The Last of the Stanfields

by Levy, Marc

  At last, I pulled away, my cheeks flushed and red. “I don’t know what came over me,” I stammered. George-Harrison started the car without a word, and we drove on for a long while in silence, our hands clasped together.

  32

  ELEANOR-RIGBY

  October 2016, Baltimore

  By the end of that day, our kiss seemed like little more than a strange interlude, and George-Harrison was acting like nothing at all had happened between us. All through dinner, I was so quiet, it felt like he was carrying the entire conversation himself. When he finally ran out of other things to talk about, he told me a little about his mother. He seemed to have unending admiration for her. She had been a free spirit who never strayed from her own personal set of values.

  “She was always taking on a new cause, the more desperate the better,” he said with a warm smile. “I admit, she went too far at times. When I started up carpentry, she forced me to put aside money to replant the trees that would have to be cut down and sacrificed for my livelihood. Which, of course, is total nonsense. Thinning out forests is essential to their preservation. But every time I explained that to her, out came the pamphlets on the sawmills ravaging the Amazon. Protecting the environment, standing up for children, fighting inequality, struggling against authoritarianism and bigotry, jumping to the front lines in the fight for freedom, and defending tolerance . . . she made all the rounds. But her biggest crusade was against corruption. She reserved a special kind of fury for people who lost touch with humanity in their thirst for power and money. I can’t count how many times I saw her totally lose it just reading the newspaper. I can even remember the last time, the final outburst before her mind started to go . . . ‘Children are slaughtered every day, living under threat of falling artillery shells, starvation, or exhaustion in sweatshops with unspeakable conditions . . . and yet people only run out to the streets to protest when two people who love each other happen to be of the same sex? Those goddamn hypocrites!’ Or, at least something like that. The injustice of double standards was another go-to cause for her. ‘Try not paying a parking ticket and they come take away your car, but the real criminals, the ones who get punch drunk and gorge themselves on the state coffers, who get paid to do nothing, who rig government contracts just to line their pockets . . . when they get caught? Oh, no! All they get is a slap on the wrist and they’re free to go. Nobody even cares.’ Sometimes I even ask myself if all the outrage is somehow to blame for her losing her mind so young.”

  As interesting as the conversation was, it still felt like one of the longest nights of my life. I had hoped he would skip dessert, but no luck. I should have known better. I watched the waitress making the rounds, table to table, just wishing I could swap bodies with her. At last, I ducked off to the bathroom, just to buy some time away from him. When I came back, he had already settled the bill and was waiting by the door.

  After walking back to the hotel, we stepped out of the elevator onto our floor, and George-Harrison turned to me. “I had a really nice evening, but it seems you didn’t. I’m sorry, I think I must have talked too much. See you tomorrow.”

  And just like that, he left me in the middle of the corridor. I bristled, like a volcano about to erupt. I felt like I could sink right through the floor. I wanted to go pounding at his door, asking if he remembered the adventures his tongue had been on inside my mouth earlier in the day. At least now I knew where we stood, no doubt about it. Starting the next morning, I’d take on the same attitude and act like nothing at all had happened.

  I tossed and turned in bed, going over and over the call with my father in my head. In the early hours of the morning, I had a nightmare. I found myself in the Stanfield manor, an exquisite and opulent space full of marble flooring, crystal chandeliers, and wooden walls adorned with gold leaf. I caught a glimpse of myself in a mirror. I had on a maid’s uniform, with a striped, fitted-waist blouse and ruffled lace headband holding back my hair. I carried a heavy tray in my hands, so cumbersome that it made me walk unsteadily, as I entered the dining room.

