by Annabel Abbs
* * *
Because it was her fault. She gave me my squint. She made Babbo ban Beckett from Robiac Square. She stopped me dancing. She gave birth to me out of wedlock. She made me a bastard. Other things too. Things I couldn’t understand. And all this time something was fluttering at the edges of my memory. Something unspeakably vile. Yes, it was her fault. She was to blame … in the beginning ….
* * *
February 2nd, 1932. Babbo’s fiftieth birthday and the tenth anniversary of the publication of Ulysses. Everyone was scurrying around, adjusting waistcoats and skirts, answering the telephone, hunting for hats and gloves and mislaid tie-pins. One of Babbo’s Flatterers was hosting a small party. There was to be a cake with fifty candles and a fondant replica of Ulysses in blue and gold. I wore a new dress my mother had bought me, with a beaded bodice and a matching headband and patent-leather shoes with T-bars studded with rhinestones, all the colour of a ripe mulberry.
I didn’t think to ask about the other guests until a few minutes before we were due to leave. My mother was standing in the kitchen powdering her nose when I asked who else would be coming to the party. Giorgio, who had brought the car and chauffeur for us, was reading the newspaper. Babbo was in the bathroom combing his hair back so that it lay flat and smooth against his head.
“Sure it’s very small this year,” said my mother. “Did you invite Mr Ponisovsky? Such a nice man.”
I shook my head. “He had a prior engagement. So who’s coming?”
“Helen will come for a bit, won’t she, Giorgio?” Mama turned to Giorgio who nodded and went back to the newspaper. “And Mr and Mrs Gilbert and Mr and Mrs Sullivan. And Mr Beckett’s coming too. So there’ll only be a few of us. Nice and small.”
“Beckett?” I said, incredulous. “Beckett’s coming?”
“Yes, why ever not? We’re all friends now.” She snapped her powder compact shut and started humming to herself.
And in that moment a torrent of fury rushed through me, so strong, so decisive, that without thinking I lunged for the nearest thing – a wooden kitchen chair – and picked it up as though it were as light as a soap bubble. I raised the chair high above my head and hurled it at my mother. She saw the chair sweeping through the air and dodged it, her eyes, face, lips white with panic and fear.
As the chair left my hands, I realised I was shaking uncontrollably. But before I had time to respond, to apologise, to understand what had happened, Giorgio leaped up and grabbed my wrists. He held them so tightly I cried out in pain. He pulled me from the kitchen, dragging me down the hall and towards the elevator. As he pulled me, I heard him calling out to my mother, telling her that this time I had gone too far, that he was taking matters into his own hands. As I heard the elevator cranking its way towards us and Giorgio shouting, I caught sight of Babbo’s bloodless face in the hall. He cried out to Giorgio, telling him to stop, to leave me alone. But it was too late. The door opened and Giorgio shoved me roughly inside. As the doors closed on us, all I could see were the rhinestones on my shoes and the beads on my dress, all winking and glinting with malice in the dim cage of the elevator. Then Giorgio grabbed my arms from behind, my wrists pinned in his bony hands. His nails dug so hard into my flesh I was sure there must be a trail of crimson blood behind me.
When I cried out in pain, he put a hand over my mouth. He told me, in a low and violent voice, that he wouldn’t let me ruin Babbo’s fiftieth birthday, that he wouldn’t let me hurt Mama – ever. “People are saying you’ve lost your wits. That you’re bringing shame on us, after everything we’ve worked so hard for. How dare you! How dare you try and hurt Mother. You’ve gone too far, Lucia.” He pushed me out of the elevator, one hand still over my mouth, the other still gripping my wrists.
Outside the apartment block, the Buick sat gleaming in the thin winter light. I saw the surprise in the chauffeur’s eyes as he jumped out and opened the back door for us. Giorgio manoeuvred me into the rear seat, thrusting me back against the leather. I shook my head so vigorously in protest that my silk headband slipped down my face until it lay noose-like round my neck.
“Où?” asked the chauffeur, bewildered. “Pas la rue de Sévigné?”
