The Secret Life of Violet Grant

by Beatriz Williams

  She hears other sounds, too. She hears Jane’s light laughter from the lounge chairs at the opposite end of the terrace, where she sits with Walter every evening.

  “Mrs. Grant. I was growing alarmed.”

  Violet spins and crashes into the shoulder of Herr Schulmann.

  “I beg your pardon. I didn’t mean to startle you,” he says, in his perfect English. Over tea that afternoon, Jane told her that Herr Schulmann attended school at Harrow and university at Cambridge, that he was once engaged to an Englishwoman, though it had ended unhappily. How Jane has discovered these facts, Violet can’t imagine; it’s as if she pulled them from some all-knowing ether, beyond the reach of Violet’s senses.

  “Not at all.” Violet’s Schuyler upbringing takes over, as it’s meant to do in such moments. She asks if he would like a drink, if he would like to sit down. The butler has already wheeled out the after-dinner trolley, an abundant arrangement of crystal decanters and cigarettes and coffee and petits fours. Can she offer him something?

  He holds up his glass. “I am already sufficiently supplied, thank you. But you have nothing. May I fetch you a glass?”

  They wander to the trolley. Herr Shulmann is drinking port, which he pronounces excellent; Violet, for want of imagination, allows him to pour her a glass. They come to rest on the low wall at the edge of the terrace, where the jasmine brushes Violet’s bare arm.

  “I’ve never met a more unusual hostess,” says Herr Shulmann. “You disappear and reappear as if borne by fairies.”

  Violet laughs. Her head is still sparkling a little from the excitement of discovery on her page of equations, from the low chuckle of Lionel’s nearby throat. “Not fairies at all, I’m afraid. I was in the laboratory.”

  “Most wives would be visiting the nursery at this hour.”

  “Dr. Grant and I have a different sort of progeny.”

  “Indeed.” Herr Schulmann looks at his hands and rolls the sharp-edged bowl of his glass back and forth between his fingers, which are long and polished. He is a government official of some sort, Herr Schulmann, though Violet can’t remember what he does. “I suppose it’s much the same with me. My work is my child, or more properly Germany, and I love her with the same passion as I might love my own daughter, if I had one.”

  “Yes, I understand.”

  He looks up. He’s not a handsome man—his face is narrow, his hair thin—but the light from the house is kind to him, erasing the tiny pits in his skin, giving his eyes a liquid warmth. He fastens those eyes on her earnestly. “You are American, Mrs. Grant, though your husband is English. Are you a patriot?”

  “I am not, I’m afraid. I find myself frustrated by these rivalries between nations.”

  “As do I. As do I.” Herr Schulmann rises from the wall, strides to the trolley, and pours himself another glass with a shaking hand. He returns to her, sweeping up his black tails as he replaces himself in his seat. “All this talk of war tonight. You must understand, Mrs. Grant, that Germany does not want war. But we’re encircled, encroached upon.” He makes a motion with his hands. “France on the one side, Russia and the Balkans on the other. Spain begins to align herself against us.” He drinks. “And there is Britain.”

  “Britain hasn’t committed herself, has she?” Violet peers through her memory, which traps equations and chemical formulae in perfect detail, but cannot always recall the current political map of Europe.

  “Not publicly. But there is an understanding with France, that Britain will follow her into war if declared. And if war is declared, Mrs. Grant, if we teeter into this abyss, Germany will be beset on both sides. France to her west, Russia to her east. And she would fight with all her strength. She would fight to the end.”

  “Pardon me, Herr Schulmann, but you appall me. All war appalls me. It is barbaric, the most brutal means of solving differences between nations. Men will be killed, men with wives and mothers and children. Hearts will break, and for what?”

  Herr Schulmann’s hand reaches out unexpectedly to enclose her own, over her glass of port. “I agree, Mrs. Grant. I am not belligerent. I despise the very thought of war.”

  Violet’s breath thins to a wisp in her chest. The giddiness of the laboratory has fled her; she is aware of Lionel’s laconic figure among the lindens, of the strength of passion in Herr Schulmann’s gaze. “Then why do you speak of it as inevitable?”

