The Age Of Desire: A Novel Part 3

"Oh, no, Mr. Wharton. I couldn't. I don't drink. . . . I just came to see if there was anything I could do for you."

"Cagey girl! I've seen you drink wine at dinner. I've a nice cabernet here." He got up from his chair and, before she could protest, drew a gla.s.s down from the shelf and poured it nearly full.

"Sit. Right. Down. There." His eyes were sparkling. She felt a little foolish, but she sat in the chair offered and took the too-full gla.s.s of black-red wine by its delicate, glistening stem.

"Go on, then. Drink your medicine, young lady," he said. She thought it amusing that he called her young lady since he was a few months younger than she. The first taste of the wine did remind her of the licorice-flavored tincture her aunt used to give her for constipation. The second swallow blossomed with ripe fruit.

"Well, this is much better than being alone," Teddy said. "Two lost children huddling together in the woods." He smiled, his walrus mustache spreading like a golden fan. "And how is little Anna?" he asked. "Is the missus working you to the bone?"

"Oh no. Mrs. Wharton is always very considerate of me."

"As she should be. You run this household. You do everything and ask for nothing."

"Catherine Gross runs the household," Anna said soberly.

"In theory. But if we asked Edith to choose just one of you to throw out on the street . . . I highly doubt you'd find yourself staring at pavement."

Anna felt herself blus.h.i.+ng and could not meet his eyes. "That's a terrible thing to say, Mr. Wharton. Mrs. Wharton would never throw either of us out on the street. Besides, not a thing would happen in this house without Catherine Gross."

He laughed. She watched him take a deep draught of his brandy. He held the gla.s.s up to the light as though trying to see through it. "Did you never want to marry?" he asked.

"There was . . . no opportunity."

"But you're a beautiful woman."

"Oh . . ." She bit her lip, shook her head vehemently. "I'm not."

"I've always thought so. I don't understand why you hide your light." She looked over at him. His blue eyes seemed a little queer. He'd been drinking too much. From where she sat she could smell the syrupy aroma of his brandy.

"My light?" She barely got the words out.

"You wear your hair like that, so tight, and your clothing is so . . . forgive me . . . drab."

"Mr. Wharton." She felt ashamed to hear him say this. Anna didn't want to stand out. When her aunt died, it was a relief to know she could blend into any household. She was sensible. She was smart. And she didn't need attention. She was an orphan who rarely got much attention at home, and she didn't mind, really . . . but to hear Teddy Wharton tell her that it was so obvious she was hiding herself, it mortified her.

"Maybe I should go."

"Oh don't, Anna. Don't go. I didn't mean to hurt your feelings. Please."

"I just came to see if I could do anything for you."

"You want to do something for me? You can keep me company. I find you very restful," he said.

She stayed dutifully in her chair. She was afraid to drink more wine. He thought her beautiful. She could hardly contain this thrilling, foreign news.

"Do you think me a fool?" he asked suddenly.

She looked up, startled. "Oh certainly not, sir."

"Edith does. She thinks I'm a buffoon. I don't know why she married me. She thinks I'm a dunce. I see it in her eyes ten times a day. But I married her precisely because she is smarter than me. I'm not afraid of a woman being smarter. I think that makes me quite wise, don't you?"

Anna felt breathless.

"I don't think Mrs. Wharton thinks of you as . . ."

"Yes, you do."

"Any woman would be happy to have you as her husband," Anna said suddenly. She felt her chin quivering.

"Would you have been happy to have me as your husband, Anna?"

Anna wanted to speak. But what were the right words? He was staring right at her.

"You won't answer?"

"I would have been so proud to call you my husband," Anna blurted out. The words burned like coals on her tongue. They were a betrayal of Edith. She felt trapped and mortified. She rose suddenly.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I'm so sorry, Mr. Wharton," She darted for the door. Her heart was thrumming up against her throat. She expected him to stop her. She waited for the feel of his hand on her wrist. Words of appeas.e.m.e.nt or praise or command. But nothing happened. The soles of her shoes slapped the floor as she ran down the hall. She took the steps two at a time to her room. She could never take back her words. Now he knew how she felt about him. Now he would always know.

The next morning, he called for her to come to his study. She'd barely slept all night. She would have to leave, she knew. She would have to find a new post after all these years. Would she have to be a governess again? Would she find someone to whom she could be a secretary? Would Edith even write a letter to recommend her? How could she explain to Edith why she needed to leave?

Teddy sat at his desk, penning a letter.

"Sit down," he said.

"Yes, sir." She was quaking. She wondered if he could see it.

"Last night I said some things I wish I hadn't said. Would you be kind enough to pretend I didn't say them, dear Anna? Would you erase last night's conversation, so we can be good friends again?"

She was silent. He smiled at her. It was the kindest smile she'd ever seen.

"I'm sure I offended you, and I'm sorry, Anna. You're a proud woman. I recognize how you must have felt. Please forgive me."

"Of course," she said.

"I have something for you," he said.

"Some work?" she asked.

He laughed. "No. Not work." He opened up his desk drawer and drew out a velvet box and set it before her on the desk.

"What is it?"

"Open it," he said impatiently.

Even the luminous blue velvet of the box was magnificent. She picked it up gingerly and unlatched the tiny case. Nestled against white satin was a beautiful gold locket on a thick chain adorned with a white enameled dove holding a letter in its beak. The letter was sealed with a tiny perfect ruby. Anna gasped.

"Mr. Wharton, I couldn't take this."

"Why not?"

"Surely it was meant for Mrs. Wharton."

"I think it suits you. Please understand, this is a gift to say I'm sorry. That's all."

A bribe. The gift was a bribe. It couldn't be a love token. . . .