I saw Giorgio’s eyes flit from left to right, as if he was trying to decide what direction we should take. Then he told the chauffeur to drive as fast as he could. He gave an address that was unfamiliar to me, but I heard the words ‘Maison de Santé’ and I knew exactly where he was taking me. It struck me, like an unwanted echo from the past, that this was what had happened to Mrs Zelda Fitzgerald. I recalled, with sudden clarity, Sandy’s words two years before. First you go to a Maison de Santé. From there it’s one small step to being locked up as a lunatic, like Mrs Fitzgerald, like Nijinsky. I opened my eyes wide and started to wriggle and struggle. I wanted to tell Giorgio that I didn’t mean to throw the chair, that it wasn’t me that threw it, that someone else had taken control of my body, my arms. I tried to twist my head and look back at the apartment, to see if Babbo was coming for me. But my neck was jammed against Giorgio’s chest and I could see nothing.
Giorgio stared grimly out of the window. After a while I felt the pressure from his hand over my mouth easing. I tried to shake my head free. I couldn’t breathe. I needed to speak. But when he felt the movement in my head, he tightened his hand again, pushing it hard against my mouth, forcing me to inhale and exhale heavily and noisily through my nostrils.
Eventually we arrived at a pair of heavy iron gates. The chauffeur was dispatched to open them while Giorgio kept me pinioned in the back seat, still unable to speak. By then, I had no resistance left. I slumped, motionless, feeling shudders run sporadically over my body. Once through the gates, we drove along a narrow winding track until we reached a large white house surrounded by gravel and laurel bushes. We pulled up at the front door and Giorgio removed his hands from my arms and my face and climbed out of the motor car. He told the chauffeur to watch me, and walked into the building. A few minutes later he returned with two burly men and I saw him gesturing to the Buick.
The chauffeur opened the door so I could get out. But instead I cowered on the back seat, whimpering like a frightened dog. Giorgio told me to get out of the motor car. But I was unable to move. I felt as though I’d been soldered to the leather, my legs and arms lifeless and heavy. And then I found my tongue and stopped whimpering. I begged Giorgio to take me home. I pleaded with him for forgiveness. I beseeched him to give me another chance. I swore never to spill our secrets. He just shook his head and said if I didn’t move the two men would have to pull me out. Slowly I climbed out of the car. One man took my right arm and the other took my left. Gently but firmly they led me towards the large white building. I turned and saw Giorgio smoothing his hair as he slid calmly into the motor car.
“I didn’t do it!” I shouted. But he didn’t look back and I heard the wheels of the Buick crunching over the gravel as they drove slowly, inexorably, away.
* * *
For a week I lay in bed or walked the dank dripping grounds of the Maison de Santé. I thought of Beckett’s hands, his fingers like twigs, thin and ridged at the knuckles, the veins that stood up like twisting tree roots. And when I managed to put Beckett’s hands to one side, I thought of Alex Ponisovsky. Alex wrote to me every day, hoping I was feeling better, hoping I was resting. And saying how much he wanted to see me and hold me and kiss me again.
And all the time something dug and trowelled in my stomach, as though another person was growing inside me – such an angry person, a beast, a monster, pawing and gnawing at me, full of rage and fury.
And when the beast retreated to its cage and I had her firmly chained to the bars, I wrote to Babbo.
Dear Babbo
Please come and collect me. I’m fully rested now and I want to apologise to everyone. And I want to see Giorgio and Helen’s new baby.
I’m very sorry, Babbo, but I won’t be coming back to live with you and Mama in Passy. It’s too cramped and dingy and I
need to live away from you. I know this will be hard for you and Mama but it’s something I have to do. Perhaps I could live with Mr and Mrs Leon for a bit until I’ve found my own apartment? I want to choose my own clothes and my own furnishings. I’ll be twenty-five in July and, as you know, I am determined to be married by then!
Anyway, you chuckle all night as you work on your book and it keeps me awake. I know you’ll agree how important rest is for my health now.
Come and collect me as soon as you can.