  For an instant, Herr Schulmann glances at the moon-shadowed trees, where Lionel and Herr von Karlow are still speaking. “Because there are those in the government, those in the military especially, who welcome war. Who believe that a decisive battle is the only way for Germany to rid herself of this encirclement. Who are convinced that an early war, before our enemies gain any further strength, is to be brought forward on any pretext.” Herr Schulmann finishes his port, sets down the glass, and reaches into his pocket for a cigarette. “Do you mind, Mrs. Grant?”

  “Not at all.” Despite the warm air, Violet’s hands are cold. She finishes her own port and watches Herr Schulmann’s elegantly nervous fingers as he shakes a cigarette from its gold case and strikes a match against the stone. The flame sends a lurid shadow chasing across his face. Nearby, the Comtesse de Saint-Honoré’s laugh pirouettes in the twilight air. Walter has pulled his chair closer to Jane’s, and his elbows rest attentively on his thighs as he leans toward her. Violet takes in all these details, all these filaments of her life, woven together in some audacious new pattern that snatches her breath with its possibilities.

  “I disagree with my colleagues, Mrs. Grant,” says Herr Schulmann, with another quick glance at the lindens, from which Herr von Karlow’s voice rises with growing urgency. “I think a general war would be disastrous for Germany, for Europe, and for humanity. But mine is a lonely voice.”

  “I am very sorry to hear that.”

  “No man is more loyal to Germany than I am, Mrs. Grant. I only wish I might save her from herself.” He looks at her again, his gaze pressing into hers, as if he’s trying to explain something vital.

  “I wish you can, Herr Schulmann,” Violet says. She lays her palms against her dress. Von Karlow’s voice rises angrily to her left, and a second later his feet strike hard on the terrace steps. He passes them both in a gust of startled air. “I wish you can.”

  • • •

  VIOLET FINDS LIONEL in his usual spot, among the rose trellises. Night has enclosed the garden, and she feels her way along, scraping her fingers against the thorns, until she catches the scent of Lionel’s cigarette and stops, waiting for his shadow to detach from the darkness.

  His hand reaches her first, drawing her next to him. “There you are.”

  “I’m sorry. The Germans left; I had to see them off.”

  “My fault, I’m afraid.” He laughs softly, and she can see him now, the whites of his shirt and tie finding the moonlight at last. Something brushes her cheek. “I’ve plucked you a rose, if only to annoy you.”

  She reaches up and takes it from his fingers. “The poor thing.”

  “Either way, it will wither and die.”

  “Like your everlasting regard?”

  “Well, there it is, anyway.” He thrusts one hand in his pocket and leans against the trellis, mindless of thorns. “Yours to keep. You can always dry it and place it between the leaves of your diary.”

  “I don’t have a diary. Not for personal things, anyway. I have my scientific journals.”

  “Yes, of course. What a pair we’ll make for the historians of the future. Not a scrap of personal sentiment left behind to incriminate us.”

  “We’ve done nothing criminal.” The air is cool among the roses, but Violet is flushed and warm. Her dress itches against her skin. She takes a step back, away from Lionel.

  “No, we haven’t. Not yet.” The faint orange end of his cigarette moves up to his lips, flares, and moves away. He waits, as always,
for Violet to speak next, to say the words that will set everything into motion.

  “What did you say to poor von Karlow?” asks Violet. “He was very angry.”

  Lionel shrugs. “He wanted me to admit that the Allies were in the wrong, that poor old Germany was persecuted and encircled. Einkreisung, the old word. He’s not entirely wrong, that’s the devil of it.”

  Violet tears a leaf from the stem of her rose.

  “And you, Violet? What were you discussing so intently with our good Herr Schulmann?”

  “The same thing, I suppose, except that he doesn’t want war. He was almost pleading with me, as if I could do something about it.” She allows a bitter laugh. “I, an American scientist, married to an Englishman, with no interest whatsoever in politics.”

  Lionel straightens. “What did he say, exactly?”

  “I don’t remember exactly. That he wished he could save Germany from herself, or something like that.”

  “Did he?” Lionel exhales a slow stream of smoke and drops his spent cigarette into the paving stone, soft with lichen. He moves his foot to crush out the last of the glow. “That’s good of him.”

