That’s it, she thought with a grin. I’ve snared the rascal. And then: Or has he snared me?
Although it was an expensive long-distance call, she tried to telephone him at the training camp in Delaware to thank him. The male operator took the message. She fixed herself tea, sat contemplating the vase, and attempted to lasso her febrile imagination and pull it down to terra firma. But lassoing, like riding bucking mustangs, remained a foreign and exotic art. She imagined herself on a horse, riding through the desert in Nevada, then smiled at the inanity of her random thoughts. Where did such thoughts come from? Random thoughts were like dreams. They came from somewhere faraway.
Like music. Another random thought—which she hurriedly dismissed. Music was rational. Otherwise, what was the purpose of her entire education?
As she gazed at the vase on her table her thoughts returned to Jimmy. She had shared memorable moments with a young man who valued music and poetry, who enjoyed life, and possessed the means to do so. But where would it lead? If Jimmy was infatuated with her, as his occasional sidelong glances and this crystal ornament suggested, the consequences were insubstantial so far: a plate of oysters, a carriage ride, a few songs.
Mulling over Jimmy’s possible intentions, she walked to the New York Public Library, where she had spent countless hours as a student poring over musical scores by Bach, Mendelssohn, and Richard Strauss. There she found the name Warburg peppered throughout the vast card catalog. With five books under her arm, and as many periodicals, she located a seat in the reading room.
As Bettina had mentioned, Jimmy was the scion of three powerful banking families, the Warburgs, the Loebs, and the Schiffs. The Warburg branch traced its lineage back to Anselmo del Banco, the most successful moneylender in 1500s Venice. Today, they occupied a lofty but precarious position at the pinnacle of European society. After immigrating to America, Jimmy’s father Paul had helped create the Federal Reserve System. That made him one of the most influential bankers in his new country. Even in the land of freedom, however, powerful voices objected to the notion that an immigrant could wield so much sway. At issue was the question of loyalty. Foreigners might retain affection for their homelands. To empower them was to expose America to vulnerabilities.
Katharine appreciated the Warburg family’s role in cofounding and supporting the Institute of Musical Art. But like other students, she had regarded them as aloof and mysterious.
The person seated to her right was peering through his wire-rimmed glasses at a battered copy of Thorstein Veblen’s Theory of the Leisure Class, taking notes. Katharine smiled, remembering how her father had cherished that book, and often alluded to it.
Sam Swift had inserted aphorisms into her piano lessons. “They need to spend, you see. They really have too much. Spending confers status. Let them disburse their excess on your work. Let them see you as a marque de prestige, but never become a slave of fashion.”
She returned her reading materials to the circulation desk, wondering how Sam Swift would have reacted to the thought of her dating Jimmy Warburg. Sam had so many qualities: his idealism, his devotion to music, his restless intellect. But his disdain for conspicuous affluence and power was deep-rooted, perhaps more emotional than rational.
His position as a connoisseur of serious music, his accomplishments as an opera critic and church organist, had conferred upon him a limited sense of achievement. Now Katharine wondered whether one of Sam’s fundamental beliefs was valid, after all. Did artistic freedom, integrity, and pride necessarily imply poverty? And if they did, was the trade-off worth the indignity?
“Did you need something else?” asked the librarian as Katharine lowered the books to the counter with a thud. With a pencil moustache and a gold watch chain dangling across his tweed vest, he gazed over the rim of his narrow glasses.
“Oh, no—I mean, yes,” said Katharine.
The librarian smiled and waited for her to continue.
“You see,” said Katharine, “I’ve spent a great deal of my life in this library. It’s like a second home for me. The staff has always been so kind. And so I was wondering… I’m a pianist, you see. But work has been terribly inconsistent, or perhaps it’s the war in Europe, or… well, what I’m saying is, do you think there might be a position for a girl like me in this place?”
The librarian’s lips curled, revealing tobacco-browned teeth. “This isn’t how you go about procuring a position in our storied establishment, darling. Telling me your saga will land you precisely nowhere because as much as I might be inclined to help, I have no say in that matter—or any other matter, for that matter. But you’re free to hop down to Personnel if that would tinkle your chime.”