"I don't think I could . . . take it."

"Of course you can. If you don't, my feelings will be hurt. Plain and simple. You type Puss's letters every day and make our lives so pleasant with your quiet and constant companions.h.i.+p. It's just a gift of friends.h.i.+p."

He got up and came around the desk. Taking the box from her, he opened it, released the pendant, worked its clasp and hung it around Anna's neck. She felt the weight of the heavy, twisted chain, the cool solidity of the pendant even through her dress. She touched it with her hand. She had never owned anything so valuable.

"That's a good girl," he said. He handed her the box. "Now, not another word about it. All right? Go see to closing up this house." He turned back to his desk with a grin. "There's so much to do and hardly any time."

"Thank you," she whispered.

Since that morning in his study, when his kind fingers brushed her neck as they fastened the heavy clasp, not a day has pa.s.sed that Anna Bahlmann hasn't worn that beautiful pendant beneath her clothes. She hasn't slept a single night without its comforting weight nestled between her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. It's grown as smooth as a river stone, stays as warm as her heart that beats against it. So many years have pa.s.sed, the pendant no longer makes her feel miserable or embarra.s.sed or ashamed. It makes her feel beloved. And sometimes when she sees Teddy Wharton smile at her at dinner or in the hallway, she knows that all these years later, he remembers that they share a secret.

THREE.

EARLY SPRING 1907.

Delighted by an invitation from Anna de Noailles for tea, Edith rings the bell and a gypsy-eyed bonne ushers her into an entrance hall draped in striped silk like a Bedouin tent and redolent of cinnamon. Edith feels as though she's visiting another country. The neighborhood is nothing like the Faubourg. No musty eighteenth-century courtyards or high, forbidding walls (which she, in truth, has cherished). Just a sunny front stoop and window boxes adorned for the winter with fir boughs.

She follows the bonne into a drawing room where a roaring fire licks the walls of a seven-foot fireplace. Anna de Noailles leans over her desk, pen in hand. Wrapped in a turquoise silk shawl, displaying bare feet, she seems completely unaware that anyone has joined her.

"Madame," the bonne says after a moment.

The Comtesse looks up with a start.

"I've interrupted your writing. I'm sorry," Edith offers.

"Don't be silly." She stretches like a cat. "I invited you to interrupt me. Come sit down, Madame Wharton."

The rumpled sofa is dressed in the same Caribbean turquoise as the Comtesse's shawl, and is strewn with pillows of brilliant yellow. Like fields of Maine sunflowers opening to summer skies, Edith thinks. The lacquered coffee-bean-colored walls reflect the flicker from the hearth. It's a dazzling room. Edith could live here, she thinks-though it is nothing like any place she's ever inhabited. The Comtesse slinks over to the sofa. Her feet are brown and sinewy, as glossy as polished bronze. Edith doesn't think she's ever been greeted by bare feet before. As a matter of fact, she's seen few unshod feet in her entire life. She never once saw her own mother's. There is something louche about bare feet-and thrilling.

"Since last we met, I finished reading Les eblouiss.e.m.e.nts and was enchanted," Edith announces. She feels pa.s.sionate about de Noailles's poetry. She is galvanized by her ability to marry nature with sensuality. The simple, organic poems remind her again and again of Walt Whitman, whom she desperately admires. "Were you writing poetry just now?" Edith asks.

"I couldn't write a thing today," de Noailles says. "Do you have days where no words will come when you beckon them?" She stares directly into Edith's eyes. "One's heart is a shepherd. If only the words would follow like a docile flock. Too often they wander off on their own and we spend days looking for them."

Edith laughs, and can't help feeling that though Anna de Noailles is much younger, she is the wiser.

"Are you living in Paris now?" de Noailles asks.

"Just until the end of spring."

"And then, New York?"

"And then we go to our country place in Ma.s.sachusetts, not far from New York."

"And what do you think of Paris?"

"I feel at home here. I spent a lot of time in Paris as a child."

"I could live nowhere else," de Noailles says. "But the French are a locked house. I was born in France, yet my father was a Romanian, my mother Greek. They think me a foreigner so I'll never be invited inside."

"And if they don't accept you, Comtesse, it's certain I won't be allowed beyond the front gate," Edith says.

"And yet Paris is the center of the world, non?"

The bonne reenters the room balancing a heavy silver tray. Plates of sweets accompany the service: pet.i.ts fours and biscuits with jammy centers. De Noailles poses high her birdlike wrists to pour the tea. Falling from so far above, it sings a melody into the cups.

"Since Rosa's, I've spoken often of your book," de Noailles says. "I was surprised how many people have already read it. You should hear what they say! I'm angry at myself for not knowing English better."

"It won't be long until the French translation is done."

"And where will it appear?"

"Perhaps the Revue de Paris, if they are willing to publish it."

"They published my first poems. I was just a girl. But it seems they publish little by women these days."

Edith takes a sip of tea, which seems particularly strong and fortifying. "Does anyone publish much by women?"

De Noailles shrugs and nibbles at the edge of a pet.i.t four. "There are so few of us who write, Madame Wharton. Or perhaps many women write-but only a few put their work up for public inspection. Are you mostly read by men or women?"

"I don't know."

"I'd wager women. Women read with their hearts. They're more eager to journey on words, because their lives are narrower."

"I never thought it mattered," Edith says. "As long as people were reading my books." But as Edith ponders it, in fact she has been most pleased when men think her worth reading. She feels herself redden with guilt.

Anna de Noailles glances up.

"Men validate us, don't they?" she says, as though Edith had spoken her thoughts aloud.

Edith nods.

"Ah," de Noailles says. "We are traitors." And then she laughs. Her laugh is free and young and full of hope.