“Why do you care so much?”
That question again.
They were at the Brown’s Hotel, in the lobby with a glass of champagne each.
“This was where the first telephone call was made in London,” Audrey said as she took a sip. “Alexander Graham Bell himself called the owner of the hotel.”
Audrey had thought Miriam needed to get away. She’d told her she needed Miriam’s help as a ruse to have her join her for the lecture she would later give.
But somehow it became Audrey who needed to get away, who needed to confide in someone. The war pressing at them, and all the truths of their lives were bubbling to the surface.
Why do you care so much?
“I was not the daughter my parents had hoped for,” Audrey said. “First of all, I was not a son for my father, and I was too curious, too vocal for my mother. It’s not right to have so many opinions, my mother would warn. But what was I to do with these thoughts? I would speak aloud in my room, knowing that no one could hear me, and it was a release, a kind of purging of the thoughts that swirled in my head like bees trying to escape. I was angry back then, always battling against those around me, both in the way I challenged and provoked and the way my body existed in the world, as if my arms and legs could not be controlled, leaving a trail of bumps and clatters as I made my way through rooms. I could not see their way of thinking, their way of living, the way they scolded the servants, were obsessed with the small matter of whether my hat was properly worn. Slapdash. That’s what my mother would have called my appearance if she had not intervened. I was her work, and hard it was.”
“Slapdash is hardly a word I’d use on you,” Miriam said. She had held the champagne glass with the pads of her fingers of both hands on the bowl for her first sip, then watched how Audrey held it in one, at the stem.
“My mother saw hope in Robert, and it seemed for the first time our thoughts were in alignment. There was nothing to discuss, but she stayed in the shadows, in case I missed my cue. To say that she was horrified when she learned of the pregnancy, and then later of the abandonment, is a gross understatement. That day I remember well. Her face like alabaster, I thought she would faint.”
“And Robert? Where did he go?”
“To France, then Germany. Funny, I wondered if I’d see him once I left for the war. But there were only trails that quickly went cold. Not that I was looking.”
“And your mother?”
“She was well trained in dealing with what she regarded as my calamitous life, so I was sent to France in the care of my older cousin Margaret, where several months later my son was born and given to a local family.”
“Your son.”
“For just a few moments.”
“Oh.” Miriam placed her glass on the table. “I’m sorry.”
The lobby was emptying out now, the soft swish of the swinging door an occasional reminder of where they were.
“Your son, did you ever hear about him after that?”
“What none of them knew, in fact, never came to know, was that in that terrible time of the birth, when they were in the process of giving my baby away, I had the presence of mind to look at the papers where the names of the parents were written, as well as the village where they lived. It took me years to go back and look for them. The war was over, and I told myself this was a holiday, since I didn’t quite know what I would do when I got there. Oh, I had fantasies of sneaking up and snatching him away, my French was good enough to communicate that I was his mother, that I would take care of him. But really it was my curiosity that had taken me there, not the deep yearning that loss brings. I wanted to see this child to see if there was anything of me in him, anything of Robert. The village was two hours from Paris by train, and the heat that July was oppressive. I watched the French countryside go by, and my handkerchief was damp from dabbing my face, a thunderstorm threatening the entire way. I ran to the hotel next to the station, barely missing the cloudburst that sent a wave of water through the streets. Mud, grit, and water washing the cobblestones as I sat with my tea waiting to go out.
“The barmaid was an older woman, so I thought to ask directions to the house of the family whose name I’d written on a slip of paper. Her puzzled look made me print the name again for clarity.
“Ils sont morts.”
Miriam’s hand shot to her chest. “Oh, Audrey.”
“Because I was unable to speak, she repeated it, this time more slowly, thinking I hadn’t understood. ‘Et le garçon?’ I asked her, to which she nodded. A tragedy. A year earlier, a fire in the chimney of the house next door dropped cinders on their roof. They died in their sleep.
“The woman offered to take me to their graves, though perplexed why this English woman was so interested in this family. But I was unable to move, and so she fed me, gave me absinthe, arranged to have my bag taken to the station for the next train. Her kindness remains with me still.”
Miriam reached out toward Audrey, placed her hand on her arm. “I’m sorry.”
“It was as though all the stories of my life ended that day, all the tributaries of people, experiences, my whole history, it all flowed away. When the war started I signed up as an ambulance driver. Having left myself behind, I needed to rush headlong into the tragedy of others.”
Once Audrey had started to tell Miriam about her past it was as though she needed to hear the details of it herself so she could understand the enormity of it—those events that began with what she thought was love.
“Why do I care?” Audrey said. “I have no idea.”