This was where the smell had come from. The smell of stone being chipped into something else. There was a saddle blanket on a stone slab where Jack must have spent the night. I had known so many of my mother’s artists but I’d never known a sculptor. I stared at the immensity of things that were and weren’t.
“Tea?”
I swung around. And burned.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know if—”
“You knew,” Jack said, reaching past me to tug the curtain closed. “I saw you zigzagging outside.”
I didn’t bother trying. “I thought . . . I didn’t know. I thought you were a painter?”
“Try getting paints out in this hellscape. The sculpting passes time.”
“But everyone said . . .” I stumbled. He was standing close, and I had that feeling, or the knowledge, really, that the storm had stopped, so there wasn’t any reason for me to be there anymore. “Everyone said that you weren’t working.”
“Different kind of work.”
He turned, and I stole one more look through the curtain’s decorative holes.
“They’re so . . . beautiful,” I said, not knowing what I wanted to ask exactly. “Is it . . . very hard?”
“It is.” Jack busied himself at the woodstove, which was burning low because I hadn’t had the intelligence to stuff more wood inside. “It’s impossible. And therein lies the sense. Tea? Costs me a fortune to get tea here so let’s not drink too much.”
“Oh, no. I’m fine.”
“I’m joking. Sort of. One has to maintain some sense of decorum. I breakfast like a gentleman. I try.”
“I’m very sorry,” I said, turning toward his studio, “for where you had to sleep.”
“Don’t be. It allowed me to feel gallant. Let’s get the water going. So. You’ve seen my sculptures. Going to tell the others what I’m up to?”
“I won’t.” And of course, I meant it. I am good at holding lies.
“They’ll ask.”
“I’ll tell them what you’d like.”
“It’s not worth the bother,” he said after a silence. “It takes oxen to move them, and I’m not going through that again. They’ll live out their lives here, giant and unseen.” Jack laughed, pleased with his own words. “The most Dada work I’ve ever done.”
“I really think they’re beautiful.” This sounded foolish; it wasn’t all of what I felt. What I’d seen in Paris, in the cities, back at Occidente, it was all so loud and garish, it conjured only the horrid bits of life. But the smoothness of his sculptures, all circles, no hard corners, they stilled something inside of me. They were peaceful. I thought that they held joy.
“They’re pure,” I said, embarrassed by the simple word.
But he nodded. “That’s the goal I had in mind, so you have complimented me well.”
He poured tea into the same mugs from before. “I do think it’s better if you assure them I’m a cowhand.”
The mug burned against my palm now; the tin was far too hot.
He put it another way: “I work best when people think that I’m not working.”
“But may I come back?” I’d asked this before I’d even thought it. My face, as you can imagine, went immediately to red.
“My poor girl, what for?”
“To see what they become?”
This question did something to his face. I don’t know how to describe it. It was like when father would come downstairs in the stone house, having fixed something in his writing that he’d been twisted with for days. By the next day, it would be gone, but we could tell from his lighter weight on the stair steps, the shining in his eyes, that for a little while, everything would be radiant, and possible, and absolutely fine.
Favorite memories:
I’ve only seen a picture of it, but I am a small baby, and I am being held, and there is me and Papa and Stephan and Mumma laughing beautifully, and the house—there were so many—the house completely white.
Fun words:
la papelería: paper shop
la bufanda: scarf
Domingo—the same one
On our ride back to Occidente, the sky was blue, and except for the branches here and there across the pathway (several of which I jumped!), nature had put the storm behind her. The air smelled clean and fresh, not dank and hanging as it usually does. The world smelled quite alive.
Along the way, I indulged the sight that we would make, me and “Heinrich” Klinger trotting up the entrance path. Hetty would swoon, I knew it, and even Mumma would be impressed. She’d run for me, make a show about it, maybe even cry. I’d be held to various breasts and patted. Relief. Relief for all!
The house was in a state when we arrived. A bamboo dining chair was in the driveway. Fronds marring the way, gone yellow at the tips. A figure ran across an upstairs patio. A female voice yelled from the far side of the house. I felt that something I had lost had finally been restored. To have Jack see the state I’d caused. You see! I thought. I’m missed!
I worried with the hullabaloo that our approach might not be heard, but Mumma came running out in one of her sack dresses from Africa, the ones she dons when she doesn’t know what she wants to dress in yet. She had an aviator hat on but her face wasn’t made up. It had been ages since I’d seen her lips so pale.
“Oh heavens!” she cried, running toward us, which made the horses start. “You heard! How wonderful! You’ll help!”
“Good morning to you, too, madam,” Jack said, shortening his reins.
“The two of you, how charming! Lara, don’t you look fetching on that horse! Have I made them nervous? Oh God, I’m so relieved!” She fell upon me, one hand on the horse’s neck, her cheek against my leg. I resisted the urge to run my hand along her little hat.
