RUBY
September 1941
He swore he’d arrive in time for the Costume Ball, but by four o’clock it was clear that Daddy was a no-show and Mother would have to play Miner ’49er on her own.
Long after the party began, Ruby sat moping on the bench outside the Yacht Club, swathed as she was in iridescent green fabric, a makeshift torch on her lap. She, the Statue of Liberty, or the saddest monument there ever was, according to Sam. He was somewhere in the ballroom, done up as Ben Franklin, kite and all. He looked swell but Ruby didn’t give a fig about any of it.
She detested the rub of her own crummy attitude, it was like sand in a bathing costume but, dagnabbit, Ruby couldn’t shake it away. Everything was going to seed, with her family and in the world. How were they supposed to close up Cliff House now? Shuttering the home at summer’s end was like the bow atop a present to be opened later. Well, this present was a doggone mess and Ruby didn’t even understand why.
“Ya searchin’ for the woebegone dame?” she heard a voice say, one of the valets’. “She’s on that bench.”
Sure as sugar, he was talking about her. Ruby looked up to see her mother beating a hot path in her direction.
“Ruby Genevieve, enough with the sourpuss act. You get your fanny in there!”
Mother clomped up and whacked her mining pan against the very bench on which Ruby sat.
“You’ve got to show your face eventually,” Mother said. “They’re playing “The Star-Spangled Banner” and the entire orchestra is dressed in doughboy uniforms. Come on, love.” Her voice softened. “All the good stuff is happening inside.”
Ruby didn’t respond and clamped both arms tighter around her belly. The Liberty getup was already hitting the skids. If Ruby wasn’t careful, people would think she’d come dressed as the inside of a garbage can.
“Ruby?” her mom pressed. “What is it? Tell me.”
“It’s nothing, Mother. I just want to be alone.”
“Are you … hormonal?”
“No!” Ruby said, and narrowed her eyes. “I’m not pregnant, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Then what…”
“I keep thinking he’s going to come,” she blurted. “He promised that he would.” Ruby let out a shaky sigh. “It’s the first time Daddy’s ever gone back on his word.”
“Oh, sweetheart,” Mother said with a deep, gut-filling exhale. She sat beside her girl. “You can’t be mad at your father. He’d give anything to be here.”
“I’m not mad. I’m … worried.”
“Aw, honey.” Mother looped an arm around Ruby’s shoulders. “You can’t fret about your dad. He’d hate it. The man works hard to give you a life where worries are never had.”
“Is he sick?” Ruby turned to face her. “Is there something wrong with Daddy? Because Topper says…”
Mother looked down at her hands.
“So he was right.” Ruby let out a small gasp. “Topper says he hasn’t been out because he’s ill.”
“He’s been out some?”
“Three lousy days at Cliff House. Three! And he only spent one night.”
“Oh, petal.”
Ruby made a face. “Petal.” The nickname was Daddy’s, and his alone. Mother never used it and she wasn’t one for nicknames. Already she seemed to be trying to patch some kind of hole.
“He’s not been in top health,” Mother said. “You’ve heard that nasty cough of his. The dang thing won’t go away.”
“It won’t go away?” Ruby said, wide-eyed and gawping.
“That’s not what I meant! He’ll be fine! Your daddy is fine. He merely needed to be closer to his doctor these past weeks and didn’t want to hassle with all the to-and-fro. Daddy will be right as rain by autumn!”
But autumn was just around the corner. What, exactly, was going to happen to make him “right as rain” in such a short time?
“That husband of yours has the lungs of a millworker,” Ruby overheard Dr. Macy tell her mother over a hand of bridge one afternoon. “The old so-and-so hacks away like he works the factory lines himself.”
It was meant to be a joke, but working the lines was exactly what Daddy did. He got down there, elbow-to-elbow, with all manner of immigrants and indigents, laboring among the grit and grime and Lord-knows. Whenever Ruby found a ball on the course she stopped to contemplate whether Daddy had touched it with his own two hands. That is, when he still made golf balls.
“How can he improve by autumn?” Ruby asked. “Summer ends in two days.”
“Huh.” Mother looked pensive. “I suppose it does. I don’t know, Ruby. I can only tell you what I’ve heard. Your father is seeing his doctor, and working less, and forcing himself to rest, all things that go against his very nature. But he is determined and if Philip Young tells me that his cough will disappear, by Jove, I believe him.”
Ruby nodded, unable to speak. Blasted doctors. Why couldn’t they prescribe a good dose of sea air? It was said to cure anything from melancholia to tuberculosis. Surely it could remedy Daddy’s run-of-the-mill (har, har) cough.