Your own bella bambina
Lucia
21
March 1932
Paris
So. I was to be married to Alex Ponisovsky. Exiled Russian Jew. Brother-in-law of Babbo’s slave, Paul Leon. Lucie Leon’s brother. Babbo’s Russian teacher for several years at Robiac Square. Degree in economics from the University of Cambridge. Safe, secure job at the Banque Franco-Americaine. Charming. Kind. Clever. Quite possibly the nicest man in Paris. Very good friend of Giorgio and Helen. Friend and relative of Peggy Guggenheim. Oh – and Hazel Guggenheim.
It was all arranged. I was to have a dowry. Our engagement party was to be at Restaurant Drouant in the Place Gaillon. Everyone approved. Well, perhaps not quite everyone. My mother liked him and thought I’d finally found a man worthy of me. Babbo liked him. The many Flatterers were happy that my little ‘crise de nerfs’ was over, happy that now I could be married off, leaving Babbo to finish his masterpiece undisturbed. Helen was thrilled and sent me a congratulatory telegram from the South of France where she, Giorgio and their new baby were holidaying.
Only one person was disapproving. When Babbo telegraphed Giorgio and Helen to tell them the news, Giorgio took the first train to Paris and went straight to the little apartment in Passy where he berated Babbo. Later my mother told me that Giorgio had said I shouldn’t be allowed to marry Alex, that I should be kept under lock and key with all the other lunatics of Paris.
* * *
When Kitten told me Sandy Calder was back in Paris, that he was living in his old studio with his new wife, I sat perfectly calmly on Mrs Leon’s perfectly upholstered sofa. No chairs were thrown, no signs of madness or anger displayed. Instead, I looked at Kitten, my hands curled serenely in my lap.
“Is she wearing my earrings and my brooch?”
“Well, it’s possible I suppose. I haven’t seen her personally.” Kitten frowned and turned her head away.
“I shall pray I don’t run into him.” I didn’t tell Kitten I was now going to church, slipping through the huge carved doors under the cover of darkness, kneeling on the stone floor, praying for the beast within me – praying for her execution, her termination, however bloody that might be.
“At least you have Alex now. He seems marvellous in every way.”
“Yes, thank goodness I have Alex.”
“And once you’re married you’ll feel more yourself.”
“Myself?” I frowned, unsure who ‘myself’ was now. And I felt the she-beast twinge and shift, as if rousing herself again, shaking off her lethargy, protesting at my uncertainty.
“You’ll be Mrs Ponisovsky,” said Kitten brightly. “And perhaps we can dance again.”
“Dance again?” I echoed. But as Kitten’s words settled inside me, a feeling of lightness entered my body. My blood, so thick and heavy, seemed to turn to air. “You mean set up our dance school?”
“Why not? We’ll both feel more settled when we’re married. And there’ll be some time before babies come along.”
“Yes,” I cried. “Yes!” And as I reached out for Kitten’s hands, as I gripped them between mine, I felt the she-beast crawl back to her cage, routed and sullen.
“Once our weddings are over, we should put together a plan. Can you remember all those Margaret Morris sequences? Some of them were terribly complicated. And Monsieur Borlin’s routines. Wasn’t he funny!”
I leapt up and lifted myself onto the balls of my feet. Could I remember? Could I really dance again? I began to spin in slow deliberate circles, back arched, arms outstretched, just as Babbo liked me. And the stiffness slipped from my limbs and the hardened marrow of my bones seemed to melt away.
“You still move so beautifully, Lucia.” Kitten fingered the ends of her hair and gazed appreciatively at me. “Promise you won’t stop dancing again?”
“I promise.” And I spoke so loudly I drowned out the soft snarling of the she-beast. I lengthened my neck, raised my arms above my head, splayed my fingers and slid out my right leg. Why shouldn’t I dance again? Yes, once I’d left home I would dance again!
* * *
A week later, I sat in Restaurant Drouant opposite Babbo and Paul Leon, their faces ruddy with wine. Everyone was there. Everyone except Kitten who was ill. Oh – and Giorgio. Everyone was drinking champagne, eating Russian caviar on blinis with sour cream, toasting my engagement to Alex. The waiters brought bottle after bottle and plate after plate. Babbo’s face grew more and more flushed. Thank goodness he’d made his short speech early on! Mr Leon was telling bad jokes and Babbo was humming an Irish ballad in an increasingly loud voice.