“Eduardito!” she hollered, raising her head with effort. “Eduardo! We’ll get your horse some water, then we can head back out? Finally, relief! Here, here, let me hold your horse, Jack. Or try! Eduardo will come out any moment; you’ll have something to eat. Let’s see if I can handle the both of them—Lara, yours is a little—ah, there you go, how marvelous! You do still ride so well! And the pink in your cheeks! Isn’t she just lovely! If only there were time to enjoy such a thing! Jack, darling, do you still have a way with tracks? Our thinking is behind us here at the start of that horrid forest. What sort of thing should I wear to look for him? I imagine all manner of thorns.”
“Leonora,” Jack said, looking down at her, “could you make even the slightest effort to make sense? I prefer my discourses middling at this early hour.”
“But Baldomero’s gone!” she cried. “Taken with the storm! He could be any of the places! There’s no way to know! It’s just horrid. It’s just horrible. What if he’s really gone!”
“Leonora—”
“He went out for his monkey! On his monkey search! He brought Caspar, certainly. This was before lunch yesterday. And you do know that Baldomero never misses lunch! Oh God! It’s been nearly a day!” She pressed her head against my calf and my heart recoiled. I should have stayed on that wet beach. Let the vultures come.
“Leonora, for God’s sake, I’ve brought your daughter back!”
“And it was so kind of her to fetch you! You’re the only one who knows—”
“Mother!” I shouted. And then I undid all the good that Jack might have tried to think of me. I dismounted. Badly. And ran into the house.
Stupid words:
useless
maybe
Stephan
ARTIST
the jungle should take ME!
This is what the sculpture looked like that I saw jumping wood.
Tonight while I lay in bed waiting for the voices I considered that it could be a porpoise as much as it could be: bird.
Domingo—NOCHE!
Tell me if there is anything worse, anything more horrible, than a total inability to plot things. All of these incompetencies show that I can’t ride off on my own. I don’t speak Spanish, I don’t know where t
o go. And anywhere I could go, I’d need mother to pay. I don’t have the first idea of how you find a means of transportation in this horrid country, and father and Stephan are leagues across the ocean, and war is coming for them, and there is absolutely not a place, not a single place where it would be safe for me to go!
It is horrible to be a young girl and to know little more than what? How to paint a picture?! And it’s not even worth drowning myself because mother wouldn’t even note it! I hate everything about this! I hate this stupid world!
And nowhere even to cry in! I fled to my room and moved the mattress in front of the door, that stupid, stupid curtain blowing back and forth and getting caught on my round mattress. I can’t even have a door! The sun deck’s all I have for privacy, the little jot that I don’t know what to do with because it’s burning hot. If I could speak the language here, I could call for a boat. But what kind of boat? To where? And I can’t travel alone, not really. What a curse to be a girl!
So I went out on the balcony sniveling and burning, the sun impossible for eyes. If I jumped onto the ground below, would anyone note that? Really, the ocean’s the only way because at least I know I’d drown, having never been taught a single useful thing in this whole world!
For a while after, I could hear everyone calling out below. Not for me: just out. Mother and Jack fighting, or him fighting with someone else. You know, I can’t trust him either. I will let you know I want to. But I am not a child, even if he would like to make mother think I am. There have been people before, before him. Who thought of me, but better. C. for example, who breaks my mother’s heart with her hard talent and her body. I think sometimes she tried, or at least I thought I felt her trying, but in the end, it’s always shock and nakedness and angry, closed, shut doors. No one in this world cares about anyone but themselves, especially not these artists, the most famous, the most stupid, the worst in all the world.
And I know Elisabeth isn’t living a misery like mine, wherever she is. I should be an orphan; at least I’d be in school! At least people would make sure that I was in bed at night, at the least, that! Instead of this, which is never-ending nothingness, nowhere for me to be. If I had a door I would throw myself upon my bed and weep and keep it locked for decades. Birds could come and drop me bits of fish from the blue sea. I’d ride away on a great bird. Or I’d be a cliff diver like the ones we saw the last time we were out here—what a thing to be. I’m always alone and I’m never alone, and there is nothing I can do!
I hope that ship sinks, I hope it burns, that’s the only thing there is. If it were here now I’d set fire to it, I’d throw the paintings in the sea. I’d sink her awful collection, and then what would she do? There’d be nothing left to fawn over and boast about and move around the world for and maybe she would be emptied enough to finally mother me.
Popocatépetl and the Sleeping Woman
In another legend that Magda used to tell me, a great warrior fell in love with a beautiful young girl. Popocatépetl was the warrior and Iztaccíhuatl, the princess. They lived in the valley of the pueblo and the air was full of flowers.
But one day, their neighbors to the south decided to wage some war on them. Popocat had to go, because he was a warrior, and Izta understood this. They agreed to marry upon his return.
But there was another warrior in their village who was jealous of their love. When the southern battle was in fact going quite well for the brave warriors, the jealous one sent back a false message to Izta that her Popocat had died.
Despite her father’s love for her and the villagers’ concern, Izta stopped eating and drinking and died of a sad heart.
When Popocat returned victorious to his village and heard of his love’s loss, he asked the villagers to help him build a funeral table for Izta high up in the hills. He laid down Iztaccíhuatl and covered her with a cloak, and then Popocatépetl sat beside her with a great and smoking torch, determined to watch over her in her forever sleep.