“I don’t understand—” Ruby started, but was interrupted by a sudden flurry of spunk and costuming pouring out through the double doors.
“All right! Listen here, cookies!”
Hattie led the charge, with Topper, Sam, Mary, and P.J. trailing behind. Hattie was dressed as a cowgirl—a Fifth Avenue cowgirl, that is—with her mink bolero and calfskin heels. Topper was her Indian, eager to show off his “peace pipe” to anyone who cared.
“Well, lookee here,” Mother said with a titter. “A welcoming party right out of Americana! I hope you aren’t representing the Donner Party.”
“No ma’am!” Hattie trilled. “Just a cowgirl and her band of assorted misfits, all of us intent on dragging ol’ Lady Liberty onto the dance floor. You don’t want Ben Franklin wandering off with some other dame, do ya?”
“I’d never!” Sam said. “Everyone knows Ben is a most loyal guy.”
Ruby smiled weakly at her husband and then looked at Hattie.
“I’m not in the mood for dancing,” she said.
“What kind of dingy excuse is that?” Hattie asked in a manufactured huff. “Listen here. You’d best get in the mood. You’re not going to pout all night and be crowned the dullest girl at the ball. I simply won’t allow it! It’s the last party of the season.”
“Actually there’s the oyster party tomorrow night,” Mary said. “At Cliff House. So not the last party, factually speaking.”
“Okay, Mary Todd.”
P.J. and Mary were dressed as the Lincolns, the joke being that they should’ve swapped roles. Mary was a dead ringer for Abe himself.
“I stand corrected.” Hattie rolled her eyes. “It’s the last dance of the season. Come on, you fuddy-duddy.”
She reached a hand toward Ruby.
“Up!” she said. “Up and at ’em! You can’t be this gorgeous and hide outside all night. Hip hop! To your feet! Get that hiney on the dance floor!”
Hattie snapped three times in rapid succession as Ruby continued to eye her outstretched hand. Things had been stiff between them, at least on Ruby’s side, after what occurred in the pantry. Ruby recognized her own prudishness. She might have been a virgin on her wedding night, but there’d been stories aplenty at Smith. Nonetheless, the wad of revulsion lodged in her belly was difficult to pass. Yet as Ruby looked at her pal’s hand, her reserve began to crackle like ice in the sun. Damn that Hattie, she could charm the gloom out of a ghoul.
“Let’s go, my friend,” Hattie said. “Chop-chop.”
“Come on, baby,” Sam said. “Where’s that happy girl of mine?”
“I’ll let you try my peace pipe,” Topper offered.
At last Ruby smiled.
“A peace pipe?” she said, and stood. “An interesting accessory for someone so jazzed about the war.”
The uncertainty and agitation began to lift from Ruby’s body, like the fog off the ocean at midday. And just in the nick of time.
The summer was over and, according to Topper and Sam and the president of the USA, a war was imminent. Daddy was probably sicker than Mother let on and Topper and Hattie were … they were something. But Ruby couldn’t let the summer end like this. Sconset had her heart and she needed to leave a piece of it there, a bookmark to hold her place until they returned.
“All right, people,” she said. “Let’s head inside. And I’ll show you how the jitterbug is really done.”
* * *
Just like that it was over.
The last drink was poured, the final cigarette ground out and left smoldering on the flagstone. The oysters had been scraped out, the shells hauled off. All that remained was a fishy scent in the air and Ruby on a chaise, blue polka-dotted frock fanned out around her.
As the caterer’s van rumbled away, Ruby drained the last of her champagne and sighed. Soon she’d be back in her bedroom, in the tall brownstone near the river on Commonwealth Ave. A hundred miles away—no greater distance than the world. Ruby always felt at odds those first weeks back, even though Boston was her home and a few doors down Mother would be keeping house at number twenty-five, same as forever.
Yet the early days fit awkwardly, like a dress in the wrong size. Ruby would catch glimpses of herself in a mirror and marvel at her hair, shades blonder, and her legs, longer and leaner and tan. Even her eyes seemed to have an extra kick to their green. But by September’s end, she’d fade back to her dishwater self. Everything would fit again.
Sam would do what he had all summer—it didn’t change much for the men. He’d rise for work every Monday at six o’clock sharp, then toil away for the week, the chief difference between the seasons being where he dined and drank on weekends. Meanwhile, without Mother and Hattie and tennis and Cliff House itself, Ruby would need to drum up a scheme or two to fill her days. More war work, she thought with a frown. God bless it, she still wasn’t sure about FDR and his big plans.
“Hey there, Ruby Red,” Topper said as he tromped out onto the veranda. His shirt was untucked, his hair a sprawl.
“What’s shaking?” he asked, and took a seat beside her.