  Hanna and Robert Stanfield were seated at opposite sides of a comically long mahogany table brimming with ornate candlesticks and silver cutlery. A child version of my mother was nearby as well, seated with her back as straight as a broomstick. An old man sat across from her, smiling warmly at the young girl. I served the lady of the house, who told me my tray was tipping and warned that she would dock my pay if I spilled a drop on her Persian rug. With an authoritarian flick of the wrist, she ordered me to serve the others. As I worked my way down the table, the stately grandfather winked at me, but the child version of my mother put out her foot and tripped me. I went sprawling and fell straight down onto the rug, eliciting roars of laughter from the entire table.

  I awoke in a cold sweat and opened the hotel room window to gaze out at the early-morning sun over the old docks of Baltimore.

  “Did you sleep all right?” asked George-Harrison at breakfast.

  “Like a baby,” I replied, hiding behind the menu and avoiding his eyes.

  After breakfast, we climbed into George-Harrison’s pickup and headed to the university. Morrison made us wait a whole hour, his secretary explaining that he was correcting papers and would receive us as soon as he possibly could. When at last we were granted entry to his office, the man appeared to be in a pretty good mood.

  “And what can I do for you two now?” he asked.

  “Tell me about Sam Goldstein,” I replied, taking the lead this time.

  “He was an esteemed art dealer, the father of Hanna Stanfield. But something tells me you already know all that.”

  “So then, tell us something we don’t know.”

  “This is the second time I’ve humored you with a meeting, and in case you haven’t noticed, I do have other obligations aside from fielding riddles from strangers. So, how about you start by telling me what you’ve really come here for, and just why you are so interested in this particular family’s history.”

  George-Harrison gently laid his hand on my knee, urging me to proceed with caution. If the professor really was the poison-pen, I’d be walking straight into his trap.

  “Out with it now, I’m all ears!” he insisted.

  “Hanna Stanfield was my grandmother. I’m Sally-Anne’s daughter.”

  Morrison’s eyes widened, and his face froze with shock. He rose from his chair without any sign of pain, as though the sciatica was nothing but a distant memory, and glided speechlessly over to the window. He gazed out over the campus, rubbing his beard.

  “If what you say is true, it changes everything,” he muttered.

  “How so?” asked George-Harrison.

  “First and foremost, it changes my level of interest in the two of you, which has gone from nonexistent to piqued. If you truly are a Stanfield, that’s another story entirely. I’m certain this new development means we can find common ground.”

  “Is it money you’re after?” I asked.

  He flashed me a condescending grin. “You strike me as either plain stupid or plain rude. I certainly hope it’s the latter. Otherwise, all of this would be a considerable waste of time. Neither of you seem especially well-off, so if you’re hoping for some kind of inheritance, you are out of luck. There’s nothing left.”

  “You also strike me as either plain stupid or plain rude,” I replied. “But I’m not quite sure which one I prefer.”

  “Why, you’ve got some gall talking to me like that!”

  “You started it,” I told him.

  “Well, how about we start over on the right foot? It just so happens I have a proposition for you.”

  Morrison admitted to having lied. In truth, he had seen Robert again after the day Hanna sent him away from the estate. He maintained it was only a lie by omission, since there hadn’t been any reason to tell us until now.

  “While Hanna loved her son most, Robert’s soft spot was for Sally-Anne. He suffered greatly when his daughter’s love turned to hate. Her exile to the boa
rding school in England only made matters worse. Robert blamed himself for everything that had transpired, and quickly sank to new depths of loneliness. He was ready to give anything to win back her trust and repair their father-daughter bond, and he would have . . . if only his own wife had not stymied his efforts. But it was always Hanna calling the shots, ruling now more than ever with an iron fist.”

  “Why did Mum start hating her own dad? Did he abuse her?”

  “Robert? He wouldn’t have harmed a hair on her head! Not a chance! Everything had changed when she overheard a conversation, one not meant for her ears, especially not at age twelve.”

  “You talk about Robert like the two of you knew each other well.”