Years passed. Then centuries. Popocat watched over Izta so long that he died himself, and the snow covered them, and the hillsides grew and grew until each of their sorrowful bodies turned into its own mountain: Izta’s flat and sleeping, Popocat’s rounded and watching over her.
Magda had seen these mountains, and said that every once in a great while, Popocat’s mountain starts to burn and smoke with rage. It trembles and it sputters and it makes the entire valley shake, and that is how you know that Popocat is still furious with grief.
From the preface to “Mexican Plants for American Gardens,” 1935
To satisfy this demand for new and interesting plant material, renowned plantsmen have explored the far reaches of the earth. But, strange to say, in all the searchings for new and rare material, plant hunters have barely touched the floral treasures of the vast North American continent. It is only within recent years that gardeners have become aware of the really worthwhile plants.
What day? ¿Qué dia?
Nothing to say and what am I to paint. I thought that he would come for me and of course he hasn’t.
Come for me for what?
I had hopes for Stephan and once I had Elisabeth and now I don’t know what to want.
Watching over someone after they’re already dead is more than loyal, it’s romantic. If they’re dead, that is true love. The only other romantic thing is something Hetty told me on one of the nights when she felt powerful. Or spiteful, is the word. That after the Vienna business, when Mum first came to Costalegre, they all came down for breakfast at the pink casita and there was a horse inside the house. That the horse had on a bright blanket with pink and green run through it and flowers in its mane, and a man in white holding on to it so it wouldn’t run. Konrad had bought a horse for C. so that she could ride.
What happened to it? What happened to the horse?
“I don’t know,” said Hetty, lolling. “I think that it was sold.”
Dear Stephan,
Papa will be pleased to know that Baldomero’s three days gone. At first, it was suggested as an act of cunning. That perhaps he had gone missing to drive his prices up, but no one is going to buy paintings if there’s a war, so that makes little sense.
Mother rounded everybody up, even the grooms from the main stable. We all spread out at different distances, although I walked with Hetty because (I didn’t write you about this!), I had recently been somewhat lost myself, and everyone was frantic, of course, to keep me from going missing yet again. So we all walked straight as possible, the idea being that one of us, eventually, would find them. (Caspar had gone out with Baldomero on the day they disappeared, Baldo terribly eager to find a monkey pet. In point of fact, I’ve learned from Hetty that kinkajous aren’t even monkeys, they’re actually small bears, but I don’t suppose it makes a difference because neither of them was found.)
The general suspicion is that Baldomero disappeared himself, subscribed to by most here except for Walter and mother and Hetty, who are convinced that he’s been kidnapped, and that they’ll soon come for the rest of us as well. Walter thinks it’s the Germans, but you know he hasn’t been well. I do think mother’s right in saying that the Germans are deeply occupied with other matters at this instant, and no one knows exactly where we are. I mean, you do. But there is a difference between knowing and trying to get here!
I don’t know what I think. To be honest, I think Baldomero was quite fond of Costalegre, and he certainly doesn’t know how to do anything by himself. I do think that it’s possible that Caspar did something terrible. No one is really well. It’s the not knowing, and the heat here, and the light is always the same. There is something chilling about there being too much sun.
Maybe he sold Baldomero to someone? It would serve Baldomero right, he’s been awful to everyone that works here and everyone in the house. Or maybe they did find that little bear, except it wasn’t little. I’ve only seen a few of them but there are, apparently, all manner of creatures in the jungle, including those sorceresses with backwar
d-facing feet—do you remember when Magda told us those dark tales? You cried once, listening to her, although I bet you won’t remember it that way.
In any case, there is an elevated air of care and of concern. And for once, people are working less and being kind. Would you believe, for example, that I planted something with our Mumma? Seeds for lemon trees, in fact. And it was Mum who came up with the idea; I don’t know if you can plant a lemon tree using only lemon seeds, but that is what we did, and not even by the poolside. In a more private place, so they would be our private trees. It was really her idea.
I’ve been painting a lot, also, using odder colors because we’re low on paint. Ferdinand has found a berry that you can crush into a colored dust. It’s hard to work with, but we have the time. I will probably go out and pick more with him, and we’ll identify some others. There are colors from the seeds and things that you can’t get with any of the paints the artists have, so really, it’s quite special. I think it would be nice to bring them into my drawings: that is, most of the picture would be paper and charcoal, and then you’d have this splash of something, berry paint.
In any case, the house has been easier with Baldomero gone. Maria, the cook here, is absolutely joyful. I think he was the worst with her. All through the day, she’s singing songs again. Really, it’s quite joyful, and if you get this (I’m going to try to get mother to ask Jose Luis about it properly, this time), you should consider this not as an invitation, but as us imploring: I think that you should come! Surely by this time of year you could use the change of climate? And we haven’t had news about it, but who knows what’s happening with the war by now. I’m sure it’s much gayer and lighter here than Europe. Still no news of Mumma’s boat!
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