Katharine nodded. “Thank you.”
She had never ventured to the library basement, a labyrinthine crypt devoid of wainscoting, windows, and the dusty odors of decaying manuscripts. In Personnel a single Edison bulb dangled from the ceiling, insufficiently lighting the brick-and-mortar walls. A cloud of stink drifted from a cheap cigar, which hung on the lip of a stocky man who hunched over an oak roll-top desk staring at a handwritten page while pecking at a Williams typing machine. “Yeah?” he grunted.
“I…” She swallowed. “I wondered if there were any employment opportunities in the music department?” She smiled. “I’m a pianist, you see, and—”
He pointed to a basket of application forms and pencil stubs and turned back to his task. So preoccupied with transcribing words, this man did not seem to enjoy uttering them. She scribbled her name and address. When she reached the Skills section, she gazed blankly at the page in front of her:
Knowledge of Dewey Decimal Classification System
Phone Switchboard Operation
Stenography
Typing
Alphabetical Filing
A mischievous fairy took hold of her hand, preventing her from applying pencil to paper. Another of those invisible creatures with whom she was all too familiar, like the Angel of Curiosity. She bunched up the application form, tossed it into the wood-slatted trash basket, and strutted out.
* * *
Fifth Avenue thronged with motorcars, buggies, and elegant shoppers, some already wrapped in furs. She ogled a store window that featured a set of Lenox dishes described as Gold Ground Botanical Service Plates. Lilies, anemones, and wisteria adorned this refined dinnerware, their leaves streaked in the hues of one-hundred-dollar bills. Along the edge of each dish was a thick, veined band reminiscent of Nefertiti’s bracelets. She felt as if she were gazing through a telescope at a distant continent where flowers never faded, gardenias exuded no fragrance, and beef gravy never smeared porcelain. Who could eat on such a plate? she thought. But why, oh why, am I staring? She pried her eyes away and dragged herself toward the Fifty-Third Street subway.
A steamy aroma of lamb chops, onions, butter, and potatoes suffused her mother’s apartment. Ellen sat at the table spooning mint jelly onto her pink stoneware plate. As Katharine stepped in, she looked up and smiled. “Just in time!” Ellen pointed to an empty chair. Katharine lowered her satchel, slumped into the chair, and helped herself to a lamb chop.
“Lately you seem distracted, dearie.” Her mother’s eyes softened. “Did something bite you?”
“It’s nothing,” said Katharine.
“A vampire,” said Ellen. “That’s what bit you.”
Katharine served herself mashed potatoes and onions.
“What was his name again? Warburg, that’s it.” Ellen glanced at the vase on the mantle. The roses and tulips were long gone. “James Warburg.”
Katharine sawed at her lamb chop. Overcooked, as usual. She chewed.
“Has he proposed to you yet? I had an inkling it’d come to this. More than an inkling. A presentiment.”
“Please, mother.”
“Well what is it, then? Out with it, or I’ll be conjuring castles and pumpkins ’til midnight.”
“Oh, that will help.”
“You’re my only daughter, Kath
arine,” Ellen pleaded, shooting her a what-else-am-I-to-do? look.
“Guys like him…” Katharine shook her head.
“They’re just human,” said Ellen.
“There are lots of girls out there,” said Katharine.
“Not like you, luv. Warburg or no Warburg, he damn well knows it. Where’d he take you this time?”
“I went to the library. I thought maybe… a job…”
“Hah! The future Misses James Warburg shelving books, organizing card catalogs. That’s a jolly one.”
“Honestly, Mother.”
“What else am I to make of that?” Ellen glanced again at Jimmy’s gift. She rose, took the vase in her hands, and turned it upside down. “Glasfabrik Johann Loetz Witwe,” she read. “That’s the place of manufacture. And this is the signature of the artist, Karl Witzmann. An authentic German treasure. Even a wealthy man wouldn’t gift such a masterpiece to a mere friend. Especially a wealthy man.”
Katharine chewed.