I felt ostracised from Alex who’d spent most of the evening at the other end of the table, corralled by my mother and Lucie Leon. What were they saying to him, I wondered. I took the opportunity to examine Alex. Again. His thick dark hair, soft and mossy. His face, as round and soft as a peach. His eyes, the colour of burnt umber, brown and flecked, open and guileless. Quite unlike Beckett’s craggy features, I thought. And when the image of Beckett floated freely before my eyes, and my pulse quickened, I felt a lurch of guilt. I hadn’t been completely open with Alex. My own deceit was weighing down on me like water, forcing the air out of my lungs, making my breath come in short sharp bursts. But when I cast Beckett away, when I pushed him back into the little box where he belonged, I looked again at Alex’s open and guileless eyes – and I knew that he too was hiding something, that he too hadn’t been completely open with me. Alex looked up, caught my eye and gave me a little fluttering wave. I waved back with a bright sculpted smile. My husband-to-be.
* * *
It was agreed. Alex would walk me back to the Leons’ apartment after the party. I dawdled, letting Mr and Mrs Leon go ahead. When they were out of earshot I asked Alex why exactly he’d proposed to me. He said he proposed because he wanted me to be his wife, of course. I asked him to tell me the truth. I asked him whose idea it was. I asked him who encouraged it. And why he’d proposed now, and not before.
Alex was silent for a moment. I felt his arm stiffen beneath my hand. And then he told me that Paul Leon suggested it, that Paul and Lucie Leon told him he had to propose. They told him I wasn’t a ‘bohemian-American-in-Paris’ type but a well-raised, bourgeois girl from a family with traditional Irish values. The sort of family that expected a man who’d walked out with their daughter to propose marriage. They told him I wasn’t the sort of girl whose affections could be toyed with and that he owed me a proposal of marriage after what had passed between us.
When I asked him if he loved me, Alex said of course he loved me. He stooped to kiss my cheek. I didn’t ask if he was in love with me. Nor did I tell him that my heart still belonged to Beckett.
* * *
After Alex and I had kissed goodnight, I climbed the stairs to the Leons’ apartment. Paul Leon had gone to bed. “Too much to drink,” said Lucie crisply. I walked to the couch and dropped onto it, tired and confused. Alex’s words were ricocheting round inside my head, pounding at my skull. I closed my eyes and tried to concentrate on my breathing. But instead of the customary respite, I felt myself falling, falling into blackness. I tried to lift my leg, but I couldn’t. I tried to move my fingers, but they wouldn’t obey my brain’s instruction. I tried to turn my head, but nothing happened. I couldn’t move.
Lucie came towards me and I heard her offer me a cup of tea. I tried to open my mouth but my lips stayed glued together. I stared blankly at her. Not one muscle in my face moved. I saw Lucie looking at me
anxiously, her brow deeply creased, her eyebrows drawn tightly together. Still I couldn’t respond. I felt the stiffness of my face, like an alabaster mask. I felt my eyes, wide and unblinking. I heard my breath escaping in short gusts. Lucie came with blankets and a quilt. She wrapped them round me and tucked them in so that I lay there like a swaddled baby.
I waited, expecting to feel fear or panic. Would I move again? Would I dance again? Would I speak again? These questions drifted through my woolly mind. But when I couldn’t answer them I felt nothing – just numb. It was as though a sleeping gas had leaked into the room, stolen inside my flesh, my bones, my brain. I felt only emptiness and a peculiar sense of peace.
For four days I lay on the Leons’ couch. I didn’t move or speak or eat. Lucie gave me water through a straw and listened to my heart beat, being very careful not to touch my skin or get too near my breath. Babbo came and sang to me. Helen brought the baby to make me laugh. Kitten arrived with chocolates. Alex came with jonquils, his eyes brimming with alarm. I could just make out their dim and ragged outlines, as though they were on the other side of a thick gauze curtain. Their voices came to me as though they were speaking down an elevator shaft.