  Lionel’s body rests a very few inches away, electric with life, blood racing and cells dividing. Here and present before her, with a vital force that might grasp Violet by the shoulders and shake her awake.

  “Will there really be a war, Lionel? It doesn’t seem possible.”

  “I don’t know, Violet.”

  “Can’t you do something? Your father, somebody.”

  He laughs drily. “I’m flattered. You must have an extraordinary faith in me.”

  “I do. You can do anything. You . . . you’re that sort of person. Nothing’s impossible with you.” The rose is denuded of leaves. Violet wraps her fingers around the stem and stares at the hole in the darkness where Lionel leans against the trellis.

  An automobile engine grinds faintly from the road. Violet knows it might be Lise and Albert and the Hahns arriving at last, hot and weary with travel, but she cannot make her heavy limbs move. She cannot free herself from this rose-scented cocoon she shares with Lionel.

  “Violet.” Lionel’s body shifts. His hand touches her hair, pulls a few strands from the loose knot at the nape of her neck. He bends his head and kisses them. “I’m falling in love with you.”

  “Don’t.” She puts her hand on his arm, intending to detach him, but her fingers in their weakness only rest there on his smooth black sleeve, examining the bony curve of his elbow. Lionel’s sleeve, Lionel’s elbow, Lionel’s peppermint shaving soap and his warm brandy-scented breath.

  “Let me kiss you, Violet. Just once.”

  “No. He’ll know, Lionel.”

  “How can he know?”

  “He’ll smell you on me. He’ll see it in my eyes.”

  “The devil he will. And what if he does? It’s only a kiss.”

  “You don’t know him.”

  “He doesn’t deserve you. He doesn’t deserve this, your loyalty.” Lionel holds her hair against his lips. His other hand is somewhere between them, ready to strike, ready to touch her if she lets him. “You think you need him, Violet, but you don’t. You can stand on your own. You’re strong, you’re the strongest woman I know, and you’ve made yourself his handmaiden because he’s convinced you, God knows how, that he created you.”

  “And now you want me to be your handmaiden.”

  “No, I don’t.” He pulls away. His face lies in dark fragments before her: a line of cheekbone, a glint of forehead, an unstoppable eye fixed on hers. “Listen to me, Violet. I want more than this. I want to lie next to you at night and worship you. I want to watch you by day and see what you’re capable of, you astonishing woman, you bloody beautiful thing. I want to count every scintillation of you.”

  “For a month or two, anyway.”

  “Why not?” His voice is stone. “Why not, if it amuses us both?”

  “I don’t want to be amused.”

  He releases her hair and steps back. “Well, neither do I. God help me.”

  An insect hums past Violet’s ear. There is the crackle of gravel from the driveway, the voices raised in welcome. “I should go.”

  “Go, then.”

  “You’re angry.”

  “By God, I am. I’m furious. You’ve made me helpless. I’m nothing but a damned bystander. Watching and waiting.” He throws his fist into the trellis with a crash, causing a pair of birds to scuttle upward from the roses.

  Violet gasps.

  “I’m sorry,” he says.

  “Don’t be. They’re only roses.”

  Lionel turns away. “Go, Violet. Go to your guests.”

  “I can’t leave you like this.”

  “And what else do you propose?”

  Jane’s laugh rises up from the front of the house, and Walter’s low chuckle. Violet’s palm hurts. She looks down and sees the rose crushed in her fist, and what must be its tiny thorns piercing her skin. Lionel’s back lies before her, his arm braced against the trellis, his black head tucked under a speck of moonlight.

  Well, Violet? What else do you propose?

  Violet pulls the petals away from the stem in a clump and does something she has never imagined doing, on a whim she cannot begin to fathom. She scatters the petals one by one over Lionel’s granite shoulders.

  “Say good night to me,” she whispers.

  “Good night, Violet.”

  Violet slips under his arm and stands in front of him. She stretches on her toes and puts her hand on his cheek.