“Nothing much. Just enjoying the last moments of this.”
Ruby gestured toward the lawn, to where Miss Mayhew was trying to unstring lights from the trees. The woman cursed as she made it into a worse jumble.
“The ending is always bittersweet,” Topper said. “But we had a helluva summer.”
Did they? It was hard to tell, and so Ruby nodded as she gazed out toward the ocean. By October the grounds at Cliff House would turn gray and cold. Mother’s flowers would shrivel as bayberries overtook the dunes below.
“We’re lucky,” Topper said, his eyes following hers. “To have this place to come back to.”
“I don’t want to hear nostalgia from you, Robert Appleton Young. It’s going to set me in a foul mood. You’re supposed to be merrier than that.”
“Sorry, old gal,” he said. “I’ll slip back into my Topper duds by the end of the day. Just for you.”
Ruby bobbed her head. They were quiet for several minutes, the wind whisking around them. As she stretched a shawl tighter around her shoulders, Ruby turned back toward her brother.
“Do you think you’ll keep up with Hattie?” she asked. “After we all leave?”
“Aw, Red, not this old song. I know you envision yourself a merry matchmaker but things don’t always line up as you’d please.”
“I understand, okay? That’s not what I’m asking.”
Ruby paused.
What, exactly, was she asking? What was it Ruby wanted to know? That there was something between Hattie and Topper? That what she witnessed was more than two animals clawing at each other in sweaty, needful desperation? You didn’t do that sort of thing for the heck of it. Or maybe you did. What did Ruby know about it, really? Perhaps European cupboards were positively packed with people doing exactly that. If so, Hitler was in for it should his aspirations pan out. An entire continent of people blind from the clap.
“You didn’t answer my question,” Ruby said at last. “Will you keep in touch?”
“‘Keep in touch’?”
“Surely you’re going to maintain some sort of … correspondence.”
“Golly, dunno. Haven’t really noodled on it,” he said with his telltale Topper squint. “It’s hard to say. Hattie’s a swell gal, no matter what, and I’m grateful to have gotten to know her.”
“I’ll bet,” Ruby mumbled.
“Of course you’re the main thing we have in common.” Topper gave his sister a nudge. “So without you around, who knows?”
“Without me around, who knows indeed.”
“You know, we were sniggering the other day,” he said. “About how much you want us to be married to each other, when we don’t want that at all.”
“I don’t find that notably hilarious. You two make a fine couple and it’s not like you haven’t had plenty of time together … alone … without me. Don’t tell me it hasn’t been fun because I’m not buying it.”
“Hattie’s a blast, you know that,” he said.
“I don’t get it, then. She’s the perfect woman!”
“Aw, hell, Red. Hattie’s fab, but…”
“Is it…” Ruby stuttered. She gave him a hard stare. “Is it because she’s … fast?”
Topper gave an uneasy laugh.
“I don’t know if ‘fast’ is the word,” he said.
“Did she give it up too easily? Is that the problem?”
“Good Lord, who said anything about ‘giving it up’?” Topper’s bluebell gaze suddenly went dark. “Not that it’d be any of your business if she had. Listen, Red. Fast or not, Hattie is a helluva gal but she’s a different breed from you. Not bad, not good, just different. And different is all right to be. Don’t let anyone claim otherwise.”
Topper stood.
“I’m not sure what she told you,” he said. “About us or me or anyone else. But the same prescription doesn’t apply to everyone. Don’t go judging her or anyone else too hastily.”
“I’m not judging,” Ruby said, though promptly realized that’s exactly what she’d done. “Topper, are you mad? I didn’t mean to…”
“Mad? At you? Never! Now then, I’m about three and a quarter whiskies past my limit so I’d better get myself to bed to avoid passing out in some scurrilous place. Mother will never get over having to extract me from the privet hedge the summer before last.”
He bent down and kissed Ruby on the noggin.
“Go to sleep, kid. It’s going to be an early morning.”
Topper turned back toward the house.
As he went to open the door, Hattie materialized on the other side of the glass. She waved at the both of them.
“Speak of the devil,” Topper said over his shoulder.
After a sly wink, Topper opened the door with a flourish. He took an exaggerated bow, just as he had the night of the Independence Ball, when the girls were exhausted, sun-chapped, and reveling in their tennis tournament win.
“Mademoiselle,” he said. “We were just gabbing about you.”
“Rats! I missed the dirt.” Hattie pecked Topper on the cheek. “What’s wrong, leaving so soon?”
“I’m leaving one way or another,” he said. “Better to be deliberate about it. Night-o, dolls. Have the sweetest dreams.”
As the door clicked behind him, Hattie plunked down beside Ruby, in the exact spot Topper had been.