Ellen replaced the vase. “You’re going to do it, you know. You’re going to tie that knot—around your neck. Or should I say, that diamond choker. And then, whatever post you’ve managed to hitch yourself to in the meantime, assuming you do find a position in a boot factory or at a makeup counter, or entertaining Tommies at the front—they adore Fauré, you know—will seem as meaningless to you as a newspaper that’s been left in the rain, with its ink running onto the sidewalk. And however much small change you’ve eked out, you’ll stare at it in your hand and giggle at the foolishness of it all. The sad joke that is the condition of the laboring class.”
“I have absolutely no idea what you’re jabbering about,” said Katharine.
“Mind you,” her mother went on, regaining her place at the table, “you’ll be wrong. There’s nothing foolish about hard work. The muddy laborer who hauls home his deer hide and his pack of Gauloises at the end of a backbreaking day is going to savor that pittance every bit as much as you will enjoy polishing your pearls.”
“His deer hide and his Gauloises?” repeated Katharine incredulously. “You’ve been reading too many French Neanderthal romances.”
“Actually he’ll enjoy his pittance more than you’ll enjoy your pearls, because it was acquired honestly.”
“Since when did you become a Socialist?”
“We’re not debating economics,” said Ellen. “We’re discussing psychology. How are the onions?”
“Mmm,” said Katharine.
“I know you love them fried in lard with pepper.” Ellen chewed absently for a moment, glancing at the door. “You’ll miss that, won’t you.”
“I’ll miss what?”
“Why, my cooking. The wholesomeness of it. The warmth. The… the lard.” Ellen smiled.
I won’t miss it one bit, thought Katharine. But she returned her mother’s smile.
* * *
One foggy morning in late November she received what at first seemed to be a monogrammed invitation: “Mister and Misses Felix Warburg request the honor of your presence at a gala soirée to be held at their Fifth Avenue residence.”
She realized soon enough that this was not a request to attend, but a professional engagement. At the bottom of the card, Bettina Warburg had scrawled, “Just piano, please. Same terms as the Trio. (Except all for you.) Game? Hugs, Bettina.”
At the library, Katharine had come across the name Felix Warburg, Paul’s brother and associate and Bettina and Jimmy’s uncle. She would have preferred to have been invited as Jimmy’s guest. But a gig was a gig, and what felt like an indignity was in fact an honor.
The trees were bare and Central Park dreary and chilly, but as she crossed on foot she felt increasingly resigned, and by the time she reached Fifth Avenue she had managed to convince herself that the evening should be pleasant. And if it wasn’t, the money would be.
The French Renaissance Revival mansion stood six stories tall and stretched the entire block from Ninety-Second Street to Ninety-Third. Large carriages and motor vehicles lined the street, bathed in radiant new electric lights. Footmen offered white-gloved hands to ladies stepping down to the sidewalk.
Silk-upholstered Louis XV furniture and oil portraits adorned the marble-floored entrance. A liveried doorman announced the arrival of “Miss Katharine Faulkner Swift.” Felix and Frieda Warburg shook her hand. Unlike his dour brother Paul, Felix had a full head of hair and a sardonic twinkle in his eye. His moustache was bushier than Paul’s and his smile warmer, but Katharine was not sure he or his wife knew who she was. Bettina hurried over.
“Where’s your music?” she asked.
“In here.” Katharine tapped her head.
Relieved, Bettina pulled Katharine to the Bösendorfer grand.
She decided to play Franz Liszt’s Un Sospiro, a beguiling étude fit for a spacious, bright room with tall windows and chattering guests. Soon she lost herself in the music, the piano notes weaving themselves into and through the guests’ words. As she raised her hands at the last chord the butler mumbled into her ear. “Mister Paul Warburg would like to have a word with you, Miss Swift.”
She followed his gaze across the room. Jimmy’s father sat on a window bench, studying her. She recognized his bald pate and big moustache. Rather than loom above him, or risk impropriety by crouching in front of him, she dragged a chair over.
“Thank you for this, Miss Swift.” He gestured toward the piano.