  Lionel’s kiss is delicate, as if he’s afraid of her touch, as if he doesn’t trust himself with her. Violet expects something wholly exotic, Lionel’s brand-new taste and smell and the feel of his lips, but in that first instant of contact he reminds her shockingly of Walter, warm-skinned, round-lipped, pungent with tobacco and masculine spirits.

  And then she deepens the kiss and it falls apart, this image of Walter, because Lionel’s chin is smooth-shaved, his cheeks are sleek against her fingers, his mouth moves so gently it hurts her chest. He touches her hair, her back. His body is wide and strong across her breast. She stops, holding her lips around his, and her shoulders begin to quiver.

  “Shh.” Lionel strokes her neck. “Shh.”

  Vivian

  You can imagine the festive spirit with which I entered the Metropolitan conference room five minutes later, knowing that those confidential files were waiting for me upstairs.

  Tibby had insisted. All right. Tibby had actually locked his hand around my arm and refused to relinquish the key until I agreed to attend Agatha’s anniversary party. “If I have to eat cake, you have to eat cake,” he said, and in the end it was this promise of implied solidarity that moved me to go along. I needed a friend, didn’t I?

  Gogo was there, beaming. Gogo had known Agatha since she was a baby. In fact, Gogo had probably decorated the birthday room herself. The place was unrecognizable. Festooned with bunting, chock-a-block with hearts and sparkling forties, overflowing with refreshments and a cake of Agatha-like proportions. The honored lady stood there herself in the center of the sitting area, pursed of lip, gimlet of eye, pointy paper hat balanced atop her pointy shellacked head.

  “Congratulations.” I lunged in to kiss the exact center of her leftmost patch of rouge. “Forty years of service! I’d never have guessed a day over thirty-eight.”

  Gogo was filling paper cups with champagne. “I’m going to cry in a minute. Remember when you spanked my bottom for rearranging all the pens in the storage closet?”

  “Spanked it good,” said Agatha with satisfaction. “You were just two and a half.”

  “Well done, Mary Poppins,” I said.

  Oh, the warm feelings packed into that room! Editors, writers, secretaries, even the typing pool, all guzzling down Lightfoot champagne and
eyeing that cake like crocodiles at a zebra convention. That cake! Some zealous confectioner had created a three-dimensional chocolate-frosted telephone, with Congratulations Agatha! trailing in swirly icing letters from the receiver earpiece, and Forty Years of Service! shouting from the mouthpiece. How we were going to cut it up, I had no idea.

  Within minutes, a dozen empty champagne bottles had piled up on the service tray, the ashtrays were overflowing, and the mood was turning fractious. “I think we’d better start the cake,” I whispered to Gogo.

  “Not yet. Daddy wants to say a few words.”

  “Mr. Lightfoot?” I owned myself shocked. S. Barnard had never made an appearance at any of the birthdays, engagements, anniversaries we occasionally moved ourselves to celebrate in the office. Word had it he only attended the Metropolitan Christmas party for a single ceremonial half hour, before departing by limousine for parts unknown but roundly suspected. “Why?”

  “Oh, they’ve known each other forever.”

  The room went silent as she spoke, so the word forever floated out cheerfully above our heads. I looked to the door, where Mr. Lightfoot stood in his elegant pin-striped charcoals, a royal purple handkerchief showing in a neat triangle from his breast pocket. A distinct air of martini wafted through the nimbus of cigarette smoke, suggesting lunch at his club with the Metropolitan’s largest advertiser.

  “Miss Brown!” he said. He walked up to her, snatched her talons, and kissed each cheek pouch.

  Someone coughed. I believe it was Tibby.

  Mr. Lightfoot turned to face the assembled minions. One hand still held Agatha’s. Gogo pressed a paper cup of champagne into the other.

  “Let me tell you about Miss Brown,” he said.

  I measured the distance to the door. Too far.

  Agatha was smiling a foundation-cracking smile, her lips stretched so wide that the scarlet had thinned out to fuchsia.

  “I first met Miss Brown thirty-nine years ago. I was just out of Philips Exeter, working at my father’s magazine the summer before I started Harvard. I had never seen anyone like her. Gorgeous face, shining blond hair. Tits like torpedoes, out to here”—he motioned extravagantly with his champagne hand—“and an ass to match.”