“Hiya Rubes,” she said. “What a shindig. Hard to believe the summer’s over.”
“Yup,” Ruby said.
“It’s been such a gas, Ruby. I’m so glad to have met ya. Who knew charity work could pay off like that? I was awfully skeptical about the whole Grey Ladies biz but it ended up being the best danged thing I could’ve done.”
“Oh, thanks,” Ruby mumbled, careful not to meet her friend’s eyes.
“Look, pumpkin.” Hattie placed a hand on Ruby’s knee. “I know you want more between your brother and me—the rings and the gown and the luncheon for hundreds. And, Lord, Topper’s a handsome guy who’s a kick and a half. I can see why you love him like you do. But it’s just not going to happen between or betwixt us.” Hattie shook her head. “Breaks my heart to think the poor sap’s gonna ship off soon. He’s too sweet a guy to fight, I’ll tell you what.”
“Then make him stay,” Ruby said, her voice coming out in a drawn-out whine. “He has nothing tethering him to the States. You be that person.”
“I can’t do much about the draft…”
“But he does defense work! He could drum up a reason to defer.”
“Babydoll.” Hattie squeezed Ruby’s leg. “I know you don’t want him to leave, and I understand entirely. But you can’t keep him here, and neither can I. I’m not what he wants.”
Not what he wants? He surely wanted her in the butler’s pantry, Ruby had to fight herself from saying.
“Golly, Rubes! Don’t look so glum. No hearts are broken, if that’s what you’re thinking. Topper and me, we’re working from the same page. We’ve had a grand time but here’s where it ends. Do you feel me?”
“I guess,” Ruby said with a grumble, though she didn’t “feel” her at all. “I thought I saw something more. Something different.”
“Yeah.” Hattie glowered. “I suppose you did.”
“So where will you go?” Ruby asked. “From here?”
“Now, that is a story. Tomorrow I’m bound for New York City. That’s right, your closest gal Hattie Rutter is going to be a true Manhattanite. Can you stand it?”
“You’re going to New York? How come you didn’t say anything?”
Hattie shrugged.
“Wasn’t sure I’d go,” she said. “But I was offered a position at a magazine in the city. Mademoiselle. You might have come across it.”
“Mademoiselle?!” Ruby said, exploding into a smile, letting genuine joy lift her onto her feet. “That’s amazing! The absolute tops!”
She smothered Hattie in a hug.
“Now, now, you don’t want to strangle me dead before I even start,” her friend said, laughing.
“Oh, Hattie, I’m so thrilled. And you’d better show me the city when I visit … once a month at least!”
“I’ll always have a spot for you.”
Just like that, any doubts Ruby had, any question as to Topper’s “we had a helluva summer” proclamation, these things rolled away like they’d never been there at all. What did she care about European liberties? Ruby wasn’t one to bother with others’ private matters. Live and let live, she believed. Ruby had a lifelong chum in Hattie, a sister of the mind. A good thing, what with all the brothers.
In the end, those waning summer of ’41 moments would be the last time Ruby and Hattie would speak face-to-face. By the next summer, Mr. Rutter would sell his island home and Hattie would morph into a New Yorker, exactly as promised.
Ruby followed her friend over the years as Hattie climbed the ranks, both professional and social. She’d see her, in a sense, years later and then not again for another twenty-five, when Ruby was in New York with her grown daughter. On that afternoon, she’d spot Hattie smack in the middle of the Rainbow Room. After catching her breath, Ruby would grab Cissy’s hand and haul her onto the street.
“Geez, Mom,” Cissy would gripe. “I’m getting awfully tired of being literally dragged all over this city. I don’t even like shopping. I’m hardly going to need miniskirts at business school.”
Ruby never explained herself. She never admitted that she’d seen an old friend, her best friend, from the last truly blissful summer at Cliff House. Cissy wouldn’t have understood Ruby’s reluctance to approach. Of course it wasn’t the person Ruby feared, but the conversation the two women might have about the decades that had passed.
They used to say that on Nantucket every house had its tragedy, most borne of the sea. It was a ghost story, a fable, a warning to Summer People that sunshine and parties and croquet on the lawn were not the natural ways of the land.
When Ruby was young, a local boy told her about the curse of the sea. Mother scoffed at the legend as she cuddled a sobbing, shaky daughter in her pink-walled room. Those stories were for the whalers, Sarah said, and the fishermen. Her daddy dealt in rubbers and plastics. There’d be no curse with them.
The sea carried with it many misfortunes, that much was true. But man himself caused a few tragedies as well. Yes, Topper, it was a helluva summer. The parties. The sunshine. The golf. All that, and the last days of peace.