Katharine smiled.
His dark eyes fixed hers. “I believe my son has taken a fancy to you.”
He paused, waiting for an answer, but she was stumped.
“You come from such different backgrounds.” He shook his head. “He is young. So are you. I want to know your thoughts.”
“We’ve shared some interesting conversations, Mister Warburg,” said Katharine. “We saw a couple shows. Shared a couple meals. Discovered mutual interests.” And she added, “I sense you’re worried.”
“You hardly know my son. He is impulsive and sometimes… flüchtig.”
“Volatile?”
“It’s not that I do not think you’re a nice girl. You seem to be good-natured. Polite. A skillful pianist. But Jimmy and you?” He shrugged.
“Isn’t Jimmy heading for the front?” she asked.
“We shall see about that.”
Katharine attempted a smile. “Mister Warburg, just so I understand, are you suggesting Jimmy and I shouldn’t be friends?”
He did not smile back. “I have nothing against friendship. But what you see as friendship may not be what James has in mind.”
“You’re asking me to warn him that romance isn’t in the cards?”
“Not in the cards?” He shook his head. “I’m asking you to throw away the deck.”
She detected a hint of superiority, even contempt in his tone, in his inability to accept his son’s potential interest in her, in his confidence in his powers of observation and persuasion. But she simply repeated his words. “Throw away the deck?”
The slightest nod, but an authoritative one. “Never see him again.”
Katharine was at a loss for words.
“To be perfectly clear,” he added, “we are discussing a financial transaction.” Trenssection, as he pronounced it with his German accent. “One that can free you to focus on your ambition.” Embition. He lowered his face and looked her in the eyes with the flair of a poker player engaged in a high-stakes bluff. “For many years. The time a wonderful artist like yourself needs to develop her reputation. And I will personally help you with that, as well.”
Stunned by Paul Warburg’s injurious proposal, Katharine glanced across the room toward Jimmy’s mother. Taller than her husband, Nina Warburg wore a single strand of gray pearls and a sapphire-and-platinum wedding ring—together, surely worth more than all of Ellen Swift’s worldly possessions. Mrs. Warburg’s posture conveyed assurance and elegance. She clutched a tumbler of sparkling water as she earnestly listened to a guest, who was relating some long-winded story
. Her face expressed both intense interest and utter boredom.
I could never hope to be that kind of woman, Katharine thought. And Jimmy’s father was discouraging her from trying. Besides, Jimmy had never actually suggested their friendship might point to romance.
All that on one side of the equation. On the other, a financial trenssection. One that would enable her to focus on her embition. More time to devote to music. Resources to rent her own flat. Yes, his offer was insulting. It implied that Katharine’s emotional entanglements were just another commodity to be bought and sold. The dignified response would be to reject Paul Warburg’s conditional patronage. But to hell with dignity. At stake was her mother’s well-being, not to mention her own, and perhaps her career as well.
As she mulled all this, the front door swung open and Jimmy stepped in wearing pin-striped brown slacks, a brown vest, a Harvard club tie, and a white shirt with a high collar. His jaw set, his eyes lit with fury, his hair disheveled, the tall young man looked dashing, especially in contrast to the other guests, who in addition to being older were all attired in black, navy, and gray. As a servant closed the door, Jimmy scanned the room and steamed over to his father.
“I thought you were in Delaware,” said Paul Warburg.
“I left,” Jimmy told him, “after my commander admitted I was wasting my time, that I would never be drafted into the officers’ corps. That it was beyond his control. Beyond his control, Dad!”
Paul Warburg blinked. Twice. “More than ten million dead, James. Ten million! And for what?”
Jimmy crossed his arms. “So you admit it, darn it.”
“I spoke with some people. How could I not, my son?”
“And you don’t see anything wrong with that? Thwarting my ambitions? My independence?”
Paul Warburg averted his eyes and combed his moustache with his fingers. “I do see something wrong with it,” he admitted. “But I see something wrong with silence as well.”
Jimmy stormed over to the bar, where he demanded a whiskey. Paul turned back to Katharine. “You see?”
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