  “Indeed, we did, eventually. A few months after that first encounter in his study, he paid me a visit. He sat in the very chair you are sitting in now. Having heard about my passionate interest in the Stanfield dynasty, he agreed to let me study the family archives, on the condition that I write a chapter recounting Robert’s own story. He desperately needed someone not directly linked to the events to confide in. Someone with an irreproachable degree of credibility.”

  “Why would he need that?”

  “To tell his side of the story. He hoped to win back his daughter with the truth so that she would forgive him and come back into his life. For me, it was an opportunity to advance my work, so of course I accepted. But I also had certain conditions. I would not make any concessions on his behalf. I would tell the facts exactly as they had occurred.

  “Robert agreed to my conditions. We met every Wednesday, in this very office. Little by little, he brought me documents to aid my research, each smuggled out of the estate with utter care, so as not to raise Hanna’s ire. Our meetings went on over a period of months, during which we became friends. Robert insisted I carry out my work quickly, but between my duties at the university and the impeccable standards of research a historian of my caliber must maintain, it was a long and arduous process. Sadly, just as I was putting the finishing touches on the manuscript, Hanna put a stop to all of it. I cannot fathom what nature of threat she issued, but Robert begged me to pull the plug. Our friendship prevented me from going against his wishes.”

  “You didn’t consider finishing the book after his death?”

  “In light of how he died—out with a bang, as they say, allegedly in the arms of his mistress—I did consider it. But beyond the grief that I felt at his loss, I was strictly prohibited from publishing anything. A clause in our agreement granted Robert the right to read the manuscript prior to release. I could do nothing without his consent. It wouldn’t have hurt the credibility of my Stanfield book, but the value of my word. A promise is a promise.”

  “Tell me exactly what my mother overheard that she wasn’t supposed to,” I insisted.

  The professor hesitated, sizing me up for a moment before continuing solemnly. “No, not before conditions have been agreed upon,” he said. “I will provide you with the means to find what you’re seeking, on the condition you grant your consent for my work to be published. Since a Stanfield heir has magically dropped from the sky, I daresay your consent would free me from my promise.”

  With that, Morrison drew a key on a chain from his waistcoat pocket and unlocked a drawer in the cabinet against the wall. He pulled out a thick folder and laid it down before us.

  “It’s all there, right in these pages. Read the chapters titled ‘1944,’ ‘1945,’ and ‘1946,’ then come see me, and I’ll fill you in on the rest.”

  With that, he led us to the door and once more wished us luck.

  I spent the rest of that day at the Johns Hopkins library, passionately poring over every last word of chapter “1944.” Every time I finished a page, I’d hand it straight to George-Harrison and he would read it himself. Through this odd ritual, we discovered the true circumstances that had swept Robert Stanfield out of Baltimore and into a hunting lodge deep in the wilderness of wartime France. We read of his friendship with Sam Goldstein, the clandestine operations with the Resistance, his torture at the hands of the enemy, his narrow escape, and how he heroically protected Hanna as they fled France and then Europe.

  After reading late into the afternoon, I was no closer to understanding how Mum had come to hate a man of that caliber, the same man who had rushed to marry a young woman in a Madrid embassy to save her life. By all accounts, my grandfather had kept his word, whisking Sam Goldstein’s daughter away to America for a new life by his side.

  I turned to the last chapter, eager to discover what befell my grandparents after they stepped off the ship.

  33

  ROBERT AND HANNA

  July 1944 to March 1946, New York

  With the war still raging across the ocean, Hanna and Robert watched from the deck of their ship as the Statue of Liberty emerged from the morning fog. While it wasn’t the first time either had laid eyes on Lady Liberty, the sight stirred powerful emotions in the newlyweds, sealing their union even more profoundly than their actual wedding day.

  After passing through immigration, Robert and Hanna climbed into the back of a taxi that took them straight to The Carlyle, a venerable New York institution with stunning views of Central Park. The couple sat down in the hotel restaurant while their suite was being prepared. Robert ordered breakfast for two, then stepped away to call his parents. He had been unable to get through to them the whole time he was in Madrid, sending only a telegram to let them know he was still alive. Going from that to announcing that they had a new daughter-in-law would be quite a leap. But Robert knew he had to warn them that he’d be returning home with her by his side. He also needed them to wire funds to pay for the hotel and the trip back to Baltimore.

  When Robert announced to the family butler that he was on his way home, the servant had no choice but to reveal the truth: Robert’s father had fled to Miami after squandering the last of the Stanfield fortune. What was worse, the family estate had been seized by creditors after they had missed too many mortgage payments. All that remained of the staff were one maid and the butler himself.

  The news left Robert crushed and humiliated. With the small amount of cash Hanna had left, the couple couldn’t afford even the slightest luxury and were forced to leave The Carlyle for a tenement on the corner of Thirty-Seventh Street and Eighth Avenue. The apartment was crammed and shabby, located in the heart of Hell’s Kitchen, a poor, Irish neighborhood too dangerous to walk in after dark.

  Hanna refused to consider staying there long. She spent her first week in New York combing the classified ads for a better apartment, something modest yet affordable. She found an enclave on the Upper West Side where many European Jews had settled after fleeing Germany in the thirties. There, the owner of a massive townhouse that had been converted into apartments agreed to rent them a ground-floor studio at a reasonable price with no security deposit. The move brought Hanna relief, however short-lived. At least now she had found a neighborhood where she could walk safely, even as far as the park, when time and weather permitted. When she walked past the extravagant buildings on Central Park West, the sight of the broad front gates and impeccable doormen reminded her of her childhood visits to New York. The Dakota stood out above all others. Hanna would gaze up at the windows and dream of the charmed lives of those living within.

  As for Robert, he quickly grew disheartened by the harsh homecoming, as he was forced to swallow his pride and slog through one odd job after another. He would leave home early in the morning to make the rounds at the employment agencies, and was lucky if he managed to lock down even the most precarious short-term job. He picked up shifts on the docks or in the stockrooms of clothing stores, until he eventually landed a permanent position driving delivery trucks for a beverage company. He worked for a friendly man who expected hard work and long hours, yet still treated his employees with decency and respect.

  Toward the end of fall, Robert was approached by another driver and became entangled in a scheme delivering black-market goods. Rob
ert would keep the keys to the truck on him after his official route had ended, and then, after hours, he would pick up the truck, cross the Hudson River, and drive down to the docks on the Jersey side to load crates of cigarettes and other contraband for distribution.

  It was a victimless crime, but it would have come with heavy consequences if he’d ever got caught. Yet the pay outweighed the high risk, a full fifty dollars per truckload. With four runs per weekend, he was at last able to offer Hanna a better life. He could now take her out to dinner on Wednesdays and Saturdays, or even dancing at a West Village jazz club.

  One night, Robert came home from work to find Hanna crying at the kitchen stove. She wept soundlessly, as the steam from a pot of fresh vegetable soup rose up into her face. Robert sat down at the table without a word, and after Hanna had set down the tureen and served his dinner, she headed off to bed. Robert followed shortly after, lying in the bed beside her and waiting for his young wife to speak.

  “I see how hard you’re trying, darling. I don’t blame you at all. Rather, I’m indebted to you for everything you’ve done for me. It’s just . . . life here . . . isn’t what I thought it would be,” she said.

  “We’re going to be okay,” Robert insisted. “We just have to wait it out. If we stay strong and stick together, we’re going to make it.”

  “Stick together?” she sighed. “I already feel like I’m going it alone, almost all the time, every day of the week. And don’t think I’m blind to what you’ve been doing on the weekends; I’m no fool. All I have to do is look out of the window to see who you’re cavorting with in the dead of night, and what you’re mixed up in. I know a deliveryman’s wages would never pay for all those meals out, not to mention the new ice box last month, or that dress you gave me.”

  “I’m just trying to give you the nice things you deserve.”