worst, the knowledge that she can’t help me, not really, not ever.
There is nothing and no one else in the world when my mother fixes her gaze on you that way. I’ve never seen such eyes on any other person. You could say they were large and blue and it would be true but also meaningless because so are Doris Day’s and so are my downstairs neighbor’s, yet their eyes might as well be from another species entirely. Mam’s eyes are vast almond-shaped seas, liquid navy, flowing with an endless depth of understanding and compassion. When she listens to you, she takes you in and you can’t help it, you simply give yourself over to her. Everyone does, I’ve seen it time and time again.
You have to turn away or you will tell her everything.
margery
Well, here we are now, and I suppose we must concentrate on what’s in front of us.
What is in front of me? This very minute?
There is this bit of sunlight, and I am grateful for it. I always gravitate to the kitchen, settle in like a cat. In the other rooms I feel the weight of darkness. I’ve done what I can in the parlor, but I’m no magician. There’s only one window and it faces south, so the room never quite brightens up properly. Just last week, I pulled down the velvet maroon curtains—heavy, ugly things—and put up those new cloth blinds they’ve been advertising at Gimbels. It made me feel better for a bit, but it didn’t really help very much. At night, though, the parlor’s transformed. Then it’s a fine place, with the lamps and wall sconces illuminating Pamela’s paintings. Her Guggenheim Madonna blazes in beauty, all reds and golds.
I shouldn’t complain about this place, I know we’re lucky to have a roof over our heads. The Great Depression didn’t spare us, and why should it? Even before Francesco had to close his bookstore, I knew a move would be inevitable. But the truth is, I miss our home on Waverly Place more than I could ever have imagined.
Funny . . . it’s the Kelvinator I miss most of all. All that shiny white porcelain, the door shutting with a satisfying, luxurious thud, the food magically cold. But now it’s back to a peeling old icebox with bad hinges, back to chasing the iceman down the street. And there’s no end in sight, not with another war on. . . . The papers say that the war has bolstered our economy, but its benefits seem to be dispersed elsewhere.
So pretty, how the sun lights up the china cabinet, piercing the little green glasses from Turin, casting emerald halos over the white dinner plates.
Sunshine dances over the glass and china like the flickering of a silent film, calling up fragments from the old days. The family dinners in Turin with Nonna and Uncle Angelo. And all those nights in London and in Harlech. . . . A velvet skirt pulled flirtatiously over a crossed knee, a spilled drink, a game of charades gone a bit risqué, bursts of laughter. How we would go on and on, talking of poetry and sea voyages, of the strengths and weaknesses of PM Lloyd George. Of bookbinding and opera and Welsh history, and who was doing what in the Royal Academy.
The green light hovers and shimmers. Another old film unreels.
Paris.
Our flat on the Rue Mayet. A fire blazing in the hearth. The mantelpiece crowded with photographs. And wafting throughout, the enticing fragrance of blanquette de veau simmering on the stove.
A little wooden goat.
Pablo Picasso has come to dinner.
Francesco and I had had a little disagreement that morning. A minor affair, yet. . . .
In those days Francesco was head of the rare books department at Brentano’s. It was a coveted post. Signore Brentano himself had interviewed him. All starched and bespectacled, was how Francesco described him. There was no question that Francesco was thoroughly qualified for the position. Signore Brentano had sent a long and formal letter ahead of the interview emphasizing that erudition was vital, but just as critical were good manners and impeccable grooming. Well, Francesco surely fit the bill. In his finely tailored Italian suits—he has always been choosy about these—he has the manners and bearing of a Medici. As for erudition, it sounds ridiculous I know, but . . . well, he does seem to know just about everything. He can translate from Latin and Greek; he’s fluent in five languages. He knows scads and scads about poetry, opera, and architecture.
Oh—and this: he is the expert in Papal Bulls.
At the conclusion of the interview, Signore Brentano asked Francesco if he had any further questions. Francesco’s response was typical. “Yes,” he said, I have one question: “Are you going to hire me? Because if you do not hire me, you will not sell so many books!”
Francesco laughed, and then Signore Brentano laughed, too, his starch suddenly gone all limp. My husband could charm anyone, it seems.
Even Pablo Picasso.
The young Spanish painter came in to the store one day to browse, and ended up talking to Francesco for hours in a mixture of French, English, and Spanish. It would have been quite natural for Francesco to extend an invitation to his new friend.
“Come to dinner, Pablo! And bring your Fernande. You must meet Margery.”
And of course the painter said yes. Who can say no to Francesco?
Pamela and I spent the morning of Pablo’s visit in the kitchen. She dragged in great long pieces of brown paper and made herself at home at my feet, drawing ducks and rabbits. I was preparing the blanquette de veau, cutting pieces of meat, dredging them in flour, and dropping them into a fluted dish. Sometimes a sprinkling of flour would fly from the table, dusting Pamela’s pictures, and she would laugh.
A tiny skylight let in some rare Parisian sun that splashed over the red-tiled floor, the cobalt-blue table, and the white porcelain sink.
Francesco came in, holding a sheaf of Pamela’s drawings, and the atmosphere shifted. You always know when something is on his mind. He doesn’t exactly charge into a room, but it seems as if he does. He stood just under the skylight and a shaft of sunlight lightened his red hair to copper.
He’s a bit vain about his hair—or was, I should say. I’m afraid it’s rather deserted him these days. Soon after we met, I made the mistake of calling his hair red. “Not red, Titian,” he corrected me, then laughed at his own absurdity.