by Anne Edwards
“The stove is your problem,” I told Mrs. Barnes, “the food made on it mine.” So she fed it and kept the temperature at least near where I needed it, and I cooked.
The char prepared fires in all the rooms before she left so that they could be lighted early the next morning. Keeping the house warm once London was awash in daily rain was no easy task. Dampness crawled into the very center of one’s body and splayed outwards to one’s extremities. After breakfast with the children, I retired to my bedroom, doors closed and knees raised; as I reclined on the bed, yellow lined pad and sharpened pencil at hand, my portable Olivetti nearby to transpose my written words, I started my work day. (This was a regime I had developed during the onset of polio.) To keep my hands from becoming numbed from the cold, I often wore gloves as I worked on my Olivetti or pushed my pencil along the lines of my yellow pads. I had regular office hours, usually nine to four, lunch on a tray, Monday through Friday. Saturday was shopping time, Sunday exploration of London and the outskirts with Cathy and Michael. I met with Raymond and David Deutsch for a story conference every two weeks and saw them both socially as well.
Raymond was married to a beautiful young woman, twenty years his junior, who he adoringly called “my angel.” He had a teenage daughter, Larain, from his first marriage. Larain was going through great angst at the time. We bonded and she often came by for supper or joined us on an excursion (later, when Fiona was no longer in my employ, Larain would be a big help as a “childsitter”). Claire was blonde and looked a bit like the fair Elaine—pure and innocent. Raymond never tired of telling the story of how he fell in love with her upon first sight, how he arranged secret meetings with her, and how her brawny brothers nearly killed him when they discovered they were lovers. He had the scars to show for it—and did.
The Strosses lived in a handsome flat on Connaught Place, a short walk from Albion Street. Residing in the same building was an American family, Gerry (Gerald) Adler, his wife Kit, and at that time their two children, Nancy (Cathy’s age) and Steve (still an infant). Gerry was a lawyer and the British director of international enterprises for NBC. There were only two television channels in Great Britain at the time, and they went off the air before midnight, often way before midnight. Scheduling was haphazard. Programs started at ten minutes after the hour, six before the hour—however long a show took. And there were no commercials. Viewers mostly rented sets and paid a fee for a television license. Radio was the best free ticket in town. It was excellent. I quickly became addicted to a program called A Book before Bedtime, on which well-known theater actors read a chapter from a classic each weeknight.
American film and television production was booming in England as budgets could be slashed dramatically from what they would have been had they been shot in the States. Gerry was a towering, gentle man. Standing, he would always bow his head to talk with you, as most people were at least a foot shorter. He was extremely sympathetic to the plight of HUAC’s victims. Kit Adler, formerly a puppeteer who had starred in her own television kiddie show in upstate New York, was a delight. When we met at dinner at the Strosses’ we immediately hit it off.
David Deutsch was a constant presence and escort on my evenings out to the theater or cinema. I was not lonely, nor was I looking for romance. My current physical condition made sex something to be avoided for the present. God knows I would have welcomed a bit of loving but my body was still in the healing process. I had been lucky to have had a fairly mild case of polio. My lungs were clear and the paralysis had affected only my right leg, the inner thigh, and a bit of necessary plumbing, the last creating private doubts that I would ever be able to reveal myself to a lover again. During the past year, after a rather lengthy hospital stay, I had been in intensive outpatient therapy care and had shown considerable improvement, mentally and physically. On my last visit to my doctor in Los Angeles, I had agreed to see a London colleague of his. I put off doing so as there were just too many other things that seemed to have first call on my time. Also, I greatly welcomed my reprieve from medical services. I promised myself to make the call the day my script was completed.
I never discussed my physical condition with my new friends, and everyone was too polite to ask. After several evenings with David, I realized he had taken a more romantic approach toward me. He brought me, and the children, small presents, put his arm around me in the theater, and kissed me on the cheek rather lingeringly at partings. One night he asked whether my “situation” was permanent (meaning, with the glance that accompanied the inquiry, would I always need canes).
“No,” I told him, more hopeful than sure. “My doctor at home says I am progressing well. But it will be a while. . . .” I hesitated.
“A while for what?”
“Until I fully recover.”
“Look,” he said with great serious concentration, his hand tightly grasping my shoulder. “We here in Britain have been through a long, painful, costly war. I don’t have a friend who has not lost a member of his family or suffered from serious wounds—physical and emotional. We Brits may appear unromantic by American standards, but I can tell you honestly we can love and deal with situations that require great understanding as deeply as any of your countrymen.”
I was greatly moved. That night, before we parted, he held me in a tight embrace and I did not pull away.
A few days later, he asked me to join him for tea with his mother at her home. (He had his own flat in a section of the city called St. John’s Wood.)
“David, what is this about?” I prodded.
“I would just like you to meet my mother. She greatly admires women of independence and talent.”
So I went.
David was an earnest fellow about my age, of average good looks and height. He did not stand out in a group and was not a talented conversationalist. However, he was bright and good natured. What he lacked in charisma he made up in curiosity and conviviality. We enjoyed many of the same things—films, theater, history, and—oddly—art deco design (a big passion of mine). We did not, however, laugh over the same things. David had a very British sense of humor, which had a way at times of being sophomoric—a lot of scatological and bathroom jokes bred, I assumed, in the all-boy boarding schools in which well-born British males were raised.
Raymond had told me a great deal about David’s background (he, on the other hand, was reticent about it). His father, the late Oscar Deutsch, had developed and owned the Odeon cinema chain, the largest in Great Britain, and was responsible for the proliferation during the twenties and thirties of the fanciful art deco movie palaces in both America and Great Britain. These, in turn, inspired the art deco design in films like the Ginger Rogers/Fred Astaire musicals. It had obviously not been easy for David to be the son of a strong personality such as Oscar Deutsch was said to have been. Although unharmed in the war, he was, nonetheless, a wounded soldier in life. I cared for him as a good friend might, but I was not in love with David, nor did I think—in view of the shortness of our relationship and my imminent departure—that he had any long-range feelings for me.
The moment I entered Lili Deutsch’s elegant sitting room, I knew I had made a grievous mistake in accepting the invitation. As Lili did not rise to greet me it seemed obvious this was not to be a simple social visit. David took my arm and advanced toward his mother. Her smile was obligatory as he made the introduction. Groomed impeccably in a gray tea gown (long, elegant, and simple), ropes of real pearls (how could they be anything else?) about her neck, Lili Deutsch looked very much the “grand dame” as she nodded for me to be seated on a chair opposite her. Her first words to me after “How do you do,” offered not as a question but as a statement, were “I understand from David that you are an American and a divorcée.”
I admitted to both crimes.
“And you have two children.”
“A son and a daughter.”
She poured tea from a magnificent silver pot into fine china cups without a single drip. “Milk or lemon?” she in
quired.
“Neither.”
There were in Lili Deutsch vestiges of Oscar Wilde’s Lady Bracknell in his The Importance of Being Earnest, who, when confronted by the young woman her nephew has brought her to meet, asks about the girl’s parents. She is informed that they are both deceased. “To lose one parent is tragic,” Lady Bracknell responds archly, “to lose two, careless.” David’s mother could have forgiven me many things. However, never that I was both a divorcée and American (shades of Wallis Simpson, I suppose). She had been hostess to Britain’s most famous stars, political figures, and, as the silver-framed photographs on display in the sitting room revealed, members of the royal family. One, in a prominent spot, was of her standing beside the sweet, jolly-faced Queen Elizabeth, recently widowed consort of George VI and mother of the current, young Queen, also named Elizabeth. At the bottom of the photograph was a handwritten inscription (which I could not read). There followed about twenty minutes of strained conversation. Mainly Lili addressed David—who called her “Mum”—testily chiding him for being rather inattentive during the previous weeks, and then relating to him her current complaints. David had morphed into a different man than the one I thought I had come to know in the past three months. He seemed suddenly to have regressed to truant schoolboy, be it one about to enter his third decade. He was not wholly in fear of Lili. “I already told you that, Mum,” he said with a decided edge. Still, he was noticeably anxious for her approval and clearly experiencing some pain that it was not being extended and that her attitude toward me was frosted with disfavor.
Not able to endure David’s discomfort, his mother’s pompous attitude, and my own awkward situation, I rose to say that I was sorry but I must leave. This was obviously a social gaffe, for David jumped immediately to his feet and chimed in with a fictional excuse for my abrupt departure. Lili, unperturbed, walked us to the door of the sitting room, no farther. David leaned over and gave her a glancing kiss on the side of her pale, bisque-like cheek—his lips barely touching her pale white skin. I was conscious of the click-click of my canes as I cautiously walked down the highly polished hallway floor to the front door where the uniformed maid stood at attention to see us out.
Once on the street, I could not control the anger that was rising inside me. I’m not sure if I felt more fury toward David for placing me in such a wrongheaded situation, at Lili for her arrogant rudeness, or at myself for not making it clear to David before it got this far that I was not in the least interested in marrying him—or anyone else for that matter—as that was what I had suddenly realized he had in mind. Once out on the street as he prepared to hail a taxi, the anger in me seeped out. He had placed me and himself in an ugly situation and done so without consulting me or asking my views.
“How could you? You brought me here on a fraudulent premise!” I accused. “She admires independent, talented women, does she! My God! Your mother looked at me as though she were interviewing a highly unacceptable, prospective daughter-in-law! Well, she is damned right!” A taxi had just pulled over to the curb. I got in and closed the door before he could join me.
My anger toward David cooled rather quickly. I had, in fact, after meeting Lili Deutsch, greater empathy for him. He apparently was desperate in his wish to change things between his mother and himself, for her to see him as a grown man—a married man. I was going to leave in a month’s time, if he didn’t stop me. Therefore, his rush to move things along between us. I told him what I felt and he seemed to take it well enough. We vowed to remain friends. And we did.
A few days after my tea with David’s mother, Raymond informed me that he was going to need my services for another two months to do further work on my screenplay. The rent on the house would still be covered, as well as the other perks I had been given, but my salary was cut by a third (no Mitchell Gertz to negotiate for me, sadly). I accepted, with relief. Fear of what I would do after my stint abroad had been nagging at me. Now I had been given another reprieve, however short, and I was grateful to have it. The children had settled in. Michael was attending school, Cathy was in a playgroup organized at the American School, and I had made an appointment with the doctor suggested to me by my stateside physician.
David and I never spoke about that disastrous tea party again. When I gave thought to it, I realized that Lili had freed us both. David had made his first bold move in cutting the cord that held him to Lili. And I had realized that I needed help to deal with my problems. Still, I knew that divorcing the children’s father had freed me on one hand and brought me more responsibility on the other. Neither was David really free. He might one day soon revolt. But my instinct was that he would win that battle and still face a long, difficult war.
Believing I had only two more months abroad, I put in many extra hours in my pursuit of all things British. I was obsessed, and being obsessed with anything other than my own condition felt extremely good. My greatest pleasure was in wandering about London on my own or with the children. I had fallen in love with Great Britain—the people, the country, and its history. Once the Russians, with all that drama and melodrama in their history and fictions, had fascinated me. My mother, however, was a dedicated reader of English literature (she had studied to be an English teacher) and she was entranced with British royalty. We spent a lot of time alone during my growing-up years—my father moving in and out of our lives for such long periods of time. I read the four Ss at her request (Shakespeare, Shelley, Sheridan, and Shaw), and listened to her stories about “that scandalous Mrs. Simpson.” She possessed some talents as an actress and her recitations were always entertaining. Of all the royals, I had been drawn most to the commanding image of Queen Mary, George V’s consort, mother of the infamous Edward VIII, who had abdicated the throne to marry Mrs. Simpson, and of his brother, poor, stuttering George VI, who—nonetheless—got his country through a terrible war. As I was now living close to Buckingham Palace—just across Hyde Park from Albion Street—my appetite for more information about the history of the country that was my present host was spurred.
Reality soon invaded the peace I had negotiated for myself. A letter arrived from Sue Rossen alerting me to the possibility that Bob would recant his initial stand in a second hearing before the Committee. It would be the first of Sue’s letters to me in which she opened her heart, out of character for this seemingly iron-strong woman. She and Bob had not agreed that this was what he should do. In the end she had relented. True, Bob could work again, the money would once again flow, but she feared what this would do to their lives, how the children would be affected, how many friends would now turn their backs on them. She asked me if I had been in touch with any of the blacklisted members of the industry who were now in England.
This last query unsettled me. I had been so involved with my own good fortune and my wonder at being abroad that I had not contacted one person who I knew was in London trying to reconstruct a life after McCarthy had robbed him of his old one, although I had brought with me ways to reach several of them. The first name on my list, along with a telephone number, was Lester Cole, one of the original Hollywood Ten who had served a year in prison for courageously refusing to give the Committee names of friends and associates who might (or might not) have belonged to the Communist Party (or a left-wing organization) at one time, even if they had rejected it in recent years. I had met Lester and his wife a couple of times at the Rossens’. He answered the phone. Yes, of course, he remembered me. His wife had divorced him while he was serving time—“a betrayal, beyond betrayal,” he bellowed. He had heard rumors about Bob—and pressed me for an update. I told him what Sue had written me.
“Sonofabitch, lousy bastard!” he hissed.
I changed the subject and suggested maybe we could meet for coffee.
“Sure. Are you working?” he added.
I told him the story of my first interview with Raymond and how I now happened to be working on the script here in London. He laughed heartily.
“What are you going to do w
hen the job is done?” he asked.
“I don’t know, Lester,” I said honestly. We set a date to meet.
After I hung up, I felt like a tsunami wave had flooded over me. Not only did I not know what I would do once I was off Raymond’s payroll, lately I had been avoiding any thought of it. Time was ticking away fast. I knew I had to find a reasonable course to follow.
• 3 •
In a London Kind of Fog
London continued to intrigue me, especially the royal family. One could not escape their omnipresence. The pages of the daily newspapers (London had a lively press, at least eight dailies and five Sunday editions) were filled with the comings and goings of not only the Queen, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, young Prince Charles, and Princess Anne, but with the Queen’s rebellious younger sister, Princess Margaret, and the royal sisters’ host of cousins. I would, at a later time, form a friendship with one of the cousins, the effervescent and extremely bright Lucinda Lascelles, who would kindle in me an even greater interest in the royal family. My friendship with Lucinda would be augmented in the future by a closer relationship with Margaret’s great love, Group Captain Peter Townsend. But that would be after the current flurry. Right now, their wish to marry dominated newspaper headlines and caused members of average British families to take sides—should Princess Margaret and Townsend be allowed to wed and Margaret keep her title?
As a romantic and an unrelenting feminist, I could not fathom why a young woman over twenty-one (Margaret was twenty-three at that time) should not marry whomever she choose? I came to understand that church and state are not separated in Great Britain as they are in the United States. The ruling monarch takes on the oath as head of the Church of England—a religious institution that did not at that time recognize divorce. It appears that I had not understood the full extent of the power of monarchy or of its subjects’ obeisance to it.
