Days of Winter

by Cynthia Freeman

  The mantel clock rang in the New Year … 1917. They hugged one another, kissed and wished each other the best of everything and a speedy end to the war.

  Magda went in to see Jeanette. She whispered, “Happy New Year, my precious. …” When would Rubin ever get to see her? She lingered for a moment, then walked out to join her guests.

  They listened to music on the victrola and drank champagne until three. Solange was the first to excuse herself. Then, gradually, the other guests left. Magda was hardly aware of what she said as she wished them all good night.

  She shut the door and leaned against it, staring up at the ceiling. Then she took off her shoes and went to the kitchen to get a new bottle of champagne and a glass to take back to her room. On her way, she saw Alexis. For a moment, she couldn’t remember. Why was he still here? Hadn’t he left with the others …?

  “I hope you don’t mind my staying on?” Alexis said.

  “No … I’m grateful not to be alone. You’re my friend, and I need …Fix up the fire while I change. …”

  “Would you like me to come to you?”

  She looked at him. “No, that’s not necessary. You’re already here.”

  She changed into a loose-fitting peignoir. Barefooted, she came back into the drawing room. Alexis was seated by the fireplace in the large brocade chair. Magda sat down on the floor beside him. “Tell me about your father and his boyhood friend, Count Leo Tolstoy. I love to hear stories about royalty. …”

  She rested her head on his lap as he began. Alexis had been born in Moscow. His father was second cousin to the Czar. His mother had been of royal French blood. They lived in a very grand house in the country. …

  As Alexis talked, Magda got more and more sleepy. “They met at the university. Papa said Tolstoy was a great writer. …”

  “Yes …” said Magda, her eyes closed, “… a very great writer indeed … but all this royalty business … truth is, I don’t understand a damn about royalty. …The English King is a cousin to the Czar and that bastard the Kaiser is a cousin of both and would you think a family could be so cruel to one another? Yes, you would, I would … I ought to know. …” And she put her head down on Alexis’ lap and passed out cold. He carried her into the bedroom, put her under the covers and looked at her for a very long time. He kissed her lightly on the cheek, turned off the light and walked out slowly, closing the door behind him.

  Magda spent the next day in bed. She was not only hung over, but also depressed. She even refused to see Jeanette. From time to time Solange came in. Magda hardly knew she was there.

  The phone rang. “I don’t know what to say, Alexis. Magda is quite depressed. I can’t seem to reach her.”

  “Would it do any good if I came over?”

  “It might. …”

  Alexis sat by the bed and spoke softly, asking if she’d like to talk about what was troubling her, though he of course had a rather good idea.

  Magda shook her head, then managed …“My husband’s been away for over two years, in all kinds of hell. How can you expect me to feel?”

  “Perhaps it would help him if you committed suicide, or had a nervous collapse?”

  “Don’t laugh at me!”

  “I’m not. I’m going to make a suggestion. Starting tomorrow, we’re going to find you something to do that will keep you occupied, so you at least won’t have so much time to brood.”

  “What? Rolling bandages? Nobody even wants me as a volunteer. Let’s face it, I’m an outcast. And besides, I’m not English and stiff-upper-lip enough. I don’t think the English are real.”

  “They’re real. And they suffer as much as you do, but they show it differently.”

  “I suppose you’re right. My knowledge of the English is somewhat distorted by certain members of the Hack family.” She started to cry. Alexis put his arms around her shoulders. “I’m so damned lonely, Alexis. I miss my husband. It’s not natural to be parted for so long. We were together such a short time after our marriage. …How can I be brave?”

  “Well, crying isn’t the answer—”

  “What is?”

  “We’ll begin with dinner. …”

  They went to the Ritz.

  “Now,” said Alexis, once they were settled. “What would you like to do?”

  “You know, it’s strange,” said Magda, “your asking me that. All day I’ve been thinking I’d like to be an actress.” She smiled. “I used to do a little singing. …”

  “Then why not do it?” said Alexis. “Be an actress.”

  “Do you really think I could?”

  “I know it Magda, you can do anything you want to do. …”

  Alexis arranged for her to see Edward Goldstein, the impresario—and also the most important agent in London. When Magda came in to see him, he was enchanted with her. Physically, she was what Alexis had promised, but could she act? He handed her the script of Camille and asked her to read from it cold.

  “You know the way it ends,” said Edward. “Camille is very sick and Armand comes to see her. …She knows she’s dying, but her courage is tremendous. …Armand must never find out, so she sends him away.”

  Magda knew that the play was based on La Dame aux Camélias by Dumas fils. She concentrated on the character of Camille, the beautiful courtesan, trying to protect the man she loved. In her mind, Magda tried to become Camille … feeling all the things she must have felt …Then, simply, she read Camille’s lines as though they were hers. Edward played the part of her lover.

  When the reading was over and Magda had spoken the last tragic words, both men had tears in their eyes. And Edward Goldstein knew one thing: although Magda had never had an acting lesson and didn’t know stage left from stage right, she knew exactly where she was. She knew center stage.

  “Was I all right?” Magda herself broke the silence she had created.

  “You … were … wonderful,” said Edward.

  “And you’ll help me …?”

  “I will help you … though I must warn you not to expect too much. The theater is hard to gain a foothold in … and once you’re in, she’s a tough mistress. Even with my help, you may not succeed.”

  “Have no fear, Edward.” It was Alexis who spoke. “When Magda Charascu makes up her mind to do something, she does not fail.”

  “Magda Charascu … is that the name you want to use?”

  “Yes … for on the stage, that’s who I am. …”

  She was cast as a maid in a play called London Town, understudying the ingénue. It was a modest hit. In the third week of the run, she got a chance to play the ingénue. A young critic, Aleister Comfort, happened to see that performance and wrote a glowing review of a new, unknown young actress named … what was it again …? Magda Charascu. …

  When the actress she understudied was forced to leave the play because of illness, Magda was given the role.

  Items began to appear in the newspapers about her. She was called “glorious,” “radiant,” “divine.” Her past as an artist’s model was publicized … her career as a singer in Paris … her relationship with the Count. …

  The Maurice and Phillip Hacks were scandalized. Her lurid past was bound to affect their social standing even more. Her escapades would ruin them. Why, the brazen little witch even smoked in public! The Hacks devoutly wished that the dear Lord in his wisdom and justice would do something to alleviate their painful embarrassment, like having Magda fall off the Tower of London. …That was their fervent prayer.

  But their prayers went unheeded. Magda Charascu flourished.

  July of this year, 1917, would soon be upon them, and with it Jeanette’s second birthday. She was a beauty, and so attended by Camail, Peter, Pamela, Alexis and Deborah that one would have imagined she would be positively intolerable, this diminutive Magda; but she was not in the least spoiled, perhaps in part because she had never really been treated, or spoken to, as a baby. …Not from the day she was born had anyone spoken baby talk to her. …She was a person, and wa
s treated as such. She was never punished, but was told there were things she could do, things she could not do, and the reasons were explained to her. Her temperament was more Rubin’s than Magda’s.

  On Sundays Alexis would call for the three of them, Solange, Jeanette, Magda. He would hold Jeanette on his lap as they drove to lunch. She adored him. …He bought her lollipops and balloons and ice cream. They romped in the park and rolled in the grass … they took drives in the country … they rode on the ponies and the carousel. Alexis was her favorite person, next to Mama and Aunt Solange. …

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  IN APRIL 1917 AMERICA had declared war on Germany. To England and France, it was as though the Messiah had come. “The Yanks are coming, the Yanks are coming … and we won’t be back till it’s over, over there.”

  The song was in everyone’s heart, that and “Keep the Home Fires Burning.” And the war took a decisive turn for the better. With Germany on the defensive, a new hope was born.

  Rubin’s letters, however, had become more pessimistic. He wrote Magda that he sometimes despaired of the war ever ending, despaired at such vivid proof of man’s inhumanity to man. Magda tried to cheer him up with news of Jeanette and her new success as an actress. She so much wanted Rubin to be proud of her. …

  She was more dependent on Alexis, who was now the most influential force in her life. Her love for him, though platonic, was greater than for any other man with whom she had shared herself. Their relationship had a special quality that went beyond the flesh, because Alexis never stepped beyond the boundaries Magda imposed. …They had a deep and abiding friendship. She knew he had a mistress here and there, but they never discussed it.

  Magda was most shocked at herself. Although she had tremendous desires, she hadn’t slept with anyone since that night with Camail … it would be a year ago in November. …

  In November Magda was to star in her own one-woman show. Alexis had put up the largest amount of money, and the balance was raised from Camail and a few other people, including Edward Goldstein—who had never before invested in a show.

  The show was booked for a two-week run. By now Magda’s name was no longer unknown, and all of London waited to see how she would handle her own show. …The finest director was hired … the best musicians … no expense was spared. …The proceeds of the first performance would go to the widow’s and orphan’s fund. And in fact, most of the money Magda made was donated to charity.

  That night Magda sat at her dressing table, smoking one cigarette after another. She had asked that no flowers be sent in advance. Being Rumanian, she was a little superstitious. …Tonight could be so important.

  When the first call came, Magda’s heart beat painfully, though outwardly she was calm. She waited for her cue … a certain crescendo in the music. Suddenly she panicked; she had forgotten the lyrics to her first song. Nonetheless, she took her place. …

  The curtain was raised on a blacked-out stage, as the music began to swell. Then a spotlight picked up Magda’s face, her hair in studied disarray.

  When she opened her mouth to sing, the lyrics came forth without effort, the lyrics she thought she’d forgotten. And from that moment on she sang to Rubin, to her memories of him. He had discovered her as she looked now, in the days when she’d literally had to sing for her supper. Her costume had cost a fortune, yet it looked like the same peasant blouse and tight skirt she’d been wearing when she met him, even to the slit on the left side, revealing her slender legs as she sat on a stool. …

  She sang a song in French about a young man going off to war and leaving behind a girl who would become the mother of his child … if he didn’t return, she’d keep her child as a symbol that he’d once walked on the earth.

  She sang in Spanish, in Greek, in Russian. And because music is the universal language, the audience understood. Her eloquence only added to the meaning of the words. She sang as she had never sung before.

  During the intermission, she was keyed up and excited. Did the audience like her? Was their applause a sign of genuine enthusiasm? Alexis assured her that the answer to both questions was yes. And finally she sang a medley of English and American songs, her voice an instrument of love, of pathos, her face, with the incredible mane of hair, the face of women everywhere.

  The applause was tumultuous. First one man, then another, stood, then a woman, until the whole house was on its feet, clapping, shouting their approval. Magda—spent and drained, she feared, of all emotion—took one curtain call after another.

  She hurried back to her dressing room, truly surprised by the warmth of her reception. How kind they were to her, how generous. Alexis and Camail were waiting.

  “Isn’t it crazy?” she said. “I used to do the very same act in the dingiest café on the Left Bank … and you know what I got? My supper … and five francs a week.”

  “Life changes. …” said Alexis. “And thank God it does.”

  They waited while she changed behind a screen, chattering all the while.

  “You’ve taken London by storm,” said Camail.

  “Have I?”

  “You can have any role you want,” said Alexis.

  “But that’s not what I want, Alexis.”

  “You can be a great actress. Other women would give their lives to have your beauty and talent.”

  She shrugged. “Perhaps. But I’m not sure I want a career on the stage. …”

  “Aren’t you thrilled with the sound of applause?”

  “Of course; I’m human. But that’s not all I want. Try to understand, Alexis. I want what I never had.”

  Alexis grimaced. “Tell me about your deprivations.”

  “All right. I want Rubin. I want my petite to have what I didn’t. When she grows up I want her to be accepted in the best homes by the best people. I’m very ambitious for her—and for myself. …I love performing, but not as a career.”

  Alexis sighed. “Such a waste of talent. You’re young, you’ll get stardust in your eyes. This is not a little café in Paris.”

  “You’re wrong,” said Magda. “I was never young. I was never a child. So don’t tell me about stardust, I know what I want.”

  When she appeared again, she looked like Magda Hack … the elegant, patrician Magda. She was wearing a heavy silk gown, completely encrusted with iridescent beads. The high oval neckline receded to the back, plunging down to reveal her slim waist

  “You always amaze me, Magda. I can barely take my eyes from you.”

  “Thank you, Alexis. You’ve made the world smile for me. I’ve been gifted with many blessings, but you have been my true savior. And furthermore,” she added, kissing him lightly, “you never demand anything in return.”

  It was less than he wanted, but he would settle for the crumbs. From her. That was the compromise he’d made when he fell in love with her.

  Camail was almost as excited as Magda. He had seen his protégé become the toast of the city. “Magda,” he said, “you were wonderful. I’ve finally decided that you must be a genius.”

  “It takes one genius, dear friend, to know another. …” They both had the wit to laugh.

  She loved being the center of attention. …This was the life she wanted. To be needed, to be admired, to be seen. She’d come a long way, and she knew one thing: Magda Charascu of Bucharest—against an array of obstacles—had finally conquered London. …

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  WHAT BEGAN AS A two-week engagement became an extended run. The critics had outdone themselves in praising Magda’s talent.

  When April came, Magda thought of Paris in the spring, the daffodils in bloom, the chestnut tree-lined boulevards. …The war, it seemed, would never end. Though Rubin’s letters still tried to make light of it, she knew he was suffering greatly. And she was right. …

  He was fighting in the knee-deep mud of Verdun. The Germans were leaving their corpses on the field to disintegrate. Yesterday he had passed by the body of a German still in uniform, the hands and face we
re fleshless, the skeleton exposed. …He had seen a group of French soldiers devouring the flesh of a horse. God, oh God, strike us dead and be done with it … we’ve turned into savages.

  In May of 1918 his unit moved on to another hell. …June was no different. July was unbearably hot. Soldiers fainted in the fields, their faces sunburned and raw. Rubin’s only joy was the letter written by the hand of his daughter, her fingers guided by Magda:

  “Dearest Papa, I’m three years old today. Mama shows me your picture. I love you, Papa. Your daughter, Jeanette Hack.”

  Then he read Magda’s letter, “Dearest Rubin, It’s impossible for us to realize what you’re going through. …We pray for the end of the war. …I dream of you and miss you every moment … Solange sends her love. …As always, Magda.”

  In August Edward Goldstein found a comedy Magda was interested in.

  On November 9, the first day of rehearsal, the Kaiser abdicated. Two days later the Armistice was declared. London was filled with people celebrating as the whole free world rejoiced.

  “How long will it be before Rubin comes home?” Magda asked Alexis at dinner that night.

  “It may take some time.”

  “Why?”

  “There are always mopping-up operations, Magda. The soldiers don’t just head for home.”

  “I can’t stand it … if that bastard Maurice gave a damn, he’d see to it that Rubin came home at once.”

  “That wouldn’t happen even if they were on good terms.”

  “Why?”

  “Because the wounded usually return first. Then the prisoners of war have to be relocated. Many men are needed for disbursements. …”

  “What you’re saying is Rubin might not be home for months—”

  “It’s possible, I’m afraid. …”

  In her room that night, Magda cried out her frustration … and her gratitude … for Alexis. …

  January 1919

  Opening night was tense, as usual. There were all the chronic fears. …Would the actors remember their lines? Would the audience laugh at the right times? Would there be jeers … or